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CULTIVATING COMMON GROUND: Water Use Efficiency Grants

Water Use Efficiency Grants: Beneficial or Double Jeopardy for California Farming? Or both?

By Patrick Cavanaugh, Farm News Director

Through a competitive joint pilot grant program, the Agricultural Water Use Efficiency and State Water Efficiency and Enhancement Program, the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) and the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) jointly intend to demonstrate the potential multiple benefits of conveyance enhancements combined with on-farm agricultural water use efficiency improvements and greenhouse gas reductions.

The grant funding provided in this joint program is intended to address multiple goals including:

Water use efficiency, conservation and reduction
Greenhouse Gas Emissions Reduction
Groundwater Protection, and
Sustainability of agricultural operations and food production

Agricultural Water Use Efficiency & State Water Efficiency and Enhancement Program – DWR/CDFA Joint RFP Public Workshops

Are these competitive grants promoted by DWR and CDFA providing financial support for further compliance or insulting to farmers who have already met and exceeded these stockpiling regulations? Or both?

I would like to address each goal, one by one.

Water Use Efficiency

I challenge DWR and CDFA to find one California farmer who is using water inefficiently or without regard to conservation. Grant or no grant, many farmers in the state have lost most of their contracted surface water deliveries due to the Endangered Species Act, which serves to save endangered species, an important goal we all share, but does so at any cost.

In addition, DWR is now threatening to take 40 percent of the surface water from the Tuolumne River and other tributaries of the San Joaquin River from February 1 to June 30, every year, to increase flows to the Delta to help save the declining smelt and salmon. This will severely curtail water deliveries to the Modesto Irrigation District (MID) and Turlock Irrigation District (TID)—population centers as well as critical farm areas.

This proposal, which disregards legal landowner water rights and human need, would force MID and TID to dedicate 40 percent of surface water flows during the defined time period every year, with no regulatory sunset, for beneficial fish and wildlife uses and salinity control. The proposal disregards other scientifically acknowledged stressors such as predatory nonnative non-native striped bass and largemouth bass, partially treated sewage from Delta cities, and, according to the Bay Delta Fish & Wildlife Office of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service Pacific Southwest Region, invasive organisms, exotic species of zooplankton and a voracious plankton-eating clam in the Delta from foreign ships that historically dumped their ballast in San Francisco waters.

While many farmers have fallowed their farmland, other farmers across the state have resorted to reliance on groundwater to keep their permanent crops (trees and vines) alive. The new DWR proposal to divert 40 percent of MID and TID surface water will force hundreds of growers in this region—the only groundwater basin in the Valley that is not yet critically overdrafted—to use more groundwater.

In a joint statement, MID and TID said, “Our community has never faced a threat of this proportion. MID and TID have continued to fight for the water resource that was entrusted to us 129 years ago.”

The deadline for submitting public comments is September 30, 2016.

Greenhouse Gas Reduction

Have regulators forgotten Assembly Bill (AB) 32, the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, that requires the state to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 25 percent (back to 1990 levels) by 2050? Ag is already accommodating this regulation.

U.S. Greenhouse Gas Emissions (Source: EPA)

Now Governor Brown has signed SB-1383, “Short-lived climate pollutants: methane emissions: dairy and livestock: organic waste: landfills” into law that mandates a 25 percent reduction in methane emissions from cow burps, flatulence and manure from all dairy cows and other cattle to achieve the 1990 statewide greenhouse gas emissions level by 2020.

Now CDFA and DWR are asking for grant requests to reduce greenhouse emissions even further. Really?

The deadline for submitting public comments is September 30, 2016.

Groundwater Protection

Ironically, farmers want to reduce their groundwater needs because groundwater has always functioned in the state as a water savings bank for emergency use during droughts and not as a primary source of irrigation. But massive non-drought related federal and state surface water cutbacks have forced farmers to use more groundwater.

Golden State farmers are doing everything possible not to further elevate nitrates in their groundwater. Some nitrate findings left by farmers from generations ago are difficult to clean up.

But the DWR and CFA grant wants California agriculture to do more!

The deadline for submitting public comments is September 30, 2016.

Sustainability of Agricultural Operations and Food Production

Virtually, no one is more sustainable than a multi-generational farmer. Each year, family farmers improve their land in order to produce robust crops, maintain their livelihoods, enrich the soil for the long term, and fortify the health and safety of their agricultural legacy for future generations.

California farmers will continue to do all they can to improve irrigation methods and track their crop protection product use.

And so, I ask again, is this beneficial or double jeopardy for California farming? Or both?

The deadline for submitting public comments is September 30, 2016.

California Ag Today2021-05-12T11:17:12-07:00September 26th, 2016|

Eighteen New California Farm Academy Graduates!

Eighteen New Farmers Graduate from California Farm Academy

By Patrick Cavanaugh, Farm News Director

The California Farm Academy, a part-time, seven-month, beginning farmer training program run by the Land-Based Learning, graduated 18 new farmers on Sunday, September 18, 2016.

With more than 250 hours of classroom and field training behind them, these enterprising graduates were honored by notables such as Karen Ross, secretary, California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA); Craig McNamara, president and owner of Sierra Orchards, as well as president of the California State Board of Food and Agriculture; Sri Sethuratnam, director, California Farm Academy (CFA); and Mary Kimball, executive director, Center for Land-Based Learning, based in Winters California.

new farmers graduate from California Farm Academy beginning farmer training program run by the Land-Based Learning.

Eighteen new farmers graduated from California Farm Academy’s beginning farmer training program run by the Center for Land-Based Learning.

“The impetus of our program,” said Christine McMorrow, director of development for Land-Based Learning, “is the need for more farmers as the current ones age out. According to the USDA, over 700,000 new farmers will be needed in the next 20 years to replace those who retire.

CFA teachers, farmers, academic faculty and staff, and agricultural, natural resource and business professionals, teach CFA students basic production agricultural practices; crop planning; soil science; pest management; organic agriculture; irrigation and water management; marketing; ecology and conservation; obtaining loans, insurance and permits; farm financials; human resource management; risk management; farm safety; regulatory compliance and problem-solving.

McMorrow stated, “These folks have been with us since February, following a rigorous application process. A lot of these folks either have land they have dreamed of farming but did not know how to put it into production. Some of them come from farming families, but they wanted to get involved in the family business on their own. They may have been in a different career and now want to do something new or different. Perhaps they haven’t studied agriculture or they have not seen much agriculture other than what their family does, so this is an opportunity for them to learn and to explore a new business idea.

“We only take people who are serious about production agriculture. This is not a program for somebody who thinks, ‘I’ve got an acre in my backyard and I really want to grow something.’ While that’s a cool thing to do, the academy is not for those people.”

“Our graduating farmers, who range in age from their late 20s to early 50s, each wrote a business plan and presented it to folks within the agriculture industry,” said McMorrow. “They also planted some of their own crops on a farm in Winters.

McMorrow elaborated, “These new farmers have been able to create their own networks, having made contact with more than 40 different folks within the agricultural industry throughout the time they spent with us. These networks include local farmers around Yolo County, Solano County, Sacramento County, and other regions, and will help our graduates realize their dreams.”

“This is the fifth class that has graduated,” explained McMorrow, “and mind you, these folks are doing lots of different things. Some of them already have their own land, some are going to work for someone who has land, some will work other farmers, and some will go into a food-related business.”

“Still others will stay and lease small plots of land from us,” McMorrow commented, “to start their own farming business. Beginning farmers face huge barriers to getting started, the biggest of which is access to land, capital and infrastructure. So, to get their farming businesses started, California Farm Academy alumni are eligible to lease land at sites in West Sacramento, Davis and Winters at a very low cost.”

The Center for Land-Based Learning exists to cultivate opportunity.

For the land.

For youth.

For the environment.

For business.

For the economy.

For the future of agriculture.

California Ag Today2021-05-12T11:00:49-07:00September 19th, 2016|

Spider Mites Gave Almond Industry Reprieve in 2016

Spider Mites Showed up Late This Season

By Lauren Dutra, Associate Editor

This year, near-perennial spider mite pressure on almonds was delayed until hull-split. “That’s the big story this year,” said David Haviland, UC Cooperative Extension entomology farm advisor, Kern County. “The orchards of people who did early management programs well their fields looked great until hull-split. And the orchards of people who did not do anything well their fields looked great at hull-split as well—when the mites showed up,” he said.

Almond hull-split

“And a good population of them arrived,” Haviland continued. “People sprayed, but now we’re at the beginning of September, and everyone I have talked to in the Southern San Joaquin Valley have reported the arrival of the sixspotted thrip, a beneficial spider mite predator. The thrips came in fierce, cleaning out anything that didn’t get controlled prior to Nonpareil harvest,” said Haviland.

“We are on the tail end of the season in Kern County, and mites ought to be going away in a couple of weeks,” he said.

Haviland also explained the appearance of navel orangeworm this year is about average. “As far as navel orangeworm goes, things are looking good. They are certainly out there. They’re certainly in some nuts, but trap captures have been about normal, so—nothing really alarming in terms of numbers,” Haviland noted. “I haven’t heard of anybody really getting hit hard this year, other than some orchard edges here and there.”

“Growers seem to be happy. We are about halfway through the harvest, hoping the second half of almond-shaking goes just as well as the first,” said Haviland.

California Ag Today2021-05-12T11:02:58-07:00September 9th, 2016|

UC Davis Researchers Point to Government as Culprit for Fallow Land

Government Policies—not Drought—Blamed for Fallow Land

By Patrick Cavanaugh

“Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed”¹ water deliveries.

Not even drought can be blamed for land fallowing due to lack of water deliveries to Central Valley federal water users.

Jason Peltier, manager of the Federal water district, San Luis and Delta-Mendota Water Authority, said, a UC Davis study released this week, “Economic Analysis of the 2016 Drought For California Agriculture,” has confirmed that failed government water policies—not a lack of rainfall and snow pack—are responsible for the widespread water shortages and the fallowing of more than 300,000 acres of land in the federal water districts on the Westside of Fresno and Kings Counties.

“It raises this question,” Peltier asked, “When do we get honest and start talking about the regulatory drought—the man-made drought, the policy-induced drought, the policy-directed drought? We can’t even have an honest conversation about that.”

“That our opponents want to deflect and obscure that whole conversation is telling,” he continued, “because we have a tremendous story of adverse economic impact as a result of failed policies. When they tried to protect the fish, they took our water away and they made the supply unreliable. ‘Just a huge failure and they don’t want to address it; they don’t want to deal with it. The same agencies are fixated with their false confidence or their false certainty, their false precision, in terms of how to help the fish.”

Peltier explained the regulators failed to deliver all of the 5% allocation [née water delivery reduced by 95%] to growers in the federal water districts south of the Delta. “It’s nonsense,” he reiterated, that part of the insufficient 5% was never delivered this season. “It’s avoidance of the reality that the regulators have constricted the heck out of the water projects and made it so—even in wet years, and like this year, a normal to wet year—we’ve got huge amounts of land out of production,” Peltier said, adding that almond growers in the federal water districts are not getting a late, post-harvest irrigation, which can hurt next year’s production.

¹Inscription on the James Farley Post Office in New York City

California Ag Today2021-05-12T11:05:49-07:00August 19th, 2016|

UC Davis Foundation Plant Services Serves the Ag Industry

UC Davis Foundation Plant Services, Critical Service to the Ag Industry

By Brian German, Associate Editor

UC Davis is home to Foundation Plant Services (FPS), a plant repository the world relies on for plant importation and quarantine, disease testing, virus elimination, and DNA identification services for a variety of plants and rootstocks. FPS also coordinates the release of UC-patented horticultural varieties and provides an essential link between researchers, nurseries and producers.

“Established at UC Davis in 1958, FPS has grown from a small kind-of-mom-and-pop scientific effort sourcing out cherry and grapevine cuttings that have been screened for virus to nurseries so that they could make better plants for growers,” said Deborah Golino, director of FPS since 1994. “FPS has grown to the point where it is a self-supporting center. We owe a lot to the growers and nursery industry that have supported us over these years,” she said.

Today FPS employs about 35 people on “soft money,” including scientists in the lab and people in the green houses, as well as propagators, and field workers. About 250 acres of various plantings—largely grapes of course—plus programs with strawberries and sweet potatoes that are mostly run in green houses,” noted Golino.

“All other programs circle around getting correctly identified, valuable commercial plant materials (cultivars). Many times, great people save varieties, and screening them for virus and making sure that commercial nurseries have that virus screened materials, so they can make plants for farmers that have the added productivity and sustainability that comes with clean material,” explained Golino.

FPS advances clean material in the lab by cutting out a meristem shoot tip and grow a plant from that. “Let’s say we have a valuable Chardonnay that came in from France. It’s a new clone and it has a couple of viruses in it. In a process that takes about a year, we take a micro-shoot tip culture and regenerate a plant,” Golino said. “For reasons that aren’t really fully understood, regenerating that plant from the tiny .5 millimeter piece gets rid of viruses. That’s our therapy, but what we give to most nurseries and growers who buy material from us is that little plant grown up in the field, and we might have hundreds or even thousand of cuttings of some root stocks.”

“The most common route for advancing a clean plant cultivar is by nurseries coming in to buy several hundred cuttings,” Golino explained, “and plant them in a field. Those plantings grow big mother plants from which they harvest more cuttings to be grown and eventually sold to growers. It’s a multi-year generational process.”

“We have over 900 cultivars of grapes and over 5,000 accessions because we have multiple clones of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir,” Golino said. “All of that material is improved by the technology we have used, technology that has been developed by other UC researchers to conduct DNA identification to ensure accuracy, which is part of the FPS mission.”

“That material is held as a trust to improve our agricultural offerings to growers of fruit trees and other crops,” Golino said. “Even though much of the material is not produced by UC growers and might even be produced by a Cornell or a Michigan breeder, it is still important to our agriculture here in California and across the country since the 2008 Farm Bill was passed. I think we owe Congressman Sam Farr (CA -20) a tribute for that. Since then, there has been money for the National Clean Plant Network with USDA’s Animal and Plant Inspection Service (APHIS) and they have funded about 20 clean plant centers around the country.”

“FPS certainly provides the highest level of screening in the world,” Golino stated, “and I think we might be the biggest too. In this modern world where margins are so thin, the universities are so tight for money for research and especially for teaching, and they have so many challenges taking care of those things, the experiment station does not have much money for service work, like the work that is done at FPS.”

“FPS conducts its work for industry, and that isn’t really directly relative to the university’s mission which has to be strictly accommodated. That is why California grape and fruit tree nurseries have assessed themselves to fund our programs since the mid 1980s,” said Golino. “And then we have the clean plant money on top of that, and our grape nurseries actually pay user fees on the plant material they make from our material. That keeps the doors open and keeps us doing world class work,” Golino said.

California Ag Today2021-05-12T11:05:49-07:00August 18th, 2016|

CULTIVATING COMMON GROUND: Almond Growers on Assessment Increase

Almond Growers Want Justification and Vote on Almond Board’s Assessment Increase

Editor’s note: We thank John Harris for his contribution to California Ag Today’s CULTIVATING COMMON GROUND. The Almond Board’s Response can be read at Almond Board’s Response on Assessment Increase.

By John Harris, owner, Harris Ranch

Marketing orders give agriculture a great tool to collect fees from producers to promote products and/or conduct research projects. The concept is great, and increasing demand is always good. To be successful, the plan needs to be affordable and explained so it is understood and backed by a big majority of the producers. I am concerned the Almond Board’s recent assessment increase from 3 to 4 cents a pound—in the absence of an almond producer vote—is unwise.

At the current rate of 3 cents per pound, money raised will increase as production increases, which seem fairly certain. Plus, the fund receives significant help from a government program to encourage exports. A year or so ago, almond growers were doing really well, when many sales were exceeded $4 a pound. But last fall prices dropped significantly, in some cases to the $2 range. This loss in revenue made it tougher for almond growers to break even. A grower producing 2,500 pounds per acre is now paying $75 per acre in assessments; under the new plan it would increase to $100 per acre.

To get feedback from growers, the USDA published a request for comments. The comment period opened on July 18 and closed on August 2. But the industry was not notified until July 27. I commented at the time that I was not in favor of the assessment without full knowledge of the purpose of the extra money. I am certain many growers have an opinion on this, but only five comments were submitted. I think most growers did not realize both the assessment increase was under discussion and a producer vote would not be forthcoming.

The time frame for comments was alarmingly short; however, the USDA has decided to reopen the comment period for 10 days. The reopening of the comment period is expected to be announced within the next two weeks and will be communicated immediately to the industry once it is published in the Federal Register.

I urge all producers to take a good look at the proposal and voice your opinions.

This link will take you to the almond assessment comment page: https://www.regulations.gov/docket?D=AMS-SC-16-0045.

There should be more of a democratic process. I think this proposed assessment increase needs to go to a vote among the growers affected by it and should require strong approval by at least 51 percent of the growers representing 60 percent of the production. We don’t want to micromanage the Board’s process, but large changes like this assessment increase should demand some form of referendum.

I also think everyone would like to know how the millions of extra dollars collected would be used.

And, of course I think the industry deserves more awareness of this proposed increase in assessment. I do not hear people talking about it; many growers may not even learn about the extra assessment until they get their check from their handler next year. I think all almond growers need to know this is happening now and not be surprised next year.

If I asked my boss for a 33% raise, I believe the onus would be on me to sell the idea and win support, rather than just push it through providing little information to the guy who would be paying me.

If the Almond Board is increasing their budget by 33%, shouldn’t the burden be placed on the Board to win the support of growers? I would think they would communicate a clear plan on how to spend the enormous increase—a strong and strategic plan—they would be eager and proud to share with growers and handlers.

To increase any tax/assessment, the logical thought process should be, “No, unless proven to be needed, supported, and affordable,” instead of defaulting to, “Increase the tax unless we get stopped.”

The Almond Board’s Response can be read at Almond Board’s Response on Assessment Increase.

Harris Ranch and Allied Companies

The Harris Family’s commitment to agriculture spans over 100 years, four generations, and four states, from Mississippi, to Texas, to Arizona, and eventually into California.

J. A. Harris and his wife, Kate, arrived in California’s Imperial Valley in 1916 to start one of California’s first cotton gins and cotton seed oil mills. They later moved to the San Joaquin Valley and began farming there.

In 1937, their only son, Jack, and his wife Teresa, began what is now known as Harris Ranch, starting with a previously unfarmed 320 acres of desert land on the Valley’s Western edge. With vision and determination, Harris Ranch has grown into the most integrated, diversified, and one of the largest agribusinesses in the United States.

Beginning with cotton and grain, Harris Ranch now produces over thirty-three crops annually, including lettuce, tomatoes, garlic, onions, melons, oranges, lemons, almonds, pistachios, walnuts and winegrapes, all backed by their commitment to superior quality and satisfaction. Harris Farms thoroughbreds are raised and trained to compete internationally. Harris Feeding Company, California’s largest cattle raising operation, and Harris Ranch Beef Company produce and market a premium line of packaged and fully-cooked beef products, including Harris Ranch Restaurant Reserve™ beef. All Harris products are served and sold at the internationally acclaimed Harris Ranch Restaurant and Inn.

The opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by the various participants on CaliforniaAgToday.com do not necessarily reflect the opinions, beliefs, viewpoints or official policies of the California Ag Today, Inc.

California Ag Today2016-08-10T16:46:47-07:00August 10th, 2016|

Breaking News: Cal Poly Opens New Greenhouse and Insect Rearing Facility

New Greenhouse Facility Opens to Save Citrus from Psyllids that Vector HLB

Facility to Rear Tamarixia Radiata, Natural ACP Predator

By Patrick Cavanaugh, Farm News Director

Scores of citrus industry leaders, citrus growers, scientists and CDFA officials attended the ribbon cutting event TODAY at the opening of a new greenhouse on the Cal Poly Pomona campus to rear Tamarixia radiata, a tiny parasitic wasp imported from Pakistan because it is an Asian Citrus Psyllid (ACP) nymph predator. ACP, in turn, is a serious nonnative citrus pest that can vector Huanglongbing (HLB)—a deadly citrus disease also known as Citrus Greening—that has devastated the powerhouse citrus

industry in Florida, threatens to ruin additional citrus economies, and is the biggest threat the California citrus industry has ever faced.

According to the United States Department of Agriculture Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (USDA-APHIS), infected citrus trees “produce fruits that are green, misshapen and bitter, unsuitable for sale as fresh fruit or for juice. Most infected trees die within a few years.” ACPs have been detected in Alabama, American Samoa, Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Guam, Hawaii, Louisiana, Mississippi, Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, South Carolina, Texas and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Of those locations, the HLB disease has been detected in California, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Puerto Rico, South Carolina, Texas and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

ENTER: Tamarixia radiata

Use of the ACP predator, Tamarixia radiata as a biological control for ACP was discovered by Mark Hoddle, biological control specialist and principal investigator, UC Riverside ( UCR), Department of Entomology. The first release of Tamarixia was in December 2011 after USDA-APHIS cleared the natural enemy for release from the Quarantine Facility at UCR.

Mark Hoddle UC Riverside Department of Entomology

“Tamarixia can kill ACP nymphs in two different ways,” explained Nick Hill, a Tulare County citrus producer and Citrus Pest & Disease Prevention Program (CPDPC) chair. “The first is parasitism. In this instance, a female parasitoid lays an egg underneath a fourth or fifth instar—the larger and final developmental stage of the ACP nymph before becoming an adult—nymphs that are most preferred by Tamarixia for parasitism. When the egg hatches, the Tamarixia larva begins to feed on the under-surface of the ACP nymph. Eventually the larva completely excavates the body cavity of the ACP nymph and pupates inside the empty shell of its host.”

Hill explained the first releases of the tiny and harmless wasp will occur this fall in urban areas, “to help control ACP so that we do not have to do mitigations such as spraying in those areas. We hope to get to a point where we no longer need to go into people’s yards and ask if we can treat the trees.”

“The issue,” commented Valerie Melano, professor and chair, Cal Poly Pomona Plant Sciences and interim chair, Cal Poly Agribusiness & Food Industry Management/Agricultural Science, “is that we need to come up with the best possible ways to raise enough wasps for big releases to prey on ACP. We will have CDFA employees working in this green house, as well as student workers who have participated in our research program all along,” noted Melano.

Nick Hill, a Tulare County citrus producer and Citrus Pest & Disease Prevention Program (CPDPC) chair.

Hill added, “The idea is to get enough Tamarixia out there so they start reproducing themselves and they become self sufficient. This is tough to accomplish, but researchers think if they can get big numbers of the wasp into the urban areas, they can put a big dent in lowering the populations of ACP.”

Cal Poly Pomona Greenhouse

The new Cal Poly 5,040-square-foot research greenhouse, built in collaboration with Citrus Research Board and constructed through a $400,000 grant from the Citrus Pest & Disease Prevention Program, will house the second Tamarixia production program in California. CDFA’s Mount Roubideaux facility in Riverside houses current production. Both facilities will support the CPDPC biological control program that oversees releases in urban areas with high ACP populations.

The new greenhouse should produce a 1-1.5 million wasps. “It’s a very nice facility,” said Hill. “We are trying to boost the biological control program to produce four million Tamarixia a year.”

California Quarantine

The California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) operates an extensive monitoring program to track the distribution of the insect and disease in both residential areas and commercial citrus groves. Results have determined quarantine zones, guided releases of biological control agents, and prioritized areas for a residential chemical control program. Nearly all of southern California is under quarantine for ACP, due to the fact that more than 15 residential trees have been discovered to be in infected with HLB.

The ACP quarantine in California includes parts of the following counties: Fresno, Kern, Kings, Madera, Monterey, San Benito, San Joaquin, San Luis Obispo, San Mateo, Santa Clara, and Stanislaus; and the following entire counties: Imperial, Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Diego, Santa Barbara, Tulare County, and Ventura.

Asian Citrus Psyllid Cooperative Program
California, Arizona, Baja California, and Sonora (USDA-APHIS). Visit our Citrus Diseases page to identify a plant infected by citrus greening, citrus canker, citrus black spot and sweet orange scab. If you detect an infected plant, report it immediately.

California Ag Today2021-05-12T11:05:51-07:00July 25th, 2016|

Solving Central Valley Water Salinity

Mizuno on Water Salinity Solutions

By Laurie Greene, Editor

According to a Central Valley Salinity Alternatives for Long Term Sustainability (CV-SALTS) report, rising salt levels in the soil and groundwater threaten the potable water supply and agricultural productivity for the entire region. Walter Mizuno, longtime lecturer in mechanical engineering at Fresno State and director, Valley Industry Partnership for Cooperative Education (VIP) Program, researches increasing salinity conditions in Central Valley soil and groundwater, as well as methods of desalination.

Mizuno explained, “As the salt level rises, and if the soil salts aren’t leached out periodically, the ground becomes unsuitable for cultivating several crops. Growers either shift to high salt-tolerant crops or essentially idle that land.”

Central Valley salinity conditions are serious, according to Mizuno. “Growers have already taken a lot of land out of production on the Westside,” he said, “and they’ll continue to do that until the salt mitigation measures have been implemented. Essentially, we need to get back to where we can currently sustain the amount of farming we have with the type of water that we have.”

“We are looking at desalination of agricultural drainage water,” Mizuno stated. “We’re trying to reclaim water that’s suitable for even human consumption; but right now, we’re looking at reclaiming water that is suitable for Ag use through a desalination process called vapor compression distillation, which takes drainage water from the Ag fields, distills it to make it pure and recovers some of the salts on the backside.”

Mizuno explained salt recovery would enhance the economic viability of this project by eliminating the cost of trucking or disposing the resulting brine and by possibly converting it into a revenue stream. “We’re trying concentrate that brine to a point, using solar evaporation, where we can find other uses for the highly concentrated form or maybe even sell it to a chemical processing company. We are also focusing on minimizing the energy cost to distill the water, to make the process more efficient.”

“We’re trying to combine multiple technologies, using ion exchange as our front end process,” Mizuno explained, “to get rid of some of the hardness in the water. We get rid of calcium and magnesium in the water, which helps the distillation process and protects the equipment for a longer period of time before requiring cleaning or eventual replacement. We’re using the brine stream of the distillation process to actually regenerate, upfront, the ion exchange units—similar to a home water softener.”

Mizuno explained, “When you look at the reasons why desal isn’t used more often—just the cost of energy makes the cost of the water expensive. So, we do a lot of energy recovery. Just take the basic process of distillation in which you heat up the water solution, boil it off, and condense the residue. A lot of that water you use, or a lot of the energy used to boil off the water, is lost; so we recover the heat from that steam to save energy. In other words, we don’t discard that energy; we try to reuse it.”

“We have been conducting studies on some Westside ranches,” he continued, “with our pilot plant that processes only one thousand gallons per hour. A series of ditches on those ranches collect the drainage water to be purified. Now, we have moved everything back to the Fresno State Center for Irrigation Technology (CIT),” said Mizuno, “because we’re building a brand new redesigned unit, which should be operating by the end of this year.

“The second phase of the project,” Mizuno commented, “is to move the unit out to Panoche, and conduct field testing out there. We will evaluate the energy efficacy and also the economics of the unit and process, and we will field-test to determine how rugged and dependable it is out in the actual service area.”

“This is actually a research project,” Mizuno clarified. “We’re still fairly far away from commercializing it. Basically, we will evaluate the scalability of these units so that depending on the size of the farm and everything else, you can either put multiple units out there or design a single-unit system very similar to ours. You could size the system to meet whatever the demands are, but you need a reservoir or holding area, and you’d like to be able to operate 24/7.”

“We are considering using solar to power this,” Mizuno mentioned. “The issue with solar is, obviously, it tends to work during the daylight hours but doesn’t do much during the evening hours. We’re looking at using batteries, electricity, natural gas or some other energy source to keep the process running when the sun goes down, but it’s a matter of economics.”

Mizuno said the research team is optimistic about the process itself, but he does not anticipate it will be a cure-all. “It is a research project,” Mizuno reiterated, “and we’re trying to see if we can drop the energy cost, and lower the water cost. I think the economics will change though. Water will cost more for everybody in the next few years. As that changes, I think some of these technologies are going to become feasible from an economic standpoint.”

The entire state shoud be aware of these water issues, according to Mizuno. “I think there are still a lot of issues that the common person isn’t aware of and how they fit in, and Ag is no exception. I would like people to understand that we are working to stretch the available amount of water supplies we have and we are working on technologies that are yet unproven. But some of these technologies will require a few more years—to many years to solve. Others are not economically feasible today, but they may be in the future as water supplies get tighter.”

Mizuno has observed that farmers are already doing a lot to conserve water, particularly employing the use of new technologies such as drones to evaluate water stress and nutrient stress in plants. “Right now,” he offered, “we are looking at another piece of the puzzle; we’re trying to stretch the amount of water supply we have, utilize it in multiple-use scenarios, and use it more intelligently to make some waste streams into revenue streams.”

Mizuno urges the general population to just be aware. “Conservation is the first step for a lot of people,” he said. “That’s the easiest way to stretch water supplies, and so I think people need to understand that water is a finite resource in the state of California. The water situation is not likely to get better anytime soon, even if we have normal rainfall and so forth. We are in an overdraft situation with our water supply.”

CV-SALTS participants collaborate to develop a workable, comprehensive plan to address salinity, including nitrates, throughout the region in a comprehensive, consistent, and sustainable manner.

Center for Irrigation Technology (CIT) celebrates 35 years!

California Ag Today2021-05-12T11:05:52-07:00July 18th, 2016|

Family Tree Farms Enjoys Exceptional Tree Fruit Year

Tree Fruits and Hybrids Are Bountiful and Delicious This Season

By Emily McKay Johnson, Associate Editor

Tree fruits this year for Daniel Jackson, a seventh-generation farmer and partner, Reedley-based Family Tree Farms, are thriving and delicious. “The quality is just exceptional right now,” Jackson said. “I think the industry is taking a little bit of a lull in volume right now for the last two days, but it looks like it’s going to pick up again. The fruit coming off late season is going to be exceptional from an eating quality standpoint,” he indicated.

Family Tree grows various tree fruit hybrids, as well as blueberries and grapes—everything from plumquats (a hybrid between an apricot and a plum) and apriums (a similar hybrid that is more apricot than plum) to fresh white peaches and nectarines, yellow flesh peaches and nectarines, and apricots.

Daniel Jackson, seventh-generation farmer and partner of Family Tree Farms in Reedley, Calif.

Although hot weather can be challenging to growers, trees in the Central
Valley have evolved to adapt to the heat. “Tree fruit genetics here in the Valley are used to that heat,” Jackson elaborated. “Other than a mid-season apricot that may get some tip burn, we’re not seeing too much damage,” he explained. “We may see some sunburn here and there; but for the most part, as long as you have a good leaf ratio on your tree, everything seems to be looking good. We’re happy with the way things are turning out.”

Jackson also reported some minor labor shortages, but their numbers are staying pretty strong. “It was short early on; now we’re pretty stout,” he commented. “I think our crews are up 25 guys, which is a good full crew. We may run into some challenges as we enter the table grape season, but right now things are looking good. We’re staying positive.”

Family Tree Farms has an optimistic attitude about their labor crews. “We just want to be able to provide a consistency of work out there so that people are happy and can stick around with us. I think most farmers are trying to do that same thing,” he said.

Springtime, this year, gave them an early bloom but a cool and mild spring, conditions that can impact the size of produce, come harvest season. “I don’t think we gathered enough heat units to grab the size that we typically have,” Jackson explained, “but I think we’re catching up now. A lot of times, that’s what happens in a season; the size may be a little bit off [early on], but it catches up and becomes more of a normal year,” he said, and other growers have experienced the same problem with their commodities,

“We were probably about a half size to a size off early on in the season, but are seeing sizing come back a little bit and we’re happy about that,” Jackson described. He attributed this impact on fruit size experienced by most California fruit growers, “because we lost a couple of early season growing days that are so important in the early-season varieties.”

The Family Tree crew remains positive; they take pride in the exceptional color of their fruit and picking has stayed consistent. “I think color has been one of the best years we’ve had. Especially with plumcot varieties, we see the ripening happening a little bit more evenly, so are able to pick more consistently as well.”

Jackson handles the fluctuating challenges in farming with stride. “There are a lot of positive things going on,” he commented. “There will always be challenges every year but we don’t let those slow us down. Farmers are more resilient than that.”

California Ag Today2016-07-15T12:32:37-07:00July 15th, 2016|

The Fight Against the Asian Citrus Psyllid

California Citrus Mutual on the Fight Against the Asian Citrus Psyllid and HLB

By Laurie Greene, Editor

On Saturday, June 4, 2016, Patrick Cavanaugh, California Ag Today’s farm news director, hosted iHeart Media’s Ag Life Weekend show on “Power Talk 96.7 FM Fresno and 1400 AM Visalia stations, sitting in for broadcaster Rich Rodriguez. Cavanaugh’s invited guests included Alyssa Houtby, director of public affairs, and Chris Stambach, director of industry relations for the Exeter-based California Citrus Mutual, to discuss the status of the state’s citrus industry amidst the ACP and HLB Infestation.

The Asian Citrus Psyllid (ACP), certainly the number one pest for California citrus, can spread a bacterium known as Huanglongbing (HLB) that is fatal to citrus trees. As of 2016, 22 trees in the state have been infected with the fatal disease and had to be destroyed. The entire citrus industry of California has been and continues to be concerned that the ACP could take down the citrus industry, as it has in Florida.

Alyssa Houtby explained that the fight against ACP in California “is going well, we hope. The Florida citrus industry has been completely decimated by HLB; an estimated 90 percent of their acreage is infested with this disease.”

Asian Citrus Psyllid Evidence on New Growth (Source: California Ag Today)

“Here in California,” Houtby continued, “we saw it crop up in residential citrus before we saw it in commercial citrus. All of the HLB finds, to date, have been in the Los Angeles Basin.” Houtby said they are working diligently to keep the psyllid population down to decrease the exposure of trees to HLB.

The California citrus industry spends approximately $15 million annually on an ACP assessment program, which includes extensive public outreach. Part of the research entails trapping the pest, conducting survey work in the regions in question, applying treatments in residential areas, and managing a delimitation survey around the area of Los Angeles where the disease has populated.

“That means that we’re scouting very consistently,” explained Houtby, “looking for other trees with the disease and pulling those trees out as soon as we find them. We are doing everything we can here in California to keep the pest and disease from spreading—now that we have it,” she noted.

Alyssa Houtby, director of public affairs, California Citrus Mutual

“The California industry has always been one to use a proactive approach,” Houtby elaborated. “We saw what happened in Florida, and we realized really early on that we couldn’t stand by and wait for this disease to find us. We had to actively go look for it and find it—before it found commercial citrus—and we’ve done that.” Regarding the 22 trees in the state that have been destroyed thus far, Houtby said, “It could be a lot worse if we weren’t as proactive as we are.”

When locating a positive ACP find in a residential area, Houtby noted, generally speaking, homeowners have mostly been compliant. “There are pockets in this state where folks don’t like government coming in, knocking on their door and asking to spray their trees with pesticides. We understand that. It’s an opt-in/opt-out scenario here. We’re not forcing homeowners in most cases to treat their trees.”

Chris Stambach, director of industry relations for California Citrus Mutual

“But that’s a different situation if HLB is present,” she emphasized. “Then we do. We get a warrant, and we go in and treat the surrounding trees. If we’re treating in response to an ACP find, homeowners can opt out, but overwhelmingly, they don’t. They support our program. They understand that citrus is a part of the California heritage, they like their citrus trees, and they want to keep them in their yards. They understand that the alternative to not treating is that tree will eventually die if it becomes infected. We’ve worked really hard to communicate to the general public about the seriousness of this issue. We’re pleased with the results.” Houtby said.

Chris Stambach discussed the importance of homeowners having a general understanding of the ACP, so if they find something unusual in their citrus tree, they know to call the local ag commissioner.

Stambach detailed ACP and HLB specifications to increase homeowners’ understanding about their beloved citrus trees. “HLB is symptomatic, but it takes a long time for those symptoms to show up in the tree,” said Stambach. “You really have to know what you’re looking for because some fertilizer deficiency issues in the tree will mimic what HLB looks like.”

“Though the ACP is a really tiny little bug, there are some key signs the public can look for,” explained Stambach. “You want to look for that psyllid and the little tubules it excretes on the new flush of growth—pretty much right there at the end of the terminals where all that new growth comes in the springtime and in the fall. That’s key to California, because there are only certain times of the year when that ACP is actively feeding on the citrus tree.”

California has a real benefit over the Sunshine State, where they have to spray 12 times a year to keep the psyllids at bay. “It hasn’t been effective for [Florida],” noted Stambach. “We had a couple of growers out this last winter to our Citrus Showcase. They planted new trees, 4 years old, and although they spray 12 times a year, their orchards are 100% infected with HLB. That’s the devastation that this insidious disease can bring. It’s really difficult to get your hands around it because it takes so long to be able to detect it.”

Another benefit for California citrus, according to Houtby, is, “We have a lot of areas in the state where we don’t have to spray at all because we can use beneficial insects. That’s just the great part about farming in California.”

Asian Citrus Psyllic Yellow Trap 2 (Source: Citrus Pest & Disease Prevention Program)

Asian Citrus Psyllic Yellow Trap (Source: Citrus Pest & Disease Prevention Program)

Houtby and her team often look to Florida for ideas and recommendations on what has worked for them, what hasn’t and what citrus growers here can do to prevent the disease from taking hold of their citrus. She clarified that 90 percent of the Florida citrus market is used for juice production; whereas, California is a “fresh-oriented industry, meaning that over 90 percent of our product goes into the fresh market.”

Although California citrus looks for recommendations from Florida, “here in California, there are a lot of things that we can’t afford to do because of the [fresh] market that we’re serving,” said Houtby.” That is what we’re fighting so hard to maintain because we cannot sustain as long as Florida has; we don’t have the luxury of sending a bad-looking piece of fruit into the marketplace like Florida can, because they just juice it. Knowing that, we’re working really hard to never get to the point that Florida has reached.”

As if the dire situation in Florida couldn’t be any worse, they battled with “another deadly bacterial-based citrus disease, citrus canker, brought in from the far reaches of the world,” Stambach said. “That’s a concern we always have with importing citrus. When we import Argentine lemons, for example, we risk our domestic plant health by exposing orchards to a lot of plant diseases they have that we don’t. We want to keep those out of our country,” noted Stambach.

Abandoned citrus trees also pose problems for the industry; they can be sanctuaries for ACP. “If those trees are dead, that’s not a problem. They may look bad, but if they are not living, that’s not a problem. It’s when those trees aren’t cared for, aren’t sprayed in a normal routine, and there is a flush of new growth, the trees provide a sanctuary for the psyllids,” he said.

Abandoned Citrus

“And ACP are very good at finding citrus. They’ll target the perimeters of new growth on the very first citrus they find. Boom, they’re right on it,” he noted.

“Those abandoned groves create a real problem, particularly when they’re in close proximity to other commercial acreage or even homeowners,” he said. Neglected neighborhood citrus trees can become ACP sanctuaries. “ACPs will feed on them and move on to another tree, and feed there,” Stambach explained. “All that time, if an ACP is infected with the HLB bacteria, it will spread that disease, with a latency period of 2 to 5 years.”

Stambach and his team are working on a critical program in Southern California to remove abandoned citrus trees. “Sometimes it’s just getting a hold of the landowner and making them aware of the situation,” he said. “Our county ag commissioners are really key in contacting those people. We’ve had growers go in and spray their neighbor’s orchard to help them out. There are a lot of different ways to attack that problem.”

Compared to counties in the San Joaquin Valley, Riverside and Ventura Counties typically have a big-ag urban interface, which means there is a lot of acreage intermixed with home sites—small homes with citrus trees. Stambach said, “It’s not really commercial production, but it’s a significant amount of acreage with a number of trees that don’t get treated.”

“We’ve gotten some support from some of our partners in the chemical industry. Bayer CropScience has stepped up and worked with us to put together a program. We’re really happy. We’re working hard to take [ACP and HLB] out.” Stambach said.

“Fresno has even found ACPs in residential areas,” commented Houtby on the Central Valley situation. “ACPs are endemic in Southern California, but we’re still at a point in the Central Valley at which we can control these populations and knock them down really quickly when they arrive here.”

Houtby points to the Central Valley’s vulnerability when citrus plant material is moved over the grapevine or from the Central Coast. “We ask that homeowners, and the citrus industry as well, not move plant material out of Southern California into the Central Valley,” she stated. “The psyllid lives on that plant material and not on the fruit. If you’re going to buy a citrus tree, buy it at a local plant nursery or a local Home Depot or Lowe’s. Don’t buy it in Southern California and drive it to the Central San Joaquin Valley,” she urged.

“Our biggest task for homeowners is that they cooperate when the California Department of Food and Agriculture knocks on the door and wants to look at their trees,” Stambach said. “That is the best way you can help us win this battle against the ACP.”

Homeowners can learn how to protect their citrus trees at:

CaliforniaCitrusThreat.org

U.S. Department of Agriculture

California Department of Food and Agriculture

University of California Cooperative Extension

Contributors to this report include Patrick Cavanaugh and Emily McKay Johnson.

California Ag Today2021-05-12T11:05:56-07:00June 6th, 2016|

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