Grower-Shipper Association of Central California (GSA) — Implementing effective disease and pest management strategies is a continual challenge for farmers. While these challenges are not new in agriculture, they impact more than just farmers. Lower yields due to disease and pest pressure affects farm employees and harvesting crews too and can also inhibit our ability to provide a steady supply of affordable …

Shifting to a new food freezing method could make for safer and better quality frozen foods while saving energy and reducing carbon emissions, according to a new study by U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Research Service (ARS) and University of California-Berkeley scientists. “A complete change over to this new method of food freezing worldwide could cut energy use by as …

Contracted production for California processing tomatoes is forecast at 11.1 million tons, averaging 48.9 tons per acre. The current production forecast is 1.9% below last year’s contracted production, and 4.3% below the May forecast. The projected harvested acreage of tomatoes grown under contract is 227,000 acres, which 0.4% lower than in 2020. Drought concerns impacted planting decisions for the 2021 …

For a few years, University of Florida (UF) plant pathologist Natalia Peres has used an ultraviolet light system to thwart strawberry pathogens. Peres even published a study this year that showed the system helps control powdery mildew. Two fellow researchers with the UF Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (UF/IFAS) have now used the same robotic UVC applicator to show that …

The dining time of different insects impacts a plant’s defenses and nutritional quality—a complexity uncovered in new research with implications for pest management strategies. A piercing-sucking, virus-carrying aphid has long worried pea plant farmers, but a more innocuous-seeming weevil that only takes tiny bites from leaves was found to also play a significant role in plant health. Depending if the …

Branched broomrape (Phelipanche ramosa), a parasitic weed that was the focus of a $1.5 million eradication effort four decades ago in California, has recently re-emerged in tomato fields in several Central Valley counties. Processing tomatoes are important to the California agricultural economy; the state produced over 90% of the 12 million tons of tomatoes grown in the United States in …

Field bindweed (Convolvulsus arvensis) is considered by many tomato growers to be the most problematic of all weeds in California production areas. Indeed, field bindweed and the closely related morning glory weeds were ranked the 8th most troublesome weeds in North America in a recent survey by the Weed Science Society of America. The rapid adoption of drip irrigation and the …

Americans are growing old and, sadly, the aging process for many means more than simply turning gray or thinning hair. According to the United States Census, in about a dozen years the number of Americans over 65 will outnumber children. Further, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention project the number of Americans living with Alzheimer’s disease (AD) to nearly triple by …

The 2020 Agricultural Chemical Use Survey of vegetable producers collected data about pesticide use as well as pest management practices on acres planted to 22 different vegetable crops. NASS conducted the survey among producers in 18 states, focusing on the states that were major producers for the surveyed crops. (Fig. 1) Data are for the 2020 crop year, the one-year period …