Water

Three women wearing goggles inside a small room with reddish-purple light look at plant sprouts growing in a tray.

Vertical farming benefits, concerns explored by The Guardian

  • by Trina Kleist
  • August 23, 2022

You may already be eating leafy greens that grow without soil, sunlight or ever being touched by human hands. Vertical farming has gained interest from growers and major investors around the world as a way to provide nourishing food, especially in urban areas. Gail Taylor, a vertical agriculture researcher and chair of the UC Davis Department of Plant Sciences, offered this perspective in an article recently published in The Guardian:

Staff Research Assistant Grant Johnson monitors a slow sand filtration tank coupled with a vegetated filter and planted with canna at the South Coast Research and Extension Center in Irvine, Calif. The work was among projects overseen by landscape horticulturalist Lorence Oki and funded, in part, by the Plant California Alliance over many years.

UC Davis Research Prepares State’s $3.7 Billion Nursery and Floral Industry for a Drier Future

  • by Trina Kleist
  • April 11, 2022

As California enters a third summer of record drought, farmers who raise nursery and floral crops are looking for ways to grow plants with less water, more efficiently, while fighting new diseases and detecting plagues quicker.

Researchers with the UC Davis Department of Plant Sciences are finding ways to help, with support from the Plant California Alliance. The grower-supported organization has granted nearly $400,000 to the department since 2006, according to college records.

Giulia Marino, UC Davis.

Giulia Marino: New Plant Sciences Faculty and Cooperative Extension Specialist

  • by Ann Filmer
  • June 22, 2020
Expert on tree physiology in orchard systems

Giulia Marino, a crop physiologist, is the new UC Cooperative Extension (UCCE) Specialist in Orchard Systems, and a faculty member in the Department of Plant Sciences at the University of California, Davis (UC Davis). She is primarily based at the UC Kearney Agricultural Research and Extension Center in Parlier, California, and has a second office in Wickson Hall at UC Davis.

California rangeland

Working Rangelands Wednesdays: Ken Tate, June 3

  • by Ann Filmer
  • May 29, 2020
Ken Tate, UC Davis and UC ANR, will address “Water Quality on Pastures and Rangelands” at the Working Rangelands Wednesdays webinar on June 3, 2020. The new series of biweekly webinars focuses on working rangelands in California and the West. Webinars are recorded and offered as podcasts.
During a conservation agriculture course, a young trainee operates a Happy Seeder mounted on a two-wheel tractor, for direct seeding of wheat in smallholder systems. (photo CIMMYT)

Conservation Agriculture Key in Meeting UN Sustainable Development Goals

  • by Ann Filmer
  • April 16, 2020
Conservation agriculture is key in meeting UN Sustainable Development Goals. A new analysis shows benefits of conservation agriculture to crop performance, water efficiency, and climate action in South Asia. JK Ladha, an adjunct professor in Plant Sciences, UC Davis, is co-author of the Nature Sustainability article.
Orchard trees

Research Suggests Water Stress May Benefit Walnut Trees (with video)

  • by Ann Filmer
  • April 07, 2020
Portable pressure chambers (“pressure bombs”) taken into orchards measure water pressure in tree leaves, to show how hard a tree works to pull moisture from the soil. This is used to determine when irrigation is actually needed by the trees. Ken Shackel and Bruce Lampinen note that this can benefit yields and orchard health.
Wood chips from recycled almond trees are spread across an orchard in California's Stanislaus County. (photo Brent Holtz, UCANR)

Almond Orchard Recycling a Climate-Smart Strategy

  • by Ann Filmer
  • April 01, 2020
Recycling trees onsite can sequester carbon, save water and increase crop yields, making it a climate-smart practice for California’s irrigated almond orchards. Professor Amelie Gaudin, Plant Sciences, UC Davis, worked with postdocs, grad students, and Cooperative Extension colleagues.
Cattle grazing

Cattle Ranchers Cope with Dry Pastures (Video)

  • by Ann Filmer
  • March 19, 2020
This winter’s lack of rain, up until mid-March, did not produce much forage for cattle, or carryover vegetation. Leslie Roche, Department of Plant Sciences, covers rangelands and pasturelands, and says this has been commonplace this winter. Many grasses are producing seeds earlier, leading to less vegetative growth.
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