August 2022 - 4

EDITOR'S LETTER
Drought spurs tech innovation
as growers seek water
Not to be a broken record here, but the most pressing topic from last month's
Editor's Letter - historic droughts and their effect on agriculture and specialty crops
- will continue to be covered here and elsewhere in Vegetable Growers News.
Assistant editor Doug Ohlemeier's cover story on drought conditions looks at
the effects of droughts on California's Central Valley and the Klamath Basin potato
growing region on the California-Oregon border.
As with many areas in the Western U.S., the lack of
water is not a new issue.
For example, look back two decades at the
Klamath Basin's turn-of-the-century drought.
In April 2001, most irrigation water deliveries
were curtailed to the Klamath Reclamation
Project because of drought and steps to protect
endangered fish.
A December 2002 report from Oregon State
University's Extension Service (with the weighty title
of " Water Allocation in the Klamath Reclamation
Project, 2001: An Assessment of Natural Resource,
Economic, Social and Institutional Issues with a Focus
on the Upper Klamath Basin " ) pretty much sums up
where we are now:
Vegetable
Growers
News.com
WATCH. READ. SHARE
VEGETABLEGROWERSNEWS.COM
Western Growers to honor California's
John Harris
Western Growers will honor California
agricultural icon John Harris with its 2022
Award of Honor.
Chris Koger
Managing Editor
USDA ARS researchers look at sweet corn hybrids
to increase yields
" The 2000-2001 drought was neither the Klamath Basin's first nor its last. Likewise,
similar natural resource conflicts face communities across the country. If sustainable
and equitable methods of resource allocation are not found, the conflicts of 2001 are
destined to be repeated in the basin and elsewhere. "
Ohlemeier talks to Don Cameron of Terranova Ranch in Helm, California, which
grows processing tomatoes, peppers, onions, nuts and grain. The lack of water,
Cameron says, makes it difficult to plan and make long-term investments. When you
don't have water to grow a crop any given year, that's a significant problem.
But year after year uncertainty? How can you plan ahead for your business, your
family, your future?
Cameron and other growers have acted to help recharge groundwater supplies,
diverting winter flood flows to vineyards and fields, a practice now endorsed by the
California Department of Water Resources.
Water conservation successes will depend on a system-wide assessment of
facilities and programs, and a realization that we need to be open-minded when
seeking solutions. To illustrate: a Pacific Institute-led water efficiency project
used remote sensors to detect toilet leaks in low-income housing. The project,
" Advancing Water Efficiency through Leak Detection for Low-Income Housing in
Southern California, " - which I've dubbed " Operation Jiggle the Handle " - showed
that a 183-unit senior housing community near downtown L.A. saved more than 1
million gallons of water and reduced bills by more than 25% by using the sensors
to alert officials to wasted water.
Down in Imperial Valley, California's desert region, University of California
Extension researchers came up with a novel way to cut water use on sweet corn
crops. Researchers conducted trials in Imperial County and found that drip irrigation
to grow sweet corn can significantly conserve water, lower fertilizer use and hike crop
yields. Ali Montazar, UC-Cooperation Extension irrigation and water management
advisor for Imperial, Riverside and San Diego Counties, conducted the drip irrigation
study over two seasons, in 2020-21 and 2021-22.
The six fields with drip irrigation in 2021-22 used an average of 37% less water
then the five fields with furrow irrigation.
With a 25% savings on fertilizer purchases and a slight increase in yield, the
benefits of drip irrigation seems to be a good option to lower water use. The real
hurdle, however, is how much more preparation and expenses are tied to the laying
of the irrigation tape vs. furrow irrigation prep.
Montazar said the success is related to the sandy soil in Imperial County, which
requires more water for furrow irrigation than other soils. He plans to continue his
research next year.
In other California news, tractor companies are questioning a decision by the state
agency regulating workplace safety. California's Division of Occupational Safety and
Health recently rejected a petition for using driverless tractors on farms. A California
labor code from the 1970s blocks wide scale approval of autonomous vehicles. Cal/
OSHA members also questioned Monarch Tractors' failure to include labor advocacy
groups during a year-long trial on the safety of the tractors.
Two other Cal/OSHA board members sided with growers, saying the technology is
being adopted and will advance, regardless of California's adoption.
There's no doubt that autonomous vehicles, whether on roads or in fields, will be
a common site at some point. In this issue, we highlight autonomous weeders. On
page 8, researchers are developing a robotic weeder that will find and eradicate
weeds on its own, and on page 9 is an article about an annual mechanical weeding
event in Benton Harbor, Michigan, in mid-September. The Vegetable Grower News
will have on-site reporting from that event, as well as at FIRA USA, Oct. 18-20 in
Fresno, California. We'll have comprehensive coverage of that event's Demo Day,
when participants will see dozens of robots harvest, weed, seed, thin and plant at the
University of California, Fresno.
WANT TO HEAR MORE FROM VGN?
Sign up to receive our monthly e-newsletter, eVGN, featuring exclusive
articles, videos and photos not seen in the pages of VGN magazine.
Visit www.vegetablegrowersnews.com to sign up today.
USDA ARS researchers and their collaborators are
looking at past and present hybrids of the sweet
corn crop to determine how farmers can increase
yields through plant density.
Cornell's AgriTech research center celebrates
140th anniversary
Cornell AgriTech, a preeminent center for food
and agricultural research in Geneva, N.Y., will
celebrate its 140th anniversary with an open house
to showcase its impact on New York's food and
agricultural industries.
Representatives, industry members implore
Senate to pass ag labor bill
National and state agricultural leaders
joined Republican members of Congress to
urge legislators to pass bipartisan workforce
solutions to address the farm labor shortage in
order to combat inflation.
facebook.com/
VegGrowersNews
twitter.com/
VGN_News
youtube.com/
TheVGNtv
linkedin.com/
showcase/vegetablegrowers-news
4
| VegetableGrowersNews.com
http://wwwVegetableGowersNews.com http://www.VEGETABLEGROWERSNEWS.COM http://www.vegetablegrowersnews.com http://www.facebook.com/vegetablegrowersnews http://www.twitter.com/vgn_news http://www.youtube.com/thevgntv http://www.linkedin.com/showcase/vegetable-growers-news http://www.VegetableGrowersNews.com
August 2022

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of August 2022
