Low snowpack keeps drought front-and-center [Hanford Sentinel]
The
first manual snowpack survey of the 2014-15 water year wasn’t nearly as bad as
a year ago, but it wasn’t good either. Here's the gist of the Department of
Water Resources’ survey Tuesday at several snow stations between Sacramento and
Lake Tahoe: Despite robust rainstorms this month, the crucial mountain snowpack
is 50 percent of average for this date….Smart, forward-looking farmers are
taking steps now to get ready for another dry year. Grower Michael Miya is
taking back ground leased to farmer-tenants. He’s planting one crop this year
instead of the normal two. That keeps more water in the bank for the Miya
family’s more valuable walnut and pistachio trees…He and everybody else
connected to agriculture is staring deep into the climate prediction crystal
ball, hoping and maybe praying for several more mega-storms like the one that
hit earlier this month.
Low
temperatures threaten Kern County citrus [Bakersfield Californian]
Expected
low temperatures Wednesday and Thursday are bringing not only the threat of
dangerous driving to Bakersfield, but potentially severe impacts to Kern
County's citrus crop. The National Weather Service in Hanford issued a hard
freeze watch for Wednesday night through Thursday morning….Bob Blakely, vice
president of California Citrus Mutual, said near freezing nights last week were
probably beneficial to growers. Citrus needs some cold nights while growing, he
said. The cold helps extend shelf life and slows the maturity process of the
fruit, allowing it to stay on the tree longer. But the county's mandarins could
be at risk with this week's cold. Blakely said the breaking point for mandarins
is at 30 to 32 degrees because of the fruit's thin skin. If the temperature
stays below that for more than three to five hours, the juice sacks within the
fruit can freeze and burst, destroying the fruit.
http://www.bakersfieldcalifornian.com/local/x1494740602/Low-temperatures-threaten-Kern-County-citrus
Most
Coachella Valley crops have survived the frost [Palm Springs Desert Sun]
Although
frost has already made its appearance in fields across the eastern Coachella
Valley, farmers are faring fairly well this year. An unseasonably warm fall
brought many of the crops to harvest two weeks earlier than usual, allowing
growers to clear their fields just in the nick of time. The first real frost of
the season came Saturday night – about three weeks later than the first frost
of the winter of 2013….Prime Time International in Coachella, which grows
peppers in the spring and fall, wrapped up its harvest of red, yellow and green
bell peppers last week, before the first frost set in….The true impact of the
frost – which is expected to return on New Year's Eve and continue through New
Year's Day – won't be realized for about a week, said Jeff Percy, president of
Desert Mist Farms. Damaged lettuce, for example, will eventually develop a
blister - a dermal abrasion like a sunburn.
Obama’s
Trade Chief, undaunted by odds, pushes for Trans-Pacific partnership [New York
Times]
For
Michael B. Froman, President Obama’s chief evangelist for expanding global
trade, skepticism comes with the territory. He and his colleagues have clocked
more than 1,500 meetings on Capitol Hill to promote the president’s big
potential trade deal, the Trans-Pacific Partnership — and still its prospects
for passage look as problematic as ever….At stake is a colossal trade agreement
that would stretch from Peru and Chile to Japan and Vietnam, accounting for 40
percent of the world’s economic activity….As the negotiations for T.P.P. have
dragged on, missing multiple deadlines, Mr. Froman has expressed unwavering
confidence in the outcome, saying the various parties are searching for
“landing zones” on issues ranging from Japanese farm subsidies to Vietnamese
labor regulations. Still, to members of Congress, both for and against expanded
trade agreements, Mr. Obama’s trade agenda has been waiting in the wings for so
long that the promises of action are beginning to ring hollow. Efforts in the
House and Senate to grant Mr. Obama trade promotion authority — once known as
fast-track authority, and viewed as critical to passing major trade deals —
have gone nowhere.
Start-ups
rise to close a gap for farmers [New York Times]
In
spite of the surging demand for locally and regionally grown foods over the
last few years, there is a chasm separating small and midsize farmers from
their local markets. But a growing number of small businesses are springing up
to provide local farmers and their customers with marketing, transportation,
logistics and other services, like the Fresh Connection, a trucking business
providing services to help farms around New York City make deliveries….“There’s
been a huge explosion of companies that in various ways are trying to address
the gap between farm and fork,” said Alan Kaufman, the proprietor of Shibumi
Farm in Princeton, N.J., which grows exotic mushrooms. “Some of them are just a
lot of buzz — there are some real challenges — but a few are figuring out how
to do it.”
Editorial: Egg ranchers should
stop squawking [San Jose Mercury News]
A
lot has happened since 2008, the year Barack Obama was elected president and
Sarah Palin became God's gift to comedians. It was also the year California
voters by a wide margin passed Proposition 2, which said egg-laying hens no
longer could be confined in cramped cages stacked on top of one another. The
landmark proposition gave egg ranchers six years to convert from the inhumane
system of stacking thousands of birds in cages so small the hens are virtually
immobile. But instead of using the time to prepare for the shift, they
squandered it filing lawsuits. Now they're whining about compliance, but it's
their own fault….The industry expects prices to stabilize over time. A
University of California-Riverside study estimated that ultimately the
difference between eggs from caged hens and eggs from cage-free hens would be
less than one cent per egg. It's a small price to pay for giving chickens the
ability to move around.
Ag
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