UC Riverside Update
Ξ February 21st, 2008 | → 0 Comments | ∇ A Day at a Time, Technology, Wine News |
On February 11th I posted GREEN MANAGEMENT OF PIERCE’S DISEASE. In it I discussed UC Riverside’s effort to find a more environmentally friendly, a greener approach to combatting the Glassy Winged Sharp Shooter (GWSS), a newly arrived vector for an indigenous bacterium, Xylella fastidiosa, responsible for Pierce’s Disease. UC Riverside has been in the forefront of new research, especially in southern California. As previously mentioned, the Western Region of Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education (WSARE) project is hinged on two principles, the participation of established organic grape-growers Bella Vista Vineyards and Sun World, and that grape growers throughout SoCal, in all counties affected, answer the base-line survey (see below).
Dr. Nic Irvin, PhD, of the UC Riverside Department of Entomology, has provided the following update: Sun World has left the program. They’ve decided to rip up the balance of their organic table grapes. But Bella Vista Vineyards troops on!
Further, here are the results provided by Dr. Irvin for the 2007 survey for the Western SARE project: “This project includes a comprehensive outreach plan to extend the results of this research to growers in Temecula, Lodi, Coachella Valley and Ventura grape growers. As part of these outreach efforts, a survey was mailed out in June 2007 and this will be repeated in June 2010 after this work and associated outreach are completed to measure the rate of adoption and percentage reduction of pesticide use resulting from utilization of our study cover crop plants.
In June 2007, this survey [click 'project' above] was mailed to 100% of growers located in Ventura (5 growers), Lodi (740 growers), Coachella Valley (30 growers) and Temecula (45 growers) with help of cooperative extension specialists Phil Phillips and Carmen Gispert, and Cliff Ohmart (Lodi Woodbridge Winegrape Commission) and Linda Kissam (Temecula Winegrowers Association). We had 225 replies from growers which is a 27.4% response rate. The surveys are currently being collated and information transferred into an Excel spreadsheet. The field work funded by WSARE will be conducted over the next 2 years and results will be extended to growers in Ventura, Temecula, Lodi and Coachella Valley following the comprehensive outreach plan detailed in the grant. In June 2010, the survey will be mailed again to determine rate of adoption and the percentage reduction in pesticide use.
Results:
Preliminary results show that 43% of growers that responded to the survey had maintained a cover crop in the previous season. The main reason for maintaining a cover crop was for dust control, while the main reason for not maintaining a cover crop was the extra irrigation required. None of the growers that maintained a cover crop in the previous season irrigated to ensure it continued growing over the spring and summer. The aim of the Western SARE research is to investigate the effect of using extra irrigation to maintain a cover crop over the spring and summer, and on the abundance of grape pests, their natural enemies, vine vigor, fruit quality and yield, and the abundance of weeds.”
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