Jim Downing

Next-generation mechanization

New advances in image-recognition technology and robotics are reducing the need for manual labor — and potentially herbicides as well.

UC groundwater research: A survey

As California implements the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA), UC research is building knowledge and supporting innovation in groundwater recharge, groundwater accounting, groundwater quality, groundwater governance and more. Heres a sample of work from across the UC system.

Enforcing the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act

An interview with Sam Boland-Brien, Groundwater Management Program Chief, California State Water Resources Control Board

A seat at the table for rural drinking water

An interview with Adriana Renteria, Regional Water Management Coordinator, Community Water Center

Advocating for growers as SGMA moves forward

Aliso Water District GSA Chowchilla Water District GSA Clayton Water District Columbia Canal Company Gravelly Ford Water District GSA Madera Irrigation District GSA Madera Water District GSA Merced County GSA New Stone Water District GSA Root Creek Water District GSA Christina Beckstead is executive director of Madera County Farm Bureau. As an advocate for growers in her county, she has been closely involved in the formation of groundwater sustainability agencies (GSAs) in Madera County and the steps towards the development of groundwater sustainability plans (GSPs). There are three subbasins in Madera County — the Madera subbasin, the Chowchilla subbasin and a small portion of the Delta-Mendota subbasin. All are classified by the state as critically overdrafted.

Tina Saitone: Understanding the beef market, and whether sheepdogs are earning their keep

Profile Tina Saitone: Understanding the beef market, and whether sheepdogs are earning their keep A visit to the supermarket meat case makes clear that special types of beef command special prices. From certified Angus to antibiotic-free to pasture-raised — along with designations such as certifications of traceability or specific vaccination protocols that consumers don’t see — beef cattle are now marketed with long lists of “value-added” attributes. Evett Kilmartin For a rancher, each attribute represents both an added production cost and an opportunity to earn more when cattle are sold. But cattle are sold at auction for a single price per pound — there’s no itemization for what the buyer is paying for each attribute — so it can be difficult for ranchers to tell which practices are profitable and which aren’t worth the trouble. “Producers know their costs better than anyone, but the marginal value of each value-added attribute is really hard for ranchers assess,” said Tina Saitone, who joined UC Cooperative Extension (UCCE) in June as a specialist in livestock and rangeland economics based at UC Davis. In a research paper in this issue of California Agriculture (page 179), Saitone and her co- authors report findings from a study designed to tease out the value of each of these attributes, as well as the price ef- fects of forward con- tracting (fixing a price a month or more before the Tina Saitone is a cattle are delivered) and the distance a lot of UC Cooperative Extension specialist cattle is from the major cattle feeding and meat based in the processing hubs in the central United States. Department of Broadly, Saitone’s research program aims to Agricultural and Resource Economics help cattle and sheep producers better under- at UC Davis. stand the economics that influence their busi- ness decisions. A native of Sonoma County, where until recently her family ran a small, century-old 178 CALIFORNIA AGRICULTURE • VOLUME 70 , NUMBER 4 vineyard started with rootstock brought from Italy by her great-grandparents, Saitone grew up around farming and horses and gravitated to economics as an undergraduate at Sonoma State University. She com- pleted her Ph.D. in agricultural and resource econom- ics at UC Davis in 2008 and worked for an economic consulting firm before returning to UC Davis. An ongoing challenge is developing good sources of data on livestock markets in California. The study described above drew on sales data involving more than 2 million head of cattle over 17 years, provided by Western Video Market, a Chico- based video auction operator that has partnered with UCCE Shasta County director Larry Forero on market studies for several years. In a video auction, buyers bid on groups of cattle based on video footage of the animals as well as verification documentation col- lected by the auction operator. Because the transac- tions are conducted online, video auctions generate large, well-organized data sets. But Western Video Market represents only a por- tion of the total cattle sales in the state — most of the rest are sold through in-person auctions, with no sys- tems for data reporting. One long-term plan for Saitone and ANR collabora- tors — Forero, as well as Tehama County Livestock, Range and Natural Resources Advisor Josh Davy — calls for developing a monthly market report for cattle producers based on data from all of live auctions. The group is working with auction operators to standard- ize data collection and reporting. Saitone is also working to better understand the role of predation in livestock production in California and the cost-benefit associated with a wide variety of non-lethal depredation strategies. One study looks at the guard dogs — typically Great Pyrenees or Anatolian Pyrenees — that many sheep producers now use to protect flocks from coyotes and other pred- ators. By gathering data on lamb losses to predation, the effectiveness of guard dogs at preventing those losses, and the costs of maintaining a guard dog, Saitone said she hopes to help sheep producers with a basic calculation: “Does the dog make sense? Does it save you enough to be worth it?” c — Jim Downing

New UC ANR working group to address residual material from anaerobic digesters

Research news New UC ANR working group to address residual material from anaerobic digesters A naerobic digestion is an increasingly popular waste management strategy in California, with over 200 facilities operating and more under construction. Anaerobic digesters use microbes to break down organic wastes, including biosolids in treated wastewater, lawn trimmings, food wastes and manure. The digestion process produces methane-rich biogas, which can then be captured and used to generate electricity or power vehicles. The residual solids and liquids left over after di- gestion is complete are known as digestates. As the anaerobic digestion sector has grown, so has the need for a coordinated strategy to manage these digestates. Since they are rich in nutrients and organic matter, digestates are potentially valuable as soil amend- ments. But their composition can vary considerably and their performance has not been well documented. Better information about digestates and their poten- tial uses could promote the development of markets for the materials, which would in turn help make digester facilities more financially sustainable by replacing digestate disposal costs with revenue opportunities. To facilitate the beneficial use of digester residuals, Stephen Kaffka, a UC ANR Cooperative Extension Letters RSVP Re: O’Geen et al., “Soil suitability index identifies potential areas for groundwater banking on agricultural lands,” California Agriculture 69:75-84: I believe we should also con- sider old approaches that at the time weren’t considered aquifer recharge, but water wasted to the ground. Being raised in the Central Valley, I remember many a hot day spent swimming in cool canals carved into the soil. April–June 2015 Then I observed the conver- sion of nearly all dirt-lined canals to concrete-lined canals, mostly in the name of water conservation. While probably reducing maintenance needs, this also eliminated miles (and acres) of recharge surfaces. If we could return lined canals back to earthen canals, this “old” approach could expand recharge across many portions of the state crisscrossed with canal systems. Furthermore, if the purpose of canal man- agement could be expanded from water delivery con- veyances to include water storage (i.e., kept watered year-round except during periods of maintenance), there might be enough water stored in them to obviate the need for new a reservoir or two. Brad Valentine Santa Rosa 138 CALIFORNIA AGRICULTURE • VOLUME 69 , NUMBER 3 I found the concept behind the article — artificial in- filtration and accelerated recharge — fascinating. Resource management looks at stormwater as an economic resource. In the climate upheavals to come, the predictions are for sudden, massive storms that shorten the infiltration intervals. The kind of flood infiltration talked about in the article tends to this direction. I think we do need to design farms for recharge rather than drainage. Sustainable design aims at preserving the structure and function of the natural water cycle, including groundwater recharge, de- spite an unstable climate. Ecology tends to look at the structure and function of the natural world, and how best to preserve natural cycles is a high priority of sustainability. But this is a difficult, if not impos- sible, task that challenges the best of us. We need to know the natural recharge capacity of the land, and derive a realistic threshold value for recharge — what nature would do had the land remained wild and un- converted to farmland. “Ecological farming” strains my imagination, because I am not an ecologist — but I wonder if we couldn’t model natural thresholds in the same manner as this article models artificial recharge. Bud Hoekstra Glencoe WHAT DO YOU THINK? The editorial staff of California Agriculture welcomes your letters, comments and sugges- tions. Please write to us at: 2801 Second Street, Room 184, Davis, CA 95618, or calag@ucanr. edu. Include your full name and address. Let- ters may be edited for length and clarity.

Kearney and West Side RECs: Studies of sorghum's adaptation to drought push the frontiersof crop improvement

News from the RECs Starting with this issue, California Agriculture will publish a regular feature on projects at UC ANR’s Research and Extension Centers Kearney and West Side RECs: Studies of sorghum’s adaptation to drought push the frontiers of crop improvement W ith the climate changing and demands on water resources growing, crops that can survive drought are near the top of the global agricultural wish list. But drought tolerance has so far confounded plant researchers. One problem is that it involves many complex relationships: a host of genes that activate when a plant is short of water; soil microbes that interact with plant roots. Another difficulty has been that plants respond differently to water stress when they are grown outdoors rather than indoors, meaning that greenhouse-based findings haven’t translated well to the field. Peggy Lemaux Two new research projects involving the Kearney and West Side Research and Extension Centers (RECs) are taking on these challenges, using a mul- tifaceted, field-based approach West Side REC director Bob Hutmacher with sorghum as their subject. collects a soil sample next to a sorghum The knowledge gained could lead plant to evaluate the microbial eventually to the ability to control population around sorghum roots. the mechanisms of drought toler- ance and the development of im- proved varieties of sorghum and other crops. “We may be able to find ways to manipulate those character- istics to enable drought toler- ance and water use efficiency,” said Kearney REC director Jeff Dahlberg. “That’s the ultimate pie-in-the-sky goal.” The projects are funded by recent grants from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) — one from the Biological and Environmental Research (BER) Program and the other from the Advanced Research Project Agency-Energy (ARPA-E). The two DOE programs support the study of microbes and plants for sustainable biofuel production. 208 CALIFORNIA AGRICULTURE • VOLUME 69 , NUMBER 4 Sorghum, in addition to being a staple food grain in much of the world, is promising as a bioenergy crop and as a substitute for corn silage in livestock rations. It is a good candidate for improved drought tolerance in part because it already handles water stress better than many other crops, including its close relative, corn. The grain emerged as a food crop in drought- prone areas of Africa, and existing varieties exhibit a range of traits that help the crop endure periods of scarce water. Peggy Lemaux, a UC ANR Cooperative Extension specialist based at UC Berkeley, is the principal in- vestigator on the 5-year,

Sierra Foothill REC: Quantifying IPM benefits in rangeland systems

12.3 million BER-funded project awarded in September. Using field plots of sorghum at Kearney and West Side RECs, the project will investigate what’s known as the epigenetics of drought tolerance — the ways in which certain genes are activated in response to water stress, Lemaux said. These mechanisms, which allow rapid adjustments to stresses, can change the plant’s physiology to better cope with reduced moisture. The project also will investigate how microbes in the soil may interact with sorghum to enhance its drought tolerance. Compounds produced by microbes may act as signals, touching off epigenetic or other responses that help sorghum plants survive a long dry stretch, Lemaux said. Microbial populations also might enhance delivery of water and nutrients to a sorghum plant’s roots and trigger them to produce en- zymes and plant hormones that influence its growth and yield. Lemaux noted that the BER project takes advan- tage of UC ANR’s institutional structure, partnering campus-based Agricultural Experiment Station (AES) faculty and Cooperative Extension specialists with researchers based at the RECs. The project’s collabo- rators also include a UC Berkeley faculty member in statistics and DOE researchers based at the Joint Genome Institute and the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL). It’s a powerful combination of laboratory and field expertise and resources, Lemaux said. “We couldn’t do it without them, and they couldn’t do it without us,” Lemaux said of the collaboration be- tween campus- and REC-based researchers.