Farm ditch is home, sweet home, to tiny aquatic species

Seasonal agricultural streams and flooded ditches, remnants of when the Willamette Valley was one big wetland, are full of aquatic life. Scientists at Oregon State University (OSU) ventured into farmers’ flooded fields in southern Williamette Valley and discovered that this biodiversity persists. They found a variety of crustaceans, snails, worms, aquatic insects, fish, and amphibians.

These findings and others gathered over a decade’s study challenged the popular assumption that agricultural streams and ditches are poor habitat.

The research offers guidance for farmers who want maintain the health of these temporary waters by setting aside low areas of their fields that consistently flood and have low yields.   

Among the key findings, streams and ditches with less watershed agricultural land-use contained more species of macroinvertebrates. Channels with the most watershed agricultural land-use lacked many of the aquatic insects found in less agriculturally influenced channels. Stream and ditch bottoms with grasses and other plants had more invertebrates than those with exposed clay bottoms.

The project was made possible with support from NIFA’s Partnership in Conservation Effects Assessment Project (CEAP).

Read more about OSU's research.

Urban farm in Arizona

Tucson Village Farm (TVF) is a working urban farm built by and for the youth of Pima County, Arizona. A 4-H program from the University of Arizona Cooperative Extension, TVF is a seed-to-table program that reconnects young people to a healthy food system, teaches them how to grow and prepare fresh food, food budgeting, and empowers them to make healthy life choices. The year-round, hands-on program focuses on the building the soil, integrative pest management, weed management, crop rotation, and cover cropping. TVF hosts more than 2,000 community members at a harvest fair and youth programs such as “Growing Forward” for K-5th graders and “L’il Sprouts” for tots.

Read more about the Tucson Village Farm.

Kelp, commerce, and cleaner water

Only 80 miles east of New York City, the Peconic Estuary on Long Island remains relatively pristine. Over time, the wetland is being affected by development and harmful algal blooms, like the brown tide that devastated the local scallop industry in 1985. The Cornell Cooperative Extension in Suffolk County, New York, is investigating whether sugar kelp can be grown commercially and help improve local water quality.”Part of our project is not only testing feasibility for growth of kelp, but also to see whether or not there is a ready market and how we can collaborate with businesses on Long Island to produce it and grow it and hopefully sell it in the future,” said Chris Pickerell, marine program director at Cornell Cooperative Extension Suffolk County. Pickerell says the sugar kelp can be used for food, fertilizer, and even medicine. It also helps the environment because kelp removes nitrogen and carbon from the water

Read more about the Suffolk County Extension aquaculture study. 

Citrus greening and Florida

University of Florida (UF) researchers are a step closer to finding a treatment for a disease called Huanglongbing (HLB), or citrus greening, which has decimated citrus trees in the state. The project was funded through NIFA’s Specialty Crop Research Initiative (SCRI).

The investigators looked at the Asian citrus psyllid (ACP), which transmits the HLB bacteria from one plant to another. Scientists discovered that the psyllid contains another bacterium, Wolbachia bacterium, that “cross talks” with the HLB bacterium. This interplay prevents an insect immune reaction that could harm both bacteria.

The Wolbachia bacterium could be a source for future spray treatments to protect trees against the psyllids, and could help the trees fight off bacterial invasion, said senior study author Dean W. Gabriel, Ph.D., a professor of Plant Pathology at the University of Florida. 

Read more about UF's citrus greening research at Science Daily.

How food systems affect health

Researchers and extension specialists involved in the NIFA-funded Multistate Research Fund project are engaging communities and facilitating institutional, family, and individual changes that improve health and wellbeing. One such project has investigated how food systems affect human health. Over the past five years, the project has produced a “hunger atlas” for the state of Missouri and a regional profile of Missouri food pantry clients. Other outcomes include an overview of Maryland community stores and the “Seeds that Feed” program that distributes vegetable seeds and training to Missouri food pantry clients. 

Learn more about human health and food systems.

Nothing like Mississippi beef

Mississippi State University (MSU) Extension's Mississippi Master Cattle Producer Program focuses on improving overall management and decision-making skills and developing a broad knowledge base for beef cattle production. For every 100 participants trained through the Mississippi Master Cattle Producer Program, there is potential to increase total beef cattle production annual net returns by an estimated $825,000. For every $1 million increase in value of cattle production, the expected impact on the Mississippi economy exceeds $1.9 million including support for employment and the tax base. This equates to an annual economic impact to date of greater than $2.75 million as a result of this program. In addition to Mississippi beef cattle producers, Mississippians from other segments of the beef cattle industry, such as feed retailers, as well as out-of-state beef cattle producers participate in the growing program

Watch the MSU Extension video.