Water Management
Introduced by Sustainable Technologies, the VariSun Controller uses captured sunlight to power irrigation pumps.
Mother Nature always likes to have her own way but farmers can now have more say over how much water stays in or out of their fields, thanks to the use of controlled drainage technology. The basic concept with controlled drainage is that a water-control structure attached to traditional tile can be used like a dam in farmers’ fields, says Crop-Tech agronomist Isaac Ferrie. When gated with stacked baffles, the structures allow you to release water when you don’t want it in the field, like during planting or harvest, or to hold it back for a crop’s use when rainfall is sc
I visited in late August with Matt Angell about California San Joaquin Valley water issues.
Such crop switching is one sign of a sweeping transformation going on in California--the nation’s biggest agricultural state by value--driven by a three-year drought that climate scientists say is a glimpse of a drier future.
Governor Jerry Brown and California Democratic lawmakers enlisted business support of a $7.2 billion plan composed mostly of new bonds for water storage and delivery to drought-stricken cities and farms.
“Rural infrastructure projects have built-in advantages that should be attractive to financiers. For starters, investment dollars go farther,” McGraw Hill Financial CEO Douglas L. Peterson wrote in an opinion piece for CNBC this week.
An American farming story: When Mike Wagner spliced a vertical business approach with ultra-conservation, he created one of the most unique agriculture operations in the United States.
Field to Market recently announced it is now able to integrate sustainability metrics and algorithms of its Fieldprint Platform with several leading precision ag and farm management software programs. This represents one of several moves the group hopes will help meet its ambitious goal of 50 million participating acres by 2020.
At great cost, phosphorus is laboriously mined and processed so it can be used by the agriculture industry. Some 27.6 million metric tons were removed from the earth in 2015. But an agtech UW-Madison spinoff has discovered another innovative way to collect this valuable mineral.
For the past four years, the California Air Resources Board, the Environmental Defense Fund and others have been working behind the scenes to develop protocols that allow farmers to offset carbon emissions.
Center-pivot irrigation systems, once thought to be suitable only for Kansas, Nebraska or California’s San Joaquin Valley, are going up in the eastern Corn Belt.
The subsurface irrigation method, first adopted in the U.S. for vegetables, fruits and nuts, is supplementing and even replacing center-pivot systems for field crops.
Indoor growers say their romaine should have been excluded from the FDA’s temporary blanket ban — although they agree consumer safety should always come first.
The California Fresh Fruit Association has prioritized issues for 2019, with federal immigration policies and their effects on the labor force as the leading issue.
Bakersfield, Cali.-based Arable Capital Partners has completed the acquisition of three irrigation companies.
No matter how much management, labor and fertilizer you apply, and regardless of the quality of seed you plant, it’s the soil that underpins how much food and fiber you produce.