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Over time, some of the links will have lapsed, so we cannot guarantee they all work. Please note that you can download our Media Database (Excel Worksheet) which contains a full description of most articles and allows searching by subject, date, source, etc. We can also provide hard copies of some items. Please contact us for further information. Farmers ignore climate change Western Producer | by Barry Wilson | June 27, 2003 Canadian farmers are not yet aware that climate change will force them to adapt, says a report from the Senate agriculture committee. Rain Causes Farm Damage, Delays in Ga. Associated Press| by Elliott Minor | June 24, 2003 Farmers Neil and Boyd Hagerson have about had it with rain, but the brothers are reluctant to complain, considering that Georgia is just emerging from a five-year drought that cost growers millions in crop losses. Reducing the Risk of Frost Damage to Short-Season Crops Scientists are Working to Understand What Controls Flowering Time and Maturity in Soybean Production American Society of Agronomy| June 23 , 2003 Scientists from Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada are investigating the importance of flowering and how to control it. Early flowering and maturity reduces the risk of frost damage and this is an important variety trait for soybeans grown in areas with short growing seasons. India Drought Amssociated Press | by Rupak Sanyal| June 23 , 2003 Amir Raikha and his family walked under the scorching sun some 280 miles with his 150 emaciated cows, looking for water. Raikha's search ended in a camp in the western state of Gujarat, where a good Samaritan is looking after more than 30,000 livestock and their 3,500 owners from drought-hit districts of Gujarat and the neighboring desert state of Rajasthan. More than 3.6 million people have been hit by drought in five of 23 districts in Gujarat and six of 17 districts in Rajasthan for a third straight year because of poor monsoon rains. Drought hits grape yield hard The Age | by Leon Gettler | June 21, 2003 The worst drought in a century has ravaged vineyards across the country with Australia's wine grape harvest falling 10 per cent to 1.36 million tonnes, the first decline in six years, figures released by the Australian Wine Federation show. Heat brings both blessing and curse Western Producer | by Ed White | June 20, 2003 Farmers in west-central Saskatchewan and eastern Alberta are caught on the horns — or the antennae — of a dilemma. Editing Flap Over EPA's Report on Environment: Whitman Cut Section on Climate Because Only Language White House Agreed on was 'Pablum'. LA Times | by Elizabeth Shogren | June 20, 2003 Environmental Protection Agency chief Christie Whitman said Thursday that she decided to omit a section on climate change from a long-awaited status report on the nation's environment because the only language the Bush administration could agree on amounted to "pablum." Rain-Soaked, Soggy Fields Mean Disaster for Maryland Farmers Knight-Ridder Tribune | by Jaime Braun | June 19, 2003 A harsh winter and wet spring after last year's drought-plagued growing season are leaving farmers with soggy, flooded fields and a delayed planting and harvesting season. Report by the E.P.A. Leaves Out Data on Climate Change New York Times | by Andrew C. Revkin with Katharine Q. Seelye | June 19, 2003 The Environmental Protection Agency is preparing to publish a draft report next week on the state of the environment, but after editing by the White House, a long section describing risks from rising global temperatures has been whittled to a few noncommittal paragraphs. Prairie farmers enjoy the green spring, but still hope for more rain The Whitehorse Daily Star | by John Cotter | June 18, 2003 Prairie farms scorched brown in the worst drought in a century have been transformed by rain and snowmelt into rippling verdant fields this spring, giving struggling producers hope of a normal harvest. Prairie farmers enjoy green spring: Drought that withered crops in recent years appears to be over Penticton Herald | June 18, 2003 Prairie farms scorched brown in the worst drought in a century have been transformed by rain and snowmelt into rippling verdant fields this spring, giving struggling producers hope of a normal harvest. Crop Reports Emphasize the Positive The Leader-Post (Regina) | by Kevin Hursh | June 18, 2003 Drought is again rearing its ugly head in many areas of Saskatchewan. Unless there's substantial and widespread rain in the next week or two, a lot of farmers will be facing another crop failure. Drought Recovery Uncertain: Bureau The Age | June 17, 2003 Rural Australia was dealt a major blow with the Bureau of Meteorology warning a break in the drought would be patchier than first thought. In its latest seasonal outlook, the bureau slightly reduced the chances of good rains and at the same time predicted an increased likelihood of hotter than normal temperatures, particularly in northern Queensland and West Australia. After predicting better than normal rain for most of NSW last month, the bureau has now backed off. Kansas Feels Lingering Pinch from Drought Associated Press | by Carl Manning | June 17, 2003 Used cars sit unsold in this community. Merchandise languishes on store shelves. Stacks of lumber collect dust. Even barber chairs sit empty. Such are the unexpected costs of drought. Climate Change Alters Grassland Diversity PNAS Online Early Edition | June 16, 2003 Global climate change may rapidly alter grassland diversity, report the authors of article #2734. Erika Zavaleta nd colleagues studied the effects of four major factors associated with anthropogenic climate change--increased carbon dioxide, nitrogen deposition, precipitation, and temperature--at a biological preserve near San Francisco. The researchers divided a large field containing 43 different plant species into small parcels. Over 3 years, various parcels were gassed with CO2, fertilized with nitrogen, watered, or heated. The treatments were applied singly or in various combinations. Additional CO2 or nitrogen rapidly decreased species diversity, whereas additional water increased diversity. A 1°C temperature increase had no effect. Most of the diversity gains and losses occurred in forb species, which include all the wildflowers in a grassland, from native morning glories to dandelions. The effects of combined treatments were additive. For example, parcels that received both CO2 and nitrogen exhibited twice the decrease in diversity, compared to parcels that received just one of the treatments.These results demonstrate the importance of considering many climate change factors simultaneously, because the effects are additive. Prairie Farmers Anticipate Bumper Crops CBC News | June 15, 2003 Canadian wheat and barley crops are headed for a dramatic rebound this year after a crippling two-year drought. Drought over? Not yet please, Australia farmers say Planet Ark | June 13, 2003 It ought to have come as a relief to Australia's embattled farmers when a government crop forecasting unit pronounced the end of the worst drought in 100 years. But no. Much better crop year predicted The Leader-Post (Regina) | by Angela Hall | June 13, 2003 Western Canada's wheat crop is projected to return to normal this season thanks to rain and snow that replenished moisture reserves across much of the parched Prairies, the Canadian Wheat Board reported Thursday. Heavy Harvest, Scant Rainfall Damages Grapes, Sets Back Wisconsin Wineries Knight-Ridder Tribune | by Jason Stein, The Wisconsin State Journal | June 13, 2003 When their dormant grapevines started sprouting green buds this spring, the owners of Wollersheim Winery found a nasty surprise. "Some vines awoke the way we expected them to," said winemaker Philippe Coquard, "But the one next to it, or the five or ten next to it, were not greening up or showing any sign of life." Mormon Crickets Invading Western States Associated Press | by Sandra Chereb | June 13, 2003 Swarms of Mormon crickets are marching across the West, destroying rangeland and crops, slickening highways with their carcasses and leaving disgusted residents in their wake. Drought doubles Agricore losses The Calgary Herald | by Michelle Lang | June 12, 2003 The 2002 drought continued to take its toll on Agricore United Tuesday, nearly doubling losses at Canada's largest grain company during the second quarter of this year. Farmers-Drought Associated Press | by Emily Gersema | June 12, 2003 While gloomy and depressing for some, a streak of rainy days made farmers happy this spring, restoring soil moisture to normal levels across wide swaths of the Midwest and the central and southern Plains. Wheat Viruses Thriving Under Cool Conditions CropPEST Ontario Volume 8, Issue 7 | June 12, 2003 The prolonged cool, wet conditions have extended spring-like weather into June. In most years, virus symptoms caused by wheat spindle streak mosaic virus (WSSMV) and soilborne mosaic virus (SBMV) would be declining with the arrival of warm weather. Typical leaf symptoms of spindle streak are yellow to light green streaks which are parallel to the leaf veins. The streaks are often tapered which gives the lesions a spindle shape, hence the name. May Rain Showers Allay Drought Concerns Associated Press | by Emily Gersema | June 11, 2003 The streak of rainy days last month were gloomy and depressing for some people, but for farmers, they brought long-awaited relief for drought-parched land. Abares Report of Drought Over Ludicrous Red Meat Advisory Council Limited Media Release | June 11, 2003 The umbrella organisation for the entire Australian red-meat industry is astonished at ABAREs assertion that the current drought, the worst in 100 years, is over. Ethiopia: Drought-Hit Farmers Receive Emergency Aid: Pre-Famine Conditions in Pockets of the Country FAO Media Release | June 10, 2003 Drought-hit Ethiopian farmers have received emergency agricultural assistance to help them prepare land for the next planting season after months of devastating crop failure, FAO said today. Years of acute drought in several regions of the country, especially the south, have withered crops and left farming households destitute and unable to feed themselves. Dryness a Worry: Local Farmers Say Recent Rains Will Not Help Them For Long Daily Herald (Prince Albert) | by Charlene Tebbutt | June 10, 2003 Despite rolling hills of green grass in many areas around Prince Albert, local farmers say crop conditions are dry. After two years of severe drought, farmers say recent rains in the Prince Albert area won't be enough to keep them going for long. Growing Pains: Rain, Cold Stifling Crop Performance AgAnswers | June 10, 2003 Ohio corn and soybean farmers could have an exceptional season if the crops would only do one thing: grow. Wet conditions have kept some growers out of their fields to complete planting, while crops planted in April continue to struggle because of cool temperatures. Officials Say Australian Drought Over, But Farmers Sceptical Agence France Presse English | by Neil Sands | June 10, 2003 Australia's official agricultural forecaster declared an end to the worst drought on record Tuesday, predicting upcoming harvests would more than double -- but farmers warned it's not over yet. Drought Could Take Ethiopia's Economy Into the Red: World Bank Agence France Presse English | June 10, 2003 Ethiopia could register negative growth this year because serious drought has slashed agricultural output, the World Bank's representative for Ethiopia and Sudan said on Tuesday. Warmer Weather Turns Earth Greener, Weedier, Study Finds Knight-Ridder Tribune | by Dennis O'Brien | June 6, 2003 Earth is a greener planet than it was just 20 years ago, and scientists say that higher temperatures associated with global warming are helping plants to grow, including many nuisance plants. Wheat Gene Controlling Cold-Weather Requirement Cloned AgNet | University of California Davis Press Release| June 5, 2003 The gene that controls "vernalization," the biological process that requirescold temperatures to trigger flower formation in some plants, has been isolated and cloned in wheat for the first time by a team of researchers at the University of California, Davis. "We are hopeful that this discovery, combined with existing biotechnological methods, will facilitate better manipulation of flowering time in wheat," said the team's lead researcher, Jorge Dubcovsky, a professor and wheat breeder in UC Davis' agronomy and range science department. "It also should open the way to a better understanding of the complex network of genes responsible for determining flowering time in temperate cereal crops." Some plants, including certain wheat varieties, will not flower until they have been exposed to a certain period of cold temperatures. For example, winter wheat requires several weeks at low temperature, usually in the range of 40-50 F, in order to flower and eventually produce grain. It is thought that the plants evolved this vernalization mechanism to prevent the cold-sensitive flowering parts of the plants from developing during winter when they might be damaged by extremely cold winter temperatures. Previously, the VRN1 gene was known to largely control the vernalization process in wheat, but researchers didn't know a lot about it, other than its general location on three wheat chromosomes. To better identify the gene, Dubcovsky and colleagues used thousands of plants to develop detailed genetic and physical maps for the VRN1 region in wheat and for the same region in rice and sorghum. By comparing the maps, the researchers determined that the AP1 gene, which belongs to a family of genes known to be important to the regulation of flower development, is the VRN1 gene that regulates vernalization. Thinking About Crop Stress Pest Management and Crop Development University of Illinois | by Emerson Nafziger | June 5, 2003 It's become the excuse of last--and sometimes first--resort: When we are stressed about the condition of a crop and by unusual weather conditions, we tend to say that crops must be under stressas well. (Crops tend not to respond very noticeably to what we think or say about them, giving us a free hand to believe or say what we might.) Sometimes crops look as if they are under stress (growing more slowly than we expected or not the color we would like) and sometimes they look normal, but we tend to think that they must be under stress if it has been wetter, cooler, warmer, or drier than "normal." By normal we really mean average; those of us who have lived in Illinois for a long time know that it is normal for weather conditions to deviate considerably from average on any given date. In fact, weather conditions in recent weeks have precedence--they have happened at this time of the year in some previous years--and so they are within the "normal range." Cold, Little Sun Hurting N.J. Farms Associated Press | by Linda A. Johnson | June 3, 2003 Soybean plants a few inches high should be blanketing 600 acres of Steve Jany's fields by now. In The Dry Dry West, a Search for Solutions New York Times | by Michael Janofsky | June 2, 2003 For nearly two weeks now, daytime temperatures in some parts of Arizona have reached well over 100 degrees, far above normal for this time of year and a not-so-subtle reminder that the drought searing the West for the last five years is not going away. Reason for Optimism; Good Moisture Conditions Have Area Farmers Smiling Grande Prairie Daily Herald-Tribune | by Kathryn Engel | June 2, 2003 As he takes a break from seeding his wheat crop to refuel, Wanham-area farmer Shane Milkovich says if current conditions are any kind of a sign, this will be a great year in farming in the region. |
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