For decades, California strawberry growers like Rod Koda injected the potent pesticide methyl bromide into soil to kill bugs, weeds and plant diseases before planting strawberries. But the chemical was slated to be phased out by international treaty because it depletes the Earth's ozone layer. And later its replacement methyl iodide was pulled off the market after numerous public protests.
Now, California regulators have proposed stricter rules to protect the public from a third fumigant that Koda and other conventional berry growers use to sanitize their fields. The restrictions are pushing California's $2.3 billion strawberry industry toward developing non-chemical alternatives to pesticides.
Methyl iodide was pulled from the US market by its Japanese manufacturer last year after criticism from environmentalists and scientists who said the chemical may cause cancer. And only a small portion of growers are still allowed to use methyl bromide before it's completely disallowed. Environmentalists and farmworkers say those rules are not strict enough for chloropicrin, an eye and lung irritant once used in chemical warfare.
Many growers are already experimenting with growing strawberries without fumigation. On part of his land, Koda mixed a carbon source such as rice bran into the soil, places a tarp over the field and saturates the beds with water to trigger growth of bacteria. The bacteria rid the soil of Verticillium, one of the most persistent berry diseases, at similar levels that fumigation does, said University of California, Santa Cruz researcher Carol Shennan. But the method — called anaerobic soil disinfestation — is more time consuming, does not yet control for other strawberry diseases, and there isn't enough rice bran for all the growers.
Another option is growing strawberries in non-soil substances, filling the beds with coconut husk fiber or even pine bark — but such soil-less media are low in nutrients and require use of fertilizers. Soil pathogens can also be killed off with heat generated by a steam machine — researchers have already built and tested the prototype. This method may, in turn, require more use of herbicides to control unwanted weeds not killed off by the steam. "People said for years that growing strawberries without fumigation couldn't be done," said Steven Fennimore, a researcher with the University of California, Davis. "But to a limited extent it can be done, the technology is there."
Source: abcnews.go.com




Announcements
Job Offers
- Grower
- Senior Agronomist/Horticulturist and Agronomy/Horticulture Manager
- Growers & Assistant Growers
- Plant Biologist
- Ripening Officer Bananas / Exotics
- Grower and Nurser
- Farm Manager
- Floriculture Production Planning Manager
- Agricultural Mechanic / Crop Sprayer Operator
- Technical Services Manager
"Tweeting Growers"
Top 5 -yesterday
- UV light signals program plants to unlock their genetic potential
- Redwire to develop first commercial space greenhouse
- Belarus: Plans to build unique greenhouse complex in Brest Oblast
- How do horticultural crops defend themselves against fungal pathogens?
- Plant molecular geneticists discover, and begin to crack, the epigenetic code
Top 5 -last week
- Top tips for growing lettuce in a greenhouse
- New packaging for hydroponic fertilizer launched
- UK: Grower reduces greenhouse temperature by more than 6°C during heatwave with no cooling, fog systems
- Taking the wisdom from indoor farming and bringing it into greenhouses
- "Kawaguchi tomato variety good option for consumer, but also good for the grower"
Top 5 -last month
Receive the daily newsletter in your email for free | Click here
Other news in this sector:
- 2022-08-18 APHIS removes Mexican fruit fly quarantine areas in Texas
- 2022-08-17 The novel leucine-rich repeat receptor-like kinase MRK1 regulates resistance to multiple stresses in tomato
- 2022-08-17 Web-based tool helps blueberry growers control disease
- 2022-08-17 Ants can be used as biological crop protection, study finds
- 2022-08-17 Legend 5L ST seed treatment launched in US seed treatment market
- 2022-08-15 Discovery of the interactions between plants and arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi
- 2022-08-15 US: Students test pest management skills during 2022 Iowa Youth Crop Scouting Competition
- 2022-08-15 A bacteria found in marine coral reefs could have the solution to tomato wilt
- 2022-08-15 Controlling powdery mildew in greenhouses
- 2022-08-15 Monitoring thrips with image technology unique, benificial insects soon to be counted digitally
- 2022-08-12 Meet the wasp that mummifies and kills the tomato hornworm
- 2022-08-12 National probabilistic risk assessment of newly registered pesticides in agricultural products to propose MRL
- 2022-08-12 "Significant part of our lettuce assortment is highly resistant to Fusarium"
- 2022-08-11 More demand for pepper washers due to aphids
- 2022-08-10 Pest management for Spotted Wing Drosophila
- 2022-08-10 "National Biosecurity Strategy a positive step in protecting Australia’s agriculture industry from pests and disease"
- 2022-08-08 US: Basil downy mildew found in southern New Jersey
- 2022-08-08 The advantages of introducing useful insects into nurseries
- 2022-07-22 Research team identifies genes making strawberries resistant to Fusarium wilt
- 2022-07-22 Protect second cucumber crops from Pythium now