text:
Posts Tagged: Kate Wilkin
ANR in the news March 1-11
Western Innovator: Putting biologicals to work
(Capital Press) Padma Nagappan, March 11
Early in life, Surendra Dara decided that no matter which field he chose, he needed to make an impact on it. Always interested in science, he chose agriculture and specialized in entomology.
"It attracted me because it dealt with arthropods and there are a lot of physiological similarities to the human world," Dara said. "It was also critical for growing food and feeding humans."
Dara is now an entomopathologist with the University of California's Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources in San Luis Obispo, and has an established reputation for exploring innovative options to control pests using microbials as biological controls, and showing growers how they can also help with plant growth, drought resistance and fighting diseases.
Group linked to Ocasio-Cortez seeks ag input after Green New Deal backlash
(Politico) Helena Bottemiller Evich, March 11
After watching that drama unfold, Frank Mitloehner, a leading scientist on agricultural emissions at the University of California, Davis, was thrilled when two outreach staff affiliated with AOC's network reached out to set up a call to discuss the potential for climate mitigation efforts in agriculture. The call, held earlier this month, lasted more than an hour, Mitloehner said.
"I was very glad to inform of what I know, and they were very receptive to it," Mitloehner said on Agri-Talk last week. During the segment, he urged agricultural producers to not dismiss the left-wing climate effort.
Sudden surge in an unusual crime in Fresno County: Goat theft
(LA Times) Hannah Fry, March 11, 2019
…Picquette's two sons have been raising goats for the last five years as a 4-H project. Losing their animals has been especially hard for the boys, Picquette said, adding that they had planned to use money won during competitions to pay for college.
"They feel very violated. They don't understand how somebody could just come and take something they worked so hard for," she said. "The bond we have with the goats is incredible. I'm just heartbroken. I don't know if they're scared or hungry. … They've always been treated so well."
California's ambitious plan to stop deadly wildfires may not be enough, experts say
(SF Chronicle) Kurtis Alexander, March 9
… "It's not fair to say that fuel treatments won't do any good," said Max Moritz, a UC Cooperative Extension wildfire specialist at UC Santa Barbara. "It may provide some protection in some places. But most of us studying this agree that you can't just do this and (expect to) make much headway."
The plan by the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, or Cal Fire, comes at the request of Gov. Gavin Newsom. On his second day in office, Newsom asked the agency to develop a proposal to address the increasingly destructive fire seasons that have rattled the state and are expected to worsen with climate change.
…In the meantime, many researchers say the most effective approach to fire protection is not in the forests, but in communities. They recommend making homes more resistant to fire with hardier construction materials, and clearing the vegetation around them.
"You have to address the home vulnerabilities themselves," said Moritz at UC Santa Barbara. "If you don't, you're just not going to make a lot of progress on fire."
After more than 140 years, a massive fig tree gracing the plaza where Los Angeles was founded collapses
(LA Times) Matthew Ormseth, March 9
… The four figs were planted at El Pueblo by agriculturalist and City Councilman Elijah Hook Workman, KCET reported in 2013. The Ficus macrophylla was brought from Australia to Southern California in the 1860s and 1870s, probably to provide shade and ornamentation, said Donald Hodel, a horticulture advisor for the University of California's Cooperative Extension.
Hodel described the Moreton Bay fig as a commanding breed of tree with an enveloping canopy that threw plenty of shade.
His reasons for admiring the Moreton Bay fig: "Their grandeur; their size — they have an imposing habit; their root structure is incredible; the spreading nature of their branches."
Hodel said he last saw the El Pueblo figs about six years ago.
"I wasn't too impressed by their health or their size, considering they're 140-something years old," he said.
California's 2018 Was the Worst Ever Recorded for Wildfires
(Gizmodo) Tom McKay, March 9
University of California, Santa Barbara UC Cooperative Extension wildfire researcher Max Moritiz told the Chronicle, "It's not fair to say that fuel treatments won't do any good. It may provide some protection in some places. But most of us studying this agree that you can't just do this and (expect to) make much headway."
4-H leader who taught lost Benbow girls outdoor skills being flown to Washington, DC for recognition
Kym Kemp, March 7
When Leia Carrico, age 8, and her sister, Caroline, age 5, disappeared into the woods around their home near Benbow on March 1, the whole nation held its breath for the next 44 hours until they were found. But, though their 4-H leaders were worried, too, they say they also knew the girls had something many other children don't–they had survival skills from a class taught by their Outdoor Adventures 4-H project leader, Justin Lehnert.
Lehnert is being honored in Washington, DC, on Tuesday for his role in teaching Leia and Caroline outdoor skills.
Researchers highlight plan to eat healthy on a budget
(Consumer Affairs) Kristen Dalli, March 7
Following a healthy diet can come with a hefty price tag, but a team of researchers has outlined a way for consumers to stick to a healthy diet -- and also stick to their budgets.
According to the team, consumers -- and their families -- can have healthy meals if they focus on buying items in bulk and planning meals in advance.
"This study determines the likelihood that families living in low-income households could create meals that meet the USDA dietary guidelines presented in MyPlate nutrition education materials," said researcher Karen M. Jetter, PhD. "In addition to food cost, the other factors considered were access to stores, time for meal preparation, and whether the menus included culturally appropriate foods."
Healthy eating is possible on a limited budget, study shows
Study: Eating healthy on a budget is possible
Eating Healthy Is Possible on a Small Budget, Says Study
Sorry, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, but "farting cows" aren't the problem
(New Food Economy) Sam Bloch, March 7
…As it turns out, neither side was accurate. Republicans are likely to continue linking Green New Deal priorities to a supposed hamburger ban. But if you don't hear about cow farts anymore from AOC, it may not be because of GOP criticism. Frank Mitloehner, an animal scientist and air quality specialist at the University of California, Davis, insists cattle flatulence isn't the problem it's made out to be, and says he helped set the record straight.
Here's what seems to have happened. On February 4, shortly before Ocasio-Cortez announced the Green New Deal, she was speaking to school children in Queens, New York. When one asked how they could "combat" climate change, Ocasio-Cortez offered two practical options—stop using disposable razors, and skip meat and dairy for one meal.
Mitloehner tweeted at her.
"Dear @AOC: we all try to help the climate," he wrote. "However, the two options you offered have low impacts compared to the 800lb gorilla, which is to reduce fossil fuel use. About ⅔ of greenhouse gas emissions in the US stem from transport and energy prod&use. Meat/milk = 4 % of total GHG," referring to findings in a recent EPA report.
… "I give her team a lot of credit for reaching out," Mitloehner says. "If we really are serious about making a difference in carbon emissions, you cannot do this without agriculture involved."
California supplies a quarter of the world's sunflower seeds
(Capital Press) Padma Nagappan, March 7
…Khaled Bali is a University of California Department of Agriculture and Natural Resources statewide water and irrigation specialist who has been working since 2016 on a four-year trial on sunflower varieties.
He was asked by the University of Georgia to help ascertain which varieties were drought resistant. He chose to conduct his trial in the low desert region of the Imperial Valley, since it gets little rain during the growing season between February when it's planted, and June when it's harvested. This would make it easier to control and measure the actual water applied to the crop varieties.
"We're looking at 285 varieties of sunflowers, to see which ones do well under stress," Bali said. He has tested different plantings each growing season for the past three years, and will finish the trial this year.
Livestream coverage of fire protection panel discussion in Nevada City
(Sierra Sun) March 7
…Following the films, the community is invited to join an ongoing conversation around the new reality of living with fire in the wildland urban interface. Panelists represent a diverse cross-section of the wildfire prevention community including: Cal Fire, Fire Safe Council of Nevada County, Nevada County Office of Emergency Services, Nevada County Resource Conservation District, Pacific Gas and Electric Company, Tahoe National Forest and University of California Cooperative Extension. The panel discussion will be moderated by YubaNet Co-founder Pascale Fusshoeller. [Kate Wilkin, UCCE fire advisor, participates on the panel in the last hour of the video.]
Bees, blooms off to slow start
(Western Farm Press) Logan Hawkes, March 6
…This year, almond bloom started around a normal time, with some early varieties showing a few open flowers in the first week of February," reported Franz Niederholzer, UCCE farm advisor for Colusa, Sutter, and Yuba Counties. "For most of the month bloom progressed very slowly,"
By the middle of February, he says, "bloom for Nonpareil was at least two weeks behind, and bee hours were limited until the last week of the month. Last year, between Feb 1-20, we accumulated 130 bee hours of good honey bee flying weather [55 F., no rain, and wind less than 10 mph]. For the same interval this year, we had around 10 hours and only six of those occurred with open flowers in the orchard."
On the positive side of the slow start, Niederholzer says, the colder weather tends to suppress activity of key bloom diseases such as blossom brown rot and anthracnose. "However, cold weather at bloom was conducive to blossom blast (pseudomonas) bacteria, and some growers were considering adding materials to their normal bloom fungicides with bactericide activity."
Wet winter aids groundwater replenishment
(Ag Alert) Christine Souza, March 6
… Helen Dahlke, a hydrology expert and professor with the University of California, Davis, Department of Land, Air and Water Resources, has been working with farmers, studying on-farm groundwater recharge locations and suitability for various crops.
"In many regions, we can definitely do more actively recharging our groundwater aquifers," said Dahlke, who currently has trials on alfalfa at the UC Kearney Agricultural Center. "It really depends on what region, how much surface water is available for recharge, what kind of sediment structure or hydrogeology we have underneath and whether it's suited for conveying large amounts quickly."
Despite abundant precipitation in recent weeks, she said the timing is not the best for studying impact of recharge on certain crops.
"We prefer on-farm recharge to happen in January and February, just because that is considered the dormancy season for most crops," Dahlke said. "With almond trees already blooming, often there is a greater risk of applying water on those crops."
She said recent precipitation has helped groundwater recharge overall, but there is "very little way of estimating how much it is helping."
Drip irrigation improves yields of Imperial sugar beets
(Ag Alert) Padma Nagappan, March 6
Halfway through a two-year irrigation trial to test furrow irrigation versus drip on sugar beet in California's Imperial Valley, Ali Montazar is looking for ways to boost yields with as little water consumption as possible in a region where furrow irrigation is the common practice.
Montazar, irrigation and water management advisor with the University of California department of agriculture and natural resources (UCANR) in Imperial County, is comparing and evaluating sugar beets for crop water use, sugar percentage, and yield, using both furrow and drip, since growers are now thinking of switching to subsurface drip.
Preliminary results from year one of the trial show that yield and crop water use are better with drip. Yield was 21 percent higher, and water use was a few points lower.
NFU says "No" to Green New Deal
(DTN) Jerry Hagstrom and Chris Clayton, March 6
Frank Mitloehner, an animal-science professor and air-quality Extension specialist at the University of California-Davis, reached out to Ocasio-Cortez's team about agriculture and the Green New Deal after seeing social media posts late last month about "farting cows" that drew a great deal of attention.
"I appreciate her interest in climate-change mitigation, but the 800-pound gorilla is the use of fossil fuels, and I told her that even the notion of cow flatulence makes this whole thing sound silly, and that's not what we need this discussion to be," Mitloehner told DTN in an interview.
From Farting Cows to More Beans; Anti-Livestock Claims Fall Short
(AgriTalk) Jennifer Shike, March 5
The EAT-Lancet Commission on Food, Planet, Health is backpedaling as industry leaders and scientists poke holes in its "planetary diet" released in mid-January that is supposed to improve human health and planet health.
Air Quality Extension Expert Frank Mitloehner of the University of California Davis joined Chip Flory on AgriTalk Monday to discuss EAT-Lancet and Green New Deal in more depth.
4-H instructor who taught NorCal sisters how to survive in wilderness speaks out
(ABC7) Dion Lim, March 4
ABC7 News spoke exclusively to the 4-H instructor who taught two young girls the life-saving skills they needed to survive a weekend lost in the woods.
… Their mom, Misty Carrico, says she's not sure her daughters would have survived, if not for their 4-H program.
"The group leader Justin has taught them fire making skills and wilderness survival skills."
Justin Lehnert, the girls' 4-H leader, said, "I'm ecstatic that they did the job that they did. They're very strong girls and they stayed calm."
… Nine-year-old Caroline Gelormini has been a member of the San Bruno-South San Francisco 4-H Program for five years. Thanks to 4-H, she feels like she'd have a shot at surviving in the woods too.
Ocasio-Cortez Seeks Ag Data on Green New Deal
(Drovers) John Herath, March 4
When freshman congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez released her Green New Deal plan, social media lit up with talk of her plan's mentions of "farting cows." That drew the attention of agriculture's preeminent expert on air quality, Dr. Frank Mitloehner of the University of California at Davis, who tweeted back at the congresswoman.
"I don't know whether my tweet was the reason, but a few hours after I tweeted her, all mentioning of cow flatulence were taken off the web pages and of all social media outlets and was never to be heard again," Mitloehner told Chip Flory on the AgriTalk Radio Show Monday.
2 missing Humboldt County girls found — 'absolute miracle
(SF Chronicle) Michael Cabanatuan, March 3
…Little additional information was available on how the girls went missing or how they survived, but Honsal said they had been trained in outdoors survival as members of a 4-H program.
Organic farm east of Denair does its part on climate change. It's getting an award
(Modesto Bee) John Holland, March 2
…The family won in the farmer/rancher category of the Climate Leadership Awards. The others:
- Researcher: Tapan Pathak of the University of California Cooperative Extension in Merced, who helps farmers adapt to climate change.
- Policymaker: Ken Alex, who was director of former Gov. Jerry Brown's Office of Planning and Research
- Legislative staff: Brett Williams, office of Assemblywoman Jacqui Irwin, D-Thousand Oaks
- Agricultural professional: Ruth Dalquist-Willard, UC Cooperative Extension, Fresno
Eructation Inflation: Greenhouse Gas Emissions of Livestock
(Science for the Rest of Us) March 1
Put your nerd hat on -- we cover a lot of ground in this fast-paced discussion with Dr. Frank Mitloehner of the University of California-Davis about the greenhouse gas emissions associated with the meat and dairy we consume. We consider how livestock emissions compare to other sectors of the US and global economies, the carbon footprint of vegetarian diets and what is the most effective way to reduce individual carbon emissions.
Keeping the Carbon Footprint of Livestock in Perspective
(AgNet West) Brian German, March 1
…"It is irresponsible and it's misguiding the public to believe that the true sources of pollution are downplayed, and the impacts of animal agriculture are grossly inflated," said Dr. Frank Mitloehner, Professor and Air Quality Specialist in Cooperative Extension in the Department of Animal Science at the University of California, Davis.
June 2018 news clips
Agricultural advances draw opposition that blunts innovation
(Science) Anne Q. Hoy, June 29
Scientists are using technology to expand global food production and ease its environmental impact, but advances are being challenged by claims that lack scientific evidence and raise public distrust and concern, a leading agricultural scientist told an American Association for the Advancement of Science audience.
Alison Van Eenennaam traced the advent of campaigns against agricultural innovations related to areas from cattle and chicken production systems to plant biotechnology. The impact such efforts are having on agricultural advances was the focus of the ninth annual AAAS Charles Valentine Riley Memorial Lecture on 5 June at the AAAS headquarters in Washington, D.C.
UC Davis Experts Help Farmers, Ranchers Profit in Growing Trend
(Cal Ag Today) Patrick Cavanaugh, June 29
Many farmers could benefit from agritourism and the added value it brings, but developing successful agritourism operations can be tricky. Experts at the Agricultural Sustainability Institute (ASI) at UC Davis are helping farmers and others in the agricultural community understand the regulations, permits, insurance, marketing and other considerations needed to succeed.
"Agritourism operations are more successful when they're part of a supportive community of tourism professionals, county regulators, agriculture regulations and others," says Gail Feenstra, ASI's food, and society coordinator.
Feenstra and her team recently received a $73,000 grant from Western Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education, a U.S. Department of Agriculture program, to develop training, resources and peer support for farmers and ranchers considering agritourism. Feenstra is working with Penny Leff, ASI's statewide agritourism coordinator and team project manager.
Green thumbs at the Marin County Fair
Wendy Irving, June 29
…UC Marin master gardeners is a group of more than 300 trained volunteers who work as non-paid staff members of the University of California Cooperative Extension. There are master gardener programs in 50 counties across California; our Marin group is one of the largest and most active.
Answer to how urban coyotes thrive is not for weak-stomached
(Texarkana Gazette) From the LA Times, June 29
This scientific study is a coyote postmortem on an unprecedented scale—it has so far documented the contents of 104 stomachs and intends to examine 300 by the end of the year. The team, led by Niamh Quinn, UC Cooperative Extension's human-wildlife interactions advisor, is already generating a wealth of data to better understand how these omnivorous canids sample everything from pocket gophers to hiking boots while managing to survive in a land of 20 million people.
Mechanized vineyard saves labor, boosts quality
(Western Farm Press) Tim Hearden, June 27
Kaan Kurtural started working on a fully mechanized vineyard to help growers save on labor costs, but then he noticed it also produced grapes with superior quality.
"We made wine from these last year and compared it to our traditionally-farmed vineyards," says Kurtural, a specialist in the University of California-Davis Department of Viticulture and Enology. "Until we tell people what it is, they can't distinguish the quality of the fruit or the wine."
He demonstrated the 40-acre experimental vineyard during a recent field day at the UC-Davis Oakville Station north of Napa. About 200 winegrape growers, vineyard consultants, and other industry representatives attended.
Several methods available to control vineyard weeds
(Western Farm Press) Tim Hearden, June 27
As most fumigants in California are being phased out, growers are having to find other ways to control weeds in young vineyards.
And while weeding by hand has been done, increased costs and a shrinking labor force have made this task impractical, says John Roncoroni, University of California Cooperative Extension Weed Science Farm Advisor in Napa County.
New podcast offers advice to California farmers
(Capital Press) Padma Naggapan, June 26
Two enterprising farm advisors with the University of California's cooperative extension have begun a podcast that will focus on tree crops and other produce grown in the Central Valley.
Called "Growing the Valley," the podcast will have a new episode every two weeks, with each episode focused on news growers can use, such as managing specific pests, irrigation techniques, alerts about what to watch out for, and what tasks to take care of at particular times of the year.
Proactive Pawnee Fire response in Lake County seeks to avoid another catastrophe
(SF Chronicle) Lizzie Johnson, June 25
"I've never seen so much focused attention in Sacramento on the issue," said Keith Gilless, a professor of forest economics and dean of the College of Natural Resources at UC Berkeley.
"Last year, 2017, got everybody's attention," said Gilless, chair of the California State Board of Forestry and Fire Protection. "Last year was just terrible. Everybody involved is doing their best to be as prepared as we can. Any area might burn now, including those with much higher structure densities than they did 20 or 50 years ago.
"You are going to need a lot of resources that you might not have needed before," he said. "The state is being very aggressive in its suppression efforts."
UC's Humiston welcomes visiting Chinese ag scientists
(Farm Press) Jeannette Warnert, June 25
UC Agriculture and Natural Resources vice president Glenda Humiston recently welcomed a delegation of Chinese agricultural scientists to UC ANR's Intermountain Research and Extension Center in Tulelake, reported Danielle Jester in the Siskiyou Daily News.
With vineyard labor scarce, Napa growers warm up to machines
(Napa Valley Register) Henry Lutz, June 24
On a recent morning at the UC Davis Oakville Experimental Station, extension specialist Dr. Kaan Kurtural walked along the edge of an especially tall block of Cabernet Sauvignon.
Planted in 2016, the block hosts 1,340 vines and produces roughly 15 to 18 pounds of fruit per vine. "So it'll be yielding quite nice," Kurtural said as he walked down the 62-inch tall rows.
Far more notable than the vineyard's fruit, however, is how it gets farmed.
"There are no hand practices out here," said Kurtural. "Everything is done by machine."
Early Detection Key to Managing Ceratocystis Canker in Almonds
(Growing Produce) Dianne Munson, June 22
...Based on a statewide survey out of the Department of Pathology at University of California, Davis, canker diseases are the primary cause of tree death in almond orchards, and Ceratocystis canker is one of the most prevailing canker diseases found in California. This canker disease is aggressive, but it doesn't have to mean disaster.
"If you know what to look for, the disease is manageable," says Florent Trouillas, UC Cooperative Extension Specialist, Department of Plant Pathology, University of California, Davis.
California has 27M more dead trees than in 2016, but numbers may be easing in some areas
(Ventura County Star) Cheri Carlson, June 22
"Trees aren't getting moisture that they need to be healthy and they're stressed," said Susan Kocher, a natural resources adviser for UC Cooperative Extension. "We had a huge insect outbreak because of the drought."
Kocher, based in South Lake Tahoe, focuses on the Central Sierra, where stands of ponderosa pines were hit hard by beetle attacks.
…The highest risk of fire is when trees still have their needles – the so-called "red and dead" phase, Kocher said. Green needles turn red, and those dried-out needles are a particularly flashy fuel, like tinder in a campfire. Once the needles fall off, the risk drops a bit.
Chinese scientists visit Tulelake
(Siskiyou Daily News) Danielle Jester, June 20
The University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources Intermountain Research and Extension Center in Tulelake hosted a group of scientists from Chinese universities on Sunday; the scientists are on a tour of agriculture in northern California through June 22.
University of California Vice President of Agriculture and Natural Resources Glenda Humiston explained the purpose of the tour, noting, "The Chinese face many of the same issues that we do here in the U.S. The Chinese universities want to improve rural economic development to lift up the quality of life for people in rural communities.
"They are also responding to global climate change, drought and pests while trying to improve food security and water use efficiency. They see UC Cooperative Extension as an effective research model; we hope that scientific collaborations will accelerate solutions and help maintain relations for California agriculture with China."
It's summer. Here's how to preserve those fresh fruits and veggies
(San Luis Obispo Tribune) Rosemary Orr, June 20
June in San Luis Obispo County is a wonderful time to start preserving our summer bounty of fruits and vegetables.
The UCCE Master Food Preservers will teach the basic principles of food preservation and canning in its Introduction to Canning class on Saturday.
With wildfire season at hand, California on slightly safer footing this year
(SF Chronicle) Kurtis Alexander, June 17
… But as significant, and plentiful, as the new fire-protection measures are, they merely nip at the edge of an underlying issue: that fire is a constant in California, and as long as people choose to live in and around the state's wildlands, experts say, the threat remains.
"I would not be surprised if we have another big fire," said Bill Stewart, forestry specialist at the University of California, Berkeley. "I just don't think we're where we need to be."
… "We really haven't put together the pieces of a resilient fire strategy in local areas," Stewart said.
Reducing food waste to combat world hunger
(Morning Ag Clips) June 17
One-third of the world's food is spoiled or tossed rather than eaten, a fact that is tragic when nearly one billion people go hungry. The injustice of food waste is worsened by the fact that food decomposing in landfills emits greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change.
UC Cooperative Extension is working closely with the cities and county of Santa Clara in a far-reaching program to divert organic matter – food and green waste – from landfills by composting and using the product to enrich soil in the home garden.
From dendrometers to drones, devices drive ag-tech boom
(Farm Press) Tim Hearden, June 16
Agriculture across the country is going high-tech, and California is leading the way as the tree nut and other industries are looking for ways to save water.
Agriculture across the country is going high-tech, as the ag and food sectors invested $10.1 billion in digital technologies in 2017, according to a University of California study. That's up from $3.2 billion in 2016, reports the UC's Giannini Foundation for Agricultural Economics.
In California, which was the leading state last year with $2.2 billion spent to adopt new technologies in ag and food production, UC Cooperative Extension researchers are researching or developing lots of new, innovative ideas. And growers are putting them to work in their fields and orchards.
Santa Barbara County Avocado Farmer Struggles to Find Workers Amid Immigration Crackdown
(CNN Money/KTLA) Kristen Holmes, June 15
…"The crops that are most affected are the ones that use hired labor," explains Daniel Sumner, director of the University of California, Agricultural Issues Center at UC Davis, pointing to avocados, berries and tree fruits. "It's really now through the rest of the summer that we're going to hear more and more farmers and farm workers rushing to get a harvest in with really not enough labor force to do it. And that's a real challenge. It may mean that we have crops rotting in the fields."
Research Nets Going Over Citrus Trees To Prevent Huanglongbing Disease
(Cal Ag Today) Jessica Theisman, June 15
Beth Grafton-Cardwell is the director of the Lindcove Research Extension Center in Tulare County and research entomologist based out of the University of California, Riverside. She recently told California Ag Today that there is work being done on installing a net structure to protect trees from Asian Citrus Psyllids, which spread the deadly Huanglongbing disease. Texas A&M researchers are installing net structures on the edge of groves to block psyllids from coming into an orchard.
Overburdened growers fuel an ag-tech investment boom
(Western Farm Press) Tim Hearden, June 14
…While ag was slower than some other industries at adopting digital technologies, farm and food sector investments in these technologies zoomed to $10.1 billion nationwide last year, up from $3.2 billion in 2016, according to a new University of California report.
California was the leading state for ag-tech investments with $2.2 billion in 2017, or 22 percent of the total, and ag and food producers in the Golden State spent $5.1 billion on new technologies between 2012 and 2017, reports the UC Giannini Foundation for Agricultural Economics.
UCD Oakville Field Day Highlights: Trellis Trials, Red Blotch Vector Update, Mechanization Tools
(Wine Business) Ted Rieger, June 12
The University of California, Davis (UCD) hosted its annual Grape Day at the Oakville Station experimental vineyard in Napa Valley June 6 with talks and presentations by UC Cooperative Extension specialists, and presentations and equipment demos from vineyard industry suppliers.
UCD viticulture extension specialist Dr. Kaan Kurtural showed a trial planted in 2016 with six different trellis systems designed for mechanical harvest in a 1-acre block at the experimental vineyard using Cabernet Sauvignon 08 on 3309 rootstock. The six trellis types include: a traditional vertical-shoot- positioned (VSP) trellis as a control; a single high-wire system designed for mechanized management; a high-quad system; a cane-pruned system with 12-inch cross arms for a sprawl-type canopy; and two versions of a relaxed VSP, one with a T-top post for a wider canopy.
Local groups offer water measurement course
(Siskiyou Daily News) June 12
The Siskiyou County Cattlemen, Siskiyou County Farm Bureau and University of California, Cooperative Extension will sponsor a Water Measurement and Reporting Course in order to comply with Senate Bill 88.
New Potato Varieties Displayed at Field Day in Kern County
(AgNet West) Brian German, June 11
Dozens of industry professionals took part in the annual Kern County Potato Variety Field Day where attendees got an opportunity to view new potato varieties and see the progress of ongoing growing trials.
"The potato field day in Kern County has a long history, it's been going on for generations essentially," said Farm Advisor Emeritus with Kern County Cooperative Extension Joe Nunez. "It's an opportunity for the growers to see all the new varieties that are being developed throughout the country and see how they perform here in Kern County because our growing conditions here are a little bit different than where most of the potato varieties are being developed."
Debating California Tillage
(Farm Equipment) Alan Stenum, June 9
Despite differing opinions, Alan Wilcox, of Wilcox Agri-Products and Jeff Mitchell, no-till advocate at University of California–Davis, sat down during World Ag Expo in Tulare, Calif., to discuss the challenges and the opportunities for conservation tillage practices to take hold in California's Central Valley.
Letter: Residents get primer on fire preparedness
(Chico Enterprise-Record) Calli-Jane DeAnda, June 8
May was wildfire awareness month and the community participated in the wildfire safety fair at Lake Oroville Visitor Center on Saturday, May 19. At this fantastic event community members were able to get information about how to sign up for emergency notifications, access the evacuation preparedness plan, get wildfire recovery information and get tips for protecting homes from wildfire.
Kate Wilkin, UC Cooperative Extension, provided two presentations on prescribed fire and ways to protect homes from wildfire. Local fire-safe councils were there to answer the question: What does a fire-safe council do?
Why a Decline in Insects Should Bug You
(Wall Street Journal) Jo Craven McGinty, June 8
Entomologists want to put a bug in your ear: Insects are necessary for the survival of mankind.
"It's the classic third-grade food chain," said Richard Redak, an entomologist at the University of California, Riverside, and co-author of the book "Bugs Rule!" "If you pull insects out, you've got a problem."
…"Any organic product in a human's life probably has a beneficial insect and a pesty insect," Dr. Redak said. "The pesty ones are an incredibly small fraction of the total. Those that are not a problem are critical to the ecosystem."
Brown Marmorated Stink Bug Officially Deemed Pest of California Almonds
(Growing Produce) David Eddy, June 7
Brown marmorated stink bug (BMSB) is certainly not new to California growers, but in the wake of some more troubling finds, it is now officially a pest of almonds.
Almonds are now listed as a preferred host on the Stop BMSB website, which was created by a team of researchers from all over the country dedicated to finding a way to stop the pest from damaging a wide range of crops.
One of those researchers is Jhalendra Rijal, University of California Cooperative Extension Area IPM Advisor for San Joaquin, Stanislaus, and Merced counties, who said the first such damage was just two years ago, when they were found in peaches. The actual first finding in the state was three years before that, in Sacramento, but despite being a very large find, they never appeared to spread, adding to the mystery of BMSB movement.
Visible smoke coming from UC field station burn
(The Union) June 7
Nevada County residents wondering why there is smoke in the air coming from our neighbors to the west today may be seeing smoke from a live fire training held by the University of California Cooperative and Extension at a field station in Browns Valley, according to Cal Fire spokesperson Mary Eldridge.
UCCE advisors launch 'Growing the Valley' podcast
(Farm Press) Jeannette Warnert, June 5
A new UC Cooperative Extension podcast that focuses on growing orchard crops in the San Joaquin and Sacramento valleys is now available free at http://growingthevalleypodcast.com, Apple iTunes and Google Play Music.
The hosts are Phoebe Gordon, UCCE orchard systems advisor in Madera and Merced counties, and Luke Milliron, UCCE orchard systems advisor for Butte, Tehama and Glenn counties. The pair conduct research and extension programs that cover tree crops, with a focus on almonds, pistachios, walnuts, prunes, figs and cling peaches.
7 Highlights from the 2018 World Meat Congress
(Pork) U.S. Meat Export Federation, June 4
The 2018 World Meat Congress concluded Friday with sessions focused on consumer trends and education, as well as an in-depth look at cutting-edge technologies reshaping meat production around the world. The 22nd World Meat Congress was held in Dallas May 31 and June 1. Hosted by the U.S. Meat Export Federation (USMEF) and the International Meat Secretariat (IMS), the event drew about 700 participants from more than 40 countries.
…The panel featured Gary Rodrigue, blockchain food trust leader for the IBM Corporation; Dr. Martin Wiedmann, Gellert family professor in food safety at Cornell University; and Dr. Alison Van Eenennaam, cooperative extension specialist for animal genomics and biotechnology at the University of California-Davis.
… Van Eenennaam, whose program at UC-Davis focuses on research and education around the use of animal genomics and biotechnology in livestock production systems, explained the value of gene editing. For example, research is underway to utilize gene editing to prevent such diseases as African swine fever in hogs and tuberculosis in cattle.
"What better way to approach dealing with disease than through genetic improvement?" she noted.
Use of gene editing to introduce the polled trait into elite germplasm
(Progressive Dairyman) Alison L. Van Eenennaam and Maci L. Mueller, June 4
Physical dehorning of dairy cattle is a standard practice to protect both human dairy workers and other animals from injury. However, it is not only costly for producers, but also painful and stressful for the animals. As a result, dehorning is currently facing increased public scrutiny as an animal welfare issue. Despite these factors, 94 percent of U.S. dairy cattle producers report routine dehorning.
Early Ripening Grapes Could Revolutionize Raisin Production
(Growing Produce) Matthew Fidelibus, June 2, 2018
The USDA-ARS raisin grape breeding program has long focused on the development of early ripening varieties. Early ripening allows drying to begin sooner, thus helping to avoid inclement weather and enable production of dry-on-vine (DOV) raisins. 'Fiesta' and 'Selma Pete' are examples of early ripening raisin grapes from the USDA that have helped change the way California raisins are made.


text:
You are currently browsing the tag archive for the 'script' tag.
Jean Renoir arrived in America for the first time on New Year's Eve 1940 on an American liner sailing from Lisbon to New York. He swiftly left the Big Apple for Sunset Boulevard and by the middle of January had been signed to a contract with 20th Century-Fox. It wasn't until the end of May however, after having had a series of ideas for stories rejected, that Renoir was able to begin on his first American film Swamp Water, scripted by Dudley Nichols and based on a novel by Vereen Bell.
Despite having been relatively forgotten even in relation to Renoir's American oeuvre Swamp Water, while at times frustrating, is ultimately impressive. It tells of the vast Okeefenokee swampland of Georgia and focuses on young Ben Ragan's (Dana Andrews) encounter with Tom Keefer (Walter Brennan) an accused murderer who has been hiding out in the swamp for years. Particularly strong is the film's use of depth photography in its location shooting of Okeefenokee as well as in some key dramatic scenes.
Likewise of interest is the film's attempt to get at the accent of the American South, which, while possibly not in itself immensely researched, nonetheless feels accurate, with performances aided by the script's strong sense of linguistic authenticity. The script also contains some sharp comic moments, a good example being Ben Ragan and Keefer's daughter Julie's (Anne Baxter) first romantic encounter, in which Ben tells Julie that "You're a heap prettier than Mabel is, if you was a little bigger" to which Julie responds, "I could grow more maybe!"
In this piece I will focus, however, on the film's central story, which on the surface might appear fairly melodramatic and apolitical and has indeed generally been received this way. Although Swamp Water was assigned to Renoir, rather than chosen by him, it nevertheless was of interest to the director who commented that, "it is still something to be able to direct a film with a story that is not completely idiotic." Screenwriter Dudley Nichols was an established figure and had worked throughout his career with such directors as John Ford, Howard Hawks and Fritz Lang. Renoir and Nichols got along very well, no doubt not in small part due to the fact that Nichols' previous experience with these directors must have left him very open to possible revisions of his work. I will argue here that while on the surface Swamp Water appears to be an escapist drama, it has a political subtext that touches at once on issues both of the American South and of the Europe that Renoir had recently escaped.
A key example of a theme in Nichols' script that appears to have been worked on by Renoir is that of humans as being not dissimilar to animals. For example, Ben like his dog is an adventurer who gets easily lost, while Julie like her kittens is small but bites when threatened.
There is nothing in the film's narrative or script, however, that could be seen to have prompted the decision to have Tom Keefer horizontally creep up on Ben the first time we see him, paralleling him with the alligators that haunt the swamplands; this seems likely to be Renoir's image.
And the choice that Julie remain silent for a long-time into the film (which incidentally is perfect for Baxter's acting, which is of a high-emotional tenor) and have wild hair and a wide-eyed performance, all seem to extend her appearance as a cat beyond those expressed on the page.
These images of Ben and Julie are undoubtedly fairly romantic and arguably mildly condescending towards the real people of small-towns in America. Indeed Renoir was close friends with Robert Flaherty, who arranged for Renoir's journey to America; and Flaherty had made the famously condescending ethnographic documentary of the Inuits, Nanook of the North (1922.) And Renoir said of Georgia that it was "an old country, very primitive, with peasants who remind me of the inhabitants of very isolated corners of Brittany" and that "the families have no idea of quitting their wooden farmhouses. The tree which shades the porch has been planted by some ancestor." (1)
On closer inspection, however, this theme is a little more complex than it first appears, since beneath the surface of this more romantic animal imagery there is also the image of the hunt. The brutality of rabbit hunting had been central to Renoir's previous film La Regle du Jeu (1939), a symbol of human brutality: as a man is killed we are shown a close up of a rabbit being shot. In both films the hunt is presented as a social convention upholding bourgeois society's cruel and arbitrary rules. In Swamp Water the culmination of Ben's ostracism from his community is represented in his no longer being allowed to hunt foxes alongside his neighbours. But the villagers' hunt can also be paralleled to their blood-thirsty desire to catch Tom Keefer and have him hanged.
In this respect Swamp Water can be considered a film about the lynch-mob mentality, following on from Fritz Lang's fairly recent film for MGM on the subject, equally with an all-white cast, Fury (1936.) Seen this way Swamp Water's opening image of a skull sitting on the top of a cross in the centre of the river which is a marker to help guide people through the river, can also be considered as suggesting that the film can be read as a Christian allegory of Jesus' unjust crucifixion.
Considering the setting of Georgia it is strange that this film has no black characters (and very few black extras.) It is possibly the case that, just as with Lang's film, it was thought that too overt reference to race could be dangerous. (2)
Despite this, however, Tom's daughter Julie, while literally white, could certainly pass symbolically as black. Indeed her reputation in the village has been blackened by her father's name and she is treated as inferior, forced to take on the role of live-in maid, one that in Hollywood cinema is traditionally taken by a black character. Equally when Ben takes her to a ball the community are surprised and while she receives some compliments the family for which she works disapprove, which is certainly suggestive of the racial issue of segregation.
A final image that suggests the racial allegory in the film is the quite blatant fact that despite Ben's dog having the name Trouble he actually does not get Ben directly into trouble. This red herring is similar to the paralleling of Tom with the alligator, whose viciousness turns out not to be in Tom's nature. In each case there is an overturning of our perceptions of a dangerous "other." Key here, however, is the fact that these quite central and obvious negations of the danger of "otherness" do not seem to have any direct reference to racism against black people, but are far broader. Clearly this more general space for considering the unfair victimization of some form of "other" makes the film, like Lang's Fury, equally open to being read as an allegory about the victimization of Jews under the Nazis throughout Europe.
While Swamp Water contains various hints that it is intended as in part racial allegory, most viewers today will probably not notice this and indeed neither would have many at the time of the film's release. The initial script of Swamp Water was greatly cut by the time the film came together: a memo from Darryl F. Zanuck to Renoir pressing him to hurry the production along notes that the script, "has been cut to 137 pages. Over 45 pages have been removed". (3) Equally, a key scene that Renoir shot was cut and Zanuck constructed another scene to replace the gap that had now been made in the plot. (4) It seems likely that a closer look at all the elements that didn't make it into the film's final cut, if available, along with the various discussions amongst the filmmakers involved in Swamp Water's production might well yield further political aspects of the film. Nevertheless I would say that something of a political perspective remains in this film, if only in its overt argument against the victimization of an "other" that may well have been recognized by some viewers at the time, if on an unconscious rather than conscious level, as a reflection on the dangers of fascism.
Ben Dooley.
(1) Sesonske, Alexander, 'Discovering America: Jean Renoir 1941', Sight and Sound, Autumn 1981, pp. 256-261.
(2) Eisner, Lotte H., Fritz Lang, Da Capo, 1988, p. 164.
(3) Vitanza, Elizabeth, 'Another Grand Illusion: Jean Renoir's First Year in America', The Film Journal, http://www.thefilmjournal.com/issue12/renoir.html
(4) Sesonske.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Blood Pressure
~ Florence Brown, M.D.
Checking your blood pressure is one of the most important things you can do when you have diabetes. By keeping your blood pressure in check you can avoid serious complications such as heart failure, stroke, and kidney and eye disease.
At Joslin we recommend that you have your blood pressure measured at every medical visit, or at least once a year. You should aim for blood pressure readings of less than 130/80 mmHg. If you already have complications due to diabetes, such as kidney disease, your blood pressure goal may be different. Ask your healthcare provider what your goal should be.
How the test works
Getting your blood pressure measured is quick and easy. A blood pressure cuff is wrapped around your upper left arm. The cuff is then inflated, and the healthcare provider who is taking the blood pressure reading will track your heart sounds as the cuff is released. Often, your pulse will be checked after your blood pressure is measured.
How to lower your blood pressure
Lifestyle changes can help lower your blood pressure. A healthy eating plan, physical activity, losing weight if you need to, lowering stress and cutting back on salt and caffeine all have a positive effect. Medication can also play an important role in regulating blood pressure. In some cases, your provider may ask you to check your blood pressure at home using a home blood pressure monitor. Checking your blood pressure between medical visits gives your provider valuable information to help him or her better adjust your treatment plan.
Remember, with proper treatment and management of blood pressure, you can live a long and healthy life and reduce your chances of getting complications from high blood pressure. Know your blood pressure goal and take the necessary steps to keep it under good control.
More Information
- Would you like a summary of the"Six tests for Staying Healthy with Diabetes," featured in this series. Click here to download the PDF file.
Page last updated: November 07, 2019


text:
The mysteries surrounding the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, and the true identities of some of its passengers, are as deep as the South China Sea waters a multinational search team is canvassing for the jet.
One promising lead has turned out to be a dead end. A "strange object" spotted by a Singaporean search plane late Sunday afternoon is not debris from the missing jetliner, a U.S. official familiar with the issue told CNN on Sunday.
A U.S. reconnaissance plane "thought it saw something like debris but it was a false alarm," said the official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
By the end of the day Sunday, more than 40 planes and more than two dozen ships from several countries were involved in the search.
Two reconnaissance aircraft from Australia, and one plane and five sea vessels from Indonesia were the latest additions, Azharuddin Abdul Rahman, the director general of civil aviation in Malaysia, told reporters Sunday.
In addition, the Chinese navy dispatched a frigate and an amphibious landing ship, according to a online post by China's navy. Those ships are expected to arrive on site Monday morning (Sunday night ET).
Those reinforcements join the rescue teams already scouring the South China Sea, near the Gulf of Thailand, on Sunday for any sign of where the flight, operated by Malaysia's flagship airline, might have gone down, Malaysian authorities said.
The area in focus, about 90 miles south of Vietnam's Tho Chu Island, is where a Vietnamese search plane reportedly spotted oil slicks that stretched between 6 and 9 miles.
Malaysian authorities have not yet confirmed the report of the oil slicks, which came from Vietnam's official news agency.
Big questions far outweigh the few fragments of information that have emerged about the plane's disappearance.
What happened to the plane? Why was no distress signal issued? Who exactly was aboard?
The flight may have changed course and turned back toward Kuala Lumpur, Malaysian military officials said at a news conference Sunday.
But the pilot appears to have given no signal to authorities that he was turning around, the officials said, attributing the change of course to indications from radar data.
As the search continues, the agonizing wait goes on for relatives of the 227 passengers and 12 crew members on board the plane.
Among the passengers, there were 154 people from China or Taiwan; 38 Malaysians, and three U.S. citizens. Five of the passengers were younger than 5 years old.
Stolen passports
Two people who traveled on the missing passenger jet, using the stolen passports of an Italian and an Austrian citizen, appear to have bought their tickets together.
The tickets were bought from China Southern Airlines in Thailand's baht currency at identical prices, according to China's official e-ticket verification system Travelsky. The ticket numbers are contiguous, which indicates the tickets were issued together.
Here's where the mystery deepens: Italy and Austria have said that none of their citizens were on board the plane. And officials say the Italian and Austrian whose names were on the passenger manifest both had their passports stolen in Southeast Asia in recent years.
The two tickets booked with China Southern Airlines both start in Kuala Lumpur, flying to Beijing, and then onward to Amsterdam. The Italian passport's ticket continues to Copenhagen, the Austrian's to Frankfurt.
Authorities say they are investigating the identities of some of those on board who appear to have issues with their passports.
Passenger manifest questioned
A fuller picture of what happened may not become available until searchers find the plane and its flight data recorder.
"We have not been able to locate anything, see anything," Azharuddin Abdul Rahman, the director general of civil aviation in Malaysia, told reporters Sunday.
Confusion over who exactly was on the plane has drawn particular attention, notably the case of the Italian and Austrian passports.
The passport mystery raised concerns about the possibility of terrorism, but officials cautioned that it was still too early to arrive at any conclusions.
A U.S. intelligence official said that no link to terrorism had been discovered so far, but that authorities were still investigating.
Another possible explanation for the use of the stolen passports is illegal immigration.
There are previous cases of illegal immigrants using fake passports trying to get into Western countries. And Southeast Asia is known to be a booming market for stolen passports.
Interpol database
Malaysian authorities have been in contact with counterterrorism organizations about possible passport issues, Hussein said earlier.
He didn't specify how many potential passport issues there were, saying authorities are looking at the whole passenger manifest.
The U.S. government has been briefed on the stolen passports and reviewed the names of the passengers in question but found nothing at this point to indicate foul play, said a U.S. law enforcement official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Of the two passports in question, the Italian one had been reported stolen and was in Interpol's database, CNN law enforcement analyst Tom Fuentes said, citing sources at Interpol.
Additionally, no inquiry was made by Malaysia Airlines to determine if any passengers on the flight were traveling on stolen passports, he said. Many airlines do not check the database, he said.
Rahman, the Malaysian aviation official, declined to say whether the airline or Malaysian authorities had checked the database.
The National Transportation Safety Board announced late Saturday that a team of its investigators was en route to Asia to help with the investigation, the agency said.
Disappearing during cruise
There is a precedent for a modern jetliner to fall from the sky while "in the cruise" and lie hidden for months, according to CNN aviation correspondent Richard Quest.
On June 1, 2009, Air France Flight 447 was en route from Rio De Janeiro to Paris when communications ended suddenly from the Airbus A330, another state-of-the-art aircraft.
It took four searches over the course of nearly two years to locate the bulk of flight 447's wreckage and the majority of the 228 bodies in a mountain range deep under the ocean. It took even longer to find the cause of the disaster.
In May 2011, the aircraft's voice recorder and flight data recorder were recovered from the ocean floor after an extensive search using miniature submersible vehicles.
It was not until July 2012 that investigators published their report, which blamed the crash on a series of errors by the pilots and a failure to react effectively to technical problems.
If all those on board Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 are found to have died, it will rank as the deadliest airline disaster since November 12, 2001, when American Airlines Flight 587 crashed into a New York neighborhood, killing all 260 people on board and five more on the ground.
CNN's Jim Clancy reported from Kuala Lumpur and Mark Morgenstein wrote from Atlanta. CNN's Jethro Mullen, Barbara Starr, Steven Jiang, Ben Brumfield, Khushbu Shah and Kevin Wang contributed to this report.


text:
Latest news from the Peruvian rainforest
The last few weeks at Taricaya have been busy as usual and, with the floods a distant memory, we have been able to push on in many of our projects and the results have been very rewarding. After nearly 14 years of working with volunteers on our Conservation project, I am still amazed by the levels of dedication they show and their ability to work hard in often unfriendly conditions.
This month was no different as we faced two huge challenges that required long hours and hard labour in hot, humid conditions. The start of the construction of our new jaguar cage and the annual preparation of our artificial turtle beaches were just two of the tasks we tackled.
It seems that a lot of my news centers around our pioneering animal rescue center; and this is hardly surprising as the centre takes up a large amount of our time, but this month we have had great success that makes all the hard work worthwhile.
Breeding animals in captivity is one of the toughest things to achieve in the field of conservation and so you can imagine our delight when one morning on our early inspection rounds we discovered that we had become proud parents once again. Our resident troop of red howler monkeys (Alouatta sara) produced a second infant just months after we lost the first one to a fall. The fact that the group has two reproductive females at such a young stage in their social development is a fantastic achievement and an indication of their relaxed surroundings, good diet, and spacious enclosure.
Many of you might recall how years ago we struggled to raise orphaned howler monkey babies, as their diet is hard to replicate in captivity. It appears that we have got the strategies right as we now have a 100% survival rate with all the babies that arrive at the center and the fact that we already have breeding adults in our release group is very exciting.
The howler monkeys, just like the spider monkeys (Ateles chamek), have strong social structures and successful releases depend on the group bonds being formed in captivity. There is no greater evidence that the group is well established than to have two females reproducing in the troop and with the others soon to reach adulthood the future for the group looks bright.
As a precaution we have separated mother and baby for the first few weeks until the youngster is stronger and more agile as we do not wish a repeat of the accident which befell our first baby as the first-time mother was a little negligent in looking after the infant.
Read the full article


text:
Cooking For Engineers
Analytical cooking discussed.
Log in to check your private messages
Log in
Kneaded No-Knead Bread
Cooking For Engineers Forum Index
View previous topic
View next topic
Joined: 19 Oct 2007
Posts: 1246
Location: central PA
Posted: Wed Feb 05, 2014 8:00 pm
Post subject: Kneaded No-Knead Bread
many people are familiar with "No Knead Bread" - it's a concept similar to a "dump cake" - toss all the stuff in, mix, no muss, no fuss.
no knead bread however requires 16+ hours to develop (a) flavor and (b) gluten.
now and then I have found myself in a severe shortage of hours-to-no-knead-bake, so I set about modifying the basic recipe for days when time has evaporated.
looks like:
bottom line:
- in a cool kitchen with 3-4 hours initial rise time, pretty dang close taste-wise
- does not require / benefit from an extended second rise - 30 minutes is plenty
- crumb structure is different - which is likely only important if you're looking to have the sandwich capers fall through the big holes
- stand mixer with dough hook highly recommended - the finer crumb is a result of the more vigorous kneading.
- makes a nice crackly crust
goes like this:
505 grams bread flour
fat pinch of salt
1 tsp dry active yeast
Note on the yeast - 1 tsp works in a cool 70'F/21'C kitchen in 3-4 hours.
if you have more time or the kitchen is warmer - like in summer... - cut the yeast in half.
mix the dry ingredients, add water
345 grams / ml hot tap water, stir briefly to mix.
using a dough hook, 10 minutes kneading on slowest speed.
after 3-4 minutes the dough should come away cleanly from the sides. on my KA lift bowl I watch the bottom center of the bowl. most of the time the dough is still wet enough that a small 'stalagmite' sticks at the bottom center; add +/-1 tbsp of flour until the bottom is also kneading cleanly away from the bowl. does not take much - and give it 2-3 minutes to 'work'
remove dough hook; allow to rise (covered) in the bowl 3-4 hours until doubled
preheat oven and baking / pizza stone to 500'F/260'C - be sure the stone has time to reach full temp.
turn out onto parchment paper, form a round, used the stretch&wrap under technique to get a smooth top.
give it 30 minutes or so under the bowl.
The bowl:
the classic no-knead uses a covered bake + uncovered bake to achieve a nice crust. works, so I'm sticking to it.
my pizza stone is 13 inches / 33 cm diameter, the stainless bowl slightly smaller.
when I'm ready to bake, I do a last minute edge tuck-under of the dough ball, using the aluminum cookie sheet as my faux oven peel, slip the dough-on-parchment into the oven on the stone. bake at 500/260 for 15 minutes.
the parchment is optional, but works very well.
after fifteen minutes, remove bowl, reduce heat to 450'F / 230'C and bake for 11-13 minutes more uncovered.
CAUTION: when removing the bowl / uncovering the loaf you unleash a bucket of live steam.
do NOT hover directly over the bowl - use of full length oven mitts HIGHLY recommended.
(the crust will have set, so 'bumping' into the loaf with the bowl is not an issue)
before you can say "ow!" the 500/260 degree steam will have scalded you right good. don't ask how I know.
Back to top
Jim Cooley
Joined: 09 Oct 2008
Posts: 377
Location: Seattle
Posted: Fri Feb 07, 2014 2:19 am
Post subject:
Nice write-up. WIll share with friends.
Making bread tomorrow in the machine and will cut the yeast as you suggested in a another thread.
I think you said too much yeast eats up all the sugar and consequently deflates the loaf?
Is this why you recommend cutting the yeast in half in this recipe if room temp more than 70°?
Back to top
Joined: 19 Oct 2007
Posts: 1246
Location: central PA
Posted: Fri Feb 07, 2014 12:42 pm
Post subject:
yeast eats sugar(s) - obviously temperature has a big influence, but too much food = faster growth/multiplication/CO2. it can over over proof more easily/faster.
it takes time for a good flavor to develop during fermentation. if it goes too fast altho it "looks good" the taste usually suffers - using less yeast will require more time for the dough to proof.
Back to top
Jim Cooley
Joined: 09 Oct 2008
Posts: 377
Location: Seattle
Posted: Mon Feb 10, 2014 1:18 am
Post subject:
Yeah, you're right: yeast eats sugar(s).
Back to top
Joined: 19 Oct 2007
Posts: 1246
Location: central PA
Posted: Mon Feb 10, 2014 2:24 pm
Post subject:
looks like a winner to me!
it's a balancing act - using the right amount of yeast to start with vs. proofing time.
wheat has natural sugars - recipes with added sugars can go too fast, especially in warmer temps.
there are methods where the dough is refrigerated overnight to slow down the fermentation/yeast (for flavor development....)
Back to top
Joined: 31 Jul 2014
Posts: 2
Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2014 10:21 am
Post subject:
Great one!!
Back to top
Display posts from previous:
All Posts
1 Day
7 Days
2 Weeks
1 Month
3 Months
6 Months
1 Year
Oldest First
Newest First
Cooking For Engineers Forum Index
All times are GMT
Jump to:
Select a forum
Cooking For Engineers
Cooking For Engineers Website Discussion
Messages from Michael
Comments Forum
Travel Comments Forum
Useless Stuff Comments Forum
Food, Cooking, & Dining
Cooking Tips
Cooking for Two
Favorite Foods
Tools, Equipment, and Gadgets
General Food Discussion
General Discussion
Anything Goes
Engineer Speak
post new topics in this forum
reply to topics in this forum
edit your posts in this forum
delete your posts in this forum
vote in polls in this forum
Powered by
© 2001, 2005 phpBB Group


text:
Media Consumers for Entertainment Equality
Warner Bros has finally glommed onto a lead actor for its adaptation of the Japanese science fiction novel All You Need is Kill.
Set in a post apocalyptic future, All You Need is Kill is about a young Japanese soldier, Keiji Kiriya, who serves on an international fighting force fighting an alien invasion. Keiji gets stuck in a "Groundhog's Day" scenario where he keeps reliving the day he died.
Set to play the main character in the film adaptation? On December 1st, 2011, Variety reported: Tom Cruise.
Throughout November, Warner Bros kicked around names for its adaptation of another property with Japanese origins: Akira.
After considering Brad Pitt and Keanu Reeves, WB nabbed Garrett Hedlund (Tron Legacy) for Kaneda, continues to evaluate a shortlist of unknown Caucasian actors for Tetsuo, and has offered Kristen Stewart (Twilight) the role of Kaneda's love interest.
Gary Oldman and Helena Bonaham Carter were also propositioned for supporting roles. After Gary Oldman turned down his offer to play the antagonist in the adapted story, the Colonel, Japanese stage actor Ken Watanabe was reportedly offered the role. A casting call has also gone out for a "Japanese American" for the role of Yamagata, a side character from the manga.
Warner Bros is also jump starting an adaptation of the Japanese anime Death Note.
One of these films will have an Asian American lead, right? Or at least an actor of color in the lead role?
In Hiroshi Sakurazaka's novel, the lead character, Keiji Kiriya, is a Japanese soldier who is part of an international military unit. For the purposes of the American adaptation, director Doug Liman (The Bourne Identity)has said that the actors will be "totally American."
And somehow, "totally American" ended up meaning "white," even though characters need not be white in order to be American.
In the script, Keiji Kiriya's name was changed to "Billy Cage," even though named Keiji have been fighting in the American military for generations.
Sound familiar? That's because history is repeating itself. Starship Troopers, another science fiction novel about an international army fighting aliens, featured a Filipino protagonist named Juan Rico. In the 1997 film adaptation, his name was changed to "Johnny" and he was cast with a white actor. An opportunity for an Asian American actor in the genre of science fiction was completely lost.
Science Fiction/Fantasy is a genre that has characters with names like Kal-El, T'challa, Worf, Neytiri, Teal'c, Cthulhu, Meriadoc Brandybuck, Leeloo, and Slartibartfast. Why was it necessary to change Keiji Kiriya to Billy Cage?
To add insult to injury, unlike Akira (a story that only contained Japanese characters), the original All You Need is Kill already featured characters who were white!
The other lead characters in the book are Rita Vrataski and Ferrell Bartolome, both from the U.S. Armed Forces. Even with an Asian American actor in the lead role, white actors would have had ample opportunities to play important roles in the film!
Instead, the production went out of its way to retool the script, erase Keiji's name and ethnicity, and essentially, lock Asian American actors out of one of their only chances to star in an action movie this decade.
Our concern is that Warner Bros casting practices employ racebending to reinforce the systemic racism that is already present in Hollywood. Setting Akira in neo-Manhattan could have been a great opportunity to reflect the diversity in modern day New York City, opening up lead role opportunities for not only Asian Americans but also other performers of color. There was ample opportunity for Warner Bros to demonstrate a commitment to diversity by finally casting a young lead actor of color.
Likewise, casting an Asian American in All You Need is Kill would not have locked out white actors from other lead roles in the movie, especially since nearly all Warner Bros movies feature white lead actors.
Harold and Kumar (from back in 2004) aside, it doesn't seem like Warner Bros is interested in developing unknown Asian American talent–even though they are more than ready to whitewash several lead characters that were Asian to accomodate white actors.
Not to mention, Warner Bros will also be presenting a yellowface joke in it's Christmas release, Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.
Not confidence inspiring.
Maybe Asian American actors are like poor Keiji Kiriya: doomed to constantly relive missed opportunities. When the rare Asian lead character comes along…
Categories: Akira, All You Need is Kill, blog, Featured, History and Concepts
Tags: warner bros


text:
Life has been so busy lately. And, every time I've tried to scoop blog-time into my fraying net of available hours, it has slipped away; swimming off into some shadowy, unreachable part of the stream. I wrote this post way back in the first week of October, and ever since then, it has been sitting amongst my hoard of drafts; tucked away until I could find time to mull it over, add photos and make final tweaks. But now, hurried by the days flowing ever faster towards Christmas, I've made another attempt at netting this blog post and (at last!) have released it from its sleepy, pondering corner:
It was a poignant treat to catch Radio 4's broadcasts of Seamus Heaney's readings from his translation of the Anglo Saxon epic poem, Beowulf.
I didn't get the chance to listen to every episode, but when I did manage to settle, be still and to tune into Heaney's warm and mellifluous voice, I felt transported to the fireside of an ancient mead hall, listening to the storyteller as he 'unlocked his word-hoard' – the ancient tale of warriors clad in 'the brightly forged work of goldsmiths,' shadowed by the terrifying monster Grendel.
My paperback copy of Heaney's translation of Beowulf wears an austere face
but there is a tactile richness about it that makes it so satisfying to hold. Its paper is creamy – its cover peach-soft. The whole book feels pliable and smooth; like silken air made tangible and divided into opening breaths, releasing word patterns across the ages.
My first experience of Beowulf was when I read bits and pieces of it in the original Old English. How did I do that? Now, I just don't know! I studied Old English for only a short time (when English Language was one of my first year subsidiary subjects) – and The Battle of Maldon was our main text of focus:
Today, well over twenty years later, I remember only a handful of Old English words, including the expressive chewiness of waelwulfas, meaning 'wolves of slaughter,' a reference to fierce warriors, often specifically the Vikings. Heaney's wonderful translation sits on my shelves, forming a much needed and hugely welcome portal to fuller understanding…
Now, when I think of Beowulf, a section of Robert Macfarlane's mesmerising book The Wild Places always comes to mind.
In the second chapter, Island, Macfarlane beautifully explores contrasting currents in humanity's attitudes to the rest of nature:
'Ideas, like waves, have fetches. They arrive with us having travelled vast distances, and their pasts are often invisible, or barely imaginable. 'Wildness' is such an idea: it has moved immensely through time. And in that time, two great and conflicting stories have been told about it. According to the first of these, wildness is a quality to be vanquished; according to the second, it is a quality to be cherished.'
He goes on to explore examples, including Beowulf, which is:
'…filled with what the poet calls wildeor, or 'savage creatures'. In the poem, these monstrous dragon-like beings inhabit a landscape of wolf-haunted forests, deep lakes, windswept cliffs and treacherous marshes. It is against these wild places and wildeor that the civilisation of Beowulf's tribe, the Geats – with their warm and well-lit mead halls, their hierarchical warrior culture – sets itself.
Parallel to this hatred of the wild, however, has run an alternative history: one that tells of wildness as an energy both exemplary and exquisite, and of wild places as realms of miracle, diversity and abundance. At the same time that the Beowulf-poet was writing his parable of the conquest of the wild, the monks of Enlli, Rona, the Skelligs and elsewhere were praising its beauty and its riotous fecundity.'
Robert Macfarlane tells of how the Celtic monks, the peregrini, 'sailed out across dangerous seas, in search of something we might now call wildness' and that:
'Their travels to these wild places reflected their longing to achieve correspondence between belief and place, between inner and outer landscapes. We can surmise that the monks moved outwards because they wished to leave behind inhabited land: land which in every feature was named. Almost all Celtic place-names are commemorative: the bardic schools, as late as the seventeenth century, taught the history of places through their names, so that landscape became a theatre of memory, continually reminding its inhabitants of attachment and belonging. To migrate away from the named places (territories whose topography was continuous with memory and community) to the coasts (the unmapped islands, the anonymous forests) was to reach land that did not bear the marks of occupation. It was to act out a movement from history to eternity.'
Macfarlane points to the 'rich literature' left behind by the peregrini, most of whose individual names, like that of the Beowulf poet, are lost to us through time. Their writings are scattered 'gleanings' we can gather and hoard to piece together glimpses of their thoughts. The monks' poems, Macfarlane tells us:
'speak eloquently of a passionate and precise relationship with nature, and the blend of receptivity and detachment which characterised their interactions with it. Some of their poems read like jotted lists, or field notes:- 'Swarms of bees, beetles, soft music of the world, a gentle humming; brent geese, barnacle geese, shortly before All Hallows, music of the dark wild torrent.'
Reading Macfarlane's descriptions of their delight-filled poems, it seems to me that, despite the monks' efforts to leave behind the named and the known, belonging gathered round them. Connection reasserted itself in growing affinity with the character of each new place, and in the larger patterns of nature that overarched wherever they travelled. There's a strong sense that those patterns, both inner and outer, adjusted and found old recognition in their fit, whether the precise details of the surroundings, or the living creatures that inhabited them, were new or familiar.
Alongside their feelings of exile from an otherworldly eternity, on which their sights were set – nature, for these monks, also seems to have been a deepening into Moment and This World. Awareness of the wind, of bird calls, of foxes at play, of sunlight spilling on the page, is accompanied by a nourishing and gladdening wonder. There is a sense that they are bearing gentle, reassured witness to not so much an over-spilling of edges – but a complete suffusion of the sacred in this world; a recognition of the epic, and a faith in the divine, as it passes over on the wings of barnacle geese, lives in the roar of the 'dark wild torrent' – or bides time in the small, focused movement of a beetle. 'For these writers,' Macfarlane tells us, 'attention was a form of devotion and noticing continuous with worship.'
Through these ancient texts, both Celtic and Anglo Saxon, we see ideas of the wild travelling on complex currents of culture, environment and experience – and a strong undertow of older beliefs and traditions mixed with the new. All leave a tangled pattern of tide marks for us to try to interpret; as well as a great deal we can recognise in the workings of the world today, and in ourselves, as each of us adds to the pattern.
Recently, I've been reading and revelling in Miriam Darlington's beautiful and gripping book, Otter Country.
I had already composed most of this post when I reached the section of the book, Marsh, in which Miriam tracks the elusive otter through the mysterious flatlands of the Somerset Levels, not far from where we live. She writes that the Avalon Marshes are: 'living memory. A reading of the layered chapters in the peat reveals the story'- and I feel compelled by Miriam's rich, illuminating observations to, otter-like, slide them in here as another layer to this post, building more seams into the ever-deepening story:
'I can't look at the marsh without the stories of its dark side creeping in. At night here it's as black as a bag, and you can't see or feel your way out. In the fog it feels as if the earth wants to eat you. Our ancestors used to throw votive offerings and trinkets into the mire to avoid being devoured. In Beowulf, Grendel comes out of the swamp to drag people off and feast on them. Bogs did and do still swallow people. The Grendel stories translate wetland into a dark, mapless world: 'it is not far from here,' the story suggests, inviting us to glance over our shoulders, 'nor is it a pleasant place.' The memory of devil-ridden mire, the unconquered swamp, has always been close-by. On the other hand, the American writer Aldo Leopold, in his Marshland Elegy, admired marshy landscape so much that he claimed he would have liked to be a musk-rat. Henry David Thoreau loved to stand up to his neck in a swamp. He said that when he was dead they would find bog oak written on his heart; and Seamus Heaney sanctifies the ottery bog as part of his national identity. He describes its fathomless texture as saturated with another sort of language 'meaning soft,/ the fall of windless rain'. Does the shape of the watery landscape affect the way we feel and see? These writers at least seem to have been consciously nourished by wetlands.'
– From Otter Country, by Miriam Darlington (Published by Granta)
As I write this, it is raining. I look out of the window and see a grey pall of sky, wet roofs and running gutters. A magpie is croaking sullenly from a chimney across the street. But, back in September, glorious sunshine turned the close of that month into a glowing lamp to light up the last corner of summer.
My husband and I took our son out to test drive his new wheelchair – and were met by a blaze of berries. The blackberries had ripened – but were mostly still unyielding fists of fruit – not yet ready to fall from the stalk as we grasped them between finger and thumb.
As we walked, the trees and shrubs flaunted their fruits – rowan, hawthorn, sloes, elder, rosehips…
But the most spectacular of all were the spindle trees. Exotic in fruitful display, the spindle is a shrub which seems to belie its credentials as a native to our ancient woodlands.
The spindle berries are like tiny Chinese lanterns. Luminous, and a startling shade of pink, they are shaped with an incredible delicacy and grace of form:
They hang from the trees like jewels waiting to be plucked. Embellishments fit for a Saxon sword.
Some of the leaves had turned the same shade of pink as the berries – and, against the blue sky, each one glowed like a mead hall flame.
A few clusters amongst the abundant spindle berries had already burst their casing – revealing bright orange seed, ripe and sticky.
Look closely at a spindle tree's branches, and you will see the beautiful, bulging precision of their squared edges – like a rounded dice, stretched and thinned into elongated form.
Richard Mabey's botanically and culturally fascinating Flora Britannica (an epic work in its own right!) tells us that the spindle tree 'shares its name with the weighted stick that was used for hand-spinning raw wool before the invention of the spinning wheel' and that this name:
'appears to have been imported by the sixteenth-century botanist William Turner: 'I haue sene this tree oft tymes in England and in moste plentye betwene Ware and Barkwaye, yet for al that I coulde neuer learne an Englishe name for it: the Duche men call it in Netherlande Spilboome that is Spindel tree, because they vse to make Spindels of it in that contrey and me thynke it may be so wel named in English.'
It is curious that this specialised foreign name stuck, and replaced a host of popular names that more accurately reflected its uses here. Spindle's hard, pale yellow wood made it ideal for skewers, toothpicks, pegs and knitting needles, and before Turner (and after him, in country districts) it was known, for instance, as prickwood, skewer-wood (or skiver) and pincushion shrub.'
As we looked and I photographed, a dragonfly darted through the spindle's leaves, pausing to glisten darkly as it warmed its wings in the sun. A speckled wood butterfly, looking fresh and pristine – a flourishing of the year's second or third brood – did likewise.
We walked home accompanied by the chatter of sparrows in garden hedges, and the soft rise of white butterflies from late flowers. In our garden, a single small white still haunted our ever-dwindling buddleia bush. The breeze batted its unresisting form between hedge and fence – and a fresh, emblazoned red admiral took centre stage, declaring itself with colours bolder even than the day.
In The Butterflies of Britain and Ireland (1991 edition), Jeremy Thomas writes:
'After hibernation, the adult Red Admiral has a strong urge to fly northwards. This lasts throughout May, June, and July, and brings varying numbers to Britain every year…. From mid-August onwards, a change takes place, and the Red Admirals start to return south. By mid-September, the traffic becomes more or less one-way. Nobody knows whether this is triggered by the diminishing length of days, or whether it is simply an instinct of the final brood to emerge…. In general, the species is commonest after a long, warm summer, and is sometimes very abundant indeed.'
In our West Country garden, the red admiral fed for a while on the buddleia, tipping its way round and between the fermenting and shrivelled flowers, disappearing and reappearing as it folded and opened its patterned wings. And, in the mellow slide of light into the lengthening grass, autumn too seemed to be opening and closing a fitful dance towards the mead hall fireside. All around us, the day was gathering a summer-hoard; drawing to it time-translating tales. Ripening them like berries.
The red admiral felt the shift in the light. Tied to the sun, it was tugged towards the story's centre. It landed, wings outspread, on our whirligig washing line – a display of contrasts.
The beautiful and the mundane, the caught and the uncontrollable, the named and the unnamed, the known and the unknown, ends and beginnings; each exists in the turned back edges of the other. Side by side, they find each other out – and, like poetry, unlock the epic in the everyday.
And in our garden now, in the rain, teasels waver – bronze, light-fringed – hoarding their confident waiting for goldfinches to set them on fire…