Backyard Orchard News
National Poison Prevention Week was March 19-25, 2017.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), poisoning is the number one cause of injury-related death in the United States, and 1073 people in California were poisoned by pesticides in 2014 alone. Each year since 1962, National Poison Prevention Week has taken place during the third week of March, to raise awareness about avoiding these tragedies. No one wants their workers or family members to experience illness or death from pesticide exposure, so the UC IPM Pesticide Safety Education Program (PSEP) would like to bring special attention to preventing pesticide poisoning this week. The program also published a new edition of The Safe and Effective Use of Pesticidesin 2016, which contains a wealth of pesticide safety and hazard prevention information for people who work with pesticides.
Both agricultural and household pesticides can poison people if they are not properly handled. In agriculture, poisoning most often results from pesticide mixing and loading, and the most harm occurs due to spills, splashes and equipment failure. In the home, many pesticide poisoning incidents involve children swallowing pesticides, including garden products, disinfectant cleaners, or other chemicals used to control pests.
One of the most important things you can do to prevent pesticide poisoning is to follow the instructions on the pesticide label. Labels address critical information about how to use a pesticide safely, including the kind of personal protective equipment (PPE) you should wear to prevent overexposure, how much of the product to apply, the minimum time you must wait to enter the area after applying the pesticide (the restricted entry interval), and the minimum time that must pass between application and harvest (preharvest interval).
Labels also include important signal words such as “Danger,” “Warning,” or “Caution” that indicate how acutely toxic the chemical is to humans, as well as directions to avoid pesticide contamination of sensitive areas such as schools and hospitals. These instructions are meant to protect anyone who is at risk of being exposed to hazardous pesticide residues. It is essential to thoroughly read and understand the pesticide label before working with the pesticide, and to carefully comply with label instructions throughout the process. The UC IPM guide to Understanding Pesticide Labels for Making Proper Applications can help you do this, and is available in both English and Spanish.
If you apply pesticides in or around your home, be sure to store them properly and keep them out of the reach of children. Keep in mind that even mothballs may look like candy to very young children. It is illegal and unsafe to store pesticides in food or drink containers, which can easily fool people into consuming them and being poisoned. According to the California Department of Pesticide Regulation, these mistakes caused 62 incidents of child poisoning from pesticide ingestion in California in 2014, and 47 of those cases involved children under six years of age.
To learn more about poisoning and how to prevent it, consider visiting the following resources:
Center for Disease Control and Prevention Leading Causes of Death Reports
National Poison Prevention Week website
National Pesticide Information Center
UC IPM online course: Proper Pesticide Use to Avoid Illegal Residues
There's Gold on Them Thar Roses
There's gold on them thar roses. No, not the kind of gold found during the California Gold Rush...
Matched pair: Two multicolored Asian beetles on rose leaves in Vacaville, Calif. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
The lady beetles lay their eggs in a cluster or row. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Close-up of lady beetle eggs. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Drones are used for research and land management; do you want to learn how to use drones?
Jeffery Dahlberg, director of UC ANR Kearney Agricultural Research & Extension Center (KARE), specializing in plant breeding and genetics, is working with drones to collect data for one of his sorghum programs. Work will continue the development of field scale drought nurseries at both KARE and West Side Research & Extension Center (WSREC) under a DOE ARPA-e funded project that utilizes drone technology to phenotype sorghum lines on a weekly basis as they are stressed under pre- and post-flowering drought stress. Research will continue this coming summer to gather additional phenotypic data, along with heat stress measurements and soil moisture monitoring. These nurseries are part of an effort to identify genes that are expressed under different field stress conditions and relate them to sorghum's ability to withstand and recover from stress.
If you are interested in learning how to use drones for research and land management, you may want to explore attending the UCANR Informatics and GIS Program's Dronecamp July 25-27, 2017 at UCANR in Davis, Calif., the application period is March 1 – April 15, 2017. Dronecamp costs $500 for UC affiliates (UC employees and enrolled students), and $900 for non-UC participants. Dronecomp is designed for participants with little or no experience in drone technology, and want to learn how to use drones for mapping applications. The intensive workshop covers drone science; safety and regulations; mission planning; flight operations; data processing; data analysis; visualization; and the latest trends and technology. Read more.
Educating the Public About the Bees: Beekeepers Meet the Public at Cal Ag Day
"How are the bees doing this year?" That was the most commonly asked question at the California...
Staffing the CSBA booth and answering questions about bees are (from left) Bernardo Niño of the E. L. Niño Lab, Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology; Eric Mussen, California Extension apiculturist emeritus, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology; and Carlen Jupe, CSBA treasurer. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Among those staffing the CSBA booth were (from left) Karli Quinn, CSBA associate director; Eric Mussen, Extension apiculturist emeritus, UC Davis; Gini and Steve Godlin of Visalia (he is the president of CSBA); Bernardo Niño of the E. L. Niño Lab, UC Davis; and Carlen Jupe, CSBA treasurer. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Honey bees proved a big attraction at the California State Beekeepers' Association booth at Cal Ag Day. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
A visitor photographs the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. observation hive at California Agriculture Day. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Congrats, UC Davis Ecologist Louie Yang
Congratulations, Louie Yang! The ecologist, an associate professor, UC Davis Department of...
Ecologist/associate professor Louie Yang (right) chats with students Geoffey Osgood (far left), animal biology major and Ryan Schemrich, entomology major. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)