While water holding capacity and infiltration can be improved with management, soil type is inherent to a location, which is why research should be localized. Increasing soil organic matter will have a greater impact on available water holding capacity in sandy soils than in silty clay loam and silt loam soils . Another focus could be to localize water needs around SGMA Groundwater Sustainability Plan for different subbasins. For instance, some Groundwater Sustainability Agencies will be monitoring water use through satellite evapotranspiration data – therefore, a practical solution could be helping growers to reduce evaporative losses from soil from through mulching and tillage .Based on the IPA, “weed management” is also an area for UCCE to prioritize. Considering this was a top management challenge for respondents, as well, there is a lot more work that needs to be done in weed management for agronomic crops. Currently, CE’s integrated weed management strategies fall under Integrated Pest Management , and much of the research on integrated control methods has been done at the plot and field scale, rather than the management scale . A bibliometric analysis demonstrated that current work in the field of invasion biology, which includes weed control, consists mostly of research related to “knowing” , while research aimed at strategically applying or implementing knowledge is poorly represented . While invasions of a new weed species provide a platform to investigate ecological theories and laws, there is also a direct, practical need to understand possible management interventions . In addition, vertical growing racks the scale of emphasis is rarely at the local level and there is a lack of reporting of costs of management, which is an obstacle to making research on weed control methods useful .
If costs of control are included, they are typically calculated at the experimental scale, which may not accurately reflect management costs . Thus, more localized, applied research in weed management is needed. Contributing to the lack of applied research in weed management is the fact that UCCE has seen a reduction in regional weed control specialists and UC ANR has not hired a weed specialist for agronomic crops since the last specialists’ retirement years ago. Because of its’ importance to agronomic crops clientele, UC ANR should advocate for new advisors and specialists with a background in weed control. Current trends in commodity industry funding reflects the value the nut crop industries see in UCCE. For instance, four staff research associates who joined UCCE scientists in 2020 were funded by the California Walnut Board, the Almond Board of California, and the California Pistachio Research Board – together, they have provided $425,000 to cover annual salaries, benefits, travel, and equipment for the new UCCEstaff . In November 2020, the Almond Board of California also hired a Senior Specialist in Pest Management to focus on pest management and weed control . The lack of funded farm advisors from a centralized agronomy commodity board should be considered in UC ANRs new hires that come from the general fund.Notably, “Greenhouse gas emissions reduction” ranked low in priority in the IPA analysis. While there is recognition of the need to reduce GHGs at the state level – as evidenced by the Global Warming Solutions Act and multiple other climate change adaptation efforts – there seems to be a disconnect between agricultural producers, policymakers, and scientists when it comes to climate change. One hypothesis for why climate change is not seen as a pressing problem is how it is framed and communicated to farmers. The threat of global warming is usually broadly targeted, and the detrimental effects are often intangible. The “psychological distance” associated with climate change impacts that occur further away or well into the future require higher levels of cognitive abstraction . When it is communicated as a global problem that affects everybody, there may be less impetus to act because the problem seems far away and out of the farmer’s control.
For instance, greenhouse gas mitigation is a problem requiring global cooperation to address, while adapting to challenges faced at the local level appeals to a farmer’s self-interest . Therefore, framing climate change in terms of local consequences may motivate actions because personal risks are psychologically close . Farmers face increasing pressure to adopt practices that align with various societal visons of better agriculture, which may overwhelm farm management capacity . State level policy initiatives often fund UC ANR research and extension activities, thereby setting their direction. For example, there is a strong emphasis on Greenhouse Gas emissions reductions in CDFA’s Climate mart Agriculture programs – for the Healthy Soils Program GHG reduction estimations are the main metric of progress.Yet, GHG reduction was ranked as the lowest priority topic by respondents in our survey. This result highlights the tension between issues that are relevant for growers versus policymakers. Water conservation and storage, weed control, and soil health were all high priority topics for survey respondents, and all of these can be addressed by implementation of healthy soils practices. Practices that reduce GHG emissions might also result in benefits that are more tangible to growers, such as increased fertilizer use efficiency and lower input costs. Therefore, policymakers should think about how these programs can measure and display these tangible benefits rather than only focusing on GHG reduction, to inspire greater adoption. If these programs highlighted reduction in weeds and improved water holding capacity of the soil as benefits of healthy soils practices, the outcomes are the same but the emphasis is landowner-centered. The central tenet of a landowner-centered approach is empathy for the landowner wherein the needs, desires, constraints, and experiences of landowners are placed at the forefront .The fact that cover crops fall into the “possible overkill” quadrant of the IPA matrix suggests the importance of adapting practices to specific regions and cropping systems. Cover crops have been proven to help with the top management challenges of our respondents, such as water conservation and storage, soil health, and weed suppression . Yet, respondents overall did not rank them as highly important. Perhaps part of this perception of overkill is framing cover cropping to mean a very specific thing– for instance, the only UC research assessing the costs and benefits of winter cover cropping in California assumes a mix of bell beans, winter peas, and common vetch . The idea behind specific cover crop mixes is important in being able to comparatively quantify their benefits, but the goals of cover cropping can be achieved in other ways. For example, soil erosion can be managed through the maintenance of ground cover on the soil surface, but what that ground cover is can be adapted to what works best in certain climates and cropping systems . Simply keeping roots in the ground can improve water infiltration, feed soil biology, protect surface water quality by reducing runoff, provide competition for weeds, increase soil organic matter, and enhance carbon sequestration. If a grower is planting small grains or forage for agronomic crop production, keeping the ground covered during the winter can achieve some of the benefits of winter cover cropping. In this way, agronomic crop producers may already be “cover cropping”.
There is opportunity here to expand agronomic crop production for those who currently fallow their fields in the winter. Not only will this increase land use efficiency, but it can diversify farm income for those who currently fallow their fields in the winter. If there is only research on a specific way of managing a potentially cost prohibitive mix of cover crop seed, only farmers who find this specific method feasible may adopt this practice. Supporting growers’ autonomy in choosing practices that achieve target principles within the context of their farming system may lead to increased conservation outcomes, since autonomy can lead to integration of conservation behaviors into a landowner’s sense of self and stewardship ethics . Yet, we cannot solely rely on landowner’s stewardship ethics, and must continually question the adaptive capacity of our institutions. Many institutions are designed to pursue narrow or siloed objectives . Within the current research reward system, growing racks in which citation is an indication of impact within academia, there may be a disincentive for scientists to publish applied and local scale research and interdisciplinary research . In many conservation fields, scientific research does not always translate into on-the-ground action, which is known as the “knowing doing gap”. Yet, local scale implementation research tends to draw less attention from the international scientific community . Managers need more applied research, but researchers are more rewarded for publishing basic research . A survey of California managers in 2012 documented that respondents relied little on published research in making management decisions, and for the research that was published, basic research was more than twice as high as that desired by managers’ , who preferred a greater level of applied and interdisciplinary research . In addition, there was a mismatch between researcher and stakeholder priorities for specific topics in basic research and published studies frequently failed tests of relevant as indicated by scale-appropriateness, usability, timeliness, and accessibility . The disconnect between science and management can be characterized as the “research implementation gap”. Managers tend to rely heavily on their own observations and those of their colleagues at other management agencies, rather than scientific research . Conservation planners also rely heavily on experience-based information, rather than evidence-based information from experiments . Therefore, devoting more resources to obtaining management information from experienced practitioners and land managers can greatly increase understanding of factors that contribute to success and failures . Interdisciplinary research that integrates landowners into the scientific process must be employed to solve larger challenges and address clientele concerns. Managers cannot separate their needs from the social and political context in which they work, so research should not either . Focusing on problems in a vacuum when weeds, water, and soil management are all interconnected, is misleading, not to mention a less effective use of limited resources.As the landscape of California agriculture changes, agronomic crop production faces many challenges. Water resources are under threat from changing climate and cropland expansion, there is a lot of uncertainty around the impacts of the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act on water supply, and California has seen large shifts away from agronomic crop production to perennial production. For these reasons, the UC Cooperative Extension Agronomic Program Team conducted a survey of agronomic crops clientele in summer 2020 with the objectives of documenting clientele needs,informing research and extension priorities, and serving as a foundation for future collaborative needs assessment efforts. Results of the survey indicated that water-related issues are of great concern to the agronomic crops community and serve as a primary management challenge. Therefore, UC needs to devote more people and resources to practical solutions for water/irrigation management. Weed management is also a primary management challenge and was identified as a priority area for extension in the Importance Performance Analysis. Currently, there is no statewide weed specialists working in agronomic crops in California, and there are only a few advisors as well. In developing practical solutions for dealing with management challenges, UCCE must balance short-term growers’ interests with long-term education to adapt to future challenges and regulations. Growers tend to want practical, immediate solutions that work at the management scale. In addition, UCCE must work with growers to develop information that integrates practitioner knowledge and is relevant to the realities of agronomic crop production. Based on projected climate change impacts, agricultural systems may have to undergo more transformative changes to remain productive and profitable in the long term . Attempts by UCCE and policymakers to develop solutions within the current framework of our production systems is not a long-term answer and primary management challenges will need to be dealt with again and again if we continue with “business as usual” without focusing on long term adaptation.Barb goatgrass primarily occurs in California, although there are records from Washington, Oregon, and Nevada, as well as from some mid-Atlantic states . Medusahead is widespread in California and the Intermountain West, occupying roughly 2.4 million acres across the western United States . Estimates for the extent of barb goatgrass infestation are not currently available, though it is much less widespread than medusahead. Barb goatgrass is a B-rated noxious weed and medusahead is a C-rated noxious weed in the State of California, meaning that they both cause economic or environmental detriment.