From the UC Blogosphere...

UCCE curriculum helps 'make a difference'

Six San Joaquin County programs were hailed for "Making a Difference" in the Healthier San Joaquin County Community Assessment 2011 report, according to the Stockton Record.

The full report presents a comprehensive health profile of the county using data on the health and general well-being of the county's nearly 700,000 population, estimated at 40 percent white, 36 percent Latino, 16 percent Asian and 7 percent African-American.

El Concilio's Family Wellness Program was one of the organizations that were recognized. El Concilio has provided 450 families with young children comprehensive health and developmental screenings and referrals, health education and parent group meetings. According to the article, its staff uses age-appropriate health curriculum from the University of California Cooperative Extension.

Luck Be a Lady

Photographers never tire of capturing images of ladybugs, aka lady beetles.First of all, they're beneficial insects. You...

Ladybug, aka lady beetle, searching for aphids. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

Ladybug, aka lady beetle, searching for aphids. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

The ladybug's coloring warns "Leave me alone!" (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

The ladybug's coloring warns "Leave me alone!" (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

A ladybug on the prowl. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

A ladybug on the prowl. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

Register Today for the Dec. 11, 2013 Turf and Landscape Institute in Rancho Cucamonga, CA

Register today for the December 11, 2013 Turf and Landscape Institute at the Etiwanda Gardens Conference Center in Rancho Cucamonga, California.  This is the largest University of California Cooperative Extension educational  event offered annually in Southern California and is open to all arborists, landscapers, irrigation professionals, and other 'green industry' personnel interested in receiving objective timely information on topics covering arboriculture, and sustainable landscaping, and we even have a session in Spanish stressing irrigation management practices and principles.

Questions?  jshartin@ucdavis.edu, 951.313.2023

 Choose from Three All-Day Educational Sessions:

 -        Sustainable Landscape Management

-         Arboriculture

-         IPM/Irrigation Fundamentals (in Spanish)

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To Register online and View the Entire Program: http://cesanbernardino.ucdavis.edu 

($75 each when 3 or more register together before or on Dec. 6 or $85 for a single registration)

To host a table-top trade show booth, contact Janet Hartin at jshartin@ucdavis.edu or 951.313.2023. Booths are $250 and includes 2 entrances into conference. 

Artisan cheese is where wine was 30 years ago

Falling milk prices and rising production costs have prompted some California family dairies to augment their income by marketing handmade, artisan cheese, reported Ben Wortham in the Wall Street Journal.

Wortham cited the UC Cooperative Extension publication Coming of Age: The Status of North Bay Artisan Cheesemaking, written by UCCE community development advisor Ellie Rilla and published earlier this year. Of the 22 artisan cheese producers in Marin and Sonoma counties in 2010, 10 were dairy farms that use their own milk, the report says. Four more artisan cheese producers are in the process of starting up, even as four dairies in the two counties went out of business last year.

These 22 producers in total made almost eight million pounds of cheese last year, covering 95 varieties, which sold at retail for as much as $30 a pound, according to the report.

"We're where wine was 30 years ago," Rilla told the reporter. "It doesn't look like there's any chance of a bubble popping in the foreseeable future."

Call of the (Alex) Wild

There are insect photographers and there are insect photographers. There are those who point and shoot, those who shoot and...

Noted insect photographer Alex Wild captured this spectacular image of sweat bees on sideoats grama. (Photo by Alex Wild and used with permission.)

Noted insect photographer Alex Wild captured this spectacular image of sweat bees on sideoats grama. (Photo by Alex Wild and used with permission.)

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