soil Content

Grassland Study Examines Soil Viral Diversity in Drought

Andy Fell — November 09, 2022 - 11:31am

Viral communities across a grassland area are not uniform, and understanding viral dynamics could lead to better insight into how bacteria in soil will react to drought and other climate changes, according to a new study out of �ٺ��Ƶ.

Viruses can affect microbes, the food web, the carbon cycle and other ecosystem processes, including controlling bacteria.

FFAR Grant to Help Improve Vineyard Soil Health

Katherine E Kerlin — August 03, 2022 - 12:20pm

Wine grapes are susceptible to subtle changes in temperature and precipitation, making them particularly vulnerable to the effects of climate change.

Regenerative agriculture, which uses holistic farming and grazing practices to strengthen soil health and crop productivity, may help grape vines become more resilient to changing climate conditions. However, more research is needed to increase adoption of regenerative agriculture practices on vineyards.

Coming Back to Soil

Katherine E Kerlin — May 03, 2022 - 1:09pm

Soil Life, a project between �ٺ��Ƶ and the Natural Resources Conservation Service, aims to educate people about the necessity of soil to support and sustain life and empower young people with solutions to some of our greatest global challenges.

Two Elected to National Academy of Engineering

Katherine E Kerlin — February 10, 2022 - 1:45pm

Two professors from the University of California, Davis, have been elected as members of the National Academy of Engineering. Professors Kate Scow and Daniel Sperling join 13 other current �ٺ��Ƶ faculty members who are in the academy. (See list here.)

Almond Orchard Recycling a Climate-Smart Strategy

Katherine E Kerlin — April 01, 2020 - 12:19pm

Recycling trees onsite can sequester carbon, save water and increase crop yields, making it a climate-smart practice for California’s irrigated almond orchards, finds a study from the University of California, Davis.

Whole orchard recycling is when old orchard trees are ground, chipped and turned back into the soil before new almond trees are planted.

Compost Key to Sequestering Carbon in the Soil

Katherine E Kerlin — August 14, 2019 - 3:24pm

By moving beyond the surface level and literally digging deep, scientists at the University of California, Davis, found that compost is a key to storing carbon in semi-arid cropland soils, a strategy for offsetting CO2 emissions.

For their 19-year study, published in the journal Global Change Biology, scientists dug roughly 6 feet down to compare soil carbon changes in conventional, cover-cropped and compost-added plots of corn-tomato and wheat-fallow cropping systems. They found that:

Maximizing Use of Water Stored in Soil Could Result in Savings for Farmers

Amy M Quinton — May 14, 2019 - 10:00am

As California faces more frequent and severe droughts, agriculture, which relies on irrigation from surface water and groundwater, could become expensive and unsustainable. Researchers at the University of California, Davis, looked at using a “free” resource — rain water stored in the soil — and found that optimizing its use could go a long way to help meet demand for five California perennial crops. Their findings appear in the journal Environmental Research Letters.