All Issues

Participation in cooperative canning usually offers a grower the advantage of an assured outlet for his raw product, because cooperative canneries generally stand ready to receive his crop for processing, regardless of the market situation. Thus the grower's risk of not having an outlet for his product may be reduced or even eliminated.

One-man operation of equipment for loading and unloading bins, and for moving the equipment up and down the box roads, is the essential element in a new method of handling citrus fruits between the orchard and the packing house.

Extremely heavy leaf drop has affected young orange trees in some inland areas of southern California in recent years.

Biological control of the spotted alfalfa aphid—Therioaphis maculala (Buckton)—in California became a rapid success after three species of parasites were introduced in 1956.

Accurate estimates of the total insect population of an alfalfa field can be obtained by the use of newly developed equipment and sampling techniques. All species of insects—each in relation to the whole as well as one to another—and measurement of the separate life stages, and appraisal of the ratios of the beneficial biological control organisms to the harmful plant-feeders can be made.

Recent reports indicate that applications of too little or too much nitrogen to avocado trees result in reduced yields.

Deterioration in quality of potatoes may be caused by applications of large quantities of nitrogen fertilizer.

Leaf-crumple, a virus disease of cotton—first observed about 1948 in the Coachella Valley—has been found in the Imperial, Borrego, Mexicali, and Yuma valleys and in the Gila Valley up to a point well east of the town of Roll, Arizona. However, neither the leaf-crumple virus nor its insect vector has been seen in the San Joaquin Valley.

Live oak—Quercus wislizenii—sprouts that develop after burning or bulldozing make conversion of a site to grass a difficult task.