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Culled from 600 pages of oral history are some recollections of northern California farm families about how technology has changed farming-and its landscape. Farming was hard work in the old days, but it had its rewards. Farming is still hard work today, but there are fewer hands needed to do it.

Alfalfa growers in the Imperial Valley have a choice between using sideroll-sprinkler and border-flood irrigation. Tests to determine which is the most feasible showed that border-flood irrigation is cheaper, but yields are higher when sprinklers are used.

Corporate farming, viewed by some as a threat to the family farm, is likely to increase in California, encouraged by 1979 tax rate changes which permit farmers to use tax savings from incorporation to finance expansion.

A genetic selection program to develop a carbaryl-resistant strain of Metaseiulus occidentalis, the predator of the spider mite, has been successful. This is believed to be the first time that a genetically improved biological control agent has been proved effective in the field.