Transport Refrigeration Unit ATCM

Winter at last! The cold weather is good, or bad, depending upon your perspective.  With regard to insects - the nuisance ones, it's great because cold weather slows them down, nearly stopping them cold! So if you are that grower who is spraying, say for mites, then it would be logical to defer an application or two. But don't stop looking! And don't think that cold weather cleans them out because it never works that way. The pesky bugs will find a way over winter, preparing themselves for the warm-up. Notice I didn't say spring here because the last few years it's been conspicuously hot in January. 

Mites again! They infest by all manner of methods - like hitchhiking on workers' sleeves, shirts, gloves and shoes. And if that wasn't enough to spread the population, the wind facilitates movement blowing them through insect screens, over walls and who knows how. Yah, Happy Holidays!

Many growers are tempting fate and their checkbooks by not turning on the heaters. They are thinking that the markets are poor, with few paying fair and equitable prices for our beautiful California Grown products. Why spend money that may not be there? I've received many calls these past weeks searching for advice on cold-growing. What fertilizers work in the cold? Can we stop spraying or use less pricy products? What happens with diseases? Can we spray only curatively?

I like this one -- space heaters are warming the air in the greenhouse. That's wonderful growing conditions, a little costly. Checking the irrigation water and note temperatures near freezing! That soil is so cold. The space heaters cannot over-power cold water quickly. Hot water heaters aren't all that expensive are they? The water doesn't need to be bath-water-hot, just over 55 degrees.

It is hard to see all the possibilities alone. Be sure to talk with other growers and advisors. There are solutions...

The New Year brings new opportunities! Let's make the best of them together.

Honeybee Colony Collapse Disorder

Last February at the Society of American Florists Pest Management Conference someone in the audience asked about Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD), which refers to the collapse of honeybee colonies worldwide and the reported loss of about a third of the honeybees in the U.S. during 2007-2008. Of course, the first thing everyone blamed - and I mean everyone - was pesticide use and specifically, the use of the neonicotinoids like imidacloprid. It's well known that the neonicotinoids can kill honeybees because it says so on the label, but to assume that the neonicotinoids are the cause of CCD is another thing. The argument is that the neonicotinoids have been used so extensively that nectar gathered by honeybees may contain lethal or sub lethal doses of neonicotinoids causing CCD because the nectar eventually is used to feed the entire colony. In addition, the argument was made that bees have never collapsed to this degree before the use of the neonicotinoids, but any objective observer will note that this population fluctuations of this kind have occurred in the past by natural causes such as disease and parasites.

As always, this sparked a mad frenzy of research across the globe using all kinds of methodology to prove that their personal theory for the cause of CCD was correct. For instance, some resorted to taping cell phones to beehives to try to prove that cell phones cause disorientation of the bees or an inability of the bees to find food or return to the hive. Others have drenched honeybees with high doses of neonicotinoids and found that it can sterilize the males, to which I say... And!!

The bottom line is that there are forces in nature that can cause adverse effects on populations of all animals and that work in cycles, sometimes causing a crash and sometimes causing a bloom. Obvious crashes can be caused by disease or overpopulation of predators or parasites. Obvious blooms can be caused by an abundance of food supply or migration away from predators or parasites.

For the honeybees, there have been several studies now that point to a force of nature that is causing CCD. Scientists in Illinois and from the United States Department of Agriculture have made their findings known in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences this year. The science behind the possible explanation for CCD is somewhat complicated, but using genetic based research they found that there was a much greater propensity of fragmented ribosomal RNA in CCD honeybees. Simply put, CCD honeybees cannot synthesize proteins and without protein synthesis, no animal can survive. It's a little more complicated than that, but let's leave it at that.

The genetic anomaly in CCD honeybees allows a much greater susceptibility to viral infections that will eventually kill the honeybee. One of the lead researchers of the study and a well-respected entomologist at University of Illinois, May Berenbaum says, "If your ribosome is compromised, then you can't respond to pesticides, you can't respond to fungal infections or bacteria or inadequate nutrition because the ribosome is central to the survival of any organism. You need proteins to survive." In addition, the scientists say that the varroa mite - a parasite of honeybee colonies now in the U.S. - is a carrier of common viruses that effect honeybees, and they are likely a significant contributor to the high viral pathogen load that afflicts U.S. bees. The mite is probably playing a significant role in CCD.

Hence, CCD is most likely genetically based and not pesticide driven. However, as I mentioned at the SAF conference, no matter what the research says, the public is now convinced that the cause is pesticide driven. After all, the media will find that much more sensational than fragmented RNA.

Several changes to the California Code of Regulations became effective last September 15, 2009.  These changes affect virtually everyone who applies pesticides.  The code sections involved are:

• 6618 - Notice of Applications
• 6619 - Notice of Completed Applications
• 6761.1 - Application-Specific Information for Fieldworkers
• 6770 - Field Entry After Scheduled or Completed Pesticide Applications
• 6771 - Requirements for Early Entry Employees

The changes in these code sections:

• Clarify notification requirements prior to, and after, a pesticide application, including who is to be notified and the persons responsible for providing such notification;
• Revise the requirements for application-specific information for fieldworkers; and
• Clarify the specific activities allowed during the restricted entry interval (REI) and the requirements employers must meet in order to send fieldworkers into the field during the REI.

Some of the key changes include the following:

• Spray adjuvants specifically have been added to the notification requirements.
• 6618 - Notice must be given prior to the use of any pesticide in ample time to assure that all subsequent notifications are properly given and to allow all persons to take appropriate actions.  Previously the requirement was only to give notice "prior" to application.
• 6761.1 - The Application-Specific Information must be posted as soon as the operator of the property receives notice that an application is complete.  Previously the operator had 24 hours to post this information.

The changes can be reviewed on the Department of Pesticide Regulation website at www.cdpr.ca.gov (click on Regulations, then Recently Adopted Regulations).  If you need further clarification please contact your inspector directly or call the San Diego County Department of Agriculture, Weights and Measures' Pesticide Regulation Program at 858-694-8980.