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Originally published:

JULY 2022
Vol. 108 Issue 7

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Stories In This Edition

Good land at risk

Borrowing costs rising

Biosecurity rules limit bird flu outbreaks

From far and white

Back 40: A reality check for those living in a virtual world

Viewpoint: Don’t overlook tax incentives for innovation

Chicken growers battle disease, high feed costs

Delayed seeding means lighter crop, higher prices

Dairy farmers welcome price increase

Ag Briefs: Dutch Treat

Ag Briefs: Bearing fruit

Ag Briefs: Photo finish

Ukraine’s loss in the global market is everyone’s loss

Diesel prices plateau but gas pains continue

Farms expected to meet carbon emission targets

Sidebar: Regulating cannabis emissions

Carbon tax tops greenhouse grower concerns

New extension initiatives for orchard sector

Langley farmers air grievances to politicians

Drought, fires mark chaotic year for ranchers

Reduced forage quality complicates the math

Targeted grazing project reduces wildfire risk

BC bee colonies see significant winter losses

Hay down

Slocan market garden finds its sweet spot

Farm co-operatives aim to do business right

Sidebar: What about larger scale cooperatives?

Researchers close in on grapevine trunk disease

Sidebar: Fighting fungi with fungi

Summer sweet

Industry collaborates on smoke taint research

Farm Story: The usual thing isnt working

Researchers investigate sunscreen for fruit

Sidebar: Larger rootstocks could alleviate heat stress

Startup supports seasonal worker payments

Woodshed: Kenneth’s rescue is TikTok worthy

Family and friends honour rancher’s legacy

Jude’s Kitchen: Summer salads are cool and refreshing

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4 weeks ago

It’s been four years since the last tulip festival was held in Abbotsford, but this year’s event promises to be an even bigger spectacle than ever. Spanning 27 acres along Marion Road, Lakeland Flowers will display more than 70 varieties of the spring blossom, including fringe tulips and double tulips, the first of six months of flower festivals hosted by the farm. Writer Sandra Tretick spoke with Lakeland Flowers owner Nick Warmerdam this spring to find out how the floods on Sumas Prairie in 2021 have had an impact on his business plan as he transitions from wholesale cut flower grower to agri-tourism. We've posted the story to our website this month. It's a good read.

#CLBC #countrylifeinbc #tulipfestival
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Tulip grower makes the shift to agritourism

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ABBOTSFORD – On a bright sunny day in early April, Nick Warmerdam points out his office window at No. 4 and Marion roads to a spot about half a kilometre away across the Trans-Canada Highway.
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Omg 🥹 Jared Huston let’s go pls

1 month ago

Farming, like any other job.. only you punch in at age 5 and never punch out 🚜 ... See MoreSee Less

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Easton Roseboom Levi Roseboom🚜

1 month ago

The province is allocating $15 million to be administered by the Investment Agriculture Foundation of BC. for a perennial crop replant program benefitting tree fruit, hazelnut, berry and grape growers. The program aims to cover 100% of plant removal costs and 75% of replanting costs. Funds are also available for sector development. The new program replaces a suite of sector-specific replant programs and recognizes the importance of sector adaptation in the face of market, disease and weather challenges. ... See MoreSee Less

The province is allocating $15 million to be administered by the Investment Agriculture Foundation of BC. for a perennial crop replant program benefitting tree fruit, hazelnut, berry and grape growers. The program aims to cover 100% of plant removal costs and 75% of replanting costs. Funds are also available for sector development. The new program replaces a suite of sector-specific replant programs and recognizes the importance of sector adaptation in the face of market, disease and weather challenges.
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1 month ago

Just a week after the Canadian Food Inspection Agency officials revoked the last primary control zones established in the Fraser Valley to control last fall’s outbreak of highly pathogenic avian influenza, a new detection on April 29 at a commercial premises in Chilliwack underscored the risk of a spring wave. This is the first new detection since January 22, also in Chilliwack, and brings to 104 the number of premises affected since the current outbreak began April 13, 2022. The disease has impacted 3.7 million birds in BC over the past year. ... See MoreSee Less

Just a week after the Canadian Food Inspection Agency officials revoked the last primary control zones established in the Fraser Valley to control last fall’s outbreak of highly pathogenic avian influenza, a new detection on April 29 at a commercial premises in Chilliwack underscored the risk of a spring wave. This is the first new detection since January 22, also in Chilliwack, and brings to 104 the number of premises affected since the current outbreak began April 13, 2022. The disease has impacted 3.7 million birds in BC over the past year.
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Any other details for FVN and chillTV please? radiodon11@gmail.com

1 month ago

The province is contributing $3.2 million for upgrades to the Barrowtown pump station in Abbotsford that was overwhelmed during the November 2021 flooding on Sumas Prairie, part of a collaborative approach to flood mitigation in the region. During a press conference at the BC Ministry of Agriculture and Food offices in Abbotsford today, the province said a collaborative approach that includes First Nations is needed as Abbotsford pursues a comprehensive flood mitigation strategy due to the potential impacts on Indigenous lands. Agriculture's interests will be represented by technical teams within the agriculture ministry. ... See MoreSee Less

The province is contributing $3.2 million for upgrades to the Barrowtown pump station in Abbotsford that was overwhelmed during the November 2021 flooding on Sumas Prairie, part of a collaborative approach to flood mitigation in the region. During a press conference at the BC Ministry of Agriculture and Food offices in Abbotsford today, the province said a collaborative approach that includes First Nations is needed as Abbotsford pursues a comprehensive flood mitigation strategy due to the potential impacts on Indigenous lands. Agricultures interests will be represented by technical teams within the agriculture ministry.
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I sure hope part of that money is to educate the people in charge of the pumps and drainage system! They just relayed on computers and weren’t even physically monitoring the water levels. I’ve lived in the Fraser Valley my whole life and the old guys managing that system know how to do it. The new generation just sit behind computer screens and don’t physically watch the water levels. That system works very well when you do it right. The Fraser river levels are very important. The system is designed to drain the Sumas Canal (the part that runs thru the valley) into the Fraser. When they let it get backed up it put pressure on the dyke and the weak part burst. Simple science. And yes, the dykes need to be worked on too. Abbotsford has not been maintaining properly for years.

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Larger rootstocks could alleviate heat stress

Researchers investigate sunscreen for fruit

Summerland research scientist Hao Xu is working to make fruit trees more resilient to heat stress. AAFC

July 4, 2022 byKate Ayers

Research scientist Hao Xu has always been interested in sustainable agriculture and carbohydrate partitioning, especially in fruit trees.

Following work as a research assistant at the Chinese Academy of Sciences and visiting scholar at the Universidad de Murcia in Spain, Xu studied symbiosis and root water uptake at the University of Alberta. She completed a PhD, majoring in forest biology and sustainable management and was a postdoctoral fellow, studying fungal and plant aquaporins, mycorrhizal symbiosis, plant-water relation and plant stress physiology.

Her work in academia and interest in plant physiology led her to a position with Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada in Summerland in 2017.

Since joining the AAFC team, Xu has conducted research to “investigate tree fruit crop resilience and fruit production in terms of yield and fruit quality under different environmental stressors and different approaches of mitigation,” she says. “Under this umbrella we have been looking at how rootstocks can impact tree resilience, carbohydrate partitioning and fruit production.”

Last year, she investigated the effects of heat on tree fruit quality in the Okanagan Valley. Other projects include looking at irrigation scheduling and how water management impacts fruit quality.

Indeed, one potential long-term mitigation approach to heat stress that she’s found is using larger rootstocks.

“Larger rootstocks … showed promising results last year that they are capable of reducing the ratio of heat damage in fruits per tree, consequently producing more damage-free trees per acre,” Xu says. “The larger rootstocks such as G.935, … we saw an increase in yields. It’s larger than M.9 or M.26 and a lot larger than B.9, which are commonly used rootstocks by growers right now.”

Larger rootstocks contain xylem, which transport water, with larger diameters allowing for higher transport capacity through the grafting union, where the scion and rootstock are united.

“When you supply sufficient water to the trees, the G.935 is able to transport more water,” Xu says. “That provides more transpirational cooling in the canopy and they have a large canopy so there is more foliage density to provide more shading onto the fruits in the canopy. This contributes to a decrease in the counts of sunburn browning on necrotic apples compared to smaller rootstocks.”

However, a downside to larger rootstocks is that they use more water.

“We are trying to sustain production in a very water-limited environment. We need to take that into consideration and do a longer time evaluation on their performance,” Xu says.

 

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