Agriculture

"In the verdant farmland surrounding Monterey Bay, a national marine sanctuary and one of the world's biological jewels, scorched-earth strategies are being imposed on hundreds of thousands of acres in the quest for an antiseptic field of greens. And the scheme is about to go national."

"Wine makers are shaking things up in their vineyards. Some of them use natural and organic methods to control pests and weeds instead of using pesticides. Now, one winery has discovered a unique, natural way to prune their grape vines."

Urban farmer Will Allen, half a mile from Milwaukee's biggest housing project, is different from others in the good-food movement.

"San Joaquin Valley farms are laying off workers and letting fields lie fallow as their water ration falls."

The Oregon legislature Monday sent to the governor a bill that would phase out the longstanding practice of burning off agricultural fields growing grass seed.

Ranchers and farmers are rebelling against a federal plan to tag livestock with microchips and track them birth to slaughterhouse for disease control and food safety.

The 1988 highway death of a family in Oregon, blinded by smoke from fields being burned for weed control, was a story so moving that it spawned a novel. Field burning is so common in Oregon that it threatens people's lungs and health. A legislative struggle to ban it remains unresolved.

"A House committee began work Wednesday on a comprehensive overhaul of food safety rules that includes more inspections and new fees on producers to pay for them."