Agriculture

Faced with a hurricane, farmer Campbell Cox had to decide which of his family's crops he was going to save. "He chose the Jimmy Red corn, an heirloom crop that generations of moonshiners knew for its nutty sweet flavor and high oil content. But scientists also know it as one of a few plants that could help society grow food amid the climate crisis, as temperatures get hotter, fresh water becomes scarce and storms get stronger."

"Colorado officially launches a controversial experiment next month: State officials will release up to 10 gray wolves as mandated by a 2020 state law that unleashed proverbial howls of protest from opponents."

"Southern staples like magnolia trees and camellias may now be able to grow without frost damage in once-frigid Boston. The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s ” plant hardiness zone map ” was updated Wednesday for the first time in a decade, and it shows the impact that climate change will have on gardens and yards across the country."

"The European Union on Thursday approved the use of the controversial herbicide glyphosate for another 10 years. But there will be new conditions and restrictions, the EU Commission said."

"The Colorado River can no longer withstand the thirst of the arid West. Water drawn from the river flows to millions of people in cities from Denver to Los Angeles and irrigates vast farmlands." "Journalists from the Los Angeles Times travel along the Colorado River to examine how the Southwest is grappling with the water crisis."

"The world is losing almost 1 million square kilometres (386,000 square miles) of productive land a year to sand and dust storms made worse by human activities, the United Nations body in charge of fighting desertification warned on Wednesday."

"Groundwater pollution in Umatilla and Morrow counties is growing worse, leading to dangerous levels of nitrates in water pumped up from what used to be safe wells."

"On a bright day this fall, tractors crisscrossed Gayle Goschie’s farm about an hour outside Portland, Oregon. Goschie is in the beer business — a fourth-generation hops farmer. Fall is the off-season, when the trellises are bare, but recently, her farming team has been adding winter barley, a relatively newer crop in the world of beer, to their rotation, preparing barley seeds by the bucketful."

"After decades of unrestricted pumping in the rain-starved northwestern corner of the Mojave Desert, the Indian Wells Valley Groundwater Basin Authority has the distinction of managing one of the most critically overdrawn aquifers in California."