College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences
To: Environmental Horticulture County Advisers and other Very Important People
From: Jim Harding
I want to thank you all for your suggestions for alumni and industry mailing lists. Your extensive industry contacts are an asset to the Department. For this Newsletter, I like Janet Harten's suggestion that we send a Department Newsletter to advisers and let them choose what is appropriate for their individual Newsletters. Please let me know how it is working.
As many of you know, Mina Ostergard and Richard Evans have set an e-mail system for the Floriculture/Nursery Workgroup; other workgroups may follow. We are planning to install e-mail in the department office as well, with Martha St. Claire as the primary contact for Cooperative Extension (mestclaire@ucdavis.edu).
Please accept my apologies in advance for news items that are omitted in this issue, and send anything you would like included in the Spring 93 version. Now, for some of the things that have been happening at Davis:
Charley Hess is back from Washington! He is located in room 164; his phone # is 752 5175. Charley is actively researching fungistatic properties of sphagnum moss with respect to controlling damping-off fungi, has crystallized the material, and found considerable genetic variation in collections of Sphagnum. He is also serving as Director of International Programs at Davis and serves on important National Science Foundation and Environmental Protection Agency Committees. It has been very interesting to hear Charley's stories about people and pork in Washington.
The USDA Center for Urban Forest Research in being located in the Department of Environmental Horticulture under the leadership of Rowan Rowntree. John Lichter was first to be housed in 144 EH (was Herbarium); he has now been joined by Jim Simpson. Greg McPherson will be added as soon as more space can be obtained from the Chancellor's Office. I have attached a statement that summarizes their objectives. The Department is fortunate to have their expertise to augment our programs in Landscape Horticulture. They can be reached at 752 9534.
John Lichter has research and extension interests in the fields of arboriculture and urban forestry. Current projects include: research related to soil aeration (surveys, measurement techniques and evaluation of improved strategies), development of simplified techniques for measuring bulk densities of urban soils, modeling tree shade effects on energy use of residences, and production of a tree tour/selection guide for Central Valley landscapes utilizing trees on the Davis campus. Jim Simpson's research interests include effects of microclimate on urban water and energy conservation, and interactions between plants and the environment. Recently, Jim's efforts have focused on relationships between vegetation and landscaping, the local climate around buildings, and energy used by those buildings for cooling and heating. Other projects considering the broader range of costs and benefits of urban vegetation are in the planning stages.
Welcome Patricia Lindsey, our new Landscape Extension Specialist. Some of you had a chance to meet Pat at the Landscape Workgroup in Riverside, although she will not actually be on the job until late November or December. She and Dennis Pittenger will work to establish a state-wide inventory of research and extension activities in Landscape and Urban Forestry. Pat also has a degree in Landscape Architecture and will have a joint appointment with the LDA group in the Department of Environmental Design at UCD.
Rich Jorgensen has joined the department as Associate Geneticist. He is an internationally recognized authority on the molecular genetics of Petunia and will be pursuing the molecular control of pigment expression in flower color. He is also interested in mapping where genes are inserted in chromosomes during the transformation process. These studies will be useful to breeders in California's flower seed industry, and his general knowledge of molecular genetics will be useful in many areas of biotechnology.
Ron Lane is our new superintendent, replacing John Ketchum following his retirement. Ron and Heiner Lieth have recently been involved in some major greenhouse improvements, including a Q-Com system of computer automation. Heiner is currently on sabbatical leave in Sweden.
I have attached an article that Michael Parrella and I wrote for Greenhouse Manager that attempts to correct statements published in Greenhouse Manager and GrowerTalks by Harry Tayama and Terril Nell, respectively, indicating there is little floricultural research being done at Davis (*/*,<*=;'.//^#).
I have also attached a schematic for the organization of the Dean's Office at Davis that was requested by Ted Stamen at the September Landscape Workgroup meeting in Riverside.
In September, Marc Cathey held a Workshop in Sacramento to evaluate the research needs for California in the Green Industries (i.e. Environmental Horticulture(. This is a nationwide program to focus Washington's (including, but not limited to USDA) attention on the problem that we are not getting enough federal money. Dave Burger and Charley Hess helped Gary Hudson arrange the meetings that were attended by Michael Reid, Ursula Schuch, Dennis Pittenger, Larry Costello, Ray Hasek, Michael Parrella, Jim MacDonald, John Kabashima, about a dozen industry reps, Dave, Charley and me.
Congratulations to Karen Robb on her marriage in November...have a great honeymoon Karen. Julie Babour and her husband Don had a little boy recently; his name is Jim. Julie worked last year with Sy Gold on his programs on playground safety. I am especially pleased to report that Sandy Fielden was recently given a Special Achievement Award for her contributions to the affirmative action programs at UCD.
Congratulations also to UCD alumnus Ron Enomoto who received the Jerry W. Fielder Memorial Award for service to the University, its alumni association and foundation. We especially appreciate all of Ron's efforts to boost relationships between the flower industry and academic community.
I think these items demonstrate that Environmental Horticulture at UCD and in the State is not declining, but actually growing with the additions of new programs. I hope this newsletter will help us all keep in touch with exciting new developments in all of our statewide programs. However, I will need your help so please keep me informed. Thanks.