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Better Farming
January 2017
Farmers may soon help educate
consumers by offering farm visits
through a web-based, start-up
program much like
Uber
.
The idea for the Visit My Farm
project stemmed from a discussion of
consumer-farmer boundaries,
according to
Sonia Muir
, manager of
business and social resilience pro-
grams at the
Department of Primary
Industries
in New South Wales,
Australia.
“We surveyed
over 400
non-farmers and
a large percentage
of them said they
would be really
interested in
visiting a farm and
they would be prepared
to pay for that experience,”
Muir said to the
Australian Broad-
casting Corporation (ABC)
in
October.
Visit My Farm could
increase communication
between farmers and
consumers, while
providing an extra source
of income for farmers.
“The concept is really about
value-adding to your actual
farm,” Muir said to ABC.
The program is currently attract-
ing investors.
BF
FAR
AFIELD
Field trips for city dwellers
Corn seedlings “call” for
assistance when eaten by
caterpillars, according to
researchers from
Martin
Luther University Hal-
le-Wittenberg, Cornell
University
, and the
Boyce
Thompson Institute
(BTI).
The seedlings release a
scent compound which is
attractive to parasitic wasps. The
wasp’s larvae then devour the pests
from the inside out.
Researchers
compared
the
strength
of the
“help”
signals
between
26 corn
varieties,
and paired
varying signal
strengths with their
associated plant genes.
This research will provide the
genetic knowledge required for
improved plant breeding, according
to
Annett Richter
, lead researcher
and scientist at BTI.
“The aim is to improve the volatile
signals of (plants’) natural defenses,
and now breeders have the opportu-
nity to use those defense genes,”
Richter said in a release.
The study was published in the
journal
The Plant Cell
in the fall.
BF
Corn signals for help
Winged farmworkers
Your newest farmhand may have
wings.
Some Washington state farmers
are turning to an innovative crop
protection source: a falconer and his
birds of prey.
Vineyard and orchard crops can be
damaged and destroyed by some
birds.
Brad Felger
, owner of
Air-
strike Bird Control Inc
., uses his
trained falcons to scare off pest birds
from farmers’ fields,
according to an
October
Washing-
ton Post
article.
Operations with
fewer than 1,000
acres typically
require one falcon, says
Felger. Farmers should fly
falcons daily from crop ripening to
harvest in order to deter problem
birds.
Felger’s customers
incorporate the
falconry with other
standard bird repelling
tactics such as noise-
makers or Mylar strips.
Some of the species that
can damage crop include
seagulls, sparrows, starlings, finches,
and crows.
BF
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Researchers hope
to highlight
and help
market the
unique
flavour of
Alberta
beef.
The
Food
Processing
Development
Centre
in
Alberta is now studying the flavour
difference between barley- and
grass-fed beef, as opposed to corn-fed
beef, according to an October
Call of
the Land
podcast produced by
Alberta Agriculture and Forestry
.
Alberta cattle are dominantly
grass- and barley-fed. “We hope the
(results) allow Alberta beef to have a
unique flavour profile that could then
be used to demonstrate product
differentiation for entering into new
markets,” says
Nicole Gaudette
,
sensory scientist at the Food Process-
ing Development Centre, in the
podcast.
A trained research panel will also
flavour profile beef from Alberta’s
main competitors – the United States
and Australia – and look for market-
able differences.
This project provides “a snapshot
of where beef flavour is for the
province,” says Gaudette.
BF
Flavoured Alberta beef
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