* I am beginning my annual county visits and look forward to meeting with
each of you in your office. It is easy this year to pull down the APRs
from APROL on the Extension home page. You may want to see what and how
your colleagues are reporting their work. For new faculty, reading reports
in the APRs on line provide a sense of peer reporting and peer evaluation
(http://cals.arizona.edu/extension/employee/#5). I will be in Phoenix this
week for county reviews before participating in Ag Day at the Capitol on
Wednesday and at Dairy Day at the State Fairgrounds on Friday and
participating in the first Ag Day on Saturday in Parker. I enjoy reading
the APRs because it gives me a sense of your programmatic efforts. APROL
data will assist us in promoting Extension and our research efforts with
elected officials and other interested clientele.
* The first annual Camp Verde Pecan and Wine Festival was held February 12,
2001. The festival was an all-day event, included the first pecan contest
known to be held in Arizona, and was attended by an estimated 1,000 people.
Local producers sold pecans, pecan pies, and pecan trees. Four Arizona
wineries also promoted their products. Dr. Michael Kilby judged 22 pecan
entries and was assisted in processing the samples by seven Yavapai County
Master Gardeners and Agent Jeff Schalau. Dr. Kilby also presented two
seminars to interested attendees: Home Pecan Culture and Home Grape
Culture. We look forward to this successful festival becoming an annual event.
* While on sabbatical leave from September 1998 to August 1999, Tom DeGomez
tested two ecological theories concerning the relationship between insect
communities and tree species that have implications for the future of
Arizona's forests. Tom can be reached at 520.774.1868,
degomez@cals.arizona.edu.
* The UA was recently fortunate to be awarded an NSF Science and Technology
Center (Sustainability of Semi-Arid Hydrology and Riparian Areas or SAHRA)
for the interdisciplinary study of water related problems in semi-arid
areas. The Center, which is housed in the Department of Hydrology and
Water Resources, involves approximately 70 physical- and social-science
faculty and research staff, and 60 students, from many of the units on
campus (including Cooperative Extension). Check out this web site
(www.sahra.arizona.edu) for more information or talk to Deb Young.
* Congratulations to Dean Fish and Marilynn Johnson for organizing and
implementing a very successful "Ag in the Classroom" field trip to the Bell
Ranch for nearly 200 Rio Rico kindergartners, teachers and parents. The
day began with each group of 25 five-year-olds at one of eight learning
stations and every 15 or 20 minutes Dean honked a truck horn and the groups
moved to a new station. Dr. Phil Ogden supervised wildflower discovery,
identification and pressing, the ranch hands demonstrated horse-shoeing,
others barrel racing, roping, ranch tools of the trade, various cattle feed
sampling and Marilynn Johnson introduced the predator/prey game that
involved a lot of running and chasing! Every child who wanted to got the
opportunity to touch a horse (which was the highlight of their day!) The
morning ended with the school cafeteria folks serving up BBQ hamburgers and
hotdogs, beans, fruit and little cartons of milk. The day was effective
because the demonstrations and language used by presenters were at the
developmental age level of five year olds. Good job Dean and Marilynn on a
high risk but highly effective day on the ranch.
* Interviews are scheduled for Assistant/Associate Agent, 4-H Youth
Development, Yavapai County for Monday, March 12, 2001 on campus. Mark
Cambron will be presenting his web-cast seminar at 8:30; Rick Richardson's
seminar will be at 2:15; Matt Summers' seminar at 3:30. Using the Real
Player program you can watch the broadcasts live at the following addresses:
rtsp://128.196.152.6/g2/cambron-seminar.rm,
rtsp://128.196.152.6/g2/richardson-seminar.rm,
rtsp://128.196.152.6/g2/summers-seminar.rm.
To watch the broadcasts, people must have Real Player installed on their
machine. They can get it for free at http://www.real.com/player/ and
clicking on Real Player 8 Basic.
Reminders: Arizona Cotton Growers Association meeting, Wednesday, March 7
at the WigWam in Litchfield Park; "Arizona Beef Cattle: From Conception to
Consumer" meetings, March 7, 2001 at the Campbell Avenue Center Meat
Science Laboratory.