As the demand for locally produced food continues to grow, a proposal gaining traction in the Legislature would provide $20 million to help rejuvenate the University of Massachusetts agriculture extension site in Waltham, which has lacked funding for decades. State legislators are in the beginning stages of considering a $1.7 billion environmental bond bill that includes earmarking funds to revitalize the UMass site, which spans 58 acres over two plots along Beaver Street. The project is dubbed the UMass Center for Urban Sustainability.
News from the Media
4-H Group Readies for Fall Events
August 1, 2013
The 4-H Pepperell Trailblazers is a horse project club with members ranging in age from 5-18. The club is part of the UMass Extension Animal Science Program.
Cape Cod Camp Pairs Military Kids and Horses
July 23, 2013
The Cape Cod chapter of the nonprofit Operation Military Kids (OMK), a UMass 4-H project, coordinated by Kerry Bickford of Marstons Mills, discusses benefits of their summer camp that matches up children of military personnel with horses.
Reducing Pollution using Horses
June 2, 2013
The Stockbridge School of Agriculture has partnered with Blue Star Equiculture, a non-profit horse farm in Palmer that rescues homeless horses, in an effort to help farmers reduce pollution. The Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection recently awarded the farm a nearly $200,000 dollar grant to install fences, walking trails and storm water management systems that will help prevent untreated, dirty water from entering the water system.
Gardening locally
April 15, 2013
John Gerber, Stockbridge School, writes a column where he outlines what he believes are some of the key arguments for growing a large garden and relying on local agriculture.
Woolly Adelgid in PA
April 11, 2013
Joseph Elkinton, environmental conservation, comments in several news stories about the discovery of the woolly adelgid in Pennsylvania’s historic old growth hemlock forests. The adelgid is an invasive insect that kills the trees. Elkinton says severe cold snaps kill the insect, but as overall temperatures rise, the adelgids will likely expand their territory.
Soil Saving Root Ball
April 10, 2013
Daniel Lass, resource economics, talks about a new system being used by a local nursery that helps save soil by wrapping tree root balls in a mixture of compost and bark contained in a knit fabric bag. John Kinchla of Amherst Nurseries, a UMass Amherst alumnus, says this system also prevents some problems created by the standard methods used to move and replant trees.
Food Waste Ban
March 17, 2013
John T. Spargo, UMass Extension, says a proposed ban on food waste in Massachusetts landfills from commercial sources, including hospitals, is unlikely to pose any health threats since potentially harmful microorganisms would be reduced by composting.
Raw Milk
March 12, 2013
Carrie Sears, UMass Extension, comments in a story about raw milk. She says some people have a negative reaction to consuming it because it isn’t pasteurized and may contain some bacteria.
Same Look - New Name
March 11, 2013
For hundreds of years, naturalists and scientists have identified new species based on an organism’s visible differences. But now, new genetic techniques are revealing that different species can show little to no visible differences. In a just-published study, evolutionary biologists at UMass Amherst and the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) combine traditional morphological tests plus genetic techniques to describe new species. Groups of morphologically similar organisms that show very divergent genetics are generally termed “cryptic species.” Lead authors of an article describing their work with scale insects in the current issue of the journal ZooKeys are AMNH’s Isabelle Vea, Ben Normark of UMass Amherst and Rodger Gwiazdowski, once Normark’s doctoral student and now a postdoctoral research fellow at the Biodiversity Institute of Ontario, Guelph.
