Soil

Soil microbes may help fight climate change.

Kate Scow, a professor of soil science and soil microbial ecology at UC Davis, keeps plastic bags filled with soil on her desk.

UC Davis helps study “fork-to- farm” fertilizer

A Sacramento company that turns food waste into liquid fertilizer has launched a three-year almond trial at UC Davis to test the product’s effect on crop production, nitrogen leaching, and soil health.

Working with Professor Edwin Lewis with the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, California Safe Soil is also conducting ongoing trials throughout the state with several other commodities, including berries, lettuce, and tomatoes. 

Despite rain, California is still in a drought. Scientists are banking water as a sunny day fund.

The Central Valley sky was a never-ending expanse of gray. Not a single pixel of blue in sight. Under it, UC Davis scientists were flooding a Modesto almond orchard with half a foot of water. On purpose. In the pouring rain.

How growers, water managers can prepare for wet winter

Growers, researchers, policymakers, and others can now pinpoint California’s most promising parcels of farmland to help replenish the state’s dwindling groundwater supplies, thanks to a new interactive map developed by the California Soil Resource Lab at the University of California, Davis.

A research team that includes a University of California, Davis, plant scientist has identified a source of carbon emissions that could play a role in understanding past and future global change.

A research team that includes a University of California, Davis, plant scientist has identified a source of carbon emissions that could play a role in understanding past and future global change.