{"id":6108,"date":"2014-04-24T09:51:32","date_gmt":"2014-04-24T16:51:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/plantingseedsblog.cdfa.ca.gov\/wordpress\/?p=6108"},"modified":"2014-04-24T09:51:32","modified_gmt":"2014-04-24T16:51:32","slug":"outsmarting-drought-sacramento-bee","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/plantingseedsblog.cdfa.ca.gov\/wordpress\/index.php\/2014\/04\/24\/outsmarting-drought-sacramento-bee\/","title":{"rendered":"Outsmarting the Drought – from the Sacramento Bee"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"This<\/a>

This unique mix of manure, compost and mulch at the base of a grape vine retains water for months \u2013 even through a drought. This Oregon House vineyard has been watered just twice in four years.
Credit – Randy Pench, Sacramento Bee.<\/em><\/p><\/div>\n

By Elaine Corn<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n

The fear of scarce water is really the fear of scarce food.<\/p>\n

In its third year, the drought has already forced California growers to leave 800,000 farm acres unplanted this year, says Dave Kranz of the California Farm Bureau. The resulting drop in\u00a0food production<\/a>\u00a0comes with the unavoidable coefficient of higher prices, particularly for lettuce, avocados, broccoli, grapes, tomatoes, melons, peppers, berries and corn.<\/p>\n

Maybe shoppers will balk at, say, a $2.50 head of lettuce. Maybe we\u2019ll put a stake in the heart of local food movements by filling in with cheaper produce from Florida, Texas and Mexico.<\/p>\n

But what if you could grow food with less water or even no water?<\/p>\n

If you want to outwit a drought, ask an Israeli.<\/p>\n

Shahar Caspi tends acres of gardens,\u00a0fruit trees<\/a>\u00a0and a commercial vineyard in the hamlet of Oregon House in the foothills between Marysville and\u00a0Grass Valley.<\/a>\u00a0His job since 2012 has been raising food year round for his community and bringing perfect\u00a0wine grapes<\/a>\u00a0to harvest \u2013 all without tilling, and with little to zero added water.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s done it before. On a dizzy ride across switchbacks and valley flats, in an area that rises and tumbles from 2,300 to 1,800 feet and back again over forested canyons and gentle slopes, Caspi gives me a tour. He has a distinctly Israeli flourish behind the wheel. When he talks to people in the back seat, he takes his eyes off the road to look at them, even as he navigates a hairpin turn.<\/p>\n

He passes a grove of olive trees neglected for 10 years that produced no olives. But after a year on the Caspi method \u2013 the equivalent of Ensure for the earth \u2013 the trees delivered 40 pounds of olives.<\/p>\n

Next we drove between two fields, one side brown, ragged and parched, the other a Caspi no-water showcase \u2013 grape vines in bud break, the ground beneath them rich, a natural\u00a0ground cover<\/a>\u00a0green as jade. \u201cMulch with shredded roots,\u201d he says exuberantly, eyes off the road. \u201cVery simple!\u201d<\/p>\n

At a sunny glade, another concept preps cherry trees. He walks us past huge square holes he flushed with water and allowed to drain. The holes were filled with Caspi\u2019s mulch, manure and compost, then a tree. \u201cThey won\u2019t need water for many, many months.\u201d<\/p>\n

Back in the greenhouse next to his mountaintop home, Caspi laid manure on the rock-hard dirt floor, and on purpose didn\u2019t till the soil underneath. He stuck chard seedlings directly into the manure. \u201cThey flourished immediately,\u201d Caspi says. \u201cThe roots went sideways into a huge mass of roots. I\u2019ve never seen anything like it.\u201d<\/p>\n

And despite no rainfall the first four months of his second season of raising food for his neighbors,water usage<\/a>\u00a0dropped 30 percent and yields increased.<\/p>\n

How does he do it?<\/p>\n

The same way a dietitian would bulk up a wasting patient with lots of calories and nutrients. Except Caspi is like a soil chef, mixing fermented manure and compost in varying proportions \u201cto re-establish a whole layer of soil that holds water\u201d like a subterranean sponge.<\/p>\n

The technique is reminiscent of Rudolf Steiner\u2019s bio-dynamics, which treats the farm as a holistic entity. But considering Caspi\u2019s past and combining it with an uncertain future of water in California, a goal of using zero water to grow food is understandable.<\/p>\n

Caspi grew up inculcated with respect for water. In Israel, kids get \u201cDon\u2019t Waste A Drop\u201d stickers in school that go on the family fridge. \u201cIt\u2019s so much in our blood to save water,\u201d he says. \u201cWe had a cartoon that showed the whole family showering together under a few drops of water.\u201d<\/p>\n

Modern\u00a0drip irrigation<\/a>\u00a0with emitters was an idea out of Israel. So is placing black plastic sheeting over soil to contain moisture. Israel leads the world in recycling 80 percent of its water. Its latest technology collects dew.<\/p>\n

In California, some growers are on top of the drought. A report from the California Farm Water Coalition says that in the\u00a0San Joaquin Valley,<\/a>\u00a0$2.2 billion was invested in drip irrigation on 1.8 million acres. But for every conserver using soil probes, infrared photography and improved weather forecasting, we have devourers of resources.<\/p>\n

\u201cHere you flood fields,\u201d Caspi says. \u201cAn Israeli would say, \u2018Are you kidding?\u2019 It\u2019s the mentality of abundance, that it\u2019s going to last forever.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2008, winemaker Gideon Beinstock hired Caspi to be vineyard manager at Renaissance Vineyard and Winery in Oregon House. With Caspi\u2019s degree in plant sciences from The\u00a0Hebrew University<\/a>\u00a0and years of experience in water strategy in Israel, his mission was to convert 45 acres of conventionally cultivated vineyard to fully bio-dynamic viticulture.\u00a0Production costs<\/a>\u00a0went down by 12 percent. Yields increased between 3 percent and 7 percent.<\/p>\n

When Beinstock left Renaissance to found Clos Saron Vineyard and Winery a few miles away, he took Caspi with him. Clos Saron is so low-tech that grapes are harvested by touch. Its wine goes mostly to pricey restaurants in\u00a0New York City.<\/a>\u00a0Caspi\u2019s technique is most evident here. The base of each vine is encircled with a thick dressing of Caspi\u2019s gourmet manure-compost-mulch. The application is repeated every year. In the last four years, the vineyard has been watered only twice.<\/p>\n

Beyond his work at the vineyard, Caspi tends the gardens of about 50 \u201cmember\u201d neighbors in and around Oregon House. Because this is a rural community, Caspi can put a sign on the road saying \u201cmanure needed,\u201d and loads are brought to him for fermenting. The finished manure plus organic matter from garden waste, wood ash and olive paste all come from within a 10-mile radius. It returns to the members in the form of Caspi\u2019s magical soil smoothie that retains water and nourishes roots.<\/p>\n

On one day, Caspi might sow one member\u2019s five acres with donated wheat berries, then low-gear the van up a twisted drive to check on what amounts to a large backyard row garden. When a field\u2019s grass grows tall, he brings in a flock of another member\u2019s sheep to act as weed eaters.<\/p>\n

The reward? Every Wednesday, all year, each member gets a box of Caspi\u2019s art \u2013 intensely flavored fruits and vegetables from one another\u2019s property. A recent week brought strawberries, chard, cabbage, parsley, cilantro, beets, carrots and spinach. \u201cAnd this is the lowest point of the year,\u201d Caspi points out. This is the purest form of community-supported agriculture, known as CSA. But this version combines aggressive\u00a0water conservation<\/a>\u00a0with\u00a0food security.<\/a>\u00a0It gives more to the land than it takes.<\/p>\n

If this sounds too fringey, it\u2019s something to consider as more cities hook up homes to water meters. What Caspi does on a large scale can be done by city dwellers. \u201cIn your own neighborhood, yes, you can do this,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

In the garden, take a load off and don\u2019t till. Then follow Caspi\u2019s instructions.<\/p>\n

Find a source of manure and compost. Lay a thick layer, up to 4 inches, on the ground and plant right into it. Apply plant by plant rather than over the entire garden. For tomatoes, dig a deep hole, water the hole until the water drains, fill the hole with a mix of chicken manure and compost, then a tomato seedling. Add a bit more nitrogen in the form of half a teaspoon of chicken manure when you dig the hole. Water once more.<\/p>\n

How long can you go without added water? A week? A month? Water only if lack of moisture is detected by sticking a finger into the ground. \u201cThe first year is hardest,\u201d Caspi says. \u201cDon\u2019t give up. If you fail, you try again.\u201d<\/p>\n

As to your own sense of food security, you can have a community-supported agriculture system on your street. \u201cOne person grows the potatoes, someone else grows the beans, and another person grows herbs,\u201d Caspi explains. Everyone adds to the pile tended by the neighborhood compost geek. In a few years, the soil will be so absorptive it will gulp winter rainwater and retain it through summer.<\/p>\n

Without access to the livestock that live near Caspi, there might be a cost for store-bought manure, unless you have a friend with a horse, a cow or chickens. When a crop is ready, deliveries begin in staggered availability.<\/p>\n

With wells already stressed in the Sierra foothills, Caspi remains an Israeli at heart, tinkering for extra droplets of water in what he presumes is a terminal drought.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe plant takes only what it needs,\u201d Caspi says. \u201cThis is how it works in nature. If you don\u2019t need it, why do you want to take it?\u201d<\/p>\n

To protect ourselves from food shortages and to buffer California\u2019s agricultural economy, we all should regard any adjustments that allow us to grow food with less water as permanent.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n<\/div>\n


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By Elaine Corn The fear of scarce water is really the fear of scarce food. In its third year, the drought has already forced California growers to leave 800,000 farm acres unplanted this year, says Dave Kranz of the California … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6108","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\r\nOutsmarting the Drought - from the Sacramento Bee - CDFA's Planting Seeds Blog<\/title>\r\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\r\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/plantingseedsblog.cdfa.ca.gov\/wordpress\/index.php\/2014\/04\/24\/outsmarting-drought-sacramento-bee\/\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Outsmarting the Drought - from the Sacramento Bee - CDFA's Planting Seeds Blog\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By Elaine Corn The fear of scarce water is really the fear of scarce food. 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