Engaging Farmers in Biologically
Integrated Farming Systems (BIFS)

The BIFS program strives to demonstrate and expand the use of integrated farming systems that have been proven to reduce natural resource degradation of agricultural origin in economically viable ways.

BIFS projects use a systems approach to develop and disseminate innovative farming practices. This means that pest management, soil building, wildlife habitat, waste management, irrigation, and other crop and livestock management concerns are addressed in combination whenever feasible.

Demonstrations and adaptive research are conducted on-farm through partnerships that make full use of the expertise of farmers, advisors, extensionists and researchers.

ACCOMPLISHMENTS

The BIFS program has funded nine projects in nine different farming systems. The adoption of biologically integrated systems has generated a number of benefits such as improved soil fertility, decreased erosion and nitrogen leaching, and increased populations of beneficial insects, fishes, migrant birds, and game. The BIFS Biennial Report (January 2001) is available on SAREP's website at http://www.sarep.ucdavis.edu/BIFS/bifs01/. Some of the achievements documented in the projects' November 2000 annual reports include:

• The successful elimination of wintertime sprays of diazinon-an organophosphate insecticide that has contaminated California rivers-on 877 experimental acres farmed by 33 prune growers statewide.
• A 57-pound per acre reduction in synthetic nitrogen fertilizer use between 1998 and 2000 on 324 acres of walnuts managed by 10 growers with no effects on yields. The use of cover crops and other organic sources of nitrogen in conjunction with monitoring of leaf nitrogen allowed growers to avoid yield reductions and to lower leaf nitrogen levels to healthy rates.
• Savings of approximately $28 per acre and a probable reduction in nitrate leaching due to a 103-pound per acre reduction in synthetic nitrogen use without yield losses on 228 acres of silage corn in nine dairy operations.
• Three successive years of soil incorporation of rice straw and winter flooding allowing a 30-pound per acre reduction of synthetic nitrogen use on 45 acres of rice managed by four farmers without yield losses.
• The use of pheromone mating disruption on 311 acres in 11 apple orchards allowing a reduction in the use of organophosphates and carbamates of 59 and 92 percent, respectively.

Positive changes in farming practices are actually occurring on a much larger scale than reported above. Farmers participating in our projects will often change practices on most of their acreage, not just in their demonstration plots. Additionally, many non-participating growers have been exposed to these innovative practices through BIFS projects' outreach efforts. Future grower surveys and analyses of pesticide use report data will show the extent to which these trends have extended to non-participating growers.

The BIFS program is part of a larger set of initiatives to which it has contributed significantly. Since 1993, the Community Alliance with Family Farmers (CAFF) has administered and continues to administer BIFS-like projects in almonds and walnuts. In 1998, the California Department of Pesticide Regulation began to fund the Pest Management Alliance, a program largely modeled on BIFS. The West Side BIFS project was instrumental in initiating a growing interest in conservation tillage among California growers.

COMPETITIVE GRANTS PROGRAM

Three-year on-farm demonstration projects are selected for funding through the BIFS competitive grants program. Projects are selected based on clearly defined criteria outlined in a Request for Proposals. A 13-member advisory board reviews proposals and makes recommendations for funding to the SAREP director.

SAREP FUNDED PROJECTS

A brief summary of projects funded during the FY1999-2001 reporting period is given below. More detailed information on each project is available at www.sarep.ucdavis.edu/BIFS/

• Stuart Pettygrove, UC Cooperative Extension soils specialist in the Department of Land, Air and Water Resources at UC Davis, "Integrating Forage Production with Dairy Manure Management in the San Joaquin Valley," $300,484 (July 99 - June 02). In California's Central Valley, dairy manure has been identified as a source of nitrate contributing to groundwater pollution. By encouraging dairy farmers to manage manure as a valuable source of nutrients for forage crops grown and used in the same dairy, the project reduces environmental pollution while decreasing dairy production costs. Project farmers have been able to drastically reduce and in some cases, completely forego the application of synthetic nitrogen to their crops without affecting yields.
  
  
• Janet Caprile, UC Cooperative Extension Contra Costa County farm advisor, "Integrated Pome Fruit Production in Contra Costa County," $116,457 (Jan. 00 - Dec. 02). Rapid urbanization around apple orchards in Contra Costa County has led to agricultural-urban interface problems, with the use of pesticides being the primary concern. This project focuses on reducing the use of broad-spectrum insecticides in apple orchards through the use of mating disruption for codling moth control. With this approach, the project is able to reduce grower reliance on organophosphates, carbamates and other ecologically disruptive materials.
  
  
• Randall Mutters, UC Cooperative Extension Butte County farm advisor, "Biologically Integrated Farming Systems in Rice," $300,000 (Jan. 99 - Dec. 01). Environmental issues such as air pollution from rice straw burning and the movement of pesticides into the Sacramento river as well as production problems arising from herbicide resistance and high production costs are requiring innovations in California rice farming. The rice project addresses these issues by demonstrating the viability of a variety of practices such as soil incorporation of straw, winter flooding, reduced synthetic nitrogen input, deep water and dry down, drill seeding, and winter cover crop. These practices reduce reliance on insecticides, herbicides and synthetic nitrogen, and offer a viable alternative to straw burning.
  
  
• Joseph Grant, UC Cooperative Extension San Joaquin County farm advisor, "Expansion of the Biologically Integrated Orchard Systems Model to Northern San Joaquin Valley Walnut Orchards," $154,160 (Jan. 99 - Dec. 01). To reduce pollution from the routine use of organophosphate insecticides and excessive use of synthetic nitrogen fertilizer on California's 200,000 acres of walnut orchards, the project has developed a farming system which relies on insect pheromone, natural enemies of pests, cover crops, and monitoring. Outreach to area farmers and collaboration with the Community Alliance with Family Farmers and the walnut Pest Management Alliance ensures wide dissemination of project results.
  
  
• Thomas Chao, UC Riverside Extension Horticulturalist, "Citrus Biologically Integrated Farming Systems," $238,700 (July 99 - June 02). Certain citrus production practices in California's Sierra foothills are thought to play a role in water pollution and soil erosion. The practices involved include the use of persistent pre-emergent herbicides and broad-spectrum insecticides, ground applied nitrogen, low irrigation efficiency and the year-round maintenance of bare orchard floors. The project is working with citrus growers to develop and disseminate alternative practices that rely on vegetative ground cover, natural enemies, least toxic pesticides, innovative fertilization and irrigation methods, and the systematic monitoring of nutrients, water and pests to improve farm management decision-making and optimize the use of natural resources.
  
  
• Gary Obenauf, Project Manager, "California Prune Board, Integrated Prune Farming Practices," $270,000 (Jan. 99 - Dec. 01). The prune BIFS project is a part of the larger Integrated Prune Farming Practices Program working with 33 prune growers in 10 counties in the Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys. The project focuses on reducing the use of dormant season organophosphate pesticides, increasing orchard monitoring activities, and reducing applications of synthetic nitrogen fertilizers.
  
  
• Carolee Bull, Research Plant Pathologist, USDA/Agricultural Research Service, "Biological Agriculture Systems in Strawberries," $300,000 (Jan. 99 - Dec. 01). Until recently and for the last 50 years, strawberry production in California was based on the use of methyl bromide, an ozone-depleting fumigant that is now nearly completely phased out. This project is identifying and promoting the use of strawberry cultivars, mulches and other cultural practices, and beneficial soil microbes and arthropods that are compatible with the commercial production of strawberries in the absence of methyl bromide.

Funding Sources
The success of CAFF's Almond BIOS, a collaborative and interdisciplinary project in which SAREP participated, led the California Legislature to request the establishment of the BIFS program with Assembly Bill 3383 (Bornstein, Brown, and Snyder) in 1994. Since 1994, funds have been provided by the California Department of Pesticide Regulation's Food Safety Account, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and the UC Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources. Further legislation (AB 1998, Thomson) signed in September 1998 expanded the goals and extended the time frame of the existing program and allocated additional state funding.

BIFS-RELATED COLLABORATIVE RESEARCH AND EXTENSION ACTIVITIES

Since BIFS projects emphasize a collaborative and interdisciplinary approach, SAREP staff work closely with them, assisting with project outreach efforts and providing natural and social science technical support. Staff also provide technical assistance by presenting at field days, assisting with customized farm plans, and reviewing and editing publications. SAREP also cooperates in applied research and extension activities with BIFS and BIFS-like projects around the state. Recent projects include the following:

The BIFS Workgroup
SAREP is a Statewide Special Program of the University of California Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources (DANR). DANR provides funding and institutional support for workgroups in high priority areas of research and extension. Workgroups bring together Agricultural Experiment Station (AES) and Cooperative Extension (CE) personnel along with non-DANR partners to work on emerging and continuing priority issues in DANR program areas. In 1999, DANR ratified a BIFS Workgroup and has provided funding so that it can serve as a forum for BIFS and other similar projects (not funded by SAREP) to share ideas, resources, and experience. Under the auspices of this workgroup, SAREP has set up a BIFS Workgroup email listserv (bifs@ucdavis.edu) which facilitates communication among projects. Workgroup meetings also encourage the sharing of experiences among BIFS, CAFF and California Department of Pesticide Regulation personnel, and UC faculty and specialists with interests in non-traditional agricultural extension. The workgroup currently has 109 BIFS listserve members and 43 active members, 25 of whom are UC DANR staff or faculty. Archives of listserv communications can be viewed at http://listproc.ucdavis.edu/archives/bifs/. Due to the intensive data management aspects of these agricultural chemical risk/use reduction regional demonstration projects, the workgroup has focussed on database training and also support for the creation of commodity-specific databases to handle monitoring and agricultural chemical data. The purpose of the databases is to increase the efficiency and ease of intensive monitoring and reporting activities by Field Scouts and Pest Control Advisors using biologically integrated farming methods. In addition, project impact assessment activities have been supported by the workgroup, such as the development of a pilot survey instrument for the rice BIFS project. Currently, the results of this farming practices survey are being analyzed. Additional surveys of prune, dairy and walnut growers are under development. Pesticide use reporting analysis for BIFS projects has also been partially funded by the BIFS Workgroup, although the majority of funds are being provided by US-EPA.

Partnerships with the Pest Management Alliance (PMA) and Biologically Integrated Orchard Systems (BIOS)
SAREP collaborates and shares experiences in a variety of ways with programs from other organizations that have goals similar to those of the BIFS program. Staff from the BIFS program, the BIOS projects of the Community Alliance with Family Farmers and the Pest Management Alliance of the California Department of Pesticide Regulation sit on each other's advisory boards and project management teams, and participate in the BIFS Workgroup. These three programs sometimes maximize their impact by administering projects in the same commodity, as is the case, for example, with walnuts. More information on the PMA program is available at: www.cdpr.ca.gov/docs/empm/alliance/overview.htm and on the BIOS program at www.caff.org/caff/programs/ag_community.html#bios

SAREP serves as a technical advisor to the Department of Pesticide Regulation's (DPR) Statewide Pest Management Alliances (PMA) in Winegrapes. The target of this three-year project is sulfur and weed management. There have been incidences of sulfur dust drifting into sensitive areas including school zones and public highways, and herbicides used in grape production have been found in groundwater in some areas of the state. This program aims to develop more sustainable practices through building on past successful efforts like the Biologically Integrated Farming Systems (BIFS) project of the Lodi Woodbridge Winegrape Commission. The PMA will focus its first efforts on demonstration and outreach related to sustainable sulfur use and reduced-risk weed management. In addition to the funding from DPR, more than 50 percent of the project costs are shared by the California Association of Winegrape Growers (CAWG) and by in-kind contributions of time and expertise from regional winegrape organizations. CAWG is providing administrative leadership for the project.

Agricultural Partnerships Conference
SAREP joined with U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (Region 9), California Department of Pesticide Regulation, California Department of Food and Agriculture, USDA Western Region Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education (SARE) program, and the Clarence E. Heller Charitable Foundation to sponsor a conference on Partnerships for Sustaining California Agriculture: Profit, Environment and Community on March 27-28, 2001. The conference, attended by over 230 participants, highlighted innovations in agricultural production, research and extension activities that are profitable as well as environmentally friendly. BIFS projects were highlighted and profiled throughout the conference. Speakers, panel discussions, and workshops focused on efforts to implement "win-win" strategies that merge agricultural and environmental concerns. Audio files of keynote presentations are available at www.sarep.ucdavis.edu/events/. Proceedings from the conference will be available in January 2002 at sarep@ucdavis.edu.

Pesticide Use Reporting Conference
The California Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) sponsored the first ever conference on pesticide use reporting in California entitled "California's Pesticide Use Reporting System: Public Access, Data Quality, and Utilization." SAREP was a co-sponsor of the conference, which took place on May 8, 2000 at the California State University, Sacramento. Additional co-sponsors included the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, California Department of Food and Agriculture, California Agricultural Commissioners Association, and the University of California's Pesticide Impact Assessment Program, the UC Statewide IPM Project, and the College of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences at UC Davis. DPR's Pesticide Use Report (PUR) is the largest and most complete database on pesticide use in the world. Since 1990, DPR has collected information on every pesticide application by growers and commercial pesticide control operators in California. Many other states and countries are looking to this pesticide use reporting system and the resulting database as a model. The conference highlighted how the PUR is used for a wide variety of environmental and public health purposes including risk assessments, promoting farm worker health and safety, analyzing human exposure patterns, protecting threatened and endangered species, monitoring and investigating environmental issues, improving pest management, and evaluating the impact of reduced-risk and use demonstration projects. In addition, the conference addressed issues such as the meaning of the data fields, how the data were collected, and the quality and completeness of the data. It was attended by over 200 interested individuals including state and federal regulators, county agricultural commissioners, university and other academic organizations, environmental and public health organizations, commodity groups and growers, and pest control operators and advisors as well as other interested parties.

Regional Initiatives in Sustainable Vineyard Management
SAREP has worked with the Central Coast Vineyard Team (CCVT) since 1995. The CCVT is a tri-county grower group whose mission is to promote sustainable vineyard practices along California's Central Coast. CCVT members own or manage over 30,000 acres of Central Coast winegrapes. The CCVT has developed the Positive Points System (PPS) ¾ a 1,000-point assessment system for evaluating adoption of sustainable farming practices for a single farm or region and over time. The PPS, through a series of questions, outlines a model vineyard that integrates soil, water, pest, and viticultural practices. The model vineyard is designed to be less dependent on chemical inputs and rely on biological systems. This integrated production system could eventually be used as the basis for a regional "eco" label for winegrapes. For more information see the Web site at www.vineyardteam.org/index.html

Earthworms and Other Decomposers in BIOS Organic Walnut Orchards
SAREP collaborated with Birgitta Rämert of the Swedish Agricultural University in Uppsala and several other scientists on a study involving the role of nightcrawler earthworm (Lumbricus terrestris) in residues of leguminous cover crops. The work included laboratory and field components, and the data indicated that the addition of L. terrestris to the resident complex of earthworms significantly increased the rate of disappearance of woolypod vetch (Vicia villosa ssp. dasycarpa) litter. Other decomposers that feed on vetch litter included various isopod Crustacea and European earwig.

Increasing the Adoption of Sustainable Agriculture in the Central Valley
SAREP is collaborating with the Community Alliance with Family Farmers, the Lodi-Woodbridge Winegrape Commission and UC researchers in a project funded by USDA's Fund for Rural America to study why farmers adopt sustainable agriculture practices and how community links might be strengthened to support adoption. Farmers in the Biologically Integrated Orchard Systems (BIOS) program and community stakeholders in Stanislaus and Merced counties have been interviewed to identify current and potential links in the areas of farmland preservation and local marketing. A community outreach project that is building bridges between a school food service director in Atwater and local farmers is underway. Other outreach efforts include the Small Farm Celebration in the fall 2001 in Modesto, and discussion with UC Merced planners about their agricultural policy.

Reduced Disturbance Agriculture For Field Crops In California
A grant from the US Environmental Protection Agency Pesticide Environmental Stewardship Program has supported SAREP work on this subject. The work has involved farm visits in the Sacramento, San Joaquin, and Salinas Valleys to assess farmer innovation to reduce tillage and add non-crop, field-border biodiversity to their operations. SAREP staff are preparing a detailed report that will profile the farmers as well as scientific literature on these and related subjects.