Sustainable Practices

By Amanda Stahl and Alexander Fremier, Washington State University Washington State is taking steps to foster environmental stewardship in agriculture using an alternative approach to direct regulatory oversight. Twenty-seven counties in Washington have opted into the Voluntary Stewardship Program (VSP), which requires them to self-assess (with state oversight) whether voluntary management actions are maintaining or […]

By Kevin Hyde, Puget Sound Partnership Stormwater runoff, particularly from roadways, is one of the leading sources of water pollution in Puget Sound. Stormwater pollution impacts people and ecosystems in different ways. Many of the things Puget Sound residents hold dear, like swimming along rivers and beaches, harvesting and eating shellfish, and fishing for salmon, […]

By Chris Schnepf Precipitation has a large influence on forests and how they function. Forests, and how they are managed or disturbed, also have huge effects on streams that flow from them and all related stream benefits, from fisheries to irrigated agriculture. Because high water quality (low temperatures, low amounts of sediment) is such an […]

By Karen Hills This is part of a series highlighting work by Washington State University (WSU) researchers through the Waste to Fuels Technology Partnership between the Department of Ecology and WSU during the 2017-2019 biennium. This partnership advances targeted applied research and extension on emerging technologies for managing residual organic matter. Composting organic waste is, in many […]

By Karen Hills This is part of a series highlighting work by Washington State University (WSU) researchers through the Waste to Fuels Technology Partnership between the Department of Ecology and WSU during the 2017-2019 biennium. This partnership advances targeted applied research and extension on emerging technologies for managing residual organic matter. Composting rather than landfilling organic waste, […]

By Paris Edwards, USDA Northwest Climate Hub and Amy Garrett, Oregon State University Extension In parts of the maritime Pacific Northwest, climate conditions work well for dry farming, a set of soil preparation and management techniques that allow for growing food with little to no supplemental water. Dry farming has a long history of practice […]

 Q&A with Weed Scientist Dr. Ian C. Burke By Doug Finkelnburg, Area Extension Educator, Cropping Systems, University of Idaho Extension In the book “Advances in Dryland Farming in the Inland Pacific Northwest”, the common weed downy brome or “cheatgrass” is identified as potentially problematic for wheat producers as the climate changes. Downy brome is projected […]

By Fidel Maureira, Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Biological Systems Engineering, Washington State University Greenhouse agricultural production currently accounts for 1 to 2% of the agricultural production in the Unites States, but is rapidly growing. The value of this greenhouse production has increased 44% in the last years, and the number of operators has gone up […]

By Georgine Yorgey When you work at a land grant university, people sometimes reach out to you with questions.  I love this aspect of my job, as it often gives me a chance to bridge the divide between research and the real world.  In 2019, one of the questions I got most often was “How […]

By Fidel Maureira, Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Biological Systems Engineering, Washington State University Climate variability and change—rising temperatures, more frequent heat waves, drought, less snowpack, pests and diseases, wildfires, and the resulting over-use of resources such as groundwater—are creating critical agricultural production risks for California, the leading vegetable and fruit producing area of the United […]