Produce And Agriculture Threats - America's heartland - Episode 901

America's Heartland is made possible by.. Farm Credit - financing agriculture and rural America since 1916.   Farm Credit is cooperatively owned by America's farmers and ranchers. Learn more at farm credit dot com.   Croplife America.. Representing the companies whose modern farming innovations help America's farmers provide nutritious food for communities around the globe.   Hi I'm Jason Shoultz. Are you excited about apricots or overjoyed about oranges? Well, Get ready to haul in a harvest of fresh fruit. This is definitely the show for those of you who are passionate about produce.   It's a good bet that the cherries on your table come from Washington State. We'll meet a family whose focus on fruit dates back more than a century. Growers in Florida face a dangerous disease that threatens to wipe out citrus crops. What will that mean to consumers?   And there are new concerns about honeybees. Without them.. produce that you enjoy may be in peril.. Then.. a "small" story about a tiny type of tangerine. We'll take you to California to talk about the "pixies".   It's all coming up on America's Heartland.   ♪You can see it in the eyes of every woman and man♪ ♪In America's Heartland living close to the land♪ ♪There's a love for the country and a pride in the brand♪ ♪In America's Heartland Living close♪ ♪Close to the land♪   Americans love their fruit. On average each person will consume about 275 pounds of fruit a year. But nutritionists say we should really be consuming more and.. different kinds of fruit. Apples, oranges and bananas are always in the top three, but pears, plums and peaches are a great pick as well.   And with more and more consumers demanding "fresh" fruit, farmers markets and u-pick-em farms have become very popular. Pulling that apple from the tree is a guarantee of freshness and there's been a growing demand for organic options as well.   But there are some dramatic challenges facing farmers when it comes to fruit production. We'll talk about those in just a moment, but first we're heading for Washington State. Where Sarah Gardner says one family has had a focus on fruit for more than a century.   It seems nature designed the Yakima Valley for both beauty and abundance. This scenic part of central Washington has cold winters, gentle summers, and modest rainfall.. an ideal seasonal balance for fruit trees to flourish including the state's famous cherries. Washington produces more than half of all the sweet cherries in the U.S. "We need a few more sprouts, on that tree, but most look pretty good." It's those cherries and apples and pears that have sustained the Allan family for nearly a century. The Allans actually started as dairy farmers here in Yakima Valley in 1901. Two decades later, they began planting fruit tree orchards. Four brothers "grew" the business into a thousand acres, passing it along to a third generation that includes siblings David and George Allan.   they when they would look back and look at the fact that the family stayed together on this thing so far, and we've been able to work that out, that'd be pretty important to them.   Now, their sons, Travis, and Tom, are taking the reins. A fourth generation acquiring their parents' knowledge while enjoying the freedom to try new things. "Sometimes you sin first and ask for forgiveness later if it's needed. But things have always changed and they've understood it, and they get it. So they've been really helpful and their wisdom comes into our decisions a lot. You know, they feed us information and we take it and then we try to make it better."   "George and I, we conduct an annual review of the upper management and when we got done we said "You know these boys are doing a lot better at their stage of development in the company than we were." And so we thought, you know, this thing maybe has some future." The harvest usually begins in early June, with the delicate cherries hand-picked at the peak of ripeness and flavor. The Allans grow more than a half-dozen varieties.. including the coveted Rainier cherry, yellow with a red blush. It's actually the sweet result of cross-breeding between two dark red varieties, including the also-popular Bing cherry.   Inside the Allan Brothers packing plant, the cherries are repeatedly washed, separated by size, and packed by a remarkable combination of equipment and people power.   Up to 27 tons of cherries are processed each hour... destined for hungry diners across the U.S. and in faraway and rapidly growing markets like China, Taiwan, Japan and India.   Back here in the orchards, Travis Allan says he's constantly looking for new ideas and innovations to increase the size of each year's harvest. Reflective foil bounces sunlight from the ground back up into the trees. Branches are trimmed, and then trussed with an elaborate system of ropes to stretch them towards the sky. So by opening up the tree and pushing the limbs to the side, that we have these light channels that would allow us to produce more fruit per linear foot per acre. But all that work goes to waste if our feathered friends have their way. Birds can wreak havoc on a cherry crop. (pop!) The loud noise from a propane gun sometimes will scare them off, but they often get used to it. Netting is another option, but it can cost thousands of dollars per acre.   "You know, as farmers I think you can't just say what worked last year is gonna work this year. And so you've got to continue to challenge yourself, what's making sense to move forward." That's why Travis is trying out new technology - laser beams sweeping out from atop a tower. "It doesn't harm in any way. When the birds fly into the light, it scares them and it will push them away and then hopefully not eat any more of my cherries!"   "So I think the system seems to be working.." Each generation of the Allan family walking these fields expresses gratitude for the hard work and sacrifice that's come before. And there's a sense of responsibility to carry it on, to adapt, to make it better for the next generation.   "Things are evolving a lot faster and so, in order to stay competitive, you got to keep changing at an ever-increasing rate. Really planning that out and figuring out where you need to go, having that vision and then being able to execute it." You know, we've been at this for over 40 years. 5, 6 years ago we took a look at each other and we said.. we look pretty old. And what's really amazing to me is most of our management now is probably under 40 years old. We have a lot of potential as we go forward.   I'm not pessimistic about this industry at all. There's challenges but I think we can meet 'em."   "Being a farmer is unique and people don't appreciate how much fun it is. You know, benefit someone's life by producing a quality piece of fruit or anything that they enjoy. It's like, 'Oh man, you grow the Rainier cherries, I love them so much!' And it's like, wow, I do that every day, so.."   Washington grows a lot of cherries. The Evergreen state has more than 25 thousand acres of cherry trees. While there are more than a thousand varieties of cherry trees in the U.S., only about ten grow the commercial fruit we see in stores. And cherries are good for you! The bright red fruit delivers high levels of anti-oxidants and beta carotene. France's King Charles the fifth was said to have loved cherries so much that he planted more than a thousand trees in his royal gardens. Oh.. and if you're in a baking mood.. it takes more than 200 cherries to make your average cherry pie.   If you've joined us on other episodes of America's Heartland, you know that farmers, ranchers and growers often face challenges in getting products to you the consumer. Those challenges could be weather, transportation, or sometimes.. pests. That's part of a significant problem for citrus growers in Florida. The Sunshine State is a major producer of citrus for U.S. and overseas consumption. But that picture may be changing.   In the citrus groves of Florida.. a menace is lurking. It's a silent but destructive force.   It doesn't have the horsepower of a hurricane, the desperation of a drought or the ferocity of a sudden freeze. But grower Paul Meador knows just how dangerous this threat is.   So Paul what are we looking at here? Well this is a younger tree inside of a mature orchard that's showing severe symptoms of greening.   It's called Citrus Greening Disease. Caused by a bacterium that's spreading through Florida's citrus trees like wildfire. Once it attacks a tree, the oranges don't grow in their typical round shape. Paul Meador showed me a telltale sign of infected fruit.   If you look at the healthy piece this is centered in the piece of fruit which is where the stem runs through through the piece of fruit We'll cut open the fruit with greening symptoms..   and you can see it's off centered. Of course it's not just funny shaped fruit with off-centered stems. In time the disease can weaken the very core of the tree and cease its production of fruit. And you can see it also has some greening to it, some green color to it instead of it being bright orange.   >> And what happens here to this fruit, then? Well, typically it will fall off. And if you look on the ground, that, you see a lot of fruit on the ground. Those are pieces of fruit that are showing severe symptoms of the greening disease. It's an industry that's seen it share of challenges in the past. Hurricanes, freezes, and most recently another disease called citrus canker have reduced the acreage of citrus by a third. But this latest challenge has folks here the most concerned. Greening has been found in more than 30 Florida counties.   Greening potentially has the ability, if left unchecked, to wipe out the entire industry.   Fritz Roka is an agricultural economist with the University of Florida. He says losing the state's 9-billion dollar citrus industry would send economic shock waves across the state. Consumers could see a dramatic rise in the cost of orange juice and other citrus products. But it goes far beyond that- Impacting everything from pickers, citrus growers, processors, shippers, to grocery stores. The second ripple effect would be the workers that pick the citrus. The workers that tend to the groves the works and the owners of these groves earn income and then they take that income and they spend it on things..   You're taking away the infusion of cash and money that comes into the region or into the state because of citrus.   The state's citrus growers, government agencies and researchers are working to combat the menace, investing tens of millions of dollars in research. The first plan of attack was to cut down trees that show the first signs of the disease. But it can take two years for trees to show symptoms of greening. And deciding to cut down trees that are initially producing fruit is not easy for any grower.   There were certain places where if you wanted to take out all the greening trees you would have basically taken out their whole block, They would have lost everything and so some growers were unwilling to do that. We were behind the 8 ball with this disease. We didn't recognize the disease until it had already infested a good part of the state. So hopefully we are at the change in the curve now and we'll be able to manage the disease a little more aggressively.   The best hope right now seems to be going after the bug that carriers the bacteria. Called a psyllid.. it's a tiny flying bug that feeds on the sap of citrus trees. And when it feeds on an infected tree and moves to another tree it transfers the bacteria. Phil Stansly is an entomologist researching the tiny disease-carrying psyllid. Those are the nymphs. So those are the immature stages. Those are the ones that pretty much pick up the disease and then adults spread it around. In his research lab, Stansly and other researchers are studying one approach: beetles and tiny wasps that feed on the psyllids-reducing their numbers.   For now, however, the growers are spraying pesticides to kill the psyllid. But spraying has environmental and economic limitations.   It's a stop gap is what it is until we come up with a more permanent solution. And what we're hoping for is that through genetic changes, improved varieties or whatever we find citrus, we develop citrus that is no longer susceptible to the bacteria.   Chemicals, genetic research and battling bugs.. all part of the arsenal. But in this war.. with growers and scientists on the front lines, a magic bullet has so-far, been elusive.   You can't look back and be sad about what took place. You just got to keep looking forward and hope for the best.   While Florida is one of the best known citrus producers in the world, oranges are not native to the Sunshine State. Spanish Explorers brought the first oranges to Florida in the 16th century. The majority of the state's orange crop goes directly into orange juice.   Let's talk about another challenge impacting farmers and growers. It's a challenge which may affect what you pay for fruits and vegetables that depend on pollination from honeybees. It has to do with a condition called "Colony Collapse Disorder". A dangerous pest.. called the verroa mite.. has been identified as one important factor in a threat to entire colonies of bees. Our Rob Stewart says research is underway in Louisiana to find a solution.   Honeybees may be small in size, but the loss of bee colonies worldwide is a huge concern for agriculture. Bees pollinate some 30% of the food crops that we enjoy every day. But in recent years, both a predator called the Verroa mite and something called "Colony Collapse Disorder" have been decimating hives and killing off bees.   "It's an enormous problem and it is a result of several things coming together all at the same time."   Dr. Tom Rinderer directs research for the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Honeybee Breeding, Genetics and Physiology laboratory in Baton Rouge Louisiana. We've got new pests and pathogens, the parasitic mites have been with us for too short a time for any solution other than the ones we've provided to be available so we're in the leading edge of that. We do have stocks, bee stocks, that are resistant to Verroa mites. Those bees.. bred with what's called Verroa Sensitive Hygiene.. or VSH.. can interrupt the process of mites attacking the hive. So these are bees in a VSH colony that are basically searching and destroying mite-infested pupae. >> Baby bees.. Baby bees. These bees are now removing the injured pupa and you can see the pupa is destroyed.. and there's another one being pulled out and as you can see, It's infested with verroa mite. There's the mite.   Outside the lab, these hives contain 60 thousand bees used in a nationwide field test. Bees that have been bred with the VSH trait.   "These three colonies did the best. We use them as breeding material." Healthy bees insure plentiful crops.. affecting prices for many fruits and vegetables at the supermarket.. The new breed of bees here will go to commercial beekeepers across the nation.   And basically just breaking this down. This is in action, what is really helping to repair some of the major problems we're seeing with bees. We think this could be very useful, yes. You know, any of these breeding programs to increase the natural genetic-based resistance in these bee populations can't help but be useful.   Researchers here say the impact on agriculture is huge. One study from Cornell University put the value of pollination at 15 billion dollars a year. There is a lot of industry support for it. I think that they see that we are doing it and that we are moving forward, and I think they are very very excited about that.   As research continues on colony collapse, The lab has also developed improved honey bee strains using varieties from eastern Europe.   This is great stuff. This is great biology. Without bee pollination, we could not possibly have the food production that we have the agricultural systems that we have So it's a small industry, but it's key to the agriculture that we have and that we see today.   Honeybees are getting some help in several parts of the country. Many farmers and farm groups have begun "native pollinator" projects- promoting the growth of native plants to attract and support honeybees. the projects also enhance wild bee population in addition to plant pollinators such as moths, butterflies, insects and even some animals.   Hello, I'm Paul Robbins and here's something that you may not have known about agriculture. You know a lot of the foods that we enjoy today have been around a long time. Tomatoes, potatoes, avocados, all of those date back thousands of years but not all of them have the history of one piece of fruit that early writers called "The Gift of the Gods".. and if you like to sing "The Twelve days of Christmas" around the holidays, you already know that colorful partridge was sitting in a pear tree. Travel back in time some 5000 years and a Chinese writer was already documenting ways to improve the pear trees by different methods of grafting the branches. In The Odyssey the great poet Homer lauds pears as a "Gift of the Gods" Pears were one of the first fruit to be grown commercially with orchards springing up everywhere across Europe by the 17th century. Pears were a popular prop for artists as still life in those renaissance paintings and if the picture didn't sell, you could always eat the fruit. Early colonists brought pears to America by 1620 and orchards thrived on the east coast until a crop blight destroyed many of those trees. Fortunately by that time, settlers in Oregon, Washington and California had begun their own orchards which today provide a majority of the pears grown in the U.S. There are hundreds of varieties of pears grown around the world but Bartlett pears which originated in England in the 1700's are the most popular variety grown in the U.S. Pears were once known as butter fruit because of their juicy delicate texture and flavor. Pears are a good source of fiber and vitamin c and pear trees can live to be 100 years old and while it may seem that there's no similarities at all, pears are actually a member of the rose family, happily, without thorns.   Specialty fruits often have their own fans. People who wait for the season.. and just the right moment.. when their favorite apples, oranges or peaches will be just right for picking. And that's the case in southern California where Akiba Howard found a small fruit with a big following.   When you look at them.. the name seems to fit. Small and sweet tasting, they are easily the "pixie" members of the citrus family. Some say it's like growing candy.. on a tree.   And kids love that, because you don't have that tang, that, you know, many Ovals or Navels tend to have. They're just super sweet. They're like candy.   Most fruits, grains and vegetables ..have been around for hundreds even thousands of years. But these hybrid, seedless mandarin Pixies were developed less than a hundred years ago with commercial production only getting underway in the 1960's.   Pixies like year round cool days and warm nights which is why California's Ojai Valley.. just east of Santa Barbara.. has become "Pixie Central" for growers of this specialty fruit.   Pixie tangerines can be grown anywhere in the world, but they're not gonna develop good flavor everywhere in the world. Much like wine grapes, you know, taste better if grown in Napa versus Stockton. Emily Thacher Ayala is a fifth generation Ojai farmer. Her father, Tony, raised a tangerine variety called Dancys along with other citrus for market. With no commercial demand however, he reserved his "pixies" for family and friends.   "So do you think we can get them to wait? The customers? Yeah. I'd like to wait until May. Why don't we."   But here in the valley, the Pixie's profile was about to change. Enter Jim Churchill and his wife Lisa Brennies. After a leaving a big-city career, Jim returned to his hometown of Ojai in 1979. He was looking for a new challenge and found it after trying one of Tony Thacher's Pixies. And I just said, "Tony, what is this?" And he said, "That's a Pixie tangerine." And I said, "Well do you sell them?" And he said, "Well, I only have two trees and by the time I'm done selling all the Dancys, my kid have eaten all the Pixies." And that was market research.   Acres of trees were planted the next year. Their efforts paid off following a taste test by the owners of a specialty food market in northern California.   He just thought, "This is good," you know. And so by the end of the phone call he bought a thousand pounds more than we had ever sold to anyone.   The growing demand for the juicy jewels energized an eclectic group of established and first time farmers.   All the growers are different, you know. We've got doctors and lawyers who have, you know, a couple of acres of Pixies in the backyard. And then we have some growers that have ten acres.   They formed the Ojai Pixie Growers Association to share information about raising, harvesting and marketing the fruit.   We looked at the fact that there were all these other people that had tangerines coming on, and we thought that it would be better if all the tangerine growers worked together.   Pixie trees take four years to bear their first commercial crop with heavy harvests available only every other year.   This tree has a lot of fruit on it, as you can see, but it has no blossoms for next year. It's spending all of its energy growing fruit for this year, and so it's not gonna make any fruit for next year.   As a part of their marketing efforts, growers here ship only as the fruit ripens on the tree.   We want them to be on store shelves, you know, within 10 days of being picked, whereas some of the other citrus you see in grocery stores, it's been a month.   Pixies have proven a favorite with several high profile chefs and the fruit has earned a "Best of the West" vote from the foodies at Sunset Magazine.   I like that we produce something, and I like that we produce something that people like.   I love being able to take my favorite food and give it to people and put a smile on their face and know that they're getting something that's good for them.   That's going to do it for this time. Thanks for traveling the country with us on this edition of America's heartland. We're always pleased that you can join us.   We know that we pass on a lot of information to you in every program and in case you missed something or you just want to check out videos from this or other shows, we make it easy. Just log on to our website at America's Heartland dot org. And, of course, there's lots going on in the social media arena.. You'll find us there as well. We'll see you next time on America's Heartland.   You can purchase a DVD or Blu Ray copy of this program. Here's the cost:   To order, just visit us online or call 888-814-3923.   ♪You can see it in the eyes of every woman and man♪ ♪In America's Heartland living close to the land♪ ♪There's a love for the country and a pride in the brand♪ ♪In America's Heartland Living close♪ ♪Close to the land♪   America's Heartland is made possible by.. Farm Credit - financing agriculture and rural America since 1916.   Farm Credit is cooperatively owned by America's farmers and ranchers. Learn more at farm credit dot com.   Croplife America.. Representing the companies whose modern farming innovations help America's farmers provide nutritious food for communities around the globe.   ♪♪