ADVICE AVAILABLE EXTENSION OFFICE FILLS POSITION AFTER 10 YEARS.

Byline: Daily News

LANCASTER - After a 10-year absence, a University of California farm adviser and researcher is helping farmers in the Antelope Valley.

Grant Poole, a University of California Cooperative Extension agriculture and environmental issues farm adviser, is at work where both farming and population growth are increasing, meaning he faces issues common to farmers around California.

``It might surprise people that agricultural production in Los Angeles County is on the upswing; at the same time, urban growth is on the upswing in L.A.'s ag areas,'' said Poole's supervisor, Rachel Surls, director of Los Angeles County UC Cooperative Extension. ``Even though the Antelope Valley might have lower agricultural production than areas in Central and Northern California, the issues our farm adviser must deal with are on the cutting edge due to ag's proximity to a growing population.''

Additionally, she said, high desert agriculture is unique.

``Things that UC farm advisers and specialists are doing in other counties don't apply in the high desert,'' she said. ``Now we have someone dedicated to farmers growing crops with the winter cold, summer heat and very, very windy conditions typical in the Antelope Valley.''

Poole, a Lancaster resident who took the farm adviser position in February 2002 after it had been vacant for 10 years, is providing one-on-one consultations with farmers, offering advice on integrated pest management, developing degree-day models for local conditions, studying water conservation, teaching soil moisture monitoring techniques and working on alfalfa weed management.

He has already brought University of California researchers to the Antelope Valley, including UC Davis alfalfa specialist Dan Putnam, Siskiyou County small grains farm adviser Steve Orloff and Kern County irrigation and agronomy farm adviser Blake Sanden.

Poole has completed a research project in cooperation with Bolthouse Farms into the ability of mustard plants to hold down dust and kill pests and diseases that affect onions and carrots - two burgeoning valley crops.

Poole said his observations showed a significant improvement in the soil quality of plots where mustard was planted over untreated plots.

Mustards produce chemicals called glucosinolates. When mustard plants are chopped up, blended into the soil and the field irrigated, the glucosinolates are converted to isothiocyanates, compounds well known to kill or suppress many soil-borne diseases, nematodes and weeds.

With the phasing-out of methyl bromide, the most common and effective soil fumigant, and the increasing tolerance of soil-borne pests to other synthetic soil fumigants, mustard plants may find a place in the vegetable crop rotation.

Mustards' isothiocyanates are similar in composition to the active ingredient in the common synthetic soil fumigant Vapam.

Poole shares offices with the UC Cooperative Extension 4-H Youth Development Program at the County Administrative Center in Lancaster (335-A K-6). Contact Poole at [phone] or online at gjpoole(at)ucdavis.edu.

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(color) Grant Pool, seated in his Lancaster office, is the new UC Cooperative Extension farm adviser.