Vegetable Resources

The resources listed below are for informational purposes only, and do not imply recommendation or endorsement by the PNW VEG.

Vegetable Crop Management 101 Workshop
(In English and Spanish)

Proceedings from the Pacific Northwest Vegetable Association pre-conference ‘Vegetable Crop Management 101’ Workshop, Nov. 17, 2015, Kennewick, WA.

• Diagnosing Crop Problems & Submitting Crop Samples for Diagnosis – Jenny Glass (WSU) & Robert Cating (OSU).
• Management of Insect & Mite Pests in Vegetable Crops – Stuart Reitz (OSU) & Mike Bush (WSU).
• Management of Weeds in Vegetable Crops – Alan Raeder (WSU).
• Soil Fertility, and Nutrient Deficiencies and Toxicities in Vegetable Crops – Joan Davenport (WSU).
• Irrigation Management in Vegetable Crops – Troy Peters (WSU).

Kate Smith (WSU), Lyndon Porter (USDA ARS), Chon Rivera (WSU), Martha Rivera (WSU), and Silvia Rondon (OSU) provided English-Spanish translation of the presentations and handouts. The workshop was organized by the Pacific Northwest Vegetable Extension Group (PNW VEG).

Food Safety Resources

• Can you improve the cleanliness of your harvest knives? Phil Tocco, Michigan State University. Not all crops require knives to harvest or pack. For those that do, knives can potentially f spread disease through all the produce they touch. There are a number of food safety considerations when using knives.
• Cheap and easy method of reducing foodborne illness risk from harvest workers. Phil Tocco, Michigan State University. If you could do one thing that could reduce passage of gastrointestinal illness by 80 percent and foodborne illness by 50 percent, would you do it? Find out about this incredibly cheap, easy method of controlling illness.
• Food Safety Program at WSU. University of Idaho – Washington State University School of Food Science.
• Food Safety. Washington State University School of Food Science.

PNW University Vegetable Programs

• Oregon State University Entomology Program.
• Oregon State University Hermiston Agricultural Research & Extension Center.
• Oregon State University Potato Integrated Pest Management.
• WSU Mount Vernon NWREC Vegetable Horticulture.
• WSU Mount Vernon NWREC Vegetable Pathology.
• WSU Mount Vernon NWREC Vegetable Seed Pathology.

Vegetable Associations and Organizations

• National Onion Association.
• Oregon Tilth.
• Pacific Northwest Vegetable Association. Scholarships are offered annually. Details on eligibility, and the application process are available at the PNVA website.
• Washington Tilth Producers, Organic and sustainable farm organization of Washington State.
• Western Washington Horticultural Association.

Vegetable Production

• Building soil quality with an oilseed radish cover crop–where did the N go? Michigan State University Extension News.
• Can I Use this Product for Disease Management on my Organic Farm?. eXtension. Includes allowed and prohibited substances, brand names materials lists, record keeping requirements, and national organic program language on materials.
• Commercial Vegetable Production Guidelines. Oregon State University, Department of Horticulture. On-line guide to commercial vegetable crop production for the Pacific Northwest. A list of crops from arugula to zucchini. Includes production, harvesting, soil fertility, and pest control.
• Cornell University Organic Crop Production Guides. These Organic Production Guides outline general practices for growing vegetable crops using organic integrated pest management techniques. The guides provide an overall approach for organic production with a focus on biological, mechanical, and cultural controls. Sections on cover crops, resistant varieties, crop rotation, field selection, soil quality and nutrient management all highlight their interrelated qualities and precede specifics on pest management options.
• Michigan State University Vegetable IPM.
• Ohio State University Vegetable Extension.
• Organic Plant Disease Management: Thinking Like a System, eXtension.
• Organic Seed Alliance. Promotes the value of seed and seed-saving skills for organic production systems.
  Contact:
  P.O. Box 772
  Port Townsend, WA 98368
  360-385-7192
  fax 360-385-7455
  info@seedalliance.org
• Seedless watermelon – how do they do that? Michigan State University Extension News.
• The Compendium of Washington Agriculture. This compendium is funded by the Washington State Commission on Pesticide Registration and is supported by the Washington State Department of Agriculture. Crops are listed alphabetically with notations as to the types of sources available for that crop.
• University of Idaho Potato Pathology program.
• University of Saskatchewan Vegetable Program in the Department of Plant Sciences.
• USDA ARS Vegetable Lab.
• Vegetable MD Online, Cornell University Department of Plant Pathology, New York.
• Washington State University’s Potato Information & Exchange.
• WSU Seed Crops IPM Website. This web site is a product of the statewide WSU Seed Crop Team funded by the WSU CAHNRS Agricultural Extension Issue-Focused Teams Initiative. This new team, led by entomologist Doug Walsh and plant pathologist Lindsey du Toit, seeks to protect and enhance the seed industries of Washington State. Other team members include weed scientists Tim Miller and Rick Boydston, plant pathologists Lyndon Porter and Ken Eastwell, county Extension educators Tim Waters and Don McMoran, and communications specialist Sally O’Neal. The Seed Crop Team brings faculty and staff from numerous disciplines and both sides of the state together to address issues impacting production of many types of seed crops.

Vegetable Seed Sources

Conventional and organic seed sources.

• Association of Official Seed Certifying Agencies – Organic Seed Finder.
• California Certified Organic Farmers (CCOF) – Organic Seed Suppliers & Resources List (PDF).
• Keithly Williams Seed Co.
• National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service – Directory of Organic Seed Suppliers.
• Off Grid Info – Heirloom Seed Companies List.
• Oregon Seed Association Member List (many regional and wholesale suppliers).
• Organic Seed Alliance – Seed Producers Database (This database is not for retail sales seed purchases).
• Osborne International Seed Co.
• Scott Seed Co.
• Washington State Crop Improvement Assoc. Seed Source List.
• WSU Vegetable Research and Extension – Grain Seed Sources.
• www.PickACarrot.com A seed database to search seed catalogs for growers of all sizes.

Vegetable Statistics

• USDA Crop Profiles.
• USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service (USDA NASS). National level data on vegetables can be found by clicking on the “Crops and Plants” link and then clicking on vegetables at Step 1 under the “Browse NASS by Subject” area.
• State offices of USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service can be reached by selecting a state in the gray box on the left. For statistics on vegetable crops by state, first select a state. On the resulting state page, select “State – Vegetables” and click “Go”. Then on the “Vegetables” page select the data type, vegetable, and years of interest. Data can be downloaded as well as viewed online.

WA State Department of Agriculture

• Washington State Department of Agriculture (WSDA).
• Who to Contact (PDF). Contacts are grouped by program. WSDA serves the people of Washington State by supporting the agricultural community and promoting consumer and environmental protection.

Weather Databases

Washington State University’s AgWeatherNet. AgWeatherNet (AWN) provides access to raw weather data from the Washington State University weather network, along with decision aids. AWN includes 134 weather stations located mostly in the irrigated regions of eastern Washington State but the network has undergone significant expansion in Western Washington and in dry land regions of the state. The AWN network is administered and managed by the AgWeatherNet team located at the WSU Irrigated Agriculture Research and Extension Center in Prosser, WA but is programmatically linked to efforts at other WSU research and extension centers.

Evapotranspiration Forecasts from the National Weather Service

Evapotranspiration (ET) forecasts, which are used for irrigation scheduling, are available from the National Weather Service (NWS) internet site. Click on “Graphical Forecasts”. Forecasts will be made for up to seven days and include departure from normal. The ET forecast is for alfalfa. Forecasts are updated daily at 5 a.m. from March 15 to October 15 by meteorologists at the NWS in Pendleton Oregon.

The ET forecast is calculated using the 1982 Kimberly-Penman model, and is based upon local conditions for temperature, humidity, wind speed, and cloud cover. Solar radiation is then derived from cloud cover based upon the time of year. The output is a reference ET forecast for alfalfa. To use the ET forecast for other crops, a conversion must be made based upon that crops growth stage. This can be done by checking the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation’s Agrimet information.

* For additions/changes to these vegetable resource listings, contact Lindsey du Toit.

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