I started to answer the question about brown rot in peaches and ended up
generating a *how-to* use the SARE database and get more information about
SARE projects. Oh, well, I needed to do this anyway :)
Here's what I address in this somewhat long e-mail:
* The SARE database of funded projects on the web;
* The AGRICOLA database of literature, from the National Agricultural
Library;
* Searching strategies for SARE and AGRICOLA;
* How to get more information about SARE projects;
* Literature searching if you are applying for a SARE grant;
The SARE database of funded projects lists all projects funded since 1988.
Most include a summary and results, and all include contact information for
either the principal investigator, or for the SARE regional office where you
can request more information. Note that the most recent projects do not yet
have summary information since we wait for the first annual report to add
it.
SARE has funded two projects that included an objective on brown rot. I
have excerpted from the database and pasted them near the end of this
message. I found them in the SARE database of funded projects (1,322 of
them at http://www.sare.org/projects/) by using the search terms:
brown and rot and peach
(you must include the *and*)
Note that if I say: brown and rot and peaches, I get only one hit, while
brown and rot and peach* gets both hits again.
If I search for: brown or rot or peach, I get 415 hits... Now I'm wondering
what all of them are. When I've pulled up a document in a search on the
web, I use the FIND function to get right to the word I'm looking for.
See http://www.sare.org/projects/search.html#HOW for searching tips.
Another use of the asterisk (*) is by itself in the search term box to bring
up all projects. That's what I did to see that there are 1,322 projects in
the database as of today.
So what do you do once you've found a SARE project in the database on the
web, read all the information available there, and are still hungry for more
information? Several options:
1) Contact the PI or other contact person listed at the bottom of the
project report on the web (see examples below with the peach rot search).
2) Contact the SARE region that funded the project. The SARE regions are
imbedded in the project number, and we have told the database search engine
to extract and print the region along with the project titles. Contact
information for SARE regions can be found at
http://www.sare.org/htdocs/sare/contacts.html or there is a shortcut
from the SAN home page http://www.sare.org/. The four regional web sites
are also linked from our home page.
3) Contact the National Agricultural Library (NAL) for a copy of annual
and/or final project reports. Many--but not all--project reports have been
submitted to NAL and are indexed in AGRICOLA. You can borrow these project
reports, either in hard copy or sometimes on diskette. (FYI: Farmer/rancher
project reports are NOT submitted to NAL.)
In general, individuals are supposed to go through inter-library loan to get
materials from NAL. That means going to any library and saying you want the
project report. Tell your librarian that NAL is the only place to get them.
Be sure to include the SARE PROJECT NUMBER and the NAL CALL NUMBER, as well
as project title, author, etc. See http://www.nal.usda.gov/ddsb/ for
information about borrowing from the National Agricultural Library.
You can search AGRICOLA to find SARE reports that have been submitted and a)
have cleared through the NAL system; b) been added to AGRICOLA and c) been
updated in whatever version of AGRICOLA you are using. You can search
AGRICOLA on the web at http://www.nal.usda.gov/ or go directly to
http://www.nal.usda.gov/ag98/. On the web, if you use the ADVANCED KEYWORD
SEARCH and type NT=SARE you get 356 hits. (NT is the note field in
AGRICOLA).
IF YOU have access to AGRICOLA on a CD-ROM (like at your university library)
it is MUCH easier to search than the web version! By searching for: SARE
in NT or SARE in SO (that means, SARE in the note field or in the source
field), you can find all SARE projects in the library (currently 349,
includes a couple of bad hits). Add another specific search term (and
peach*) to narrow your search.
Incidentally, there are 148 documents indexed in AGRICOLA that fit the
search:
brown and rot and peach*
I'd be glad to send those 148 hits to Nathan via e-mail. Presumably they
are not all *sustainable* approaches to the problem.
NOTE: Your results may differ from mine. I am fortunate to have AGRICOLA
on my LAN (network) since it is produced here at NAL. It is the most
up-to-date version, and I can search all of the CDs at once, whereas in a
library, you may need to do the same search on several different CDs.
Here's what the hit on the SARE brown rot in peaches project from AGRICOLA
(networked) looks like:
AN: IND 21242876
UD: 9808
AU: Shearer,-P.W.
TI: Peach orchard ground cover management to reduce antropod damage.
SO: Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education SARE research
projects Northeast Region. [1988-. 1997. 9 p.
CN: DNAL S441.S855
PA: USDA
PY: 1997
LA: English
NT: SARE Project Number: LNE96-74. Record includes floppy disk.
Reporting period for this report is September 1996 to December 1997.
PT: Article
SF: IND
DE: prunus-. orchards-. ground-cover. crop-management. crop-damage.
plant-parasitic-nematodes. plant-diseases. integrated-control. new-jersey.
CC: F100; F822; F830
AN: IND 20439723
UD: 9500
Here's what you get from the SARE database:
A Multidisciplinary Approach to Evaluate and Aid the
Transition From Conventional to Low-Input Pest Management
Systems in Stone Fruits
Project number: LW91-028
Project coordinator: Kent Daane
Year: 1991
State(s): CA
<Stuff deleted>
Good progress was made towards a more sustainable approach to brown rot (the
major fruit
disease of peach) management. Three tools have shown promise: maintenance of
moderately low
tree nitrogen level, addition of organic composts to the soil and cleaning
up of diseased,
mummified fruits in the trees. Additionally, we observed a negative
correlation between a yeast on the fruit and levels of brown rot. Methods of
manipulating this yeast will be studied in greater detail in
the future. In addition to less fruit disease, the application of compost to
the soil has also shown a
tendency towards better fruit quality and less fruit damage from insects.
For more information about this project, contact the
principal investigator at:
Kent Daane
Division of Biological Control UCB Kearney
Agricultural Center
UCB Kearney Agricultural Center
Parlier CA, 93648
Phone: 209-891-2500
A second project from the SARE database:
Peach Orchard Ground Cover Management to Reduce
Arthropod Damage
Project number: LNE96-074
Project coordinator: Peter Shearer
Year: 1996
State(s): NJ
<Stuff deleted>
Methods and Results
Results of this study clearly demonstrate that peach growers
participating in this project had three
times less damage caused by tarnished plant bug feeding in orchard
blocks with managed sod
ground covers compared with fruit grown with weedy ground covers or
disked orchard floors.
Tarnished plant bug levels were also lower in ground covers where
herbicides were used to remove
broad leaf weeds and alternate host plants of this pest. This project
found that certain peach
diseases including brown rot, cytospora canker, and bacterial spot were
not influenced by different
ground cover management practices.
For more information about this project, contact the
principal investigator at:
Peter Shearer
Rutgers University
121 Northville Road
Bridgeton NJ, 08302
Phone: 609-455-3100
THE SEARCHES IN AGRICOLA AND THE SARE DATABASE ARE NOT THE SAME! One of the
SARE project reports is not in NAL, or is in the bowels of the building
getting processed. Also, sometimes the project report comes in with a
different title than the title of the funded proposal. Before we noticed
that this was happening, some titles got cast in stone in AGRICOLA. Use the
SARE project number whenever possible.
Finally,
IF YOU ARE APPLYING FOR A SARE GRANT, the Alternative Farming Systems
Information Center (AFSIC) will conduct a literature review for you and send
the resulting bibliography. The reference specialist at AFSIC can do a much
more targeted search than what I am capable of fumbling through! AFSIC is
funded in part by SARE and is also located at the National Agricultural
Library (the SAN office is co-located with the AFSIC office). Contact
afsic@nal.usda.gov if you need a lit review done for your SARE grant.
Please don't all fill the inbox now, and be sure to give several weeks lead
time for an individualized search! See also http://www.nal.usda.gov/afsic/
to view MANY great bibliographies already done!
I've done enough damage today. Hope this has helped rather than, and check
out the SARE database of projects at http://www.sare.org/projects/. Try
some searches in your favorite sustainable agriculture topic area. See what
you find!
Andy
Andy Clark, Ph.D.
SAN Coordinator
c/o AFSIC, Room 304
National Agricultural Library
10301 Baltimore Ave.
Beltsville, MD 20705-2351
PH: 301-504-6425
FAX: 301-504-6409
san@nal.usda.gov
http://www.sare.org
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