The 6th California Climate & Agriculture Summit was held on March 4-5, 2019, including a farm and ranch tour of three climate-friendly farms in Yolo and Solano Counties, a full-day conference at UC Davis, and a festive evening celebration of CalCAN’s 10th anniversary.
The tour visited:
- The Cloverleaf Farm in Davis located at the Collins Farm
- Bobcat Ranch in Winters
- River Garden Farms in Knights Landing
The conference offered three tracks—practice, policy, and science—as well as a series of lightning talks. See the full program here. Find titles of each workshop below with links to presenters’ presentation slides where available.
Plenary Presentation
Climate & Agriculture Policy: Vision & Action
- Jeanne Merrill, CalCAN Policy Director
Practice Track
Creative Financing Tools for Agricultural Conservation
Moderator: Sacha Lozano, Resource Conservation District of Santa Cruz
- Brett Melone, California FarmLink
- Jeff Schahczenski, National Center for Appropriate Technology (NCAT)
Protecting Ag Land, Protecting the Climate
Moderator: Kara Heckert, American Farmland Trust
- Matt Freeman, Santa Clara Valley Open Space Authority
- Michele Clark, Yolo Land Trust
- David Bunn, Department of Conservation
Triple Win: Manure Management Strategies on California Dairies
Moderator: Mike Griffin, Organic Valley/CROPP Cooperative
- Lynne McBride, California Dairy Campaign
- Jana McClelland, McClelland’s Dairy
- Jake Magneson, Magneson Dairy
Technical Assistance as a Driver of Climate Smart Agriculture
Moderator: Dave Runsten, Community Alliance with Family Farmers
- Rex Dufour, National Center for Appropriate Technology (NCAT)
- Doug Parker, UC California Institute for Water Resources
- Karen Buhr, California Association of Resource Conservation Districts
What It Takes On the Ground to Get Carbon Into the Ground
Moderator: Sara Tiffany, Community Alliance with Family Farmers
- Ellee Igoe, Solidarity Farm and SD Carbon Sink Farms
- Blake Alexandre, Alexandre Family Farm
Policy Track
Getting the Most Out of California’s Climate Smart Agriculture Incentives Programs
Moderator: Vicky Dawley, Resource Conservation District of Tehama County
- Kristin Sesser, Point Blue
- Jessica Rudnick, UC Davis
- Jeanne Merrill, CalCAN
Connecting California’s Climate & Agriculture Policies to Equity
Moderator: Gail Wadsworth, California Institute for Rural Studies (CIRS)
- Thea Rittenhouse, California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA)
- Teresa Andrews, Western Center for Agriculture & Health Safety at UC Davis
- Kassandra Hishida, Community Alliance for Agroecology
- Combined presentation slides
Groundwater Management Implications for Agriculture
Moderator: Helen McGrath, Ditch Ranch & Flying M Ranch
- Keith Wallace, California Department of Water Resources
- Stacie Ann Silva, New Current Water & Land LLC.
SWEEP & Other Successful Water Conservation Programs
Moderator: Brian Shobe, CalCAN
- Daniele Zaccaria, Cooperative Extension at the Department of Land, Air and Water Resources of University of California, Davis
- Miguel Garcia, Napa County Resource Conservation District
- Ruth Dahlquist-Willard, UC Cooperative Extension
Climate Adaptation: What Can We Do to Keep Producers Producing?
Moderator: Wendell Gilgert, Point Blue Conservation
- Eric Larson, San Diego County Farm Bureau
- Tapan Pathak, UC Merced Cooperative Extension
- Adam Cline, Yocha Dehe Farm and Ranch
Science Track
Rethinking the Nutrient Management Paradigm for Soil Health
Moderator: Judith Redmond, Full Belly Farm
- Kabir Zahangir, USDA NRCS
- Tim Bowles, UC Berkeley
- Cristina Lazcano, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo
Managing Agroecosystems for Climate Resilience
Moderator: Jo Ann Baumgartner, Wild Farm Alliance
- Amélie Gaudin, UC Davis
- Caitlin Peterson, UC Davis
- Valerie Eviner, UC Davis
- Combined presentation slides
The Many Forms of Nitrogen in Agriculture and the Environment
Moderator: Ann Thrupp, Down-to-Earth Innovations
- Mike FitzGibbon, California Air Resources Board
- Genevieve Gale, Central Valley Air Quality Coalition
- Noelle Cremers, California Farm Bureau Federation
Cutting Edge Soil Science
Moderator: Jane Sooby, CCOF
- Charlotte Decock, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo
- Jessica Chiartas, UC Davis
- Rebecca Ryals, UC Merced
Lightning Talks
Moderator: Anthony Chang, Kitchen Table Advisors
Can seaweed reduce methane emissions from cattle?
- Ermias Kebreab, UC Davis
Reducing tillage on organic farms: Farmer-led research
- Cynthia Daley California State University, Chico Organic Dairy Program
The benefits of beaver stewardship to California agriculture and rangelands
- Kate Lundquist, Occidental Arts & Ecology Center WATER Institute
The power of visual storytelling to educate, inspire and drive change in our food system
- Oliver English, Common Table Creative
From research to tools: How the California Climate Hub supports climate-smart agriculture
- Lauren Parker, UC Davis
An uncertain future of first-generation ranchers
- Kate Munden-Dixon, UC Davis
State-of-the-art climate smart farmworker housing
- Alexandra Alvarado, Mutual Housing California
Agriculture is green infrastructure: Blazing the trail on land use planning and funding in San Jose
- Andrea Mackenzie, Santa Clara Valley Open Space Authority
