The Other California: The Great Central Valley in Life and Letters by Gerald W. Haslam

1991 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 275-276
Author(s):  
Liahna Babener
Keyword(s):  
2020 ◽  
Vol 148 (5) ◽  
pp. 2033-2048
Author(s):  
Matthew D. Cann ◽  
K. Friedrich

Abstract The pathways air travels from the Pacific Ocean to the Intermountain West of the United States are important for understanding how air characteristics change and how this translates to the amount and distribution of snowfall. Recent studies have identified the most common moisture pathways in the Intermountain West, especially for heavy precipitation events. However, the role of moisture pathways on snowfall amount and distribution in specific regions remains unclear. Here, we investigate 24 precipitation events in the Payette Mountains of Idaho during January–March 2017 to understand how local atmospheric conditions are tied to three moisture pathways and how it impacts snowfall amount and distribution. During one pathway, southwesterly, moist, tropical air is directed into the Central Valley of California where the air is blocked by the Sierra Nevada, redirected northward and over lower terrain north of Lake Tahoe into the Snake River Plain of Idaho. Other pathways consist of unblocked flows that approach the coast of California from the southwest and then override the northern Sierra Nevada and southern Cascades, and zonal flows approaching the coast of Oregon overriding the Oregon Cascades. Air masses in the Payette Mountains of Idaho associated with Sierra-blocked flow were observed to be warmer, moister, and windier compared to the other moisture pathways. During Sierra-blocked flow, higher snowfall rates, in terms of mean reflectivity, were observed more uniformly distributed throughout the region compared to the other flows, which observed lower snowfall rates that were predominantly collocated with areas of higher terrain. Of the total estimated snowfall captured in this study, 67% was observed during Sierra-blocked flow.


Plant Disease ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 100 (6) ◽  
pp. 1054-1063 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. Saito ◽  
T. J. Michailides ◽  
C. L. Xiao

In recent years, an emerging, undescribed postharvest disease was observed on mandarin fruit after extended storage in California. We collected decayed mandarin fruit from three citrus packinghouses in the Central Valley of California in 2015 and identified this disease as Mucor rot caused by Mucor spp. Mucor rot occurred in 11 of the 15 grower lots sampled, and the percentage of Mucor rot in the total decayed fruit varied among affected grower lots, ranging from 3.3 to 93.1% with an average of 49.2%. In total, 197 isolates of Mucor spp. were obtained from decayed mandarin fruit and identified based on internal transcribed spacer sequence and morphological characteristics. Of the 197 isolates, 182 (92.4%) were identified as Mucor piriformis, 7 (3.6%) were M. circinelloides (6 M. circinelloides f. lusitanicus and 1 M. circinelloides f. circinelloides), 4 (2%) were M. racemosus f. racemosus, 3 (1.5%) were M. hiemalis, and 1 (0.5%) was M. mucedo. All species grew at 0 and 5°C, except M. circinelloides, which did not grow at 0°C. Mycelial growth was arrested at 27°C for M. piriformis; 35°C for M. racemosus f. racemosus, M. circinelloides f. lusitanicus, M. hiemalis and M. mucedo; and 37°C for M. circinelloides f. circinelloides. Optimal mycelial growth occurred at 20°C for M. piriformis and M. mucedo, 25°C for M. racemosus f. racemosus and M. hiemalis, 27°C for M. circinelloides f. lusitanicus, and 30°C for M. circinelloides f. circinelloides. M. piriformis grew significantly faster than the other four species at 5 and 20°C, and M. mucedo was the slowest in growth among the five species. Sporangiospores of M. piriformis, M. racemosus f. racemosus, and M. hiemalis germinated at both 5 and 20°C. M. circinelloides germinated at 20°C but did not germinate at 5°C after incubation for 48 h. All five Mucor spp. caused decay on mandarin fruit inoculated with the fungi, and the lesion size caused by M. piriformis was significantly larger than that caused by other species at both 5 and 20°C. Our results indicated that Mucor rot in mandarin fruit in California is caused by Mucor spp. consisting of M. piriformis, M. circinelloides, M. racemosus f. racemosus, M. hiemalis, and M. mucedo, with M. piriformis being the dominant and most virulent species. Previously, M. racemosus was reported on citrus. This is the first report of Mucor rot in citrus caused by M. piriformis, M. circinelloides, M. hiemalis, and M. mucedo.


2021 ◽  
Vol 135 (1) ◽  
pp. 39-46
Author(s):  
Rodger Titman ◽  
Elise Titman ◽  
Shawn Craik

Pair formation in ducks is thought to be influenced by the acquisition of breeding plumage, the occurrence of courtship display, or both. We examined the frequency of pair formation in Mallard (Anas platyrhynchos), Green-winged Teal (Anas crecca carolinensis), and Northern Shoveler (Spatula clypeata) in the central valley of California in relation to the frequencies of male attainment of breeding plumage and courtship display. Predictions related to two hypotheses are: (1) the timing of pair formation is directly related to the attainment of breeding (definitive alternate) plumage by males, and (2) frequencies of courtship display are highest during pair formation. Most female Mallard were paired by the end of October, with >80% in pairs by early December. Of Northern Shoveler, 90% were paired by early January and 90% of female Green-winged Teal were paired by early February. The highest rates of courtship display by Mallard were observed during October through November, by Northern Shoveler in November, and by Green-winged Teal in November through January. Courtship display was, therefore, relatively frequent at the same time as pair formation for all three species. Northern Shoveler spent less time in courtship display than the other two species. Most (90%) male Mallard had acquired alternate plumage by mid-November, Northern Shoveler by early February, and Green-winged Teal by mid-December. Thus, timing of pair formation coincided with timing of attainment of breeding plumage in Mallard and Green-winged Teal but not Northern Shoveler.


2011 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 108-111
Author(s):  
Barry Estabrook

California's Central Valley is ground zero for large-scale, industrialized agriculture in the United States, and it is paying a high environmental price for that distinction. Its water is contaminated, and its air is more polluted than that in large, urban areas such as Los Angeles. But there is another side to food production in the Central Valley. Small, artisanal, often organic farmers are showing that it is possible to raise crops and animals profitably and sustainability. If it can be done in the Central Valley, it can be done anywhere.


Author(s):  
Cheryl Colopy

Before I went to Bihar I knew little about embankments. I had seen levees in California, in the Sacramento–San Joaquin Delta and in the Central Valley. There, if you stand on an embankment on one side of the river, you can look across and see a matching embankment. Some have been set back from the river a half of a mile or so; but even then it is easy to grasp in a glance the relatively linear triad of a river and its pair of embankments. The first embankment I saw in Bihar after miles of bumping along in the back seat of a gray Tata Sumo SUV in the April heat was a steep-sided loaf of sand, maybe twelve feet above the adjacent land. I scrambled to the top and looked around. The Kamla River glared below, reflecting a hazy but intense sun. It flowed lazily between the embankment and a wide stretch of sand a few inches above the water. Together the water and the sandbank narrowed as they receded into the distance. I didn’t see another embankment. I was disoriented by the incessantly jarring ride and the heat, but I recall asking where the other embankment was. A gesture directed my eyes toward the horizon of low trees and brush and sandy soil. Nothing was very distinguishable in the monochromatic haze of dust and heat. Over the next two days my eyes and brain continued to struggle in vain to make sense of what I was seeing by comparing the north Indian state of Bihar to California. California rivers are powerful and can flood portions of the flat Central Valley, but they are in no way comparable to the rivers that rush out of the towering Himalaya. The Sierra Nevada ranges from five to twelve thousand feet. At twelve thousand feet in the Himalaya, one is still in the “middle hills,” where in spring there are forests of rhododendron trees blooming.


1988 ◽  
Vol 62 (03) ◽  
pp. 411-419 ◽  
Author(s):  
Colin W. Stearn

Stromatoporoids are the principal framebuilding organisms in the patch reef that is part of the reservoir of the Normandville field. The reef is 10 m thick and 1.5 km2in area and demonstrates that stromatoporoids retained their ability to build reefal edifices into Famennian time despite the biotic crisis at the close of Frasnian time. The fauna is dominated by labechiids but includes three non-labechiid species. The most abundant species isStylostroma sinense(Dong) butLabechia palliseriStearn is also common. Both these species are highly variable and are described in terms of multiple phases that occur in a single skeleton. The other species described areClathrostromacf.C. jukkenseYavorsky,Gerronostromasp. (a columnar species), andStromatoporasp. The fauna belongs in Famennian/Strunian assemblage 2 as defined by Stearn et al. (1988).


1967 ◽  
Vol 28 ◽  
pp. 207-244
Author(s):  
R. P. Kraft

(Ed. note:Encouraged by the success of the more informal approach in Christy's presentation, we tried an even more extreme experiment in this session, I-D. In essence, Kraft held the floor continuously all morning, and for the hour and a half afternoon session, serving as a combined Summary-Introductory speaker and a marathon-moderator of a running discussion on the line spectrum of cepheids. There was almost continuous interruption of his presentation; and most points raised from the floor were followed through in detail, no matter how digressive to the main presentation. This approach turned out to be much too extreme. It is wearing on the speaker, and the other members of the symposium feel more like an audience and less like participants in a dissective discussion. Because Kraft presented a compendious collection of empirical information, and, based on it, an exceedingly novel series of suggestions on the cepheid problem, these defects were probably aggravated by the first and alleviated by the second. I am much indebted to Kraft for working with me on a preliminary editing, to try to delete the side-excursions and to retain coherence about the main points. As usual, however, all responsibility for defects in final editing is wholly my own.)


1967 ◽  
Vol 28 ◽  
pp. 177-206
Author(s):  
J. B. Oke ◽  
C. A. Whitney

Pecker:The topic to be considered today is the continuous spectrum of certain stars, whose variability we attribute to a pulsation of some part of their structure. Obviously, this continuous spectrum provides a test of the pulsation theory to the extent that the continuum is completely and accurately observed and that we can analyse it to infer the structure of the star producing it. The continuum is one of the two possible spectral observations; the other is the line spectrum. It is obvious that from studies of the continuum alone, we obtain no direct information on the velocity fields in the star. We obtain information only on the thermodynamic structure of the photospheric layers of these stars–the photospheric layers being defined as those from which the observed continuum directly arises. So the problems arising in a study of the continuum are of two general kinds: completeness of observation, and adequacy of diagnostic interpretation. I will make a few comments on these, then turn the meeting over to Oke and Whitney.


1966 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
pp. 337
Author(s):  
W. Iwanowska

A new 24-inch/36-inch//3 Schmidt telescope, made by C. Zeiss, Jena, has been installed since 30 August 1962, at the N. Copernicus University Observatory in Toruń. It is equipped with two objective prisms, used separately, one of crown the other of flint glass, each of 5° refracting angle, giving dispersions of 560Å/mm and 250Å/ mm respectively.


2020 ◽  
Vol 43 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip Pettit

Abstract Michael Tomasello explains the human sense of obligation by the role it plays in negotiating practices of acting jointly and the commitments they underwrite. He draws in his work on two models of joint action, one from Michael Bratman, the other from Margaret Gilbert. But Bratman's makes the explanation too difficult to succeed, and Gilbert's makes it too easy.


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