An upcoming seminar that may interest you (managing weeds!)

Next week's MSU Horticulture/Crop and Soil Sciences seminar might be of interest to those of you interested in agroecology, sustainable agriculture, and organic farming.  Dr. Eric Gallandt from the University of Maine will be giving a seminar on managing soil weed seed banks at 4:10 pm on Thursday, April 28, in PSSB room 149.  His research focuses on soil quality and ecological weed management; current projects that Eric and his students are involved with include:

• comparing growers' attitudes towards weed management to those of researchers and extension agents
• evaluating the Weed Master--a sort of human powered tractor with adjustable and adaptable cultivation and flame-weeding implements that can dramatically decrease the time spent on hand weeding
• investigating weed management in organic cereal crops using different planting densities, row spacing, and cultivation techniques
• managing weed seed rain using cover crops

Eric is very involved in extension and outreach work in Maine's organic farming community and teaches an introductory sustainable agriculture class (in addition to others!); he is currently the chair of the Plant, Soil, and Environmental Sciences department and has been active in the Sustainable Agriculture Program at UMaine for a number of years.

You can get more information about Eric's research from his website and blog:

http://www.umaine.edu/weedecology/

http://gallandt.wordpress.com/

Contact Erin Haramoto ([log in to unmask]) for more information, or if you'd like to meet with Dr. Gallandt.

THURSDAY, APRIL 28
4:10 PM
PLANT AND SOIL SCIENCE BUILDING, ROOM 149