A group of students traveled to the City of Roses to participate in creating the floats for the annual rose parade. Here's what Jadice Rhead had to say: I am so grateful for the amazing opportunity I had to design floats for the Portland Rose Festival Parade this past week. For approximately 14 hours a day, we designed flower arrangements for six of the fifteen floats, and assisted where needed on four more. At first it was intimidating to create such large pieces. The five of us had to communicate with one another in order to match our designs on each float. Although this was challenging at times, we quickly got the hang of it and designed some pretty fun arrangements! Read an article about the event here. I am in Ruskin Florida working for the company Ag Reserves Inc. with Deseret Farms of Ruskin. They have around 680 acres of Citrus consisting of two varieties of juice oranges, Valencia and Hamlin. The majority of my time has been spent caring for these trees. The citrus industry is being plagued by a disease called Greening. It is spread through psyllids feeding on the leaves and it affects the overall development of the tree. The tree loses 30% of its root system, the leaves are smaller and yellow colored, the fruit is small, discolored, and low in pound solids and sugars. There is no cure for this disease so I've been experimenting with different fertilizers and heat treatment to try to push the disease back into the roots. That would allow the tree to grow unhindered for a few years before the disease migrates back into the leaves. Along with that I've learned how to operate a backhoe, tractor, and fertilizer spreader. he annual Ag Days event was held June 18th this year. Ag Days is unique in that the whole event is planned, set up, and ran by students. The purpose of Ag Days is to inform and educate more people, specifically college students, about the how they are impacted by agriculture— from the clothes we wear to the food we eat. The event also serves as a great recruiting tool to encourage more students to major in the field of plant science. There was a great turnout this year— 2200+ people came to ride the tractor up the hill, see the animals and farm machinery, milk a cow, munch on ice cream, pancakes, french fries, and grapes, sow a few seeds, and learn a thing or two about the big world of agriculture. The planning committee did a great job this year as the day went smoothly and everything was set up on time. The Horticulture Department had a booth set up where attendees could come enjoy flowers and sow some seeds in a mini pot to take home. We were busy the entire day talking about what we do in the horticulture program while helping students and families pick seeds to plant.
The 2015 Master Gardener Regional Convention, sponsored by University of Idaho Extension, will be June 25th and 26th located in the Benson Building at BYU-Idaho and the BYU-Idaho Thomas E. Ricks Gardens. “Master Gardeners and those interested in learning about the Master Gardener Program in Idaho, Wyoming, Utah and Montana. Students and faculty from the University of Idaho and BYU-Idaho are also invited to attend.
Convention schedule: Thursday, June 25th— 6:00pm
Classes offered:
Did you know that all your dreams can come true and that you can work for Disney? We know you’re in the field of plant science, but just because you spend more time these days playing in the dirt than daydreaming about being a prince or princess in well-spun fairytale, doesn’t mean that you should count Disney out. Disney/Epcot puts a lot of money into their landscaped gardens. It’s part of it’s magical charm and one of many reasons the masses enjoy their Disney adventures. Disney also is heavily involved sustainable high-tech horticulture and agriculture. They do truly amazing things with plant material.
But we’re getting off-topic. Did you know that every year they are looking for students to fill internships in the field of plant science? Hey, that’s us! In fact, a few of our students have interned with Disney in the past, and we have a few completing their internship experience with them right now. It’s quite the process to be accepted for one of their programs, so we wanted to put this information out right now for anybody who thinks this is something they would like to be involved in. Start looking into and planning now for this opportunity. Desired majors include but are not limited to: Ag. Communication, Ag. Education, Agribusiness, Agriculture, Agronomy, Aquaculture, Aquatic Biology, Biology, Biotechnology, Botany, Crop Science, Biological and Biosystems/Agricultural Engineering, Entomology, Environmental Horticulture, Fisheries, Food Science, Horticulture, Landscape Design, Marine Biology, Microbiology, Molecular Biology, Ornamental Horticulture, and Plant Science. Possibilites include: Aquaculture: Operate a recirculating freshwater aquaculture facility. Monitor filtration systems and water quality, assist in diagnosis and control of disease, and raise fish to marketable size for Walt Disney World® restaurants. Biotechnology: Maintain a tissue culture production facility. Prepare media and culture a wide variety of plants. Then, collect, package and deliver the tissue-cultured plants to Epcot® merchandise locations. Entomology: Become an integral part of The Land’s Integrated Pest Management program. Rear and maintain insect colonies, release beneficial insects into greenhouse crops, and maintain entomology-related shows. Plant Science: Maintain a high-quality show of hydroponically-grown food crops from around the globe. Seed, transplant, irrigate and prune plants; harvest produce for Epcot® restaurants; rake, sweep, and provide general cleanup of greenhouses. The majority of positions accept applications from January-March (for summer/fall), and August-November (for spring), positions may be posted at any time during the year, so we encourage you to check their site for updates regularly. http://disneycareers.com/en/default/ We post information when we hear from their science programs manager so look for that as well— all right here on our weebly. Also, check out these links from Disney to get a better idea of what’s expected and how to apply. http://disneycasting.net/downloads/profintern/animal_prog_descr/Plant_Science.pdf http://disneycasting.net/downloads/profintern/animal_prog_descr/Horticulture.pdf The annual Fashion & Floral Gala took place on March 28. This year there was one HUGE difference compared to years past. Instead of being held in the Benson building, the event took place in the Hart auditorium. This was a great move. There was more room to showcase student’s work and less stress setting it all up. Students and attendees both loved the new venue. Because the event was held in the Hart auditorium, we were able to have access to the school’s Audio/Video department. They set up the stage (minus the floral pieces, of course) and took care of the sound equipment. It was awesome having the big screens running live footage during the fashion show. Because the A/V crew took care of the stage mechanics, Home & Family students were able to focus on their fashion pieces and the Horticulture students were able to focus on their floral arrangements— just as if they were all contracted for a large live event. Everything was so professional and it really gave students a great industry experience. The jury’s still out, but right now we think it’s safe to say that this was one of the best shows to date. We’re already looking forward to next year. On March 27th, the Greenhouse Operations class traveled to central Idaho to view some greenhouse businesses. They were able to tour three very different operations and see how their class lectures apply to a real business. First stop was Mountain States Plants. We visited the operation site in the Twin Falls area but they also have operations in northern Utah. The Twin Falls site is unique because it is heated via geothermal water, which is abundant in the area. Mountain States is a large mum producer, providing potted mums to large stores like Fred Meyer and CAL-Ranch. The second stop was Onsen Farms. They grow produce all year long in 5 high tunnels. They follow organic principles and practices and also have an aquaponics systems. We loved being able to taste whatever greens caught our fancy as we learned more about their permaculture techniques while being surrounded by the beauty of their greenhouses. They sent us back on the road with a bag of delicious fresh sunflower sprouts to snack on. Last destination was Moss Greenhouses in Jerome. This facility is jaw-dropping, to say the least. Students were awed to near silence during their tour as they were able to witness how a large greenhouse business operates. Moss’ key to success? Automation. Mechanized seeding, transplanting, and watering allows Moss to consistently grow millions of healthy crops. If you’ve ever been to Thanksgiving Point down in Utah, then you’ve seen Moss quality bedding plants as they are the premier growers for the Thanksgiving Point Gardens. Three stops in one day is a lot to take in, but the students arrived home dreaming of their future greenhouse operation and how to incorporate everything they were privileged to learn that day. BYU-Idaho Horticulture has been attending the landscape industry's "Student Career Days" for years and years now. Each year we've attended our students perform at top-notch. This year was no different. The 39th annual PLANET Student Career Days and National Collegiate Landscape Competition took place March 12-15th, 2015, at North Carolina State University. Over 850 students attended from the nation's top horticulture and landscape programs while competing in over 28 team and individual competitions (http://cals.ncsu.edu/hort_sci/scd/). Our team competed in 28 events overall, and drumroll please. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Brigham Young University-Idaho earned the title of National Champion!!!!!!! Everybody involved- students and teachers, put a lot of time into preparing for this and their hard work really showed this year. The results are as follows:
1 BRIGHAM YOUNG UNIVERSITY - IDAHO 4139.80 2 MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY 4043.45 3 CAL POLY - POMONA 3819.55 4 COLORADO STATE UNIVERSITY 3778.65 5 BRIGHAM YOUNG UNIVERSITY - PROVO 3708.34 Results for the events our students competed in and placed top 5:
Click here to see more details on the final results. Of the other 15 events our students competed in, most placed in the top 10 and made huge contributions to our overall team score. Our first place win was truly a team effort and we are so proud of each of our team members. One HUGE advantage of attending PLANET and performing well is the opportunity to network within the industry and earn scholarship money for school. Six our students were awarded scholarships this year to fund their horticulture education.
Mississippi State University will be hosting next year and we're already looking forward to spending some time in the south. |
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