Shades of Green Athens-Clarke County Agriculture and Natural Resources E-Newsletter May 2021

What’s included in this issue...

Articles Programming and Resources

A Note From Athens-Clarke County Pg. 2 Pg. 7 Online Green Thumb Lecture Agriculture and Natural Resources

Pg. 3 Pg. 8 Billions of periodical cicadas and Stay in the Loop! their songs set to fill the spring air Pg. 9 Pg. 4 UGA student investigates why mod- Local Farmers Markets ern tomatoes have lost their flavor Pg. 13 Pg. 5 Your lawn could help save the bees Helpful Resources

A note from Athens-Clarke County Agriculture & Natural Resources

Hello readers! Hopefully this newsletter finds you all well. Spring is already flying by. We have some fun events and opportunities we are looking forward to sharing with you all this month. One that we find especially exciting is Inter- national Compost Awareness week (May 2-8, 2021). Make sure to check out the “Stay in the Loop!” page of this newsletter to find out how to get in- volved with the various events going on in Athens during this week (one including a local compost sale!!). Our Green Thumb Lecture for this month will be discussing composting and is in partnership with ACC Solid Waste Depart- ment in celebration of International Compost Awareness Week. Details and the link to register will be in the flyer later in this issue. We will be having our 2021 Smoked Boston Butt Sale just in time for your Memorial Day weekend plans! Ordering is available now until May 21. Make sure to check out the flyer later in this issue to see the new additional casseroles available to order as well. Have a great month of May! We hope you enjoy this month’s issue of “Shades of Green”. Take care, Athens-Clarke County Agriculture and Natural Resources

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Billions of periodical cicadas and their songs set to fill the spring air By Sean Montgomery

this unique opportunity I t has been 17 years together — if they can since a set of billions of stand the brood's loud periodical cicadas noise. emerged from their underground chambers Most of the seemingly and filled the air with endless vibrations and boisterous buzzing and buzzing that fills the air desperate mating calls. comes from males sere- Brood X (pronounced nading their potential ten), the largest emer- mates with an echoing gence of the dozen pe- chorus that must be riodical broods, makes its highly anticipated re- louder than their competition. The females then turn just in time to shake up the spring in various echo back with clicking sounds generated from regions spanning from northern Georgia all the their wings. way to Pennsylvania. Fortunately, most of these exchanges only take “The average person only gets about four or five place during the day — making them less of a opportunities during their entire lifetime to experi- nuisance during more quiet hours. ence Brood X,” said Nancy Hinkle, cicada enthu- siast and professor of veterinary entomology at Restarting the cycle the University of Georgia College of Agricultural Cicadas live in underground burrows for 16-and-a and Environmental Sciences. “It is just amazing -half years before emerging to breed, lay eggs that you have this large number of the same spe- and then die. cies of insect emerging at the same time.” “The only time they are above ground is for about However, most Georgians will have to travel six weeks,” said Hinkle. “They don’t feed as north to experience the phenomenon. adults, so they are only using the energy that they stored when they were underground.” “Tracking them down is going to be very chal- lenging (for Georgians),” said Hinkle. “We are es- While burrowing up from the soil, cicadas bring timating that they are only going to emerge in large concentrations of nutrients back to the sur- about 10 counties and in the very northeastern face, aiding plant growth and becoming food for part of the state. Even then, there may only be a various animal populations. few spots where they can really be noticed.” At first, the pale-colored cicada population arrives Safe and ‘sound’ without wings before shedding thin exoskeletons Although they arrive in large numbers throughout that can be found latched onto trees and scat- a short six-week span beginning in May, cicadas tered throughout yards. are harmless to humans and pets. In fact, one of the only dangers of encountering the species is One of the most recognizable features of living overconsumption by animals. cicadas is their dazzling red eyes.

“They don’t bite, they don’t sting and they’re not “Annual cicadas are the ones that come out eve- poisonous,” said Hinkle. “Even kids can catch ry year and the ones we see around here are and handle the clumsy flyers.” greenish in color,” said Joseph McHugh, a professor of entomology and curator at the Georgia With warmer weather and more sunlight during Museum of Natural History at UGA. “But the the day, families in search of Brood X have a periodical cicadas are chance to get out in the woods and experience black cicadas with red (Continued on page 6)

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UGA student investigates why modern tomatoes have lost their flavor By Austin Clark

the amount and type of chemicals, or volatiles, W hy have tomatoes lost their flavor? Why do present in the food. some dishes call for ketchup when cooking with “To link different volatiles to actual consumer tomatoes? preference, we cannot rely simply on the meas- These are a couple of the questions that Qian ured value. We need to have a taste panel so Feng, a second-year University of Georgia Col- that the human perception of flavor can be taken lege of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences into account,” Feng stated. doctoral candidate, seeks to answer through her Using research from Denise Tieman and Harry research. Klee at the University of Florida, who have spent Feng, a member of Professor Esther van der years collecting volatile data along with taste Knaap’s plant biology lab in the UGA Institute panel evaluations from over 100 tomato varieties, of Plant Breeding, Genetics and Genomics, grew Feng was able to map additional genes responsi- up in China, the world’s top producer of toma- ble for volatile production in order to offer a more toes. Many traditional Chinese dishes include to- complete picture of the biochemical pathways in matoes as a main ingredient, but Feng recog- tomatoes. nized a confusing trend. Although further research in the van der Knaap “More often than not, my family had to add lots of lab will not focus on selective breeding to in- extra condiments to bring the right ‘tomato’ flavor crease the amount of identified volatiles in toma- out,” Feng explained. toes, Feng hopes that her results can be used by Dissatisfied with the bland flavor profile, Feng be- other breeding labs and facilities to introduce the gan investigating the evolutionary history of the desirable genes into current or new tomato varie- tomato in order to uncover any traits that could ties. explain the loss in taste. She found that through This research was funded by the National Sci- selective breeding to increase the size and outer ence Foundation grant IOS 1564366. For more protective shell — in addition to breeding disease information about research in the Institute of resistant varieties of tomatoes — farmers and Plant Breeding, Genetics and Genomics, vis- producers created a less intense tasting and less it plantbreeding.caes.uga.edu. nutritious tomato. (Austin Clark is a Georgia 4-H public relations The key to measuring and increasing the taste of associate) a tomato lies in its chemistry, more specifically 4 Return to table of contents

Your lawn could help save the bees By Maggie Narvil

insects and weeds, but centipedegrass is low O ver the past few decades, pollinators have been maintenance by comparison. It is used for lawns, in decline worldwide, which is concerning because parks and golf course roughs and is well-adapted to 70% of crops used for human food depend on polli- the sandy, acidic soils of the southeastern U.S. Now, nators. Turfgrasses – used for most residential lawns researchers like Joseph and his team are realizing – often take some of the blame for pollinator decline centipedegrass is useful for much more. as they are known to be wind-pollinated and were “The knowledge that centipedegrass lawns can be thought not to serve as a pollinator food source, until beneficial to pollinators is a complete change in now. thought about turfgrasses,” Harris-Shultz said. University of Georgia and U.S. Department of Agri- “There is an environmental benefit to growing centi- culture researchers identified bees that were collect- pedegrass as it does require minimal care. Addition- ing pollen from the flowers of a turfgrass called centi- ally, by providing a food source to bees, these bees pedegrass. The researchers have been looking for may pollinate other economically important crop ways to reverse the decline of pollinator populations plants.” by examining centipedegrass as a food source for pollinators, with hopes of normalizing low- Evaluating pollinators maintenance, bee-friendly lawns. Their findings have The study consisted of two parts: identifying which been published in the Journal of Entomological pollinators are present on centipedegrass lawns and Science and Insects. finding which of those pollinators are directly collect- The study was led by College of Agricultural and En- ing pollen from the flowers. In the first study, vironmental Sciences faculty Shimat Joseph and Da- samples collected from mowed and unmowed lawns vid Jespersen on the UGA Griffin campus alongside that had no prior exposure to insecticides in central USDA researcher Karen Harris-Shultz in Tifton. and south Georgia consisted of 173 bees belonging “Insect pollinators are frequently described in the me- to 13 genera. dia as needing help and homeowners may not real- This suggests that a diverse mixture of bees are re- ize that their lawns could help these insect pollina- siding on lawns. tors. They also may be applying insecticides to their The goal of the second study was to determine which centipedegrass lawns and may not realize they may pollinators are feeding on the flowers of centi- be harming bee populations,” said Harris-Shultz, a pedegrass, Jespersen said. Centipedegrass produc- USDA research geneticist. es spike-like flowers from August through October. The long-term goal of the study is to promote bee- Eleven lawns were sampled in 30-minute intervals, friendly grasses. Some types of turfgrasses require and if a pollinator was observed collecting pollen large amounts of water and fertilizer, and homeown- from the flower, it was caught in a special trap and ers often use insecticides and herbicides to control identified in the lab. (Continued on page 6)

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Your lawn could help save the bees (continued…)

“We have found that 13 genera of bees are present while maintaining its low-input growing patterns. in centipedegrass lawns and five genera of bees di- Many factors, such as coloration of the flowers, time rectly collect pollen from centipedegrass,” said Jo- of year and the ecology of the bee, should be con- seph, assistant professor in the department of en- sidered, Joseph said. tomology. “Here we show that a turfgrass — centi- “We have a couple of projects already planned,” pedegrass — serves as a source of pollen for sweat Harris-Shultz said. “One is to use metabarcoding to bees, bumblebees and honeybees.” identify all the insects in direct contact with centi- The results of the research imply that low- pedegrass flower heads. Another is examining if the maintenance turfgrasses can be utilized as a valua- ploidy (number of chromosomes) of centipedegrass ble ecosystem habitat useful in critical bee conser- impacts pollinators, or if certain genotypes are pre- vation. Knowing that pollinators use centipedegrass ferred.” flowers as food is the first step toward adopting non- The importance of maintaining bee habitats has be- disruptive lawn practices that encourage bee forag- come undoubtably clear. Bees require nectar and ing. pollen in order to continue to play their critical role in “In the popular press, there’s this idea that turfgrass- our ecosystem, supporting the growth of trees, flow- es are ecological deserts and do not provide any ers and other plants that serve as food and shelter ecosystem services, so this research is interesting for various creatures, including humans. for showing that there are pollinator species that in- “Our research will help us to have lawns with im- teract with turfgrass species,” said Jespersen, assis- proved benefits, which take into consideration eco- tant professor in the department of crop and soil logical aspects beyond the aspects normally attribut- sciences. ed to lawns,” Harris-Shultz said. Funding for this research project was provided by Looking forward the USDA-Agricultural Research Service. To learn Joseph, Harris-Shultz and Jespersen agree that ex- more about CAES research, visit caes.uga.edu/ panding this research over time will negate misinfor- research. mation about turfgrasses and eventually lead to the development of bee-friendly lawns. (Maggie Narvil is an agricultural communication stu- The next step is determining how to enhance centi- dent at the University of Georgia) pedegrass to make it even more useful for bees

Billions of periodical cicadas and their songs set to fill the spring air (continued…) eyes that have these very long life spans, and they To ensure proper credit and record keeping, infor- are out of sight for most of their lives.” mation such as location and time are especially help- Following the six-week period, all of the Brood X cica- ful. Insects can be captured, sun-dried and shipped to das will have lived out their lifespan and set the next the museum in a small, sturdy box or photographs cycle in motion with the dispersion of eggs in tree can be emailed to [email protected]. The small win- branches. Shortly after, new nymphs will hatch, fall to dow researchers and historians have to study the the ground and burrow under the soil. brood makes public contributions of even greater value. A piece of history For more information on periodical cicadas, see When the Brood X cicadas emerge, researchers and the active map of U.S. broods. Find more resources collectors at UGA’s Georgia Museum of Natural Histo- from the UGA Department of Entomology ry plan to expand their collection of over 2.2 million at ent.uga.edu. You can also watch a video on arthropod specimens. Brood X created by the University of Georgia’s Col- Members of the public are encouraged to share their lege of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences. captures with the museum for documentation and proper identification, creating a historic record of in- (Sean Montgomery is a public relations coordinator volvement in the UGA Collection of Arthropods. for the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences) 6 Return to table of contents

Athens-Clarke County Extension Virtual Green Thumb Lectures 2021 Free Monthly Gardening Class Series

May: Composting Please join us online for an informative presentation on topics including:

• Basic concepts and importance of efficient composting

• Materials for composting

• Recommended structures and methods Gardeners of all experience levels are welcome.

WHEN: Wednesday, May 5 · 6:00-7:30 pm

WHERE: ONLINE via Zoom.com Specific link to join Zoom meeting will be sent to the email you register with.

TO REGISTER: Registration is required. Please register by May 4 by visiting www.accgov.com/gardening

For questions: Contact Laura Ney, Extension Agent at 706-613-3640 or [email protected]

The University of Georgia is committed to principles of equal opportunity and affirmative action.

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Stay in the loop! (local or online activities and events)

UGA Dougherty County Extension Spring International Compost Awareness Week Gardening and Lawn Maintenance Series events in Athens, Georgia Webinars May 2-8, 2021 Tuesday, April 6: Home Vegetables Tuesday, April 13: Floral Container Gardens Celebrate by joining events going on throughout Tuesday, April 20: South GA Lawn Care the week including tours, videos, stories for soils, Tuesday, May 4: Landscape Herbs and a compost sale! For more details visit the From 6:00pm-7:00pm To register, please visit Spring Horticulture Se- ICAW Athens Website ries Registration 2021

The UGA Honey Bee Lab upcoming 2021 Vir- Marigold Farmers Market Grand Opening in tual UGA / Young Harris Beekeeping Institute Winterville, Georgia An educational event Thursday - Saturday, May 13 - 15, 2021 that meets the needs of everyone: Saturday, May 8 from 10am-2pm experienced beekeeper or complete begin- at Pittard Park ner. Please visit their website for updates soon (115 Parkview Road, Winterville, GA 30683) on program and registration information. Live music by Mayor Dodd Ferrelle

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Local Farmers Markets

The Athens Farmers Market is taking place on Saturdays from 8am-12pm at Bishop Park. Make sure to visit their website for updates and details.

Find them on Facebook: @AthensFarmers- Market Follow them on Instagram: @athensfarmersmarket

West Broad Farmers Market Online ordering with pick-up and delivery options are available on Saturdays. Visit their website to find out how to order online. Find them on Facebook: @WestBroadMarketGarden

Are you interested in the new Winterville Farm- ers Market? Online ordering with pick-up options available now. Visit their website to order online.

Find out more on Facebook: @marigoldmarketwinterville Instagram: @marigoldmarketwinterville

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Order Now for Memorial Day $35 Don’t miss out! Limited quantity 8-9 lbs. available!

to benefit the Demonstration & Training Garden at the new ACC Extension Office To ORDER Your Smoked Butt, Sides To PICK UP Your Smoked Butt, Sides and Casseroles and Casserole Call in your credit card order to ACC Saturday, May 29 ONLY, and ONLY 10 Extension Office, 706-613-3640, a.m. to 1 p.m.

Monday - Friday, 8am - 5pm Parking Lot of Saucehouse BBQ 830 W. Broad St., Athens - one block OR from Varsity Orders must be Mail a check, made out to ACC Extension, to received no later than ACC Extension Office Friday, May 21 275 Cleveland Road, Bogart GA 30622 Order Form on ACC Extension website OR

Drop Box deposit Check and Order Question? Call/Text/Email Form in box located John Aitkens UGA Master on storage building wall behind ACC Gardener Extension Volunteer Extension Office 706-255-0998 [email protected]

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Concerned about the state of your garden?

Are weeds taking over your landscape?

No need to fear, Clarke is here!

Follow @gardenwithclarke on Instagram and learn how to battle pests, identify weeds, build your soil and so much more as you garden alongside Clarke, Athens-Clarke County’s super gardener!

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Helpful resources online:

Find My Local Bugwood— Pest Landscape Alerts Extension Office Images Online

Pest Management Georgia Turf Free Online Handbook Webinars Pesticide Applicator SE Ornamental Info Georgia Certified Horticulture Plant Professional Production & IPM UGA Center for Blog Urban Agriculture Extension Publications

Athens-Clarke County Extension Agriculture and Natural Resources

Mission Statement The UGA Athens-Clarke County Extension’s mission is to respond to the people’s needs and interest in Agriculture, the Environment, Families, and 4-H/youth in Athens-Clarke County with unbiased, research-based education and information.

Visit us online: Like us on Facebook: Contact us: 275 Cleveland Road Bogart, GA 30622 Phone: (706) 613-3640 Email: [email protected]

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