From the Desk of Gilbert

by Rob Gilbertragilber@ufl.edu@IFAS_VP In part because of the access the University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences College of Agricultural and Life Sciences (UF/IFAS CALS) offers to a world-class education, Jessica Switzer of Lutz is working toward her second career and her third UF degree.  Switzer’s degrees have been earned through different pathways […]

By Rob Gilbert ragilber@ufl.edu @IFAS_VP You are about to see the biggest expansion of UF/IFAS presence in support of Hillsborough/Polk agriculture in a generation. As the University of Florida’s new interim senior vice president for agriculture and natural resources and head of UF/IFAS, one of my goals is to deliver two big projects to your

by J. Scott Angle jangle@ufl.edu About eight months ago, I brought UF President Ben Sasse to the Gulf Coast Research and Education Center (GCREC). He met world-class agricultural scientists and world-class agricultural leaders from Hillsborough and Polk counties and beyond. It must have made an impression. A couple of weeks later, he made me the

By J. Scott Angle jangle@ufl.edu @IFAS_VP I work for you. But if I’m doing my job right, I’m working for your kids, too. The next generation of agriculturalists not only give me great hope about the future, they give me insights on what UF/IFAS can do to help create it. It’s one they see filled

By J. Scott Angle jangle@ufl.edu @IFAS_VP Please come to visit with university scientists on Nov. 9 to get tips you can use in your field on Nov. 10 as well as a preview of how you’re going to be farming in November 2030. It won’t cost you a cent. You can register for the Florida

Until recently, a lab, headquarters, and workshop dedicated to putting artificial intelligence to work in your fields was mostly an idea. Now it’s an idea with more than $11 million in state funding behind it. Thanks to Representative Lawrence McClure, who sponsored the legislation that provides the funding, we can start making plans to design

By J. Scott Angle jangle@ufl.edu @IFAS_VP The new University of Florida president knows a great deal about agriculture. I took him to Hillsborough County this month to get him up to speed on Florida agriculture and how UF/IFAS supports it. When Dr. Ben Sasse arrived in Florida to become UF’s 13th president in February, he

By J. Scott Anglejangle@ufl.edu@IFAS_VP Back in the early 1990s, aquaculture was a niche industry, a loosely connected group of largely self-taught producers, according to Marty Tanner, a longtime Florida aquaculture producer and leader. Craig Watson and the founding of the UF/IFAS Tropical Aquaculture Laboratory (TAL) in Ruskin helped change that, Tanner said. The establishment of

By J. Scott Angle jangle@ufl.edu @IFAS_VP It is expensive to seek science-based solutions to strawberry diseases. So is failing to seek them. So when pestalotia arrived here, the Florida Strawberry Growers Association chose to invest in science—again. This time, it was a six-figure check to help UF/IFAS strawberry breeder Vance Whitaker launch a wide-scale search

By J. Scott Angle jangle@ufl.edu @IFAS_VP Without one of the most ancient of technologies, the wheel, we might not be celebrating the centennial of Wish Farms here in Plant City. Its #AgIsAmerica story starts on the streets of Manhattan in a single pushcart selling fruits and vegetables. It continues with the Wishnatzkis migrating to Central