Tamarisk was brought to the U.S. from Kazakhstan in the early 1800s to shore up riverbanks and railroad beds. It worked. Left to itself, tamarisk multiplies. Left to itself in America, 6,000 miles from natural predators on the Asian steppes, tamarisk goes nuts. Tamarisk is a tenacious shrub whose pinkish flowers look good just enough […]
Palisade
Posted inBusiness, Coloradans, News
Palisade peach freeze prompts Colorado governor to declare emergency
GRAND JUNCTION — Colorado’s governor announced he is seeking federal aid for farmers impacted by a freeze that wiped out significant portions of the state’s peach crop. Democratic Gov. Jared Polis said he sought the aid as a result of an April 14 freeze in Colorado’s Western Slope region, The Daily Sentinel reported Saturday. Polis and state […]
Posted inBusiness, Coloradans, COVID, Environment, News
A bitter freeze and coronavirus have sprouted big problems for Palisade’s peach season
Palisade-area fruit growers were out in their orchards the frigid night of April 13 and into the next morning, frantically cranking up wind machines, turning on irrigation water, and lighting burn barrels in last-ditch efforts to save crops from a bud-killing Canadian cold front that crept across Colorado’s premier peach country. But none of those […]
Posted inBusiness, Coloradans, News
In the age of “go back where you came from,” Palisade carries on tradition of thanking orchard workers before they leave
Francisco Pacheco is in his 39th year working the peach orchards around Palisade. He was 17 when he first took a bus from his home in Sonora, Mexico, to join a seasonal crew pruning, thinning and picking peaches. He is about to wrap up a year that has been particularly tough because of sweltering heat […]
Posted inBusiness, Coloradans, Environment, Growth, News, Outdoors
The Palisade Plunge (and its 6,000-foot descent) will be one of Colorado’s crown jewels
GRAND JUNCTION — Perched on basalt boulders at the end of a path freshly carved through a jungle of scrub oak, Scott Winans is as close as ever to a 10-year goal that promises to highlight the recreational assets of his Grand Valley home turf. “It’s been a lot of work to get here. A […]
Posted inBusiness, Coloradans, Environment, News, Outdoors
How a small Colorado town fought the Japanese beetle and won
PALISADE — In 2003, Brant Harrison needed a project. The Palisade peach grower was part of an agricultural leadership program and needed something good. Around the same time, he attended a meeting hosted by Colorado State University about a new insect found in the area: Japanese beetles. They’d found a few in 2002. “The next […]
Posted inBusiness, Coloradans, Culture, Environment, News
Peach growers are expecting an all-time bumper crop on the Western Slope, but there’s one problem
The plink and plop of tiny green peaches hitting the ground at a Talbott Farms orchard is the sound of exceptionally good news for Colorado fruit lovers. This season there have been no damaging freezes, no punishing winds and no bruising hail on the more than 500 acres of fruit trees at the Talbotts’ orchards […]
Posted inBusiness, News, Politics and Government
Hemp has arrived: Colorado crops double after Farm Bill makes growing more legit
Entrepreneur Joey Coleman is enthusiastically prepping for a 40-acre “farm-to-doorstep” crop of hemp he plans to grow near Grand Junction this spring. In Monte Vista, Corbett Hefner has added an industrial hemp harvester to his heavy-equipment product line. Colorado State University-Pueblo chemistry professor Chad Kinney is preparing to host around 500 researchers from around the […]