Blogmocracy in Action!
Guest Post by Bunk X
The Great Farm: Urban Forester Scores Job Measuring Barley Crop
Field Correspondent Bunk Strutts
Irvine, California (Strutts News Services, Opinion Section) –
Everyone knows that Urban Foresters are in great demand today (even though there is no such thing as an Urban Forest) and Tyler Stevenson is one who excels at his trade.
There are no forests or jungles within hundreds of miles of Irvine, California, so he gets to measure the height of a local field of barley, not just eyeball it. He measures it. And he gets paid to measure it with a tape measure and a cameraman in tow just to prove that he’s not exaggerating the growth.
Great Park workers have literally planted the seeds for the park’s first major round of construction, kicking off a $65 million development plan by attempting to reawaken more than 100 acres of once-fertile agricultural fields.
The sprouting of barley seeds planted just before the recent rainstorms marks the first stage in an agricultural plan that will eventually cost up to $1.4 million and encompass community gardens, a farmers market and rows of fresh-grown produce.
Maybe that’s just a typo. Maybe the “agricultural plan” will reap up to $1.4 million to offset $65 million, but remember, this was FRONT PAGE NEWS. No typos are ever allowed on the front page.
We were not able to contact Mr. Tyler Stevenson because we didn’t bother. We do not intend to disparage the integrity of Mr. Stevenson or the honorable legion of Urban Foresters (heh). But it seems silly to us that in pitiful economic times that the government, local or otherwise, should be getting into the farming business, and taking work away from the folks who need it the most: the illegal immigrant community.
[Photos, italicized and indented captions via the Orange County Register.]