USDA Blog

After weeks of searching, Washington State Department of Agriculture (WSDA) entomologists–—using a radio tag provided by USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service and a trap developed by the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service–— have located and eradicated the first Asian giant hornet (AGH)...

Have you noticed, while in your local grocery store, that you have been seeing more organic products? This growing segment of agriculture is more prevalent now than it was just a decade ago and we have the data to show it.

Bats are the only mammal with a natural ability to fly. Maneuvering with great elegance and awe-inspiring precision, they can hunt in complete darkness. They pollinate over 500 plant species, providing us dietary staples like bananas and avocados.

The Pesticide Data Program (PDP), part of USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS), recently published its 2019 PDP Annual Summary (PDF, 10 MB). This yearly report found that nearly 99 percent of almost 10,000 samples of fresh, frozen and processed foods had pesticide residues below levels set by...

This is the second installment of the Organic 101 series that explores different aspects of the USDA organic regulations. Organic standards are designed to allow natural substances in organic farming while prohibiting synthetic substances. The National List of Allowed and Prohibited Substances—a...

My mom raised five kids, taught high school chemistry for 15 years and then retired back to the family farm in 1986. Her new life on the farm depended on the Salisbury, MD farmers market where she sold daylilies. The farmers market, just one of 8,000 or more markets listed in USDA’s National Farmers...

Do you remember the last time you got sick from eating something that “didn’t agree with you?” It’s likely you or someone you know has experienced food poisoning. It’s not fun!

Timber sales are an important part of the work to reduce wildfire risk on your national forests and grasslands. However, many of the policies governing how forest products are harvested and sold are decades old, and forest conditions, climate, forest products markets and our workforce have changed.

Many claim that 2020 has been a year of chaos and calamity, but for one rare squirrel, it might be a year of hope and new beginnings. The Delmarva Fox Squirrel (DFS) is a subspecies of fox squirrel found on the eastern shore of Maryland, Southern Delaware and Virginia. This pudgy, slow squirrel with...

Every five years, the United Nations designates October 20 as World Statistics Day to celebrate the importance of official statistics. USDA has two principal federal statistical agencies, the National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) and the Economic Research Service (ERS). These two agencies...