By taking the grazing land away and selling it to Mission Produce, the sheep flock had to be reduced, which in turn impacted the students negatively because they didn't have as many sheep to work with. The other main concern with selling this piece of land to Mission was that their was only one species being planted there (which is called a monoculture). The concern is that if a disease finds its way over to the orchard and attacks the avocado's it will wipe out the whole crop. This would be devistating due to all the work that has already gone into this project in the last year and a half. Mr. Rutherford also said that Mission is having problems with the squirrels in the orchard. He hopes to help them with this problem and also gain access for his sheep to start grazing in between the avocado trees to bring back some of the productive grasses.

To visit the College of Agriculture website click here.