In the latter months of 2019, a novel coronavirus probably leaped from a yet-unknown animal in central China into a human. Some speculate that SARS-CoV-2 leaked from a laboratory in Wuhan, China. But evidence suggests that it’s far more likely that the virus was a natural “zoonotic” leap from animal to human. The resulting COVID-19 pandemic has killed hundreds of thousands of Americans, including more than 23,000 Georgians, and mutated into dangerous new variants.

The Trial Gardens at the University of Georgia have announced the 2021 Classic City Award winners from the hundreds of varieties tested over the long, hot summer. The Trial Gardens are known as the “go-to research trial garden to test plants for the combination of heat and humidity,” said John Ruter, director of the Trial Gardens and 2021 UGA Inventor of the Year.

As climate issues capture governmental and public attention — from the effects of methane emissions to weather extremes — it is incumbent on the world to take action. Experts in UGA's College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences are focused on helping residents address climate challenges in ways that will benefit the environment and ensure both profitability and sustainability for industry.

With the support of a five-year, $6.2 million grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the Elevate project leverages the vast University of Georgia Cooperative Extension network and several community partners to deliver evidence-based healthy-couples and relationship-education programming to couples across Georgia.

When University of Georgia peanut pathologist Bob Kemerait does something, he does it wholeheartedly. A passionate advocate for producers both near his academic home at the University of Georgia Tifton campus and around the world, Kemerait describes himself as “a field guy,” most comfortable among the rows detecting, diagnosing and addressing the myriad diseases and pests that threaten Georgia’s second-largest row crop.

Students, staff and faculty from the University of Georgia’s Griffin campus sacrificed the luxury of sleeping late on a Saturday morning to pitch in on Oct. 16 for the City of Griffin Annual Stream Cleanup, a long-standing event that brings together citizens of Griffin-Spalding County to clean up area streams and waterways.

More than 30 4-H’ers from across Georgia competed in the 2021 Georgia 4-H Pumpkin Growing Contest, with the winning pumpkin weighing in at 650 pounds. The Pumpkin Growing Contest offers students the opportunity to learn and utilize knowledge of agricultural and environmental sciences to produce prize-winning fruit.

Recently, a church trustee in Bartow County brought samples of “holey” mail to the local University of Georgia Cooperative Extension office for closer examination. Strangely, mail deposited in the church’s mailbox was showing up with holes chewed through the outer layer of the envelopes, but the mail inside was intact — a small miracle in itself.

Last month, UGArden Club members camped out at Shooting Creek Vines in western North Carolina, harvesting and processing wine grapes over the course of a weekend.