New CRC Blog- It's about the box

By Roberta Firoved

People visiting rice fields often ask to see a rice box as if it were some mysterious, illusive structure. Rice farmers manage about five acre-feet of water, which translates to three acre-feet after recirculation and reuse, with water levels approximately five inches deep in the field. Our growers must comply with mandated water holding requirements after specific pesticide applications. Fields are flushed to add fresh water while only releasing about an inch to make room. Farmers use water depth to control the temperature on pollinating rice plants to insulate the plant and increase yields - when Mother Nature does not cooperate with warm July days and cool nights.

It takes days to drain the field for harvest and up to a week to put water on. Regulatory requirements, water shortages and weather challenges have made the rice farmer a master irrigator. All this water is controlled with the simple rice box. The design has changed somewhat, but not dramatically, in approximately 100 years. Rice boxes are made of wood, plastic, or metal and situated in the levees known as checks separating rice paddies. The box is packed with soil, or either plastic, melamine or straw and soil to keep everything in place.

Visitors to rice country ask about water management, often eager to see a rice box. We walk them up to the field levee where a rice box is situated and they seem perplexed, often not registering that the simple structure they stand above is the most integral part of rice production. They expect the rice box to be some type of elaborate structure with an old, traditional name. Really folks, it is just a box!

---

Roberta Firoved is Manager of Industry Affairs for the California Rice Commission.