Cornell Work, Research, and Educational Resources: Interview with Daniela Vergara, PhD

Sebastian Krawiec:

Can you tell me a little bit about kind of your current work with Cornell University. How you've kind of applied your past with genetics into there, and how it's different from what you've done previously?

Daniela Vergara:

Yeah, so I work for Cornell Cooperative Extension, and that's kind of extension and is a part of the university that extends beyond the university. So I am the person that helps the industry and the person that goes and figures out how to troubleshoot or how to help farmers. Somehow, I've learned a ton. It has been a hard role, because I am only allowed to work with hemp. However, there is not a ton of hemp going on, right? Like, really people are growing marijuana. So, there's an issue there. I try to provide reliable information without getting the university or myself in trouble. I have learned a lot because I am the one that helps people navigate to any issue. So, I get phone calls all the time, or texts all the time. So my phone doesn't ring, it doesn't make any noise. Whenever I pick it up, I figure out whether there's something going on, because otherwise I would go crazy. And there's some people that can text you at four in the morning, or there's others that can text you at midnight, right? Farming really does not have a time, like the plants do not know that it's a Sunday.

I really like the interactions with people. I feel that my job is very fulfilling, because I feel that I am helping people, but I at the end of the day, I think that they are helping me, because I've learned so much about legality. I get calls about how do I interpret this regulation, or how do I read this COA, or what do I do with my soil. And I do not have that background, so I've had to learn, or I have to self teach myself many things. Or, I have people at Cornell that I can rely on, you know, like, there's about ton of people that know a lot about soil, my boss included. But it's like, okay, what do you do when you have heavy metals in your field? Like, what do you do with that? Or how do you read the soil analysis and so whenever someone needs, okay, I need a processor. Okay, I'll give you the contacts that I have. So it's very contact. I text people, I'm gonna introduce you to so and so. Oh yeah, I have that contact information. Let me do you know so and so.

Because I covered the entire state, I know people everywhere. Took me a while to realize that the people in Buffalo know the people from Buffalo, they probably do not know the people from Hudson Valley. It took me a while to figure that out. Believe it or not. yeah, That's kind of my role, and I'm trying to figure out productivity. How much is the state producing? The governmental entity should know, and they should have the data out there. But here we are trying to guess, and I'm trying to know how to improve the growing conditions for people.

Krawiec:

So wonder if you could maybe elaborate on, kind of the some of the things that you've learned in your time at the Cornell Cooperative Extension, kind of about productivity in the hemp space in New York in particular, and what you're hoping to continue to learn and grow with that research.

Vergara:

So what have I learned about productivity? I guess that it depends on what size operation you have. If you are a one man show you need to be very careful about what you grow and when you grow it. For example, perhaps it is not a good idea to grow photo period starting on June 1st, because then when you are going to harvest them in October, they're going to be huge, and perhaps you're not going to be able to do it alone. So maybe, if you're going to grow photo periods, maybe starting them in July would be a better idea. They're going to be smaller, probably they're going to have less yield. I cannot tell you exactly how much less, because we don't have those numbers, but they're going to haveless yield. But you're going to be able to do it alone, and probably you won't have to spend money on other workers, right? I think that auto flowers provide good alternative as well. And with auto flowers, perhaps you're not going to get as many a buds, but you don't have to trellis them. You don't have to prune them. You kind of like, in a way, I mean, I know that is, this is not the way, right? But you kind of just set them and forget them. And so it depends, are you going to go for processing, or are you going to go for for flower, right? I am kind of in the mindset a little bit with my work at Cornell.

I'm also in the mindset of processing right now. So we have developed several free resources for growers. We have a manual that we released in 2023 that I led. That was my first big job, when I got at Cornell. Then we translated that manual into Spanish. Then we did a guidebook in 2024. In the manual we have one page post harvest, it's one page. And so now I wish, I want to expand that one page into what's harvest and post harvest, which is a ton. And then processing, and processing, I want to make it very biochemistry-oriented. I realized when I moved to the US that I would have had a minor in Chemistry, because in Colombia, the undergrads are at that time, at least, were five years and I took, I don't know how many chemistry classes, but many, for some reason. They were required. It's not that I chose them. No, they were required. So I took a ton of chemistry classes. I would venture to say that I understand it a little bit, although I think it's kind of arrogance, because, hopefully there's not a chemist that is, but in any case, I would like to know more about processing. Why would you process with, butane or propane instead of ethanol? What are the advantages of these advantages? What do you need? Is it more profitable? Are you producing more or is it better quality? I don't know, all of those things. And then you can produce resin, rosin, diamonds, butter, shutter, etc. Can you do a more through ethanol? Can you do it more through solvent and solventless? That's all of those questions are right now, where I'm kind of going, everything is collaborative. Everything that I do is collaborative.