Weather Article

The article I chose was entitled "Calif. vintner uses aloe vera on grapes." I found this article to be pretty interesting and unique.

First of all, the story was about a California grape grower that sprayed a compost tea that included small amounts of aloe vera on his grapes. The reason for doing so was to try to keep the grapes from getting too much of the unusually hot California sun this summer. As far as the lead goes, I thought it did a good job of introducing the concept of the article by using subtle humor and not giving too much information away. This compelled me to continue reading the article.

Another thing that I enjoyed was that it gave a little background into the origins of this practice. For example, it cited an Australian philosopher for coming up with the idea.

The thing, besides the unusual concept of spraying grapes with aloe vera, that struck me most in this article, was the fact that it was written in a very easy to understand way. Some of the things that were being done to combat the summer sun sounded like it was pretty technical. However, things were presented in a fairly elementary way as not to confuse or lose the reader. A good example of this would be the following sentence: "Pott uses about two to three ounces of yucca per acre and about four to five ounces of aloe vera gel per acre, each mixed in with a compost spray. Because the spray is so diluted, by the time grapes are picked there's no residue."

One thing I didn't like is that they used several quotes from different people in the article. However, they didn't use a single quote from the very farmer that the article was really about. I think they could have at least incorporated one small quote from him to give it a more personal feel.

Overall, it was a pretty entertaining article and a unique way to incorporate the hot summer sun into a news topic. The closing was a good way to end things. It used a quote that compared humans getting enough water when it's hot out to plants needing water when it's hot out, too.

http://www.usatoday.com/weather/news/2006-09-11-grape-sunscreen_x.htm