CANYONVILLE, Ore. (AP) — Clouds and the end of triple-digit heat helped firefighters battling the Stouts wildfire in southwest Oregon.

Fire spokesman Dave Wells says the blaze is only 3 percent contained, but crews made good progress on the fire lines and some evacuated residents were able to return.

The fire burning in forestland east of Canyonville has scorched 23 square miles, and kept about 35 families from their homes.

Another 100 families along the Tiller Trail Highway have been told to prepare to leave.

The flames have yet to burn any homes. No injuries have been reported.

More than 1,000 people have been assigned to fight the wildfire that started Thursday. The cause has not been determined.

High temperatures this week are forecast to be in the 80s and 90s.

SALEM, Ore. (AP) — The Oregon State Fair is looking to hire 400 workers.

The Salem Statesman Journal reports that there will be a recruitment day Tuesday at the fairgrounds looking for people to work as ticket sellers, parking attendants, ticket takers, cashiers, food handlers, bartenders and grounds crew members.

Most of the jobs last from Aug. 28 to Sept. 7, the duration of the fair.

Fair spokeswoman Mary Agnew says all jobs pay minimum wage but bartenders also make tips.

ONTARIO, Ore. — Oregon State University researchers in Eastern Oregon are trying to help onion growers figure out which mix of insecticide treatments is most effective, and economical, for controlling thrips populations.

Researchers are rotating chemistries, using them at different times of the season and applying them in varying intervals, said Stuart Reitz, an OSU cropping systems extension agent.

Onion thrips cause feeding damage and are also a vector for the iris yellow spot virus, which can significantly lower onion yields.

There are no good biological controls for the insects and onion growers say that not spraying for them in this region isn’t an option.

“Onion thrips are a bigger problem than anything else in onion production,” Reitz said. “If you don’t do anything to manage thrips in the Treasure Valley, you’re not going to have very good onions.”

Onion growers used to spray three or four times a year for thrips but in recent years they have had to spray as many as eight to 10 times in a season, said Nyssa farmer Paul Skeen.

“The key ingredient in controlling thrips is getting on it early and keeping their populations down,” he said. “When in doubt, you spray.”

But each treatment costs money and the main goal of the OSU trial is to try to find a season-long control program that will allow growers to reduce the number of times they spray, Reitz said.

Researchers are also trying to determine if products have a longer residual effect at certain times of the season. If they do, growers could get by with spraying less often.

“It’s getting so costly to control them and we want to see if we can reduce that cost for growers,” he said.

There are only six products that are effective for controlling onion thrips and researchers also want to develop a treatment program that allows growers to rotate chemistries often to avoid insect resistance, Reitz said.

Malheur County farmer Bill Johnson said the ongoing OSU trial is helping growers zero in on the optimal treatment program for thrips.

“We continue to have issues with flexibility in some of the chemistries we work with,” he said. “We’re just trying to find the right mix of chemistries. There are a lot of complexities (involved).”

This year’s trial includes some experimental onion varieties that could have resistance to thrips.

The varieties come from New Mexico State University’s onion breeding program, which wants to see how they perform in an area with strong thrips pressure, and the early results are encouraging, Reitz said.

“We seem to be seeing lower numbers of thrips on some of these experimental lines,” he said.

If any of the varieties do have genetic resistance to thrips and that trait can be bred into commercially acceptable lines, that would help onion growers in this region immensely, Reitz said.

“It would have huge benefits all around, helping growers’ bottom line as well as avoiding problems like insecticide resistance,” he said.

CANYONVILLE, Ore. (AP) — Record-breaking heat and parched forestlands fueled a southwest Oregon wildfire that rapidly spread to nearly 10 square miles.

The Stouts fire started Thursday afternoon in the unincorporated community of Milo — east of Canyonville. A few hours later, helicopters were dumping pond water on the hillside flames and aerial tankers dropped retardant.

Gov. Kate Brown invoked the Emergency Conflagration Act so the Oregon fire marshal can mobilize resources from around the state to protect homes. About 450 firefighters were on the scene Friday.

Kyle Reed of the Douglas Forest Protective Associations says several homes were threatened, but none burned.

Nearly two dozen residents were told they could go to a crisis shelter at Canyonville Elementary, but the Roseburg News-Review reports that no one was there late Thursday.

The area near Canyonville has a history of explosive wildfires. The 1987 Bland Mountain fire destroyed 14 homes and killed loggers Mark Giles and James Moore.

PENDLETON, Ore. — The recent withdrawal of nearly all container shipping at the Port of Portland has forced businesses throughout Oregon to choose between paying more for exports or risk losing customers overseas.

State officials are now asking what they can do to help.

Business Oregon, the official state agency for economic development, is leading a series of workshops to brainstorm solutions while the Port of Portland attempts to recruit another container shipper to Terminal 6.

More than 100 people attended the first Oregon Trade Solutions workshop last week in Portland. The series shifts to Eastern Oregon on Wednesday with a meeting in Hermiston.

Ryan Frank, spokesman for Business Oregon, said the initiative started earlier this year when Hanjin Shipping and Hapag-Lloyd stopped making stops in Portland, taking the vast majority of the port’s container business with them.

Oregon shippers now pay an additional $500-$1,000 per container to send their goods to Seattle and Tacoma. Not only is the freight more expensive, but it has also led to congestion along the other West Coast ports.

Gov. Kate Brown announced a deal in April providing $300,000 to help small and medium-sized businesses stay competitive in the export market. The goal is to deliver a list of solutions to lawmakers for the 2016 Legislature.

The workshops are co-sponsored by Business Oregon along with the state Department of Agriculture, Department of Transportation and Port of Portland.

“We want to hear from private industry to tell us what they need,” Frank said. “The best solutions are going to come from people who live and breathe this business every day.”

Bruce Pokarney, spokesman for the Department of Agriculture, said the team was interested in visiting Hermiston based on the region’s vibrant farm economy.

Umatilla County ranks first in the state for growing fresh vegetables that are shipped in containers, mostly potatoes and onions. Processed and packaged foods, such as french fries from the Lamb Weston potato plant, are also moved in containers.

Wheat, on the other hand, is exported in bulk and not affected by Terminal 6.

In all, about 40 percent of Oregon agriculture is exported out of the country, Pokarney said. With the added cost per container, that’s hitting a lot of small growers in the pocketbook.

“There are ideas out there that we at the state level could certainly be advocates for,” Pokarney said.

Input at the Portland meeting included possibly building a drop yard near Corvallis, where containers could be transferred off trucks and onto rail, saving businesses trucking costs. Companies also proposed a website where the state and local ports could communicate shipping delays in real time.

At the Port of Umatilla, manager Kim B. Puzey has spent more than a decade looking into short sea shipping on the Columbia River which would allow inland ports to bypass Portland entirely. So far, Puzey said he has not been able to find funding for the proposal.

“I think it has merits. Europe and Asia seem to think so, and I haven’t given up on the idea,” he said.

More than 1,000 Oregon businesses rely on container shipping for imports and exports, totaling $101 million in revenue, according to figures from Business Oregon. Frank said there’s a whole range of potential solutions that can come out of the workshops.

“A lot of companies are doing really any workaround to get their product where it needs to go,” Frank said. “Sometimes they’ll pay the extra cost to ship to other ports, and are more or less eating those costs ... That’s not really a long-term sustainable solution.”

Meanwhile, the Port of Portland is continuing to work with Terminal 6 operator ICTSI Oregon to restore container service, though port spokesman Kenny Macdonald said bringing in a company the size of Hanjin might take several years.

American Agri-Women President Sue McCrum is driving through Oregon this week as the organization celebrates 40 years of advocating on behalf of agriculture.

The AAW’s five-month “Drive Across America” began in Maine in June. McCrum, often accompanied by state agri-women officers at each stop, is at the wheel of a Dodge pickup truck donated for the occasion.

McCrum began the week in Central Oregon and will be touring spots in the Willamette Valley by the weekend. She takes breaks from driving to return home to Maine from time to time, them hooks up with the travel crew again. The tour is scheduled to conclude in time for the AAW’s national convention in Maine in early November.

AAW describes itself as the nation’s largest coalition of farm, ranch and agri-business women. Oregon Women for Agriculture, its state affiliate, is meeting with McCrum when she swings through the state.

State President Dona Coon said McCrum will have dinner in the field July 31 with her grass seed harvest crew in Linn County. McCrum also will be able to visit a grain mill, mint distillery and Christmas tree operation, Coon said.

“What we’d like to do make people aware that Oregon agriculture exists and how diverse ag is,” Coon said. “Coming to the Willamette Valley is like speaking a different language, there’s so many different crops.”

Lunch on Saturday, Aug. 1, will be at Diamond Woods Golf Course near Monroe. Coon said she hopes McCrum is able to tour the Port of Portland as well.

Sponsors of the tour include seed, chemical and agri-business companies Syngenta, Monsanto and Bayer CropScience.

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UMATILLA, Ore. — A loaded semi-trailer pulls up to the Pendleton Grain Growers McNary Elevator on the banks of the Columbia River, hauling nearly 35 tons of freshly harvested wheat.

The cargo is dumped over a grated pit that drops down into the bowels of the concrete facility. From there, conveyor belts lift the crop 200 feet into large storage silos, ready and available to exporters.

With Eastern Oregon’s wheat harvest in full swing, PGG is storing grain at a fast clip to sell overseas. The McNary terminal, located just above McNary Dam in the Port of Umatilla, allows the co-op to blend different varieties of wheat into one package for customers, and load the product onto barges.

The vast majority of soft white wheat grown in the Pacific Northwest is exported to countries in Asia, including Japan and South Korea. Soft white wheat is low in protein, making it ideal for products such as noodles and cakes.

Umatilla County grows by far the most wheat in Oregon, anywhere from 14-22 million bushels per year. PGG usually handles 12-13 million bushels through its 1,850 members in Eastern Oregon and Washington.

Of that total, about 90 percent of members’ wheat is shipped out of McNary, said Jason Middleton, PGG’s director of grain operations. Built in the 1960s, the terminal is capable of storing 6.6 million bushels at any given time.

“It definitely gives us capacity at the river, which is where we want a majority of our wheat to land,” Middleton said.

After harvest, Middleton said it is up to the farmer if they want to sell their wheat to the co-op right away, or wait until later in one of PGG’s 14 elevators. The pace of exporting is driven by a number of variables in marketing and price, Middleton said.

Right now, members are facing a double-whammy of difficulty. Three straight years of hot, dry weather are expected to cut into most yields, while the price of wheat is down 23 percent — at $5.82 per bushel — compared to a year ago.

Activity hummed at McNary Thursday afternoon as truck after truck arrived for delivery. The elevator can easily handle up to 300 trucks per day, Middleton said, each carrying approximately 1,150 bushels.

Tiny kernels whoosh and rattle their way down the pit and up the conveyor system, while superintendent Adam Bergstrom mans the controls. He is responsible for knowing what type of grain comes in on every truck, and which container it needs to go to avoid accidental mixing.

Middleton works with exporters to sell a certain package of wheat to Asian millers. Once the deal is signed, it’s up to Bergstrom to make sure that specific product makes it onto the barge.

“What he decides to put on paper, I have to put on an actual barge,” Bergstrom said.

Bergstrom is also in charge of worker safety, no small task at such a large elevator. Dust from the grain can potentially be explosive given an ignition source, and working in tight spaces increases the risk of falls.

McNary does have a dust mitigation system, Middleton said, to reduce the danger of an explosion.

“Once that stuff gets airborne, it’s like a bomb,” he said.

The grain industry has come a long way from its history of wooden elevators, Middleton said, to metal and concrete structures used today. The McNary terminal gives PGG members added strength and durability for storage.

“This is like something you’d see down on the Willamette that an exporter would operate,” Middleton said.

Rick Jacobson, PGG’s general manager, said McNary Elevator was built with money borrowed from the Farm Credit System and is the co-op’s “crown jewel.

“It’s a great story, when you think about what a co-op system can do,” Jacobson said.

HARRISBURG, Ore. — Agriculture’s influence in Oregon apparently goes well beyond the food it brings to people’s tables and the positive impact it has on the state’s economy.

Agriculture, according to farmers and the youths they hire, has a positive impact on high school and college students across the state who help farmers harvest their crops each summer.

Mikayla Sims, who has spent the past eight summers driving combine for Tydan Farms in Harrisburg, Ore., characterized the experience as “invaluable.”

“It has taught me so much,” said the 21-year old. “Especially being a girl and being able to drive big equipment, knowing how to fuel a combine and stuff like that is really cool.

“And the long hours helped me pay for school,” Sims said.

“For me this is more than just about the money,” said Ethan Brock, 17, who works alongside Sims on Tydan Farms. “Farming is what I want to do, so I am learning as much as I can.”

According to the Oregon Employment Department, farmers hire the 14- to 18-year-old age group at a much high percentage than the rest of private industry. The age group represented 6.2 percent of agricultural workers in the third quarter of 2014, compared to just 2.9 percent for all private industries.

Farmers also frequently apply for permits that allow their young workforce to work more than 44 hours a week.

The Bureau of Labor and Industries issues more than 40 of such permits annually, with 42 issued in 2015 and 48 in 2014, according to BOLI statistics.

Even permitted employees under the age of 18 are limited to 14 hours a day and 72 hours a week, limitations that can become an issue during harvest, when long hours are the norm.

Nevertheless, farmers said they are willing to abide by the hour limitation and the extra paperwork involved in bringing youthful workers onboard.

“When you have seasonal labor requirements, it almost requires you to go to somebody who frees up during summer months, and that is basically your high school and college kids,” said Harrisburg farmer Wayne Kizer.

“We’re looking for a quality seasonal person,” he said, “and most quality adults are not looking for seasonal work. They’re looking for full-time work.”

Seasonal student workers often start with little to no farm experience, Kizer said.

“You have to do a good job of training and educating them,” he said.

Once trained, however, students, particularly those who return to the farm year after year, are excellent workers, said Nick Bowers of Tydan Farms.

“After a while, I can turn them loose on certain projects and they know what to do, and that allows me to be more efficient with my time, because I don’t have to micromanage them,” Bowers said.

Most students that work seasonally on farms aren’t looking to make agriculture their career, Kizer said. But the lessons they learn on a farm can last a lifetime.

“It has taught me so many different things that I can use throughout my life,” Sims said.

“Long hours. Hard work. Problem-solving. It is all stuff you use in life,” Brock said.

“I’ve had some kids come in that had academic problems in school,” Kizer said. “One year on the farm and they went back and hit the books hard. They decided they didn’t want to do this type of work for the rest of their life.”

Occasionally, Bowers said, former employees come up and thank him for providing them an invaluable working environment.

“They grow up to be adults and raise their own families and establish their own careers, and they say, ‘Thank you for the experiences that I had on the farm,’” Bowers said, “and it makes you feel good.”

Some employees even stick around after finishing their schooling. Kizer has one seasonal employee, Stephanie Sather, a teacher at Harrisburg High School, who has worked with him for 19 years.

“She started working when she was 15 and she’s still here,” Kizer said. “She has more time in the combine than I do.”

Sims, who graduated from George Fox University this past spring and will be teaching at an elementary school in Junction City next year, could follow Sather’s path.

“I’m going to have summers off,” she said when asked if she’ll return to Tydan Farms. “So why not come back and work.”

ONTARIO, Ore. — After four straight years of drought conditions in Eastern Oregon, there’s growing interest in camelina, which can be grown without irrigation water.

Because water has been scarce, about 20 percent of the farmland in Malheur County has been left fallow the past two years.

Camelina won’t make farmers much money, but the oilseed crop could help growers cover some of the fixed costs they have on their land, said Clint Shock, director of Oregon State University’s Malheur County experiment station.

Growing camelina on farmland that otherwise would be left fallow would also help keep the ground from eroding, Shock said.

“We need to be thinking about what we’re going to do without water,” he said. “This is not a big money maker but it is a way of taking care of your farm ground. Also, consider that the return on the land will be negative without a crop.”

If the drought continues, more farmers are going to be taking a serious look at camelina, said Owyhee Irrigation District Manager Jay Chamberlin.

“If this is a trend we’re stuck with for awhile, camelina could be something that brings in some income and protects your soils,” he said. “The whole mind-set of growers needs to change; the traditional things aren’t going to continue to work.”

A camelina field trial at the OSU experiment station yielded 1,500 pounds of seed per acre, Shock said. No irrigation water was applied to the field and the crop received 4.17 inches of precipitation between the time it was planted in late January and harvested in late June.

With camelina seed currently selling for 20 cents a pound, the field would have brought a grower about $300 of income per acre, Shock said.

By comparison, onions, the region’s main cash crop, are worth more than $4,800 an acre.

The crop wouldn’t fetch nearly as much as onions would, “but if the drought continues, perhaps it may help you to hold the farm together,” said Oregon farmer Bruce Corn.

If camelina is grown on a large scale in this area, farmers would have a buyer in Willamette Biomass Processors, which is near Salem.

The company, which crushes camelina into oil and sells the high-protein meal as feed to the beef and poultry industries, currently gets most of its product from Montana and Canada.

“We’d absolutely be interested in buying camelina from Eastern Oregon,” said Tomas Endicott, WBP’s vice president of development.

Bill Buhrig, an OSU cropping systems extension agent in Ontario, estimates it would cost a farmer in this region about $150 an acre to produce camelina.

Even though the net for camelina would be small compared to what farmers can make from some other crops, it would still provide growers a little bit of income, Corn said.

“Ground doesn’t just sit there idle without costing anything,” he said.

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — An Oregon winemaker has filed a lawsuit against a neighboring farmer, claiming herbicide drifted from the grass-seed field and destroyed one of his grape crops.

The Oregonian reports that Willamette Valley Vineyards filed suit Tuesday in Polk County Circuit Court against Five Cent Farm, saying he lost 12.7 tons of Pinot Noir grapes.

According to the lawsuit, the Oregon Department of Agriculture investigated and found that herbicide drift had occurred.

Five Cent Farm’s Jeff Nichols says the agriculture department could not prove where the herbicide came from. Nichols says the grapes could have been damaged by nearby homeowners using weed killers.

Willamette Valley Vineyards contracted with Elton Valley Vineyard about 20 miles northwest of Salem, just east of fields leased by Five Cent Farms.

SALEM — The Oregon Board of Forestry has punted its decision whether to expand no-logging buffers around streams to prevent water temperatures from rising after harvest.

After hearing testimony from timber and conservation groups on July 23, the board formed a subcommittee that will narrow the range of possible options for consideration during a future meeting in September or October.

Supporters and opponents of expanding Oregon’s no-cut buffers, currently set at 20 feet from either side of a stream, didn’t seem to have appetite for compromise during the recent hearing.

Representatives of environmental and fishing groups claimed that buffers of 90-100 feet would not always be adequate for protecting fish, while small woodland owners and commercial timber operators said that increasing buffers to 70 feet would be economically devastating.

The legal implications of increasing forestry regulations were also discussed.

Under Measure 49, a ballot initiative passed by Oregon voters in 2007, state and local governments must either waive new regulations or compensate landowners for lost land value in many circumstances.

That would not apply to expanding no-cut buffers because the rule change pertains to meeting federal water quality standards, said Richard Whitman, natural resource advisor to Gov. Kate Brown.

State regulations that are required by federal law are exempt from Measure 49, he said.

Dave Hunnicutt, executive director of the Oregonians in Action property rights group, disagreed with this assessment.

Measure 49 only exempts state regulations that are mandated by the federal government, but not those that would merely cause the state to lose some federal funding, he said.

In this case, the buffers aren’t required by federal statute and they clearly reduce property values, said Hunnicutt.

“Those are the triggers for a Measure 49 claim,” he said.

Hunnicutt said that enacting the buffers virtually guarantees the state will spend hundreds of thousands of dollars litigating the issue.

Sybil Ackerman, a board member and advisor to philanthropic groups, said that any regulations the board does impose must adhere as closely as possible to achieving federal water quality standards rather than meeting other objectives.

BOISE — Domestic bulb onion prices have risen rapidly since falling below break-even levels this winter.

“The market’s really strong right now,” said Nyssa, Ore., farmer Paul Skeen, president of the Malheur County Onion Growers Association.

The mood at last week’s National Onion Association meeting in Boise was markedly better than it was at last year’s event, Skeen said.

“Things are definitely better now than they were this time last year,” he said. “Everybody’s more upbeat nationwide.”

Bulb onion prices were at depressed levels last fall and got worse through the winter, falling as low as $4 for a 50-pound bag of jumbos, said Kay Riley, manager of Snake River Produce, an onion shipper in Nyssa.

“That’s below break-even and doesn’t really cover production on the farm,” he said.

But prices have increased rapidly since March and are now at $16 a bag.

“For a mid-summer market, that’s exceptionally high,” Riley said.

NOA Executive Vice President Wayne Mininger said the rise in onion prices was largely a result of heavy rains that significantly reduced the onion crop in Mexico and Texas.

“There was a big reduction in supply and the markets improved dramatically in the spring and they continue at a very profitable level through the summer to this point,” he said.

Onion growers in Southwestern Idaho and Eastern Oregon, the nation’s largest onion producing region, are hopeful prices will still be robust when they start shipping this year’s crop in the fall.

“Once we get started shipping, the pipeline should be somewhat empty and we should have a good market to begin with,” Skeen said.

An improving transportation situation has also helped the industry, Mininger said.

During the NOA’s Boise meeting, national experts said truck transportation rates and availability are both better this year and the West Coast port situation has improved significantly.

But the industry still faces some significant challenges, Mininger said, including a persistent labor shortage and how the Affordable Health Care Act will affect employers going forward.

“At the moment, there’s less pressure on the industry but there are certainly challenges, too,” Mininger said.

Riley said onion growers are also anxiously awaiting the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s final produce safety rule, which is due in October.

The rule limits how much bacteria can be present in irrigation water. That’s a major concern for onion growers in this region because most of their water wouldn’t meet the FDA’s standards.

However, FDA included a bacteria die-off provision in its revised rule that allows a farm commodity to comply with the rule if scientific evidence shows that bacteria dies off the product quickly after harvest.

The onion industry in this region believes fields trials conducted by Oregon State University researchers the last two years have proven that.

“We’re optimistic the FDA’s final rule will be something that is manageable for us,” Riley said. “But until we actually see it, it’s still a cause of apprehension.”

EUGENE, Ore. (AP) — The Lane County Board of Commissioners approved a five-year tax break totaling $8.56 million for the International Paper linerboard mill in Springfield.

The company requested the break as it considers a $101.6 million upgrade to its 66-year-old mill, mainly to replace two “functionally obsolete” pieces of heavy equipment.

Under the deal, the company isn’t promising to add any new jobs to its Springfield workforce of around 280. The agreement allows the company to reduce its workforce by 20 percent at any point during the five years, though company officials say they don’t plan to do so.

The commissioners said Tuesday they supported the tax break because of the size of International Paper’s investment, because the break won’t reduce the amount of property taxes the company currently pays, and because the company pays employees, on average, above the county’s median wage.

“The concern that I have is for ongoing employment” at the plant, Commissioner Pat Farr said. “By investing this amount, it’s insurance that the mill will not close down.”

Added Commissioner Sid Leiken: “It’s impressive that IP is willing to make this kind of investment” in Springfield.

Commissioner Faye Stewart said he toured the plant a few years ago and was impressed with how highly automated it already is. He said he believed it was “unlikely” that International Plant would be unable to keep it running with fewer employees than it now has.

“It’s absolutely incredible what they’re doing there with the number of employees they have,” he said.

Only one member of the public showed up to testify. Sandi Mann said she was concerned about the plant’s impact on air and water quality in the area. The plant operates under government permits to emit air pollution and to discharge process water into the McKenzie River. Before approving the tax break, local elected officials should require a new study of those impacts, she said.

“Nobody seems to care” about the hefty tax break, Mann added, referring to the lack of public comment on the proposal.

Commissioners downplayed Mann’s concerns about air and water quality.

Stewart said the plant, under its emissions permits, has to meet “some very stringent requirements” to prevent pollution.

Under state law, property tax breaks awarded in an enterprise zone typically are reserved for projects that increase jobs by at least 10 percent. But the zone’s sponsors can waive that requirement if an eligible company spends more than $25 million on a project.

International Paper is eligible for an extended five-year deal because it agreed to additional terms, including that all new hires during that time would receive, on average, total compensation of more than 150 percent of Lane County’s average annual wage of $38,353 — or $58,530.

The company’s current average employee annual compensation, a figure that includes wages and most benefits, is $95,882.

The company, headquartered in Tennessee, will decide in coming weeks which of its mills will receive capital funding. If selected, construction on the Springfield linerboard mill would begin in September and end in 2016.

GRANTS PASS, Ore. (AP) — Gov. Kate Brown has declared drought emergencies in three more Oregon counties.

With Tuesday’s declaration, 23 out of 36 counties are under drought emergencies. The new ones are Curry, Hood River and Union counties.

Brown says this year’s extreme drought reflects a new reality for Oregon and dealing with it is part of the “continuing challenges of climate change.”

The governor’s drought declaration does not bring any help in the form of aid or loans, but does allow increased flexibility in how water is managed.

Last winter saw a record-low snowpack, leading to low streamflows this summer that have affected irrigators as well as fish.

ANTELOPE, Ore. — Hannah Boozer inched her way along a narrow cable, her eyes worried, her jaw set.

The Pendleton teenager wore a harness and a lanyard that slid along an upper wire, so she knew she wouldn’t fall far. Still, a dizzying 50 feet stood between the 18-year-old and terra firma.

Boozer, a camper at the world’s largest Young Life facility near Antelope, Ore., was tackling the ropes course — a web of cables and ropes attached to utility poles set into a hilltop. The final station required a six-foot horizontal leap to a trapeze bar before she would be gently lowered to the ground.

Had Boozer felt more relaxed, she might have taken a few moments to gaze at the scenery from her lofty position.

The view encompassed Young Life’s Washington Family Ranch, a 64,000-acre Christian youth camp with a manmade lake, Olympic-size pool, three zip lines, go-kart track and an 88,000-square-foot sports center. About a mile away, in the middle school section, younger kids slid down tube slides at the camp’s water park. Every week, about 1,100 new campers arrive at the ranch.

The oasis is surrounded by high desert flora and fauna. A gravel road leading to the camp slices through country rich with sage, juniper, greasewood and rimrock. The locals, many of them cattle ranchers, are rugged individuals who have weathered baking temperatures, middle-of-the-night calvings and the biggest irritant of all — the Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh.

The Bhagwan, a spiritual leader from India, in 1981 established a commune on the land now occupied by the Young Life camp and what earlier was a large sheep and cattle concern called the Big Muddy Ranch. In the 1800s, a farmhouse still standing on the property served as a stagecoach stop.

The Bhagwan bought the remote property for $5.75 million and invested millions more to build Rajneeshpuram as a spiritual retreat for thousands of his red-frocked followers. In news clips from the 1980s, Rajneeshees line the road for the Bhagwan’s daily drive-by in a vehicle from his fleet of more than 90 Rolls Royce automobiles. Rancho Rajneesh, as some called it, had its own newspaper, fire department, night club and mall.

The Rajneeshees clashed with locals over land use. The utopian desert commune collapsed after Rajneeshees were convicted of infecting four salad bars with salmonella in The Dalles, the Wasco County seat, in order to hamper voter turnout and swing an election. Other crimes included attempted murder, arson, election fraud and wiretapping. About 10 followers were imprisoned. The Bhagwan was deported for immigration violations.

Montana billionaire Dennis Washington bought the seized property for a cool $3.65 million as a destination resort, but ran into zoning problems. The Washington family donated the property to Young Life in 1996 and has continued support with additional donations.

Patty Read, administrative systems assistant at the Washington Family Ranch, said the camp is a mixture of new construction and remodeled Rajneeshpuram buildings. The hotels were repurposed into dorms. The nightclub and mall are now a residence for workers.

The transformation to a Christian camp is nothing short of ironic, said Pendleton, Ore., Young Life leader Chris Thatcher. He and three other leaders shepherded a contingent of 28 Pendleton teens all last week. Thatcher stood in the sports center where kids scrambled up climbing walls and thudded basketballs off the hardwood. Once a place where thousands of Rajneeshees worshiped the Bhagwan, the center is a hub of recreational activity.

He described the camp as a place where the gospel is presented, but not pushed. Seeds are planted during nightly meetings as kids sing and fellowship in a mosh pit-esque setting inside a building a short hop from the swimming pool. A pastor zings a short but pithy message.

Thatcher said much of the faith building happens one on one.

“We believe something real happens when you journey with a kid,” he said.

If the camper isn’t interested in faith?

“We meet people where they are — we don’t force God on people,” Thatcher said. “We provide space for every camper to respond to the good news. We don’t stop journeying with kids if they don’t choose him.”

Camper Andrew Thomas, a recent Pendleton High School graduate, described the camp as engaging, non-threatening and “insane fun.”

“The brochures say this will be the best week of your life and they’re not lying,” Thomas said.

“It is kind of like an escape from reality,” said Makya Theis, of Pendleton, “It’s a place where you know you are loved.”

Read is one of 40 year-round employees at the ranch. She serves as camp tour guide along with her other duties. The camp’s recent history includes some fascinating wrinkles. God, some say, sanded down some of the rough edges in the planning process.

Early on, Read said, planners discussed creating a manmade lake, but ran into a big problem.

“Consultants said the pond would evaporate about 10,000 gallons a day,” she said. “They needed some kind of natural water source.”

The lake went on hold until a crew digging the swimming pool hit a natural spring with a flow of — you guessed it — 10,000 gallons per day.

When planners couldn’t decide what to do with the Bhagwan’s house, a 1997 range fire decided matters. A finger of the fire raced down the ridge and torched the residence, the only one of 300 Rajneeshpuram buildings to burn.

The camp’s huge grassy field, a place for soccer, volleyball and other activities, required several inches of sand to mitigate for muddiness. Someone on a four wheeler exploring the property discovered a huge sand deposit that provided the exact amount of sand needed.

“This place is a gift,” Thatcher said.

Hannah Boozer, once she conquered the ropes course, said she thinks the setting is a perfect place for getting close to God.

“Young Life is a week full of eye-opening moments,” she said. “God’s grace definitely changes lives at Washington Family Ranch.”

The Oregon CattleWomen have named Molly Jo Delcurto as the state’s official Beef Ambassador.

The 19-year-old Linn-Benton Community College sophomore will serve as the public face of the industry, interacting with a consumer base that is increasingly concerned with everything from humane slaughter methods to the myriad uses of animal byproducts.

“A lot of people don’t know how the process works,” Delcurto said. “The biggest (misconception) is thinking that beef is grown on factory farms, when in reality it’s grown on family farms.”

Appointed to the position in late March, Delcurto has already promoted the interests of ranchers at Salem’s Ag Fest, at Oregon State University’s Summer Agricultural Institute and through presentations to elementary school children in her hometown of Cove.

She’ll also appear at the Oregon State Fair and the East-West Shrine All-Star Football Game, a fundraiser for the Shriners Hospital for Children, in Baker City.

Delcurto was awarded a $500 scholarship for the ambassadorship after emerging from a crowded field of applicants, according to Oregon CattleWomen President Katharine Jackson.

“I think that Molly is ready to go,” Jackson said. “She has a very calm presence and will be able to say what needs to be said”

Growing up on a hobby ranch where her parents raised registered Angus cattle, Delcurto started her own mini-herd when she was 9-years-old.

All it took was a little grit, gumption — and a loan from Mom and Dad — and soon the junior rancher had three flowery-named heifers: Rosy, Daisy and Lily.

“My cattle tend to be a little more ornery than normal. They definitely have a mind of her own” Delcurto said. “We spoiled them too much. They got extra feed all the time.”

Delcurto moved up the ranks in Cove High School’s 70-member FFA contingent. She served as chapter historian and secretary before becoming president in her senior year. She also participated in livestock judging competition in high school and now plays on a collegiate level.

Delcurto is pursuing a major in agricultural business management and a minor in animal science. She hopes to continue to work as an industry spokesperson after she graduates.

During her educational presentations, she said explaining the beef cultivation process left the young children “amazed.”

“They see the animals in the field, and they see what’s on their dinner plate, but they have no idea how it got to that spot,” she said.

Delcurto will vie for one of five spots on the national beef ambassador team in September. If she wins, she’ll be in good company. In 2013, Oregon Beef Ambassador Jacquelyn Brown won a spot on the traveling team.

Farmers in Oregon will soon get some much-needed assistance with battling the slugs that are devouring their crops.

Oregon State University plans to recruit an entomologist who specializes in slug research as part of a broader hiring spree made possible with added money from state lawmakers.

Earlier this year, the university held a “Slug Summit” with farmers who complained that the pests have grown more problematic in recent years.

Theories abound as to why slugs are more prevalent — increased restrictions on field burning and reduced tillage were among the reasons proposed — but concrete proof is scant.

Methods of controlling the mollusks, such as bait containing the pesticide metaldehyde, aren’t reliably effective, growers reported.

The new research position will focus on the best ways to kill slugs or otherwise disrupt their life cycle, said Dan Arp, dean of OSU’s College of Agricultural Sciences.

The Oregon legislature recently approved $14 million in additional funding for OSU’s agricultural experiment stations, extension service and forest laboratory over the next two years.

Agricultural experiment stations will receive more than $6 million of that amount, which will fund 16 new assistant professor positions and six support positions, said Arp.

OSU will begin trying to fill the positions as soon as possible, but the recruiting process usually takes about eight months, he said.

“We’re really grateful to the legislature for making this possible,” Arp said.

Following is a summary of the other research positions that OSU’s agricultural experiment stations will be looking to fill:

• Rangeland ecology with a focus on conserving the sage grouse, a bird species that’s a candidate for federal protection. Ranchers fear that threatened or endangered status for the species could result in grazing restrictions.

• Integrated management of cropping systems, focusing on managing nutrients, water and pests for crops with intensive rotations.

• Weed and pest management primarily for horticultural crops like vegetables and berries.

• Water management and efficient use, such as examining innovative tools for irrigation.

• Fertilizer rate and transport, which involves the study of how much fertilizer is consumed by crops and where surpluses end up.

• Near-shore fishery and oceanography, looking at sustainable practices.

• Food processing and safety, researching new technology and food safety concepts such as improving shelf life.

• Food microbiology, studying ways to prevent contamination with pathogens.

• Pesticide management, including the best management of rates and timing.

• Integrated pest management response to climate and weather, with a focus on modeling how changes will affect pest control.

• Consumer demands and marketing, which involves the study of how people make buying decisions and how to influence them. The main focus will be on products of fermentation like alcohol and cheese.

• Brewing microbiology, which will examine how to use microbiology to improve flavor.

• Quantitative plant genetics, which requires the use of modern molecular tools to improve breeding.

• Vegetable and specialty seed breeding and management.

• Seafood processing and innovation, which will include new methods and safety components.

• Two pollinator biology technicians, one focused on lab work and the other on field work.

• An experiential learning coordinator who lines up internships for students.

• Supplemental funding for three positions in fermentation science.

OSU’s Forest Research Laboratory will receive $3.5 million of the additional funding, which will be spent on a two-year study of the marbled murrelet, a threatened bird species that nests in coastal forests.

The birds will be banded with radio transmitters so researchers can find out more about where they travel and how far inland they lay eggs.

“We really don’t understand much about their behavior. They spend most of their lives out at sea,” said Thomas Maness, the laboratory’s director.

OSU’s extension service will receive nearly $4.5 million of the added funding but is still in the process of prioritizing which positions will be filled, said Scott Reed, the service’s director at the university.

SALEM — The leader of the Oregon Farm Bureau has announced his bid for the presidency of the American Farm Bureau Federation.

Barry Bushue, president of Oregon Farm Bureau for the past nine years and vice president of American Farm Bureau for seven years, will seek the national organization’s top office at its January convention, according to an OFB press release.

“In recent years, Oregon has been on the front line of numerous challenges facing American agriculture. We continue to engage in public policy debates around genetically modified organisms, immigration, animal welfare, pesticides, water use, endangered species, and other environmental issues,” Bushue said in the press release. “I’ve been blessed as a leader to work for farmers in my community, county, state, and across the country. To serve as AFBF president would be an unrivaled opportunity to use these experiences for the benefit all American farmers and ranchers on the national stage.”

Bob Stallman, AFBF president for 16 years, announced last week that he would not seek re-election.

Bushue, who has long been active in the Farm Bureau, has served as president of Multnomah County Farm Bureau, a regional director on the Oregon Farm Bureau Board of Directors, and as OFB’s first vice president.

In 2008, Bushue was elected vice president of the American Farm Bureau Federation. His leadership at the national level includes service on the AFBF Nursery & Greenhouse Committee, AFBF Trade Advisory Committee, a national labor taskforce, and a National Food Quality Protection Act workgroup.

Bushue continues to serve on the USDA Advisory Committee on Biotechnology & 21st Century Agriculture, the Executive Committee of the United States Biotech Crop Alliance, and the Board of Directors of the Generic Event Marketability & Access Agreement Biotech Accord.

In Oregon, he serves on the Executive Committee of Oregonians for Food & Shelter, a coalition that protects and advocates for access and safe use of pesticide, fertilizers, and biotech tools for the agriculture and natural resource communities.

Named Agriculturalist of the Year in 2014 by the Oregon Agri-Business Council, Bushue has worked on numerous task forces at the request of the governor, the state legislature, and with natural resource agencies on critical issues, including water quality and quantity, pesticide use, biotech, labor, navigability, public land grazing, and wildlife depredation.

Bushue is the third member of his family to run the farm in Multnomah County, Ore. He and his wife raise vegetables, berries, flowers and pumpkins at the nearly century-old farm near Portland. They sell directly to the public and host events for the local community.

After attending college, Bushue taught high school in South Australia. It was during those years “down under” that he met his wife Helen. The Bushues returned to Oregon in the late 1980s to take over the family farm. They have three grown children.

“At the county, state, and national level, Farm Bureau is a true grassroots, democratic organization,” Bushue said. “Farms and ranches of all sizes, commodities, and production types have an opportunity to bring their issues forward and have their voices heard. Our unity is our strength, and there is no more effective way for family agriculture to be heard in the legislative arena than Farm Bureau. It would be an honor to serve our members at the national level.”

HERMISTON, Ore. — When Lauren Smith pulled out a collection of spiders at the Hermiston Agricultural Research and Extension Center July 17 she had an eager audience.

The children participating in the station’s first-ever Farmtastic event crowded closer to the Oregon State University graduate student, passing around the vials of specimens preserved in alcohol and commenting on the size of what was inside.

“Why are spiders beneficial?” she asked the group.

“Because they eat bugs!” a student piped up.

The lesson was part of a free day-long activity at HAREC for children interested in science and agriculture. Annette Teraberry, administrative assistant for the center, said the event was conceived and designed by the center’s graduate students as a way to introduce science to local youth.

The program was advertised through Hermiston’s Parks and Recreation department, and 20 spots were available on a first-come, first-served basis.

Sarah Light, a graduate student working on a dual master’s degree in soil science and plant pathology, said the group tried to come up with a curriculum that was a mixture of hands-on activities, games and informational lessons.

“The idea is to get kids excited about science in the context of agriculture,” Light said.

She said each of the program’s five graduate students have a different area of expertise, so the children were getting exposure to a wide range of elements of farming.

Before Smith’s lesson on beneficial bugs — which also included a demonstration on pollination using an armful of flowers and a collection of preserved bees — Light had been teaching the group about plant pathology.

“Plants can get sick, too,” she told the group, noting that plant diseases cost the United States about $8 billion annually.

Later in the day the group would learn about soil and creek ecosystems, take a tour of the experiment station and visit the pathology lab. The center’s staff hopes to make Farmtastic an annual event.

“It’s been going great,” Light said. “The kids seem really into it and we’re having a lot of fun.”

Oregon grass seed farmers can feel right at home in Washington, D.C., this summer with the National Arboretum highlighting turfgrasses in a display titled The Grass Roots Exhibit.

Oregon growers, in fact, have a stake in the exhibit: The Oregon Seed Council donated $50,000 to help construct and maintain it.

Coming at a time when home lawns are under fire in California and other states, Roger Beyer, executive director of the council, said the council felt it was important to show the positive side of grass.

“We felt it was important that our story be told,” he said.

In the exhibit, signage identifies which grass species are planted in the different sections and provides glimpses into some of their environmental, aesthetic and recreational benefits. Signage also directs visitors to a website where they can obtain more information on the displays.

Now nearing one year old, the exhibit has been a popular draw among arboretum visitors, said Geoff Rinehart, the exhibit’s coordinator and a former turfgrass research technician at Washington State University.

Among the exhibit’s more popular elements, one displays an artificial grass sports field next to a sports field of Bermuda grass. “There is a lot of appeal there to compare and contrast when they are side by side,” Rinehart said. “People are pretty engaged with that.

“And of course everybody likes the golf exhibit,” he said. The golf exhibit includes bentgrass grown from seed produced in Oregon. “A lot of folks who have never been on a golf course are able to get an idea of what a golf putting green feels like.”

The exhibit also features a display of perennial ryegrass grown for seed. “We’ve let it grow to where we have the seed heads and we’ve got a sign out there that talks about the importance of growing grass for seed for turfgrass,” Rinehart said.

“The grass plants aren’t as big as they would be in the Willamette Valley,” Rinehart said. “But we have signage that says, ‘This is what a grass plant looks like when it is grown for grass seed.’

“We also have perennial ryegrass in our cool season lawn display, which we keep at typical lawn-grass height,” he said.

Other grass species displayed include tall fescue, fine fescue and Kentucky bluegrass.

The exhibit also provides glimpses into agronomic benefits of grass plants in a display highlighting the use of cereal rye, wheat, oats and barley as cover crops.

“Our message is these crops are grasses, too, which is news to most people,” Rinehart said. “Especially in D.C., many people have never seen a wheat crop.”

The exhibit, located in an 8,000-square-foot field adjacent to the arboretum’s main entrance, is scheduled to run through 2017.