DENVER (AP) — Now that Nevada has approved an early start to recreational cannabis sales, existing medical marijuana companies in the state are readying for a burst of new business that could equate to tens of millions of dollars in additional revenue this year.

With Las Vegas alone drawing 40 million-plus visitors in 2016, the overall recreational cannabis industry is set to take another big step forward.

The early rollout will make Nevada the fifth state with an operational recreational market and the first to launch since last November’s election, when voters in four states approved adult-use programs. Nevada will also be the first new recreational state to go live under the Trump administration.

“It’s great news for everybody,” said Ben Sillitoe, the CEO and co-founder of Oasis Cannabis, a medical marijuana dispensary in Las Vegas.

Nevada’s recreational marijuana industry got the thumbs-up for an “early start” program Monday, when state tax authorities approved temporary regulations that allow licensed medical marijuana companies to begin adult-use sales July 1.

The recreational program isn’t expected to fully launch until 2018 because the tax commission has until January to finalize rules for the industry.

According to Marijuana Business Daily estimates, Nevada’s recreational market could generate $75 million or more in sales this year and $450 million-$550 million annually down the road. Tourist spending is expected to account for a heavy portion of sales.

The early recreational marijuana program will run from July 1 until January 2018 and will be open to roughly 190 medical marijuana dispensaries, growers and processors.

Sillitoe said the industry, state officials and other stakeholders “all worked together to make this happen quickly, and I think Nevada is a good example of how good regulation works to advance the industry.”

However, there are plenty of caveats. The biggest: At the outset, only existing medical marijuana businesses will be allowed to obtain recreational sales licenses; other interested companies must wait until January to jump in.

Environmentalists have filed a lawsuit challenging the legality of USDA’s predator control efforts in Idaho, arguing the environmental effects were inadequately studied.

The complaint, filed by Western Watersheds Project, Wildearth Guardians, Center for Biological Diversity and Predator Defense, seeks to stop “killing projects” by USDA’s Wildlife Services division until a new analysis is complete.

An environmental assessment by USDA authorizing predator control by Wildlife Services in Idaho violated the National Environmental Policy Act by failing to disclose the full “direct, indirect and cumulative effects” of these activities, the complaint said.

Wildlife Services should have conducted a more comprehensive “environmental impact statement,” or EIS, that took into account the total effects of killing black bears, coyotes, cougars and wolves in addition to poisoning ravens and starlings, the plaintiffs claim.

“It does not disclose how the areas in which it conducts these activities may overlap with one another or how they may act in concert to increase or change impacts on the environment,” according to the complaint.

Capital Press was unable to reach a representative of USDA’s Wildlife Services for comment.

A more extensive analysis is necessary because Wildlife Services has committed to killing ravens at the direction of the Idaho Department of Fish and Game to protect the greater sage grouse, the complaint said.

Similar lawsuits against Wildlife Services have recently yielded mixed results for environmental groups.

A complaint filed by Wildearth Guardians challenging environmental studies that underpinned USDA’s predator control programs in Nevada and elsewhere was initially dismissed by a federal judge in 2013.

However, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated the case in 2015 and USDA settled it last year, agreeing to update the environmental studies and avoid killing predators in Nevada’s wilderness areas and wilderness study areas until then.

Several of the same plaintiffs in the recent Idaho case also filed a complaint in 2016 against Wildlife Service’s agreement to kill wolves at the behest of Oregon wildlife regulators.

A federal judge dismissed that lawsuit last month, finding that USDA wasn’t required to perform an environmental review of the program because Oregon officials could kill wolves regardless of the federal agency’s participation.

The J.R. Simplot agribusiness company is seeking a preliminary injunction against a potential food supply disruption stemming from a dispute with business partner Frank Tiegs.

Simplot and Tiegs are engaged in a legal battle over the control of two jointly owned food processing companies: Gem State Processing of Heyburn, Idaho, and Pasco Processing of Pasco, Wash.

Ownership of the National Frozen Food Co. of Seattle, a subsidiary of Pasco Processing, is also at stake in the litigation.

Tiegs, a large-scale Washington farmer and business owner, filed a lawsuit claiming that Simplot effectively forfeited ownership of Pasco Processing due to a deadlock over whether to infuse the company with a $6 million capital contribution.

Simplot has filed a counterclaim alleging that Tiegs has grossly mismanaged Pasco Processing and Gem State Processing to his own financial benefit by forcing them to buy excessive amounts of poor-quality crops from his farming affiliates.

Although Tiegs’ takeover of Pasco Processing is invalid, he has nonetheless claimed to lenders and employees to have sole ownership of the company, according to Simplot.

These claims have been used to “intimidate critical witnesses” employed by the National Frozen Food Co. while Tiegs has threatened to “cut off Simplot’s supply of critical products” with little time to find alternative sources, the company argues.

Simplot has asked U.S. District Judge Rosanna Malouf Peterson for a preliminary injunction prohibiting Tiegs from taking any action based on his claim of full ownership of Pasco Processing.

Pasco Processing supplies roughly 42 percent of Simplot’s “vegetable and specialty inventory,” which equates to about $54 million in sales for the company, said Michael Johnston, vice president of manufacturing and supply chain at Simplot, in a court filing.

Since the conflict erupted, the facility is has provided “dismal service levels” and may soon stop supplying Simplot altogether, he said.

“If Tiegs were to act upon his threat to cease production for Simplot, it would quite literally put Simplot out of the vegetable and specialty businesses, result in multi-million-dollar losses, and have a devastating effect on Simplot’s customer relationships because of failure to meet contractual obligations,” Johnston said.

Joe VanLeuven, an attorney representing Tiegs, said that Pasco Processing does not plan to cut off food supplies to Simplot.

The processing facility’s operator — Washington Potato Co., which is owned by Tiegs — has agreed to continue supplying Simplot through the end of its fiscal year in early September and is willing to negotiate a new supply agreement beyond that date, VanLeuven said.

“It’s very frustrating to read this in a motion when the reality is so different,” he said.

Before the ownership dispute, Simplot bought products from Pasco Processing but did not operate the facility, VanLeuven said. “Whether we’re the sole owner or not, doesn’t mean they’re not a customer.”

There’s also no evidence of intimidation of witnesses employed by the National Frozen Food Co., he said.

An attorney for National Frozen Food Co. was simply notified that Simplot no longer had an ownership interest in Pasco Processing and that it’s inappropriate for NFF employees to insert themselves into the dispute, other than to provide evidence in an impartial manner, VanLeuven said.

Canola isn’t just a crop that farmers can turn to when wheat prices drop, Washington State University oilseed specialist Karen Sowers says.

Farmers should also consider the improvements possible to their wheat crop after growing canola, she said.

“We’ve called canola the opportunity crop for quite some time, but it’s good for producers to see that canola, whether it’s spring or winter, could potentially become a regular part of their rotation,” she said. “It’s helpful with weed control, it’s helpful with breaking disease and pest cycles.”

Some growers have reported wheat yield increases of 5 to 25 percent following canola, Sowers said.

WSU will offer tours of winter canola field trials at 4 p.m. May 23 in Odessa, 10 a.m. May 24 in St. John and 4 p.m. May 24 in Ralston.

USDA projections in April anticipated canola would increase to 34,000 acres in Idaho, 10,000 acres in Oregon and 50,000 acres in Washington.

The current winter canola crop has “a lot of unevenness,” Sowers said. High moisture levels from extended snow cover and high rainfall took nutrients out of roots. The canola looks best in the high-elevation Pomeroy area, and is “fair” elsewhere.

Weed pressure is also high, but canola is a “fierce competitor,” Sowers said.

“Canola is a very resilient plant. It fills in blank areas just by branching out more,” she said. “I think in the end, the crop will even out and be a good, quality crop.”

“Outstanding” moisture levels set the stage for a good spring canola crop, too, she added.

Demand for the crop will remain high from the Viterra Pacific Coast Canola plant in Warden, Wash. Estimates say it would take 400,000 acres to feed that facility, Sowers said.

“We’ve got a long ways to go on that,” she said.

WSU will offer spring canola variety tours in Walla Walla, Pullman, Almira and Fairfield in mid- to late June.

Online

http://smallgrains.wsu.edu/wsu-winter-canola-field-tours/

MORO, Ore. — Azure Farms and Sherman County officials agreed Thursday to try a new weed control plan that would allow the farm to retain its organic certification. The agreement came during a two-hour county court meeting that saw approximately 300 people, more than one-sixth of the county’s population, file into the high school gym.

The county has warned it will ask the Oregon Department of Agriculture to quarantine the 1,922-acre organic farm if it doesn’t control rampant noxious weeds that neighboring wheat farmers say are spreading on to their ground. The local weed control supervisor said the county will spray herbicide and bill the farm for the work if the problem is not dealt with.

The situation, which has been a local issue since at least 2006, came to a head this spring when local farmers renewed complaints that Azure’s property is filled with Rush Skeleton weed, Canada Thistle, Bindweed, White Top and Morning Glory. Conventional farmers, especially those who grow certified seed, said weeds from Azure can contaminate their crops and increase their input costs due to additional spraying.

For Azure Farms, however, spraying conventional herbicides would cause it to lose valuable organic certification for three years after the last application.

Azure Farms is part of Azure Standard, a major distributor of organic products, and the company’s first response — a video that urged a social media uprising against the county — didn’t win them any local friends. County officials counted approximately 57,000 emails from around the world, critical of their proposed action. The county courthouse also shut down its phone system after being deluged with protests.

At the May 17 meeting, however, Azure representatives said they regret the conflict.

“We have every intention of living peaceably with all of our neighbors,” farm manager Nathan Stelzer said.

“I’m deeply sorry if we hurt you guys,” he added later.

His brother, David Stelzer, CEO of Azure Standard, said he authorized the social media campaign but doesn’t have a Facebook account himself and didn’t understand the implications.

“I do apologize for unleashing social media on the county,” he said. “I am sorry.”

But the brothers made it clear they don’t want to use weed control methods that will cause them to lose organic certification. They proposed a combination of tillage, mowing and organic products to do the job. County weed district Supervisor Rod Asher said he will work with Azure in concert with farmers, university weed experts and perhaps organic consultants.

Some of the conventional farmers in the area are skeptical. During the meeting, several said Azure Farms should simply spray herbicide, clean up its fields and resume organic operations in three years.

“This has gone on long enough,” said Bryan Cranston, who grows certified wheat seed adjacent to Azure Farms. He said the farm should use Milestone, a powerful herbicide that will kill the weeds.

Grower Chris Moore, who also farms next to Azure property, said the time he spends on weed abatement has gone from hours to days, and he’s losing productive ground. He said “half measures” by Azure won’t be sufficient.

“If you do undertake it, control every weed,” he said. “Don’t let it go to seed. If you do that, I don’t think you’ll have a problem with your neighbors.”

Jean Luxford-Hubert was blunt.

“What we’re looking at here is bad farming practices that have gone on for a number of years,” she said. “This is pure and simple poor management, poor soil control, poor conservation of the fields.

“You need to fix this problem because you’re encroaching on your neighbors,” she told the Stelzers. “That’s not the way it should be in an agricultural community.”

Blake Rowe, CEO of the Oregon Wheat Growers League in Portland, said Sherman County is one of the state’s key wheat producing regions. Wheat is among the state’s leading export products, with much of it going to Asia, and the area’s reputation for high quality is at risk, Rowe said.

“Weed in wheat is a quality standard that is measured,” he told the county court. “I hope you bring Azure into compliance. There may be different ways to attain compliance, but control is what’s important.”

Afterward, Nathan Stelzer said it appeared most of the conventional farmers in the area want to play “hardball” with Azure Farms and force them to spray. Stelzer said he is committed to working with Asher, the weed district supervisor, on the farm’s proposed weed management plan.

Rowe, of the Wheat Growers League, said a list of weed control practices such as Azure proposed is not enough. The problem must be monitored, with some way found to measure results, he said.

“We’ll have to see what they come up with,” he said.

County Commissioner Tom McCoy said the county wants a workable plan that will control weeds before they go to seed and spread to neighbors.

“We don’t want to spray an organic farm if we can possibly get around it,” he said.

RICHLAND, Wash. — The 2017 Pacific Northwest sweet cherry crop is forecast at 22.7 million, 20-pound boxes, but it could easily exceed the 23.2 million-box record set in 2014, several growers said May 17 at the Five State Cherry Commission meeting.

But they also foresee a good spread of 90 to 100 days to harvest the crop, which they hope makes for orderly supply and sales and good prices.

“This crop is bigger but will have more shipping days. Last year we had 20 days to move the bulk of the crop. This year it should be 40 so it will sell like a smaller crop,” said West Mathison, president of Stemilt Growers, Wenatchee.

The 2016 crop was 20.97 million boxes, the third-largest in history. Many growers said this year’s crop could well be 15 to 25 percent larger. That would put it in the 24 million- to 26 million-box range.

“We will have lots of cherries,” said B.J. Thurlby, president of the industry promotional arm Northwest Cherry Growers and the Washington State Fruit Commission in Yakima.

In 2009 and 2012, weather-caused harvest compression — when the whole crop matured at about the same time — caused a glut in the supply chain and depressed prices. Growers are crossing their fingers that doesn’t happen this year.

After two years of record-early harvest starts driven by warm springs, this year’s cooler spring is bringing the start back to normal, or slightly later than normal.

For years, the first cherries picked in the state have been the Chelan variety at the orchard of John and Debra Doebler at Sentinel Gap north of Mattawa. Heat reflected into their orchard from high basalt cliffs brings early maturity.

Their normal start is June 1. Last year was their earliest ever, on May 18, and the year before it was May 23, giving Stemilt Growers the first cherries to pack.

At the meeting, Mathison said the first cherries will probably be picked June 12 this year. But later that day in their orchard, the Doebler sons, Ryan, 30, and Travis, 26, estimated a start of June 5 or 6. Their father, John, said June 7 or 8 is more likely.

“Usually, the warehouse comes out and says, ‘Let’s start tomorrow and then they do and whoops, it’s too green.’ Then it’s ‘Let’s wait a day,’” Debra Doebler said.

“There’s always an eagerness but there’s no real reason to be early because California has plenty of fruit,” John Doebler said. “It’s better to be patient and have better quality.”

The Pacific Northwest harvests about 80 percent of the national sweet cherry crop, and California harvests 15 percent, followed by Michigan and New York. Washington grows roughly 85 percent of the PNW crop.

2016 prices have not yet been released by USDA, but Washington’s 2015 crop garnered $436.9 million and averaged $19.70 per box. Those were low due to harvest compression from hot weather. The national value of sweet cherry sales that year was $758.9 million.

California harvests before the PNW and for several years has been hindered by bad weather. This year, it has its largest crop in years, estimated at 7 million to 8.5 million, 15-pound boxes.

The bulk of the California crop will be harvested the weeks of May 21 and 28 and should be wrapping up as Washington’s harvest ramps up.

“I worry about California having some carry-over. There’s always some shippers down there who sit on some fruit and then put it out after we start. I hope that doesn’t happen this year. Those little nuances can really affect us,” Thurlby said.

He said Washington’s late start makes him nervous about having enough volume for Fourth of July sales. He anticipated roughly 5 million boxes in June, 14 million in July and 4 million in August.

“I pray we hit the Fourth with some volume and if every retailer is at $5.99 per pound, we are dead. We need to get ads (with prices of $3.99 and $2.99 per pound) going for momentum,” Thurlby said.

The crop in Turkey is early this year and should be finished by mid-July, opening a window for Northwest sales into Europe, he said.

South Korea, China, Southeast Asia and Mexico are priority foreign markets with Myanmar and Cambodia promising for the future, said Keith Hu, international program director of Northwest Cherry Growers.

A big help to exports is a new Western Distribution Services’ cold storage facility next to Sea-Tac Airport, Thurlby said.

“Last year, we put more fruit through Sea-Tac than ever before, but we’ve always needed more cold storage there so this has the potential to really help us,” he said.

James Michael, domestic promotions director of Northwest Cherry Growers, said 71 percent of cherry sales are impulse buys. He encourages retailers to prominently display cherries because they are a top revenue item.

With 76 million out of 318 million Americans buying cherries, there’s huge growth potential, he said.

Cherries are a great source of fiber, a natural anti-inflamatory and make a great evening snack, he said.

“They have a low glycemic index so their sugar is absorbed more slowly and they have natural melatonin to help you sleep,” he said.

The five state forecast is for 186,000 tons for Washington up from 149,218 in 2016 and 165,267 in 2015. Oregon is forecast at 39,000 tons down from 41,156 in 2016 but up from 21,784 in 2015. Idaho is forecast at 1,800 up from 833 the previous two years. Montana is estimated at 1,000 tons and Utah at 200.

The Washington breakdown is: Wenatchee district 100,000 tons, up from 86,368 in 2016 and 87,248 in 2015; Yakima district 85,000 up from 62,850 in 2016 and 78,019 in 2015.

The Oregon breakdown: Hood River, 7,000, down from 7,055 in 2016 and up from 4,860 in 2015; The Dalles, 30,000, down from 33,330 in 2016 but up from 16,766 in 2015; Milton-Freewater, 2,000, up from 771 in 2016 and 158 in 2015.

The Five State Cherry Commission adopted an $18 per ton grower assessment for promotions.

PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — Maine Rep. Chellie Pingree is among a trio of lawmakers that wants to more than double funding for a key U.S. Department of Agriculture organic research program.

Pingree, a Democrat, is working with Rep. Dan Newhouse, a Washington Republican, and Rep. Jimmy Panetta, a California Democrat, on the Organic Agriculture Research Act. The legislation increases the funding of the Organic Research and Extension Initiative from $20 million to $50 million annually.

The program helps pay for research projects that help organic farmers improve operations and meet consumer demand. Pingree cites the fact that sales of organic food have doubled in the U.S. in the last ten years as evidence that the added funding is needed.

The bill has the backing of the Organic Trade Association and other organic industry groups.

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The California Department of Fish and Wildlife has extended an emergency closure of the commercial rock crab fishery in Northern California.

The commercial rock crab fishery north of Pigeon Point in San Mateo County to the Oregon border has been closed since last fall after state health agencies found unhealthy levels of domoic acid.

The closure was set to expire Tuesday but will now remain in effect until officials determine that domoic acid levels no longer pose a significant risk to public health.

The fishery is clean from Bodega Bay south along the entire California coast.

The acid is a potent neurotoxin produced naturally in marine algae whose levels can increase under certain ocean conditions.

CASPER, Wyo. (AP) — In a pen surrounded by 8-foot-high fences, at a research station by the side of a winding canyon road in southeast Wyoming, stand seven elk that are going to die.

The creatures don’t look sick yet. Their caramel-colored fur still covers round bodies the size of small horses. They run back and forth with each other and two bighorn sheep ewes that share their pen, greedily eating food offered at the gate. How long they’ll last is a question researchers can’t answer.

Each animal has been exposed naturally to chronic wasting disease, a killer that can lie dormant for years before corroding their brains with tiny, sponge-like holes.

But these female elk are unlike most others. They have rare genetics, which might just prolong their lives.

The cow elk are one small piece of a complicated puzzle that has confounded researchers, scientists, wildlife managers and federal disease specialists for decades, threatening deer and elk in more than a dozen states and three Canadian provinces.

At stake is Wyoming’s identity. The Cowboy State’s iconic herds not only draw thousands of hunters and wildlife viewers each year, they’re why many people live here in the first place.

The puzzle started in the 1970s in a Colorado State University lab. Late-CWD researcher Beth Williams noticed that some deer acted disoriented and weak before they eventually died. She diagnosed the killer as chronic wasting disease, a cousin to “mad cow disease,” scrapie in sheep and the always-fatal Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in humans. Her discovery led to a nationwide panic over fears it could spread to humans, followed by relative apathy when it seemed more and more like it would not.

Now the seven elk behind the 8-foot fence could possibly be the key, even in the smallest sense, to solving the mystery of a disease that first appeared in Wyoming in the mid-1980s and is creeping northwest, permanently infecting everything it touches.

“As one question is answered, two more pop up,” said Hank Edwards, wildlife disease specialist for the Wyoming Game and Fish Department. “It is frustrating. It’s hard to get a handle on controlling this disease when there’s so much left to learn.”

After decades of work, wildlife managers are, in some ways, starting over in figuring out how to manage the disease. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention still don’t recommend humans eat an infected animal, but there have been no cases of transmission. Nor did the disease initially tear through herds as quickly as first predicted.

But that’s all starting to change. New models are showing that in the long term, mule deer numbers, particularly in central Wyoming, could plummet.

Instead of raging through like an ancient plague, the disease kills slowly, taking years or even a decade, and spreading in ways no one quite understands. So Wyoming wildlife managers and researchers are regrouping, working at ground zero with new information and seeking input from the public as they race to grasp the full impact of — and possible solution to — one of the most deadly wildlife diseases facing the state.

One crisp morning in late winter 2016, cattle rancher Peter Garrett opened his front door and found a four-point deer leaning against the side of his house.

The rancher’s dogs — black and white McNabs — raced outside without noticing the buck. Startled, Garrett tried shooing the buck, but the animal just stood and kicked, then laid back down.

Ten minutes later, the buck was still there. Nothing could make it move. Not the dogs coming back. Not Garrett. Not his wife.

“Maybe he was looking for warmth against the house,” Garrett said. “It was right there where the sun beats and by the fireplace.”

The Garretts ultimately called Game and Fish, as they always do when they find sick deer on their ranch, which sprawls on both sides of Highway 487 southwest of Casper. When the game warden arrived, he removed the buck. Later, he told Garrett that it tested positive for CWD.

It wasn’t the first.

More and more deer were dying on and near Garrett’s ranch in what Game and Fish calls Hunt Area 66. It has the inauspicious distinction of carrying the second-highest rate of CWD in the state.

But the mule deer herd is part of Garrett’s life. It helped keep the lights on in his family ranch 50 years ago when he and his new wife were short on cash and worked as outfitters on the side. It kept them alive when the couple couldn’t afford to eat the beef they were raising for market. Shed antlers cover chandeliers in his log home tucked at the base of a mountain. Mounts of some of the deer he and his sons have shot nestle in corners.

Garrett, 70, has spent years working with Game and Fish on habitat projects in the area to try to improve food for the deer. His list of accolades from organizations such as Game and Fish and Wyoming Stock Growers Association for good stewardship of his land grows longer each year.

But a solution still eludes him.

“I don’t like it, but what can you do?” he said. “Our deer numbers — when my kids were in school, you could count 400 to 500 between here and the highway, and now you’re lucky if you count 50.”

“And that’s on a good day,” said his wife, Ethel Garrett. “Now it’s 10 or 15. Then we complained about too many deer. But we’d like to have a happy medium.”

Game and Fish estimates that in that particular herd, about 23 percent of the buck deer will die in less than two years.

Chronic wasting disease is certainly not the only wildlife illness to confound specialists.

But finding a solution is particularly tricky because, like Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s, CWD can’t be targeted and killed like a bacteria or virus. It doesn’t have a cure or vaccine. It doesn’t die if you simply cook it long enough or let it sit in the sun.

“Diseases like brucellosis, we know how to work with that,” said Scott Edberg, deputy chief of Game and Fish’s wildlife division. “There’s no silver bullet, but we’re trying to find one. It’s not like a common cold.”

Edberg, Hank Edwards, the disease specialist; Dr. Mary Wood, the state wildlife veterinarian; and a handful of other researchers and wildlife experts in Game and Fish are all part of a CWD think tank of sorts. They meet periodically to talk about new research, changes in the herds around the state and new cases of the disease.

At a February meeting at the Tom Thorne and Beth Williams Wildlife Research Center at Sybille, they explained CWD’s complexities and its infamous history in Wyoming.

CWD, Edwards said, is a prion. That means it’s a protein, a natural part of a body, which mutates and becomes infectious. The mutated protein then attacks other cells living in the body’s nervous system. As it forms tiny, sponge-like holes in an animal’s brain, the animal begins to act lethargic, become emaciated and drool excessively before eventually dying.

Chronic wasting disease itself affects only mule and white-tailed deer, elk and moose in Wyoming, but there was a time after the disease was first discovered in southeastern Wyoming in 1985 when fears ran rampant.

“The threat that this prion disease could go to humans, that really drove a lot of our research and awareness, but now, based on our information, we don’t believe the disease will go to humans,” Edwards said. “I think it is time to switch the focus away from human health to herd health.”

Yet for every question researchers seem to have answered, they find new ones that are more confounding.

The prions that cause scrapie, for example, have changed over time, forming multiple strains, said Wood. Something is keeping the strains from crossing into other species; researchers don’t know what that biological reason could be and whether it’s strong enough to continue to prevent crossover.

Researchers also don’t know why CWD seems to kill deer at higher rates than elk or moose or why it kills more males than females.

It spreads by contact, researchers believe, but it also sheds off animals and can likely live in the ground for more than a decade. So far only incineration above 1,000 degrees, lye and bleach can actually kill the prion.

“What we don’t know in a free-ranging herd on the landscape is: How significant is animal-to-animal transmission versus environment-to-animal transmission? We don’t know what’s going on on the landscape,” Wood said. “That makes it hard. Knowing key transmission is the most important thing to model what is going to work.”

The disease is always fatal but takes more than a year and a half, depending on genetics, to actually kill an animal.

“Along those lines, how high does CWD prevalence get in a herd? How much can a herd withstand? Every herd is going to be different,” Edwards said. “As time goes on, we will figure this out, of course. It’s a big question of how much CWD these herds can stand without seeing a pretty big population reduction.”

Scientists are starting to get a better idea. Research by Melia DeVivo, a former University of Wyoming graduate student, concluded that the mule deer bucks in Hunt Area 65 southeast of Casper have a 40 percent prevalence, which means if nothing changes, the herd could be essentially gone in about 50 years.

Researchers are still investigating whether it can pass to humans. But over time, federal money for testing has dried up.

Each CWD test costs about $15. It’s not much, but when a resident deer license nets the state $38 and a resident elk license costs $52, the processing fee starts to eat into money used for management, said Edwards, the Game and Fish disease specialist.

The lack of federal involvement, however, doesn’t mean research has stopped.

Wood, the state wildlife veterinarian, participated in a CWD vaccine trial at the Sybille Canyon research station. A Canadian company produced it and hoped it would provide that long-anticipated silver bullet. Unfortunately, it proved ineffective.

A study of genetics in elk showed that those with an MM genotype died first. Those with an ML genotype were the next to go, and those with an LL lived the longest. It’s why the seven elk at the research station in Sybille could be a key to solving the CWD puzzle.

Edwards and Wood caution against putting too much stock in genetics. Even if those elk can survive, it could take a century for the genes to eventually help change the population. And the fear is, with longer lives, they have more time to spread the disease.

In the meantime, CWD continues to march northwest. West to some of the largest elk herds in the Rocky Mountains, and west to 23 feedgrounds, places where animals congregate and diseases can spread like wildfire.

And so while specialists like Wood and Edwards continue to research biological solutions to the disease, others on the CWD team are beginning to go to the public for answers.

Some states have increased hunting to thin herds. Others have tried sharpshooting to drop numbers and possibly slow the spread.

Game and Fish officials don’t yet have formal proposals for strategies. They want to hear from hunters, ranchers and wildlife watchers. Are Wyomingites noticing herd numbers decline? Are they willing to have antler-point restrictions on hunting seasons or increase numbers hunted to perhaps decrease the rate the disease spreads? Should feedgrounds be changed?

“We manage wildlife for the public trust, and the public has a voice in how to make these decisions,” Wood said. “If we ignore that voice, we won’t be successful. Likely any management that is done will take a long-term commitment from the public and the wildlife agency.”

The answer may come from the public, or another vaccine trial, or something no one has yet thought of. Or maybe the answer — even part of the answer — is in those seven elk living out their days behind a fence off a highway in southeast Wyoming.

SUSANVILLE, Calif. (AP) — The U.S. Forest Service has filed criminal charges against a California State University, Chico fraternity for cutting down 32 trees in a Northern California national forest during an initiation of new pledges.

The complaint was filed Tuesday against the school’s Pi Kappa Alpha chapter and its president, Evan Jossey, in federal court. Jossey was not available for comment Wednesday.

The fraternity is charged with cutting the trees at a campground in the Lassen National Forest during a weekend initiation in April.

This is the second time in a year that a California recreational area has been damaged by college social organizations.

Last May, a Lake Shasta campsite was wrecked after about a thousand University of Oregon fraternity and sorority members left a half-mile-wide swath of trash after an annual trip.

Public review of the contentious way Oregon manages gray wolves continues May 19 with a hearing in Portland.

Not surprisingly, a draft plan from Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife has been criticized by livestock producers and wildlife activists alike. The ODFW Commission will hear testimony and eventually will adopt a five-year management plan. No date for adoption has been set. A first hearing April 21 in Klamath Falls saw 40 people testify.

Department biologists say the draft management plan builds on what they’ve learned over the years. Oregon had no documented wolves when the first plan was adopted in 2005; the state now has a minimum of 112 wolves, including 11 packs and eight breeding pairs. Russ Morgan, ODFW wolf program leader, has described wolves’ population growth and geographic spread as a biological success story.

Livestock producers and other rural residents question that thinking, while urban environmentalists generally favor the return of wolves to the state’s landscape.

The management plan is where those differences get argued.

Oregon Farm Bureau and Oregon Cattlemen’s Association said the draft plan makes it harder for ranchers to protect their animals because it increases the number of confirmed attacks required before allowing lethal control of wolves.

The draft plan requires three confirmed depredations or one confirmed and four “probable” attacks within a 12 month period. The previous standard was two confirmed depredations or one confirmed and three attempted attacks, with no time period set.

The groups also believe ODFW should continue collaring wolves, and should set a population cap for wolves in Oregon.

Groups such as Oregon Wild and Cascadia Wildlands find fault with the plan as well.

They believe Oregon took wolves off the state endangered species list prematurely. They oppose a population cap and plan provisions that might allow killing wolves if deer and elk populations drop, saying that proper habitat is a greater factor in ungulate populations.

They’ve also criticized a draft plan provision that would allow USDA Wildlife Services to conduct livestock depredation investigations for ODFW. Nick Cady, legal director for Cascadia Wildlands, has said the agency is too quick to blame wolves for every attack.

Meanwhile, 10 Oregon counties will distribute $184,039 to compensate ranchers who lost livestock to wolves and to help pay for non-lethal defensive measures.

The Oregon Department of Agriculture allocated the money, which comes from a grant called the Oregon Wolf Depredation Compensation and Financial Assistance Program. It’s intended to compensate livestock owners for actual losses or injuries caused by wolves, for missing livestock and for defensive measures. County-based committees review claims; the counties are reimbursed for their administrative costs as well.

Most of the grant money, about 70 percent of the money, is to help pay for defensive action meant to deter or scare off wolves. Non-lethal measures include removing carcasses and bone piles, putting up fencing or electrified ribbons, hiring range riders, deploying guard dogs, setting up flashing lights and noise-makers, and other methods.

Wallowa, Klamath, Umatilla, Lake and Jackson counties filed claims for confirmed or probable livestock losses. Baker, Umatilla and Wallowa counties filed claims for missing livestock.

A last-minute weed management plan filed by an organic farm may be “workable” if the farm managers follow through, a Sherman County official said.

The operators of Azure Farms, a 2,000-acre organic farm on the outskirts of Moro, filed a weed management plan 24 hours before the Sherman County Court was scheduled to discuss the issue. The county had warned it would seek a quarantine on the farm if it didn’t get a handle on what it describes as “rampant” noxious weeds.

County officials, responding to complaints from neighboring farmers who don’t want their fields infested, said they will spray the weeds with herbicide and bill the farm for the work if necessary. The farm says it will lose valuable organic certification for three years if it uses the chemical herbicides conventional farmers use.

In an email, County Commissioner Tom McCoy said he discussed Azure Farms’ plan with county weed control Supervisor Rod Asher.

“He is researching some of the measures, but believes the plan may be workable if Azure is really willing to implement it. So far, their follow through has not been good,” McCoy wrote.

The Oregon Wheat Growers League urged a “prompt and rigorous review” of Azure’s proposal.

“From our members on the ground, it’s become clear that even a casual observation of Azure’s property makes it clear that their noxious weed problem is severe and has been worsening for many years,” league CEO Blake Rowe and growers Bryan Cranston and Chris Moore said in a prepared statement.”

“Neighboring farms, including those at some distance from Azure, are being impacted by the spread of noxious weed seeds from Azure’s property. The ability of surrounding wheat farms to continue to produce certified wheat seed and the reputation of the entire area for producing high quality wheat, with virtually no weed contamination, are at risk.”

The farm proposed methods that, depending on the weed, included heavy fertilization and then deep cultivation to get at roots, spot use of Boron, citrus pulp mulch, covering weeds with landscaping fabric, salt, mowing before seeds form and spraying with calcium, manganese and boron before cultivation. “This causes the new blooms to wilt and not seed out; doesn’t kill the entire plan, though, but controls the spread,” the farm suggested.

McCoy, the commissioner, said the county court has received more than 40,000 emails about the issue, “and the number is increasing rapidly.” On social media, critics have called the county’s stance outrageous and accused the county of trying to poison the organic farm on behalf of “Big Ag” or Monsanto, which has no apparent role in the matter. McCoy said the charges against county officials are inaccurate.

In a memo prepared for the county’s May 17 meeting, weed Supervisor Asher laid out the timeline of his interactions with the farm.

March 2: Asher sent the farm’s parent company, Ecclesia of Sinai at Dufur, a weed control ordinance violation notice. The letter listed 15 company properties covering 1,922 acres in the Moro area. It gave the farm 30 days to submit a plan to control Rush skeleton, classified by the county as a Class A noxious weed, and Canada thistle, Morning Glory and White Top, all Class B noxious weeds.

March 27: Ecclesia of Sinai responded that the county didn’t have jurisdiction over it and cited biblical justification for not spraying.

April 19: The County Court discussed the issue. By then, some of the properties had been mowed, “but this was seen as a poor method of control as the weeds will grow back and root systems will flourish and continue to spread, as they have done over the many years,” Asher wrote.

Local residents attending the meeting expressed “deep concern” over weeds and were skeptical that methods other than herbicide would control them.

May 1: Asher sent a second letter to the farm, suggesting various control methods.

May 2: The county’s Weed Advisory Board agreed to defer to the county court on further action.

May 5: Asher met with Nathan Stelzer, the Azure Farm manager, who said he was unaware weeds were such a big problem. Asher felt he’d made progress in the discussion.

May 11: Asher viewed Azure’s social media campaign and said it “clearly misstated the situation.”

“My thoughts of progress and working together in the future were dashed,” Asher wrote.

The campaign, which included videos of the farm’s principals urging viewers to express their outrage at the county’s stance, resulted in an estimated 40,000 emails to county officials from around the world

May 16: Azure Farms submits a weed management plan. It lists methods the farm will use to control Rush skeleton, Canada thistle, Bindweed and White Top.

May 17: The county court meets to discuss the issue. The meeting is moved from the courthouse to the high school gym, the only space large enough for the anticipated crowd.

The City of John Day has obtained a $50,000 grant to study the possibility of using wastewater for hyroponic crop production or pasture irrigation.

The award was one of eight grants totaling more than $400,000 approved for water project feasibility studies by the Oregon Water Resources Commission.

John Day currently stores treated wastewater in four ponds near the John Day River, but the system may not pass regulatory muster in the future due to potential adverse impacts on water quality.

For this reason, the city wants to examine re-using the wastewater, which amounts to 87.6 million gallons annually, in hydroponic greenhouses.

The other option would be to pipe the water to two 40-acre lagoons north of town, which would feed a 120-acre center pivot irrigation system.

The total cost of the study is expected to be $110,000, with matching funds provided by the city and another state grant program.

After the approval of the eight grants, the Oregon Water Resources Commission still has more than $600,000 available for future water project feasibility studies.

One of the proposals submitted to the commission — $93,935 to study removing sediment from the Applegate Reservoir in Southern Oregon to increase storage capacity — was rejected.

The Oregon Water Resources Department, which is overseen by the commission, recommended against funding the study because it only proposed removing sediment, which is a temporary solution.

The study would be stronger if it also looked at preventing future sediment buildup by reducing it from upstream sources, according to OWRD.

Following is a summary of the other water project feasibility grants approved by the commission:

• $30,000 to study the re-use of wastewater from Baker City for agricultural purposes.

• $60,000 to study expanding the City of Carlton’s water reservoir.

• $72,500 to study whether to rehabilitate or remove the City of Brookings dam and reservoir.

• $50,330 to study the possibility of paying landowners to forgo irrigation to increase stream flows in the Hood River Basin.

• $65,680 to study above-ground and below-ground water storage in the Upper Klamath Basin.

• $42,297 to study aquifer storage and recovery in the Milton-Freewater area.

• $40,505 to study natural water storage in a wet meadow in the John Day River Basin.

PENDLETON, Ore. — Dan Roeser rode Sanjo Gold calmly and confidently into the Pendleton Round-Up Pavilion Saturday, ready to show what the 7-year-old palomino gelding was capable of doing.

It was several hours before the Western Select Horse and Working Dog Sale would begin inside the Pendleton Convention Center — part of the annual Cattle Barons Weekend — and ranchers huddled inside the pavilion for a preview of the animals in action. Some scrawled notes in their programs as the horses ran alongside steers for a live roping demonstration.

Roeser, who runs Roeser Ranch in Marsing, Idaho, has been training horses for 40 years and taught a number of local cowboys the finer points of horsemanship. He regularly attends Cattle Barons Weekend, now in its 10th year, which helps raise scholarships for local students looking to pursue a career in agriculture.

Along with Sanjo Gold, Roeser also brought a second horse, Dealers Kid, to market at the sale. Whereas Sanjo Gold is a gentle ranch horse for riders of all abilities, Roeser said Dealers Kid is more fit for high-caliber ropers. It is Roeser’s job to show both animals at the best of their abilities in the arena and auction ring.

“It’s a lot of work,” he said. “You have to use a lot of consistency in your methods so the horses know what they can expect from you.”

Once the sale begins, trainers like Roeser take center stage in the convention center where buyers bid up to tens of thousands of dollars for horses to add to their operation. Selling horses is a big part of Roeser’s business, and he said Cattle Barons Weekend has proven to be a great venue.

“It’s a good market for the horses,” he said. “The people who run the sale do a really good job.”

Cattle Barons Weekend also featured a Western-theme trade show and Buckaroo BBQ Challenge, where teams competed for the best ribs and tri-tip beef. Proceeds go toward raising scholarships that event leaders say keep the Western tradition alive in northeast Oregon.

“That’s why we do what we do, to maintain it into the future,” said Andy VanderPlaat, Cattle Barons president.

Roeser’s return to Pendleton reunited him with at least two of his former pupils in Justin Bailey, of Pilot Rock, and Ryan Raymond, of Helix. Bailey worked eight years for Roeser on the ranch in Idaho, and described him as a highly regarded mentor.

Bailey now runs his own training business, Bailey Performance Horses, and showed three of his own animals during the Western Select auction.

“What we’re trying to show is a quality horse that can handle ranch-like situations,” Bailey said. “You’re trying to show their willingness and quiet mind.”

Bailey Performance Horses is located on the home ranch of Anderson Land & Livestock, operated by Terry and Debby Anderson who won this year’s Cattle Barons Legacy Award.

Raymond, a fifth-generation rancher who runs cows for Raymond & Son, worked three years for Roeser and continues to ride plenty of horses. Showing horses at sales like Cattle Barons Weekend takes honesty and integrity, Raymond said, with the trainer’s reputation on the line.

“These guys know what they can sell here,” he said. “You can’t bring a horse here you can’t lope around and rope on.”

Cattle Barons Weekend is just another fun event to bring more people into Pendleton, Raymond said, while promoting ranching businesses that are the lifeblood of small Eastern Oregon communities like Helix.

“If we don’t do more things to involve people in local agriculture, I would think those places will be gone,” he said.

JOSEPH, Ore. – For more than 40 years the Joseph Oregon’s Associated Ditch Company has struggled to find the money to fix its aging Wallowa Lake dam. This spring the private company announced it is exploring an old idea with new enthusiasm.

Exhausting several avenues over the years, including selling water to a downstream user, the ditch company’s board has found the support it needs to form an irrigation district, making funding such as low-interest Clean Water State Revolving Fund loans easier to access.

Following a rash of dam inspections in the wake of the 1976 Teton Dam failure in Idaho, the dam was deemed unsafe to store the ditch company’s entire water allotment. In order to bring the dam back to full storage capacity and protect water used by upper Wallowa Valley farmers valued at $36,079,000 per year, the dam needs to be rebuilt. Any reconstruction, Tom Butterfield, former Associated Ditch Company president said, must include fish passage. That dollar amount, he said, is still being studied.

Butterfield’s son Dan is now the ditch company’s president. He said forming a district had been considered in the past.

Jay McFetridge, a multi-generational Wallowa Lake water user, said when his grandfather was president of the ditch company in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s and his father in the ‘90s the worry was over the equitability, or perceived lack there of, in how votes are tallied among water users under the rules of a district versus the one vote per acre agreement currently used.

“My dad said his biggest reason that it wouldn’t work, and they would not pursue at all, was because of the voting,” McFetridge said.

This time the suggestion came from Nate James of the Natural Resource Conservation Service when he was asked to help the board with its irrigation modernization plan.

Butterfield said, “About a year ago we met with Nate to look at financing for piping spur ditches, screening the ditches and possibly even putting in water measuring devices.”

James said he has worked with Wallowa Lake water users individually to upgrade their systems, but with the scope and scale of the ditch company’s modernization needs, including reconstruction of the dam, they needed extra funding sources not available to a private ditch company. A district, formed under state statute, would hold public meetings and be able to vote and process decisions in a timely manner.

“They could see the benefits were very positive to going down this path,” James said.

For technical assistance, James asked Farmers Conservation Alliance to work with the ditch company’s modernization committee. During their initial meeting, fixing the dam was discussed.

The alliance’s executive director, Julie O’Shea, said her organization started out manufacturing fish screens for irrigation districts, but after years of designing and installing screens she said her staff found it difficult to fix one piece of an irrigation system without opening a box of other issues.

“We realized there was a great need for irrigation districts to have people come in with expertise – not just from an engineering perspective, but a financial and community-based one,” O’Shea said.

With help from Energy Trust of Oregon, the alliance started working with districts all over the state, serving as project manager. To date, they’ve worked with 11 districts on irrigation modernization plans.

In April, a little more than a year after their first meeting with NRCS and the alliance, the Associated Ditch Company’s board of directors presented their irrigation district proposal to the Wallowa County Commissioners. Rebecca Knapp, the Associated Ditch Company’s attorney, said following the publication of a series of notices, the commissioners will sign an order calling for an election of the landowners within the boundary of the new district.

Dan Butterfield said besides overwhelming backing from the landowners, there is a lot more support statewide to repair the dam than the ditch company realized.

“Everyone seems to know where Wallowa Lake is,” Butterfield said.

New numbers from the Bureau of Land Management show Oregon’s wild horse and burro populations are on the rise.

There are an estimated 4,351 wild horses and burros on Oregon’s rangelands. That’s up more than 13 percent from last year’s population. And it’s far more than the number of horses the BLM says the rangelands can handle in balance with other public land uses.

Wild horses are protected under a 1971 Congressional Act, which makes it illegal for the government to euthanize them to keep populations down. But the horses cause big problems on the rangelands when they chomp down native grasses and cause erosion.

The BLM wants to try new birth control methods for wild horses — including capture and sterilization — but those methods have been protested by animal rights advocates.

The BLM says the appropriate population number is 2,715 for Oregon’s rangelands.

Sherman County weed control Supervisor Rod Asher suggested several ways Azure Farms might be able to control the noxious weeds that other farmers in the area say are spreading to their fields. Owners of the 2,000-acre certified organic farm oppose using herbicides recommended by the county, which warns it will ask the Oregon Department of Agriculture to quarantine the farm if it does not agree to a weed management plan by May 22.

“Your control practices are not destroying the weeds, specifically the root systems that continue to flourish after mowing,” Asher wrote in an April 27 letter to the farm’s parent company.

He suggested:

• “Heavy deep tillage that would rip up and bring the root to the surface,” but said it probably would have to be done every 10 to 14 days through the growing season.

• Covering the weeds with dark plastic or rubber to block out the sunlight. Escaping shoots would have to be cut off during the growing season and the coverage would have to be maintained for multiple years.

• Treatment with organic herbicides. “I am not familiar with any of these so I cannot make a recommendation,” Asher said.

• Treatment with traditional herbicides. The farm would lose organic certification for three years if it uses them.

• Intense burning or “any other method that can effectively destroy the entire plant and root,” Asher wrote.

Sherman County may order owners of a 2,000-acre organic farm to spray noxious weeds or face a possible quarantine.

Local wheat farmers say weeds spreading from Azure Farms, on the outskirts of Moro in north central Oregon, cost them money in the form of additional herbicide control. Most critically, growers of certified wheat seed say their crops will be worthless if contaminated by Rush Skeleton Weed, Canada Thistle, Morning Glory and White Top spreading from the farm.

Spraying the weeds with Milestone or other herbicides, however, would cause the farm to lose organic certification for three years. Azure Standard, which operates Azure Farms, is a major distributor of organic products.

Sherman County gave the farm until May 22 to respond with a weed management plan. If not, the county will ask the Oregon Department of Agriculture to quarantine the farm.

The issue has blown up on social media.

The manager of Azure Farms, Nathan Stelzer, urged supporters to “Overwhelm the Sherman County representatives with your voice.” A video posted on the farm website called for people to express their outrage reportedly has resulted in hundreds of phone calls and thousands of emails to county officials.

The issue may come to a head Wednesday when the county’s Board of Commissioners takes up the issue. Meanwhile, the Oregon Wheat Commission and several growers are meeting with the state agriculture Director Alexis Taylor, hoping to enlist the department’s support.

Oregon Tilth, which certifies organic operations, is calling for calm and urging the county to pause its enforcement timeline. Executive Director Chris Schreiner said Oregon Tilth hopes mediation can result in a weed management plan that allows Azure Farms to retain its certification while addressing concerns of neighboring farmers.

Wheat farmer Bryan Cranston, who grows certified seed next to Azure Farms, said its weed problems have gotten progressively worse over the years. Cranston said he spoke to Selzer and told him, “I don’t drift chemicals on you, I’d appreciate it if weeds don’t drift on me.”

Cranston said he told Selzer, “I grow seed wheat to garner more out of the market, you grow organic to garner more out of the market — we have a lot in common here.”

But he added, “You’re messing me up.”

Cranston estimated weed control in his wheat is costing him $12 per acre more than in the past. He said some weeds, especially skeleton weed, produce airborne seeds and can rapidly infect fields.

Another area farmer, Ryan Thompson, said the county needs to stand its ground on the weed issue.

“These guys are operating by their own set of rules,” he said. “They are not good stewards of the land. They are pretty much using religion and the fact that they’re organic to say our county laws and statutes don’t apply to them.”

The problem has been building for some time. Azure Farms appears to consist of three entities: A parent company, Ecclesia of Sinai at Dufur, in neighboring Wasco County; Azure Standard, in Dufur, which distributes organic products; and Azure Farms, the farmland near Moro, in Sherman County.

In a March 2 letter to Ecclesia of Sinai at Dufur, weed district Supervisor Rod Asher said the noxious weeds “have been found to be growing rampant and unchecked on your properties in Sherman County” and had to be destroyed.

Asher said Sherman County takes weed problems seriously. “The potential damage and economic loss caused by noxious weeds to an agricultural based community can be substantial,” he wrote.

The county warned that it would spray if the farm didn’t, and the cost for multiple surveys throughout the growing season would be billed to the farm as a lien on its property taxes.

Asher said the county could help identify weed, recommend control methods and herbicide products, and had a spray crew for hire if necessary.

In the business’s first response, a letter signed by Alfred Stelzer said Ecclesia of Sinai “is not subject to your direction.” In a three-page letter dated March 27, Stelzer said the farm will not allow any federal, state or county employees to trespass and “spray any toxic or poisonous substances at any time.”

Stelzer said the farm “made a covenant” to keep the “Common Law” of the bible. He cited Numbers 35:34, “which states that the land must not be defiled or polluted.” Stelzer, then released the video and social media plea to supporters, saying the county’s plan was “possibly to spray the whole farm with poisonous herbicides.”

Blake Rowe, CEO of the Oregon Wheat Commission, called the social media campaign “pretty inflammatory.”

The farm has since adopted a more conciliatory position. In a video posted May 12, Azure Standard CEO David Stelzer, the brother of Nathan, acknowledged the farm has “room for improvement.” He said one of the problems is that for the past five years, the family has been farming the Moro property “long distance” from Dufur, which is 48 miles away by vehicle.

David Stelzer said Azure is attempting to improve its ground through crop rotation and “companion planting” of various crops.

“Bio-diversity, a few weeds in the field, does not make a bad farmer,” he said.

Responding to comments he said have been made about the farm, he said it is not affiliated with a religion although they are a “family a faith.” He said Azure properly pays its taxes and provides a $6 million payroll. He said the farm’s wheat yields nearly meet the county average and is of high quality. Eventually, organic farming methods will be “dominant,” he said.

Two decades after she managed to “break out of the cubicle,” Rebecca Landis says she still draws on her time as an “all around bureaucrat.”

These days, Landis applies her experience to the variety of impromptu problems that arise while running two Oregon farmers’ markets, from filing online forms to fixing pop-up tents.

“It’s not really a career path, you just bring to it whatever skills you have,” she said.

Aside from managing the farmers’ markets in Corvallis and Albany, Landis serves as a policy adviser to the Oregon Farmers Markets Association, helping to navigate the regulatory hurdles growers encounter when selling directly to consumers.

The rising prominence and popularity of farmers’ markets in recent years inevitably led to questions about government oversight and food safety.

For example, should the Oregon Department of Agriculture require farmers’ markets to be licensed, as are grocery stores?

Do growers need licenses to sell jams, jellies and similar products that were processed on-farm from their crops?

“It wasn’t clear what was regulated and what wasn’t regulated,” Landis said.

To dispel that confusion, Landis and other experts formed a work group aimed at establishing clear rules for farm-direct marketing.

The resulting legislation, House Bill 2336, was approved by the Oregon Legislature in 2011 with strong bipartisan support.

The bill clarified that farmers’ markets aren’t subject to licensing requirements — unless they refuse to comply with sanitary standards — and sets parameters for which processed goods can be sold in such venues.

“We talked out every product category that might be ripe for a lower level of regulation,” Landis said. “I think it’s stood the test of time so far.”

When a legal uncertainty recently came to light regarding egg sales, Landis lobbied for another bill that allows farmers to sell ungraded eggs as long as they checked them for inner defects with a candling light.

The proposal, House Bill 3116, passed the House and Senate unanimously this year.

The process highlights the improved lines of communication between farm direct marketers and ODA, which supported the bill, Landis said. “That made it easy to proceed with a fix.”

As a member of ODA’s Food Safety Advisory Committee, Landis has helped the agency avoid pitfalls in other proposed food safety legislation, said Stephanie Page, ODA’s food safety director.

The farm-direct marketing bill in 2011 has “provided greater certainty” for growers as well as ODA, Page said. “We see the farmers’ markets as an important partner.”

Landis’ experience with laws and regulations dates back to her job as a legislative analyst in Texas, which she left to move to Oregon with her husband, Larry, in 1991.

After resettling in Corvallis, the couple was involved in starting that city’s farmers’ market.

Landis initially worked for a regional government, managing contracts to provide homeless services, but decided she’d had enough of office work and in 1995 became manager of the Corvallis farmers’ market.

Her arrival as the market’s manager coincided with an emerging curiosity about local agriculture among consumers.

“How stuff was being grown wasn’t discussed in the mainstream culture until 20 years ago,” she said.

Back then, for example, having 14 vendors at the Corvallis farmers’ market would be a “spectacular day,” Landis said. Last year, the number of vendors topped 70.

Expanding a farmers’ market is often a “chicken and egg” proposition — vendors are reluctant to show up unless they can count on lots of visitors, while shoppers aren’t enthusiastic unless they can pick among lots of vendors.

An important trend that’s boosted market attendance is the availability of meat and poultry, which provides stability in comparison to the seasonal fluctuations of fruits and vegetables, Landis said.

Improved payment options have also helped.

Consumers who don’t usually carry cash can now swipe their debit or credit cards at the farmers’ market in exchange for tokens used to pay vendors. Some vendors now accept “plastic” directly, through devices connected to their smartphones.

The ability to pay with food stamps — the USDA’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP — has increased the number of people shopping at farmers’ markets as well.

“None of this existed back in the ’90s at all,” Landis said.

One thing that has remained constant, though, is the connection that farmers’ markets provide between growers and consumers.

Landis said she’s vigilant in ensuring her markets are free of vendors who simply resell wholesale food, since they undermine the venue’s credibility and unfairly compete against actual farmers.

“It’s transparent and traceable to have direct sales,” she said. “There’s a lot of accountability that comes from direct-selling.”

Rebecca Landis

Occupation: Manager of the farmers’ markets in Corvallis and Albany, Ore. Policy adviser to the Oregon Farmers’ Markets Association.

Hometown: Corvallis

Age: 58

Family: Husband, Larry, two cats

Education: Bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of North Texas in 1980, master’s degree in government from the University of Texas at Austin in 1985

MEDFORD, Ore. (AP) — The Rogue River is higher, faster and has more water than it has for six years, bringing new rafting hazards and a late return for spring chinook salmon.

With a snowpack above Lost Creek Lake now at 123 percent of average, the U.S. Geological Survey’s Northwest River Center is predicting inflows high enough that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will be releasing anywhere from 10 percent to nearly double the water from last year into the upper Rogue, depending on the week.

State fishery and water managers are in the midst of finalizing their outflow recommendations into the Rogue through fall, and early drafts call for releases of 3,000 cubic feet per second of water through June and early July, almost twice the releases seen throughout all of July last year.

Outflows into the Rogue are not projected to drop below 2,000 cfs until after Labor Day as water and fish managers grapple with a heavy water year coming just two years removed from a three-year drought — a scenario that will alter salmon runs and rafting activity.

“It’ll be the most water we’ve seen since 2011, and it’s going to change the dynamics considerably,” says Pete Samarin, a fish biologist with the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife helping set Lost Creek releases for the maximum benefit of Rogue salmon runs. “There’ll be some concerns. There will be a lot of people on the river who are used to drought conditions.”

The differences from last year to this year will be even more dramatic in the Applegate River Basin, where summer inflows are projected to be 163 percent of average into an already almost-full reservoir.

In the Bear Creek Basin, irrigators have already begun filling canals from reservoirs that are already as full as they are going to get, according to the federal Bureau of Reclamation.

Howard Prairie and Emigrant lakes already are full, while Hyatt Lake is being held at 64 percent of full so contractors can add seismic retrofits to Hyatt Dam.

That has the Talent Irrigation District regularly increasing and decreasing releases from those projects into Bear Creek to ensure those projects don’t overfill — a far different scenario than what plagued the district during drought years.

“High water has its own problems,” TID Manager Jim Pendleton says. “But it’s definitely more fun to work off the tops of these reservoirs than off the bottoms.”

Augmenting summer Rogue flows to enhance chinook salmon runs is the primary rationale behind the water-release strategy crafted each summer by ODFW to get the biggest bang for Lost Creek’s watery investment.

Releases typically are higher in May and June to cool lower Rogue flows and curb natural warmwater diseases during the bulk of the spring chinook push upstream, then releases are upped again in mid-August to do the same for fall chinook.

Flows are backed off in mid-September to corral spawning wild spring chinook in the upper Rogue.

Lost Creek Lake surface levels eyed by wakeboarders and waterskiers are considered secondary benefits for the stored water, and forecasts predict the lake’s two boat ramps will be usable through Labor Day.

River-watchers saw a big taste of what lots of water flowing into an almost-full reservoir looks like last weekend, when a spike in air temperatures triggered a snowmelt that saw runoff into Lost Creek Lake climb on Saturday to 6,800 cfs, with the Corps releases peaking at 6,156 cfs — about twice that of an average early May day, according to the Corps.

That triggered Rogue flows at Dodge Bridge near Eagle Point to record levels for May 6, according to the USGS.

This weekend’s forecast of rain on the snowpack is forecast to trigger another inflow spike that is forecast to peak around 4,670 cfs as the reservoir remains slightly more than a foot from full.

“We’re not even showing us getting back to full again,” says Jim Buck, the Corps Rogue Project operations manager. “But if we were to have that kind of warm weather again next week, we could see some noticeable increases in the inflow.”