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4 CapitalPress.com January 22, 2016 Wet end to hot year bodes well for Washington Mild winter still in the forecast By DON JENKINS Capital Press legal-4-2-4/#4 tion report released Jan. 13 confirmed 2015 was Wash- ington’s warmest in the past 121 years. Temperatures were particularly high in February, March, May, June, July and October. The year ended, however, with the fourth wettest De- cember on record, while tem- peratures were near normal. The precipitation started snowpacks, which hardly ma- terialized last winter. Basin snowpacks throughout the state ranged between 125 and 75 percent of normal, accord- ing to the Natural Resources and Conservation Service. Washington’s overall snowpack was only 27 per- cent of normal in mid-March last year when Gov. Jay Inslee declared a drought emergency in parts of the state. Inslee de- clared a statewide emergency in May as conditions wors- ened. For months, climatolo- gists have expected El Nino, a warming of the Pacific Ocean, to produce a warm and dry Northwest winter, raising concerns that Washington will suffer a second straight drought year. attributed to factors other than climate change, but he added that baseline temperatures are rising. “It wasn’t due to global warming, but it’s going to be what global warming feels like,” he said. “We are warm- ing, and that’s going to accel- erate.” Oregon also set a year- long heat record, with an av- erage temperature of 50.4, 3.9 degrees above the 20th centu- ry average. Idaho and California had their second-hottest years on record. The average temperature in the continental United States was the second-warm- est on record, surpassed only by 2012. The U.S. had its third-wet- test year ever. The total amount of the country in drought shrank during the year by 10 percent, according to NOAA. Nurseries growing new Washington apple By DAN WHEAT Capital Press QUINCY, Wash. — A sea of 2-foot-tall trees, brown leaves still hanging on, ride above a blanket of snow. They look normal enough but it’s rootstock growth, in a field owned by Gold Crown Nursery. In another month they will be cut off six to eight inches above the ground, just above single buds that were grafted into the stems last August. In spring, the buds will burst forth, growing new nursery trees through sum- mer. They’ll be ready for digging in November, placed in cold storage through win- ter and shipped for planting in the spring of 2017. What makes these trees special are that they will be the first commercial planting of Cosmic Crisp, the first ap- ple variety bred in Washing- ton to be exclusively grown by any and all Washington growers that the industry hopes will become the new “Washington” apple. The first apples will be harvested and sold in stores in the fall of 2020. Initially known by its breeding name, WA 38, the apple was bred from En- terprise and Honeycrisp in 1997 by Bruce Barritt, who was then the apple breeder at Washington State University Dan Wheat/Capital Press A sea of rootstock trees stands in a blanket of snow near Quincy, Wash. They will become Cosmic Crisp apple trees this year. Tree Fruit Research and Ex- tension Center in Wenatchee. Cosmic Crisp has a sweet, tangy flavor and ranks high in taste, texture and beauty and has many qualities of the popular Honeycrisp with fewer horticultural challeng- es, says Kate Evans, who succeeded Barritt after his retirement. Twenty-four growers were chosen by drawing to plant the first 300,000 to 400,000 commercial Cos- mic Crisp trees in 2017. But propagation is going well enough that 600,000 will be ready so a second set of 24 growers also will receive trees, said Bill Howell, man- aging director of Northwest Nursery Improvement Insti- tute, Prosser. NNII is man- aging tree production by seven nurseries. Growers are evenly split into two classi- fications: smaller growers wanting 3,000 to 5,000 trees and larger ones receiving up to 20,000. In 2018, nurseries will have enough Cosmic Crisp that the drawing won’t be Dan Wheat/Capital Press This bud was grafted into this half-inch-diameter rootstock last August and will grow into a new Cosmic Crisp apple tree this year after the rootstock above it is cut off in February. used and any Washington grower will be able to buy them at nurseries. “We have orders for well over 1 million trees for 2018 and orders are coming now pretty aggressively for 2019,” said Lynnell Brandt, president of Proprietary Va- riety Management in Yakima that is coordinating the com- mercialization of Cosmic Crisp for WSU. Aerial applicator’s license suspension unwarranted, judge says By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI Capital Press An administrative law judge has found that Oregon’s farm regulators weren’t justi- fied in yanking the license of an aerial pesticide applicator accused of endangering the public. In September 2015, the Or- egon Department of Agricul- ture suspended the pesticide applicator’s license of Apple- bee Aviation of Banks, Ore., and fined the company $1,100 for allegedly spraying chemi- cals in a negligent manner. Over the following months, the agency revoked the com- pany’s license for five years and increased the penalties to $160,000 — with another $20,000 in fines tacked on for its owner, Mike Applebee — as it learned the company re- peatedly conducted spray op- erations even after its license was invalidated. However, the “preponder- ance of the evidence” doesn’t substantiate ODA’s allegation that Applebee Aviation posed a “serious danger to the public health or safety,” as is required to suspend a license without a hearing, according to Senior Administrative Law Judge Monica Whitaker of Oregon’s Office of Administrative Hear- ings. Emergency license suspen- sions are an “extreme remedy,” but ODA’s findings of miscon- duct — such as workers han- dling pesticides without proper protective equipment — were largely based on the claims of only one former employee, Darryl Ivy, Whitaker said. The administrative law judge said the agency’s heavy reliance on Ivy’s accusations was “inherently problematic.” Ivy quit his job with Ap- plebee Aviation in April 2015 and claimed he was exposed to herbicide spraying that caused mouth blisters and a swollen airway, triggering an investi- gation by ODA and the Ore- gon Occupational Safety and Health Division. While an ODA investiga- tor cited photos taken by Ivy to support the agency’s con- clusions, “the photos were not authenticated” and Ivy wasn’t called as a witness to the evi- dence, Whitaker said. For example, photos of residue on a truck windshield, which ODA accepted to be a pesticide spray mixture could have been “soap residue” be- 4-1/#4x cause the substance was never tested, she said. The former employee’s “mere assertions” aren’t suf- ficient to establish the al- legations against Applebee Aviation without further veri- fication, Whitaker said. Whitaker has issued an or- der proposing that the original license suspension and civil penalty against the compa- ny be reversed, though those sanctions remain in place until ODA makes a final decision. At this point, the adminis- trative law judge’s proposed order is a recommendation to the ODA. The agency’s direc- tor, Katy Coba, will issue the final order, which Applebee Aviation can challenge. “As we speak, we’re mull- ing over the options,” said Bruce Pokarney, communica- tions director for ODA, noting that the agency can’t com- ment on the proposed order’s findings. LEGAL SAGE Fact #125 Port of Morrow tenants have access to ample clean, clear water from seven wells in the Boardman Industrial Park, and from the City of Boardman’s municipal water system. 4-4/#5 LEGAL PURSUANT TO ORS CHAPTER 98 Notice is hereby given that the following vehicle will be sold, for cash to the highest bidder, on 2/1/ 2016. The sale will be held at 10:00am by B.C. TOWING 1834 BEACH AVE NE SALEM, OR 2015 JEEP RENEGADE UT VIN = ZACCJBATIFPB48417 Amount due on lien $4,545.00 Reputed owner(s) LILLY A WEBER Don Jenkins/Capital Press Plants wither during Washington’s record-warm 2015. The state’s climatologist sees an improved water outlook in 2016. 4-4/#7 Washington’s year of re- cord-breaking heat was capped by a wet and only slightly warm December that should help make the 2016 snow- pack much improved over last winter, even if El Nino props up temperatures for the rest of the season, State Climatologist Nick Bond says. “Overall, it looks like we’re going to be in pretty decent shape in regard to the water supply,” Bond said. “In light of the kind of warm and probably wet conditions we’ll have, (the snowpack) prob- ably will be a little less than usual, but three times what we had last year.” A National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administra- In some El Nino years, however, winter storms move in as usual, Bond said. “There are plenty of exceptions and this may be one of those.” Bond said he still expects a mild winter, but the precipita- tion so far has a built cushion. “We can all appreciate De- cember. It put us in a good way,” he said. Washington’s average temperature in 2015 was 50 degrees, 3.9 degrees warmer than the 20th century average, according to NOAA’s Nation- al Centers for Environmental Information. Bond said a warm strip of water off the West Coast, nicknamed “The Blob,” influ- enced temperatures. The Blob is now cooling, he said. “It’s definitely moderated. I’m OK with saying The Blob is more or less out of the pic- ture,” Bond said. Bond said Washington’s record-breaking year can be 4-4/#6 PUBLIC NOTICE The Oregon Soil and Water Conservation Commission (SWCC) will hold its regular quarterly meeting on Thursday, February 11, 2016, from 12:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. and Friday, February 12, 2016, from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at the Willow Lake Water Pollution Control Facility located at 5915 Windsor Island Road N., Keizer, OR 97303. The meeting agenda covers SWCC reports, advisor reports, Soil and Water Conservation District pro- grams and funding, Agriculture Water Quality Management Program updates, and other agenda items. The Oregon Department of Agriculture complies with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). If you need special accommodations to partici- pate in this meeting, please contact Sandi Hiatt at (503) 986-4704, at least 72 hours prior to the meeting. 4-1/#4