4
CapitalPress.com
June 24, 2016
FOR LOVE OF MONARCHS
Oregon couple
grows food to
sustain them
Flight of the monarch butterfly
The migratory route of monarch butterflies takes them over and through prime U.S.
farmland. Conservationists say monarchs are threatened by pesticides and their
primary food source, milkweed, is often sprayed as a weed.
By ERIC MORTENSON
CANADA
Capital Press
N or th ern r an ge of mi l k w e e d
Con
tine
UNITED
STATES
ntal
Divi
Corn
Belt
de
NEWBERG, Ore. — Or-
egon is known for its special-
ized agricultural production,
but Jim and Bonnie Kiser may
occupy the state’s narrowest
market niche.
Their entire crop this
year, seeded in February and
March, consisted of 990 milk-
weed plants. By mid-June,
about 800 survived to be giv-
en away and planted in yards,
parks or gardens.
The plants, Asclepias spe-
ciosa, or showy milkweed,
are intended as forage for a
migratory insect: the monarch
butterfl y.
The brightly colored mon-
arch has become something
of a poster-bug in the debate
over pesticide and herbicide
use, agriculture’s impact on
wildlife habitat, and the role of
voluntary conservation efforts
in staving off potential regula-
tory or legal action.
The Kisers are among a
cadre of people who have tak-
en it upon themselves to aid
monarchs. They’ve been at it
since 1998, when they dug up
and rescued milkweed plants
from a Costco store con-
struction site in Eugene, Ore.
They’ve also rescued plants
from construction at a Tektr-
onix electronics plant in the
Portland area, and at a high-
way interchange near Rick-
reall. They have a couple doz-
en milkweed plants growing
in their yard, in addition to the
hundreds of seedlings growing
in plastic tubes. Last year, they
planted 300 milkweed plants
at Champoeg State Park.
“This is an amateur oper-
ation, but it’s effective,” said
Jim Kiser, a semi-retired con-
sulting engineer.
The monarch population
has steeply declined; one esti-
mate puts the population loss
at 90 percent over the past
Food Safety, said settlement
negotiations are underway.
In the meantime, USFWS
encourages voluntary milk-
weed plantings, saying that
every backyard can become an
“oasis” for the butterfl ies and
other pollinators. The agen-
cy urges schools, community
groups, businesses and state
and local governments to plant
milkweed on public and pri-
vate land and in rights-of-way.
“Monarch declines are
symptomatic of environmen-
tal problems that also pose
risks to food production, the
spectacular natural places that
help defi ne our national identi-
ty, and our own health,” USF-
WS says on its website.
Monarchs are a compel-
ling story. They migrate south
from Canada to Mexico in the
fall and head the other way in
the spring, going through sev-
eral generations on the way.
The monarch’s primary fl y-
way covers the Midwestern
U.S., including the Corn Belt,
but a subset migrates each fall
from Canada across the Pacif-
ic Northwest to Southern Cal-
ifornia, reversing direction in
the spring.
The notion of helping mon-
archs by planting milkweed
resonates with many people. A
group called Monarch Watch
advocates a “monarch high-
way” of milkweed plantings
along Interstate 35, which runs
from Duluth, Minn., south to
Laredo, Texas.
But Kimbrell, the Center
for Food Safety attorney, said
nothing short of mandatory
protection under the Endan-
gered Species Act can help
monarchs at this point.
The group applauds volun-
tary planting efforts, “But it’s
not nearly suffi cient to save
them, unfortunately,” he said
by email.
Tom Landis, a retired For-
est Service nursery specialist
in Medford, Ore., disagrees.
Landis and others have raised
and planted milkweed in half
a dozen “way stations” for mi-
grating monarchs in Southern
Oregon. “It’s been working
like a champ,” he said.
Pacific
Ocean
Atlantic
Ocean
Legend
MEXICO
Fall migration
Gulf of
Mexico
Spring migration
Summer breeding
Oyamel fir forests
of Central Mexico
Spring breeding
Overwintering
High monarch
production
N
250 miles
Source: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Eric Mortenson and Alan Kenaga/Capital Press
The star-shaped blossoms
of showy milkweed provide
food and egg-laying space for
migrating monarch butterfl ies.
Photos by Eric Mortenson/Capital Press
Jim Kiser of Newberg, Ore., shows some of the showy milkweed
seedlings he’s growing at his home. Kiser and his wife, Bonnie,
give seedlings away for planting in gardens and parks. The plant
is critical food for migrating monarch butterfl ies.
two decades, although they
bounced back this year.
Critics say farming practic-
es, especially in the Midwest,
have killed off milkweed, the
only plant on which butterfl y
larvae feed. In March 2016,
the Center for Biological Di-
versity and the Center for
Food Safety fi led suit against
the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service for failing to protect
monarchs under the federal
Endangered Species Act.
The two groups blamed
planting of genetically modi-
fi ed corn and soybeans for loss
of milkweed in the Midwest.
They said farmers spraying
Roundup, Monsanto’s trade-
mark herbicide, kill milk-
weed while leaving “Roundup
Ready” corn and soybeans un-
scathed.
The groups asked USFWS
in 2014 to list monarchs as
“threatened” under the ESA,
but the agency has not taken
action. The March 2016 law-
suit asks a court to set a dead-
line for a decision by Fish and
Wildlife. George Kimbrell, se-
nior attorney for the Center for
NE Washington has another wolf pack
Capital Press
The Washington Depart-
ment of Fish and Wildlife
has confi rmed the state’s 19th
wolf pack, formed when a fe-
male wolf left one group and
started traveling with a male
whose history is unknown.
The Sherman pack, named
by state biologists after geo-
graphic features in Ferry
County, was announced June
14 by the state Department of
Fish and Wildlife.
female June 12 in the Profani-
ty Peak pack.
With collars transmitting
signals from both groups,
WDFW was able to confi rm
they were separate packs.
WDFW has not yet de-
termined whether the packs
have overlapping territory.
The Sherman pack has been
staying south of Highway 20,
while the Profanity Pack has
been roaming north of the
highway, Becker said.
The Sherman pack is the
15th in the northeastern cor-
ner of Washington. The U.S.
Fish and Wildlife Service
has de-listed wolves in the
eastern one-third of Washing-
ton, but the animals remain a
state-protected species.
Statewide recovery goals
call for wolves to disperse
over more of the state, includ-
ing into the South Cascades.
Lone wolves have been spot-
ted in the South Cascades,
but WDFW has received no
reports of wolves traveling to-
gether in a pack.
“It’s only a matter of time
before they show up in the
South Cascades,” Becker said.
“We’re continuing to search
down there.”
WDFW confi rmed seven
wolves in the Profanity Peak
pack at the end of 2015. The
department counted at least 90
wolves in the state.
The Huckleberry pack in
Stevens County split last year,
with the Stranger pack form-
ing just to the north. One of
the packs killed a Holstein
heifer in May, the last con-
fi rmed wolf depredation in the
state.
The depredation would be
the fi rst of the year for either
pack. WDFW’s policy calls
for the department to consider
lethal removal of wolves after
four depredations.
WDFW wolf policy lead
Donny Martorello said the
department is monitoring the
movements of the packs to
determine which one was re-
sponsible.
“We want to make sure we
don’t assign it to the wrong
pack,” he said. “There’s no in-
tention to not assign” respon-
sibility.
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2018 harvest
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By DAN WHEAT
Capital Press
PORTLAND — The Pear
Bureau Northwest won’t pro-
mote organic fresh pears from
this fall’s crop since growers and
packers representing 93 percent
of last year’s organic tonnage
decided to stop paying promo-
tional assessments.
It would be diffi cult for the
Pear Bureau to coordinate pro-
duction for the remaining 7 per-
cent of tonnage spread among
six packing houses so the bu-
reau board decided to end the
program, said Kevin Moffi tt,
bureau president in Portland. It’s
a loss of an estimated $423,500
in revenue for the bureau for the
fi scal year starting July 1, he
said.
The 2014 Farm Bill includes
a provision allowing growers
and shippers of organic produce,
under federal marketing orders,
to opt out of promotional assess-
ments and handle their own pro-
motions, Moffi tt said.
Regulations to implement
such changes were fi nalized by
the USDA at the beginning of
the year.
“Washington and Oregon
pear growers have been promot-
ing as a group for 85 years with
the Pear Bureau. It’s disappoint-
ing to have this split,” Moffi tt
said.
The bureau will continue to
collect and spend an estimated
$6.8 million promoting pears in
general from the 38.5-cent-per-
box assessment on convention-
al pears, he said. That activity
includes in-store sampling and
radio, national magazines, other
media, social media and the bu-
reau’s website.
The 2016 Pacifi c North-
west pear crop is estimated at
18.7 million, 44-pound boxes,
including 1.1 million boxes of
organic pears.
Organic growers and packers
will no longer pay the 38.5 cents
per box for promotional activi-
ties but along with conventional
growers and packers will contin-
ue to pay 3.1 cents per box for
research and 3.3 cents per box
for Pear Bureau administration
and funding the Northwest Hor-
ticultural Council.
“It wasn’t unexpected.
We’ve been preparing for this
for a year,” Moffi tt said. “I
think people opted out because
they want to promote their own
brands. There is a good chance
retailers may go directly to them
for promotional money.”
Twenty other commodities
including cherries, potatoes, on-
ions, grapes, citrus, olives, avo-
cados and nuts are under federal
marketing orders that apparently
are open to the same thing, Mof-
fi tt said.
However, B.J. Thurlby,
president of Northwest Cherry
Growers in Yakima, said Wash-
ington cherry and apricot assess-
ments fall under state law, which
doesn’t allow for growers and
shippers to opt out.
Farmers approve
Wilco-HGO merger
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So far, WDFW has only
confi rmed the two adults in the
pack, though biologists sus-
pect they have pups, WDFW
wolf specialist Scott Becker
said. Two wolves traveling to-
gether qualify as a pack.
The female was captured
and fi tted with a radio collar
last year and at the time was
possibly the breeding female
in the Profanity Peak pack.
She may have been pushed
out of the pack by another fe-
male, Becker said.
“We’ll probably never
know for sure what actually
happened there,” he said.
The male wolf was cap-
tured and collared in February.
WDFW collared a 2-year-
old male June 9 and a yearling
26-1/#7
Sherman pack
breaks from
Profanity Peak pack
Pear Bureau
loses organic
promotion
funding
The members of two Ore-
gon farm cooperatives, Wilco
and Hazelnut Growers of Or-
egon, have overwhelmingly
voted to merge their opera-
tions.
The combination of Wil-
co, which focuses on farm
supplies and fuel, with HGO,
which processes and markets
hazelnuts, is planned to be
complete by Aug. 1.
A major result of the merg-
er is the expected relocation
of HGO’s facility in Cornelius
to a new plant before the 2018
harvest that’s more centrally
located in the Willamette Val-
ley, the nation’s major hazel-
nut-growing region.
Construction of the HGO’s
new processing plant will be
made smoother due to the
fi nancial stability provided
by Wilco, which generates
about $220 million in annual
revenues through its 17 farm
stores, seven agronomy cen-
ters and bulk fuel sales ser-
vice.
Together the two coop-
eratives will have about 900
employees, though some po-
sitions may be cut due to re-
dundancies when a portion of
HGO’s offi ce functions are
moved to Wilco’s headquar-
ters in Mt. Angel.
Doug Hoffman, Wilco’s
current CEO, would remain
as chief of the merged cooper-
ative while HGO’s CEO, Jeff
Fox, will head its hazelnut di-
vision.
Farmers will earn equity
and dividends in the com-
bined cooperative based on
their purchases of farm sup-
plies as well as their hazelnut
deliveries, though the pools
will remain separate.
Among Wilco’s members,
79 percent voted for the merg-
er while 99 percent of HGO’s
membership’s supported it.