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4 CapitalPress.com April 14, 2017 WSDA reports increase in cropland acreage Judge: No permit required about 7 million, a 2.5 percent increase. Sandison singled out about 4,000 acres of cropland added in the Red Mountain area in Benton County, in- cluding 1,600 acres in wine- grapes. In Western Washington, cropland grew by 81,894 acres to about 290,000 acres, or by 39 percent. Statewide, the increase Idaho to exceed 250,000 acre-feet in recharge By JOHN O’CONNELL Capital Press MENAN, Idaho — Though the region’s irrigation season hasn’t started, heavy fl ows have been diverted from the Snake River into the Great Feeder Canal since early March. In the Upper Snake Riv- er Plain, the Feeder, Fre- mont-Madison Irrigation District, Enterprise Irrigation District, Farmers Friend Irri- gation District and the City of Blackfoot have opened their systems to help the state in- tentionally inject natural fl ows into the groundwater to re- plenish the declining aquifer, through a process known as managed recharge. The state’s upper valley recharge water right is only in priority during especially wet springs. In the lower valley, the state holds a recharge right that’s active for at least 150 days, including all of winter. The Idaho Department of Water Resources has re- charged 220,000 acre-feet of water combined in the up- per and lower Snake valleys since last October, breaking the previous recharge record of 160,000 acre-feet set in 2012. IDWR recharge coordi- nator Wes Hipke said the state is on pace to exceed a goal it set in 2015 to average at least 250,000 acre-feet of recharge per year, with the upper valley poised to contribute just shy of half of the volume. “It’s going to be a really good recharge year all the way around,” Hipke said, “There is going to be a lot of natural re- charge that goes on, which is John O’Connell/Capital Press Wes Hipke, recharge coordinator with the Idaho Department of Water Resources, stands by the di- version into the Great Feeder Canal system near Menan, Idaho, which is taking in water for managed aquifer recharge. Hipke led an April 10 tour of recharge sites in the Upper Snake River Plain. going to benefi t the aquifer, and then you add on top of that the stuff we’re doing, and there’s going to be even more benefi t.” Hipke said the department will also likely exceed the $1.5 million it budgeted for this season to pay canal companies fees for facilitating recharge. Four of the 21 canals that divert from the Feeder also have their headgates open to conduct recharge. Luke Hicks represents the Feeder system on the Com- mittee of Nine, which pro- vides guidance on behalf of the major federal irrigation projects in the Upper Snake. Hicks said the Feeder system has recharged 34,000 acre- feet already this season. He explained his canal deferred some of its maintenance until next year to allow recharge. “We see water availability as the importance of this sea- son,” said Hicks, who chairs the Committee of Nine’s re- charge committee. Hicks said his company has begun studying four potential sites for conducting off-canal recharge — ranging from 10 to 50 cubic feet per second — thereby allowing recharge to continue even after irrigation starts. Hipke said the irrigation season is expected to start on about April 20, but he antici- pates strong natural fl ows will support recharging in the upper valley’s off-canal sites through June. Jeff Raybould, an Idaho Water Resource Board member from St. Anthony, explained the Bureau of Land Management is conducting an environmental review to expand a critical Up- per Valley off-canal recharge site on the Egin Bench, ac- cessed by the Fremont-Madi- son system. Raybould said the project, once approved, will ex- pand an existing recharge pond into surrounding BLM land, helping to increase recharge capacity on the bench from 800 acre-feet per day to 1,000 acre- feet per day. Hipke said the Egin project is among fi ve infrastructure upgrades the state hopes to implement this fall through- out the Snake to expand re- charge capacity. Mon t. on R lm r Sa Salmon A predator hunting “der- by” in Idaho didn’t require a permit from federal offi- cials despite the use of a na- tional forest, according to a federal judge. Chief U.S. Magistrate Judge Ronald Bush has ruled that federal environ- mental law doesn’t com- pel the U.S. Forest Service to issue a permit or study the impacts of the derby, in which hunters competed to kill wolves, coyotes and other predators. “The derby did involve hunting, and possibly hunt- ing on the forest, but that hunting was a legal activ- ity each of the participants could pursue on forest land if they chose to do so, inde- pendent of and unrelated to the derby,” he said. Eight environmental groups filed a complaint ac- cusing the federal agency of violating the National En- vironmental Policy Act by allowing Idaho for Wildlife, a hunting group, to organize derbies in 2013 and 2015 without a special use permit for the Salmon-Challis Na- tional Forest. The Forest Service’s de- cision was “arbitrary and capricious” because such permits are required for similar events such as fish- ing contests and vehicle races, according to plain- tiffs Wildearth Guardians, Cascadia Wildlands, Boul- der-White Clouds Council, Kootenai Environmental Alliance, Predator Defense, Center for Biological Di- versity, Western Watersheds Project and Project Coyote. The agency gave “blan- ket permission” for the events without any analy- sis or public comment even though the U.S. Bureau of Land Management de- termined permits were re- quired and then didn’t allow the competition on its prop- erty, the plaintiffs said. “The killing contest is an organized event involving time limits, cash prizes and hundreds of participants, and has a greater impact on forest resources than recre- ational hunting,” according to plaintiffs. The Forest Service ar- gued that derbies don’t need special use permits because the hunters aren’t congre- gating in one location, but the agency previously de- cided that the distance be- tween participants of other events was irrelevant, the Fk. 28 Challis ho noted in Sandison’s report, winegrapes stood out. Acres of vineyards increased by 58 percent between 2008 and 2016 to 56,883 acres from 35,951 acres. Acres of Washington’s No. 1 crop, apples, declined slightly to 180,787 acres from 184,094 acres. In the past eight years, cropland in Eastern Washing- ton grew by 175,881 acres to Salmon- Challis National Forest Id a Washington Agriculture Director Derek Sandison gives a presenta- tion March 29 at a Results Washington meeting in Olympia on the growth of cropland. The state has added more than 257,000 acres of cropland in the past eight years, according to WSDA. Capital Press 93 IDAHO 90 n t. Courtesy of Results Washington By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI Missoula Area in detail Mo OLYMPIA — Farm- ers have added more than 257,000 acres of cropland in Washington in the past eight years, according to the Department of Agriculture, keeping the state on pace to have 7.35 million acres in plant production by the end of 2020. Cropland acres grew on both sides of the Cascades, through the percentage in- crease was much higher in Western Washington, ac- cording to a presentation by WSDA Director Derek Sandison at a recent meeting of Results Washington. A group that includes Gov. Jay Inslee and several agency directors meet peri- odically to review progress in meeting state objectives. The goals include maintaining the state’s farmlands in the face of population growth. Among individual crops Environmentalists claimed U.S. Forest Service violated federal law l m on R . Capital Press for predator hunting derby Sa By DON JENKINS was from 7 million acres to 7.32 million acres, or 3.6 per- cent. Some 96 percent of the state’s cropland is east of the Cascades. Cropland does not include pastures or shellfi sh beds. Sandison also highlighted the loss of cropland in places, such as near Lake Chelan in Central Washington. “The statewide numbers mask what’s happening in spe- cifi c areas, like this,” he said. “When we evaluate the viabil- ity of cropland through a state- wide lens, we get a far differ- ent picture than if we evaluate it through a local lens. “We do continue to be con- cerned about conversion of cropland to urban, suburban and large-lot rural develop- ment,” he said. “Once these conversions are made, it’s highly unlikely those lands ever return to agriculture.” While the state has set a goal to maintain farmland, it’s also pursued a policy of buying open space, including grazing lands and farmland, for wildlife habitat and recre- ation. Md . Winegrape acreage up 21 N 75 93 Ketchum 20 miles Alan Kenaga/Capital Press environmental groups said. Also, the hunting der- bies effectively congregated people because registration and ceremonies were held in Salmon, Idaho, and hunt- ers weren’t likely to venture far during a relatively short time frame, plaintiffs said. “In contrast to an ordinary hunting season, the contest causes an intense burst of killing over a weekend,” the plaintiffs said. Before the Forest Service could issue a permit, offi- cials should also have stud- ied the environmental ef- fects of the hunting contest as a “major federal action,” the environmentalists said. “The contest increases the risk of wolf- and coy- ote-killing not just during the three- or four-day event but throughout the year by fostering intolerance to wolves and carnivores gen- erally,” according to plain- tiffs. The judge rejected the arguments, finding that the derby didn’t charge a fee or limit hunting to the national forest’s borders, as partici- pants could shoot predators on private lands as well. The awarding of prizes and other events occurred outside the national forest, and it’s likely that more hunters entered the forest during peak hunting periods than during the derby, Bush said. For similar reasons, the Forest Service didn’t have to analyze the derby under NEPA, since hunting is al- lowed within the national forest regardless of the con- test, he said. Bush said he didn’t doubt the environmental groups felt their enjoyment of the national forest was dimin- ished by the hunting derby. “But such use is permit- ted under the Idaho’s regu- lation of hunting, including for predators, and is a use that has existed on the forest since the days that Theodore Roosevelt first set aside the forest reserve in 1906 that later became the (national) forest,” he said. AUCTION INCLUDES: Zac Brown Band Go Online For Auction Preview: owaonline.org 15-2/#13