August 28, 2015
CapitalPress.com
7
PNW gets new Smaller wheat seed may impact
refrigerated planting decisions, expert says
rail service
By MATTHEW WEAVER
Capital Press
Capital Press
A new refrigerated rail
service connecting the Pa-
cific Northwest, the Mid-
west and East Coast has
been announced by an At-
lanta, Ga., company.
Infinity Transportation
Logistics, a subsidiary of
Infinity Management Part-
ners, Atlanta, announced
Aug. 24 that it will pro-
vide door-to-door tempera-
ture-controlled intermodal
service from Washington
and Oregon to the greater
Chicago area and farther
east.
Destinations
include
western Michigan, southern
Wisconsin, northern Indi-
ana, Buffalo and New York
City. They also include:
Boston and Springfield,
Mass.; Philadelphia, Cham-
bersburg and Harrisburg,
Pa.; Baltimore, Md.; Jack-
sonville, Orlando and Tam-
pa Bay, Fla.; and Atlanta.
Intermodal ramps in Se-
attle, Spokane and Portland
will provide pick-up and
delivery service to a radius
of about 160 miles. Pick-
up and delivery extends to
the Willamette Valley, Hood
River and Bend, Ore., and to
Puget Sound, Skagit Valley,
Yakima, Wenatchee, Colum-
bia Basin and northern Ida-
ho.
ITL has operating agree-
ments with major Class
1 railroads and owns 200
state-of-the-art Hyundai, 53-
foot refrigerated containers,
according to an ITL news
release. Transit time is ap-
proximately five to six days
to the Midwest and seven to
eight days to the East Coast.
Service is intended for
frozen foods including fish,
french fries, vegetables and
juice concentrate. It’s also
intended for fresh produce
including apples, pears, po-
tatoes, onions and carrots.
Frozen foods and beverages
will be transported from the
Midwest and East Coast to
the Northwest.
An ITL spokesman could
not be reached for comment,
so it is unknown if the ser-
vice involves the acquisi-
tion of the defunct Cold
Train refrigerated rail ser-
vice that operated between
the Northwest and many of
the same Midwest and East
Coast locations from April
2010 to August 2014. Cold
Train grew to about 700
refrigerated containers per
month carrying apples,
produce and frozen goods.
It was increasingly used by
Washington apple shippers
and mainly operated from
Quincy, Wash., and Port-
land.
Service terminated when
BNSF Railway reduced ser-
vice. The owner and pres-
ident of Rail Logistics,
Overland Park, Kan., that
owned Cold Train, sued
BNSF for $41 million or
more for breach of contract.
The Wenatchee, Wash., at-
torney who filed the lawsuit
could not be reached for an
update.
Matthew Weaver/Capital Press
Washington State University spring wheat breeder Mike Pumphrey
looks on as Ryan Higginbotham, director of the university’s variety
testing program, addresses farmers during the Lind Field Day on
June 11 in Lind, Wash. Higginbotham advises growers to carefully
consider which wheat varieties they choose to plant this year. All
seed will be smaller than normal.
see little difference, Higgin-
botham said.
“But if they’re out in that
dry country, they might want
to consider planting based on
seeds per square foot or seeds
per acre to account for that dif-
ference in seed size this year,”
he said.
Higginbotham says farm-
ers would be well-served to
consider which varieties have
done well in the past in similar
circumstances and have several
Former USDA inspector loses whistleblower lawsuit
By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI
Capital Press
A former USDA inspector
who accused the agency of re-
taliating against her for blowing
the whistle on unsafe food prac-
tices has lost her lawsuit.
In 2011, several school-
children were sickened by ap-
plesauce from a Snokist food
processing facility in Yakima,
Wash., which prompted an in-
vestigation by the U.S. Food
and Drug Administration.
When FDA investigators
showed up at the plant, Wen-
dy Alguard — an inspector for
USDA’s Agricultural Marketing
Service — told them that facili-
ty employees regularly scraped
mold from bins of old applesauce
and mixed it with fresh product.
While the practice wasn’t
ultimately found to have caused
the illnesses, ensuing financial
problems led to the company’s
bankruptcy and closure.
Alguard claimed the USDA
then retaliated against her for
costing the agency inspection
revenues by relocating her to a
distant facility and terminating
her employment when she re-
fused the assignment.
The USDA contended that
Alguard’s boss approved of her
disclosing the problem to FDA
but later reassigned her simply
because there was no longer
enough inspection work in the
Yakima area.
A federal judge has thrown
out the case, finding that it was
plausible that USDA relocated
and fired Alguard for legitimate
reasons, not as a form of retal-
iation.
Terminating inspectors who
will not relocate is standard
practice at USDA and “such
disciplinary action is consistent
with other agency employees
who had refused a directed re-
assignment,” according to U.S.
District Judge Thomas Rice.
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playing ‘The Price Tastes Right’ with children from Boise.
By Amber Bucknell
Healthy living is a 4-H national mission mandate focused
on engaging youth and families to be physically, socially,
and emotionally healthy. Idaho is one of seven states
nationwide to take part in a community healthy living
initiative called 4-H Food Smart Families. To implement
the initiative, 4-H has partnered with University of Idaho’s
Eat Smart Idaho program.
Funding for 4-H Food Smart Families and Eat Smart
Idaho is provided by the National 4-H Council, the
ConAgra Foods Foundation, the Albertson’s Corporation,
the USDA’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program
(SNAP), Food and Nutrition Services, Idaho Department
of Health and Welfare, and the University of Idaho.
4-H Food Smart Families has a special interest in reaching
limited income families and communities. To do so,
college interns and Eat Smart Idaho Nutrition Advisors
have partnered with community organizations and migrant
education programs to teach 10 hours of healthy living
35-1/#24
By DAN WHEAT
This year’s hot weather
has resulted in smaller wheat
seed, and a Washington State
University expert says farm-
ers may want to consider that
when deciding which varieties
to plant this fall.
“Seed size and test weight
would likely be lower across
the board,” Ryan Higginboth-
am, who oversees WSU’s
cereal variety trials, said. “If
they’re planting wheat based
on pounds per acre, they’ll end
up with more seed than they
normally would, because seed
sizes are smaller.”
Smaller seed has less en-
ergy to germinate and emerge
from a deep planting in the
soil than larger seed. Farmers
planting late and dusting seed
into shallow moisture would
options in mind when meeting
with their seed dealer.
Farmers should consider
several years of data as they
decide which variety to plant,
he said.
“I always recommend peo-
ple look at multiple years of in-
formation, so they can see how
things perform over different
years” Higginbotham said. “I
would recommend something
that has done well over years
and even over locations.”
“It has been a crazy year,”
Higginbotham said. “It de-
pends where you were, when
you planted, what you planted,
whether you got hit with the
cold snap, whether you got rain
— there were so many factors
that played into it.”
In some locations, the ex-
pected varieties did well. In
other locations, unexpected va-
rieties came out on top, he said.
Eat Smart Id
Nutrition A aho
dv
Brandi Veg isor,
a, teaching
how to read
a recipe.
lessons. Topics covered include: handwashing and food
safety, eating more fruit and vegetables, making half of your
grains whole, eating low-fat dairy, budgeting, the USDA’s
MyPlate, and the importance of being physically active.
Teen advocates have been trained to co-teach lessons and
lead physical activities alongside the interns and nutrition
advisors. In June teens attended a week-long 4-H
conference at the University of Idaho Moscow campus to
learn more about leadership, public speaking and community
service. Lorena Rivera, of Caldwell, Idaho says she has
learned “time management, and how to teach kids to help
their families make better decisions.”
During each lesson youth learn how to make easy-to-prepare
nutritious snacks that highlight locally grown produce such
as fruit parfaits with in-season strawberries. Youth also
learn how to read nutrition fact labels and chose snacks with
less sugar, sodium and fat. At the end of the program
participants receive a recipe book and a bag of groceries to
make two snacks at home with their families.
4-H Food Smart Families can be found on Facebook and Twitter at facebook.com/UI4HYD or @UI_4HFSF.
Eat Smart Idaho can be found online at www.eatsmartidaho.org.
35-2/#13