September 18, 2015
CapitalPress.com
17
CRP grazing extended for fire, drought victims
By DAN WHEAT
Capital Press
SPOKANE, Wash. —
Ranchers in Eastern Wash-
ington who have lost grazing
ground to drought or wildfire
will be able to graze Conser-
vation Reserve Program land
through Dec. 15, says Judith
Olson, state director of the
USDA Farm Service Agency
in Spokane.
That’s welcome news and
will help meet the short-term
needs of hundreds of ranch-
ers throughout Eastern Wash-
ington dealing with grazing
losses because of wildfires,
said Jack Field, executive
vice president of the Wash-
ington Cattlemen’s Associa-
tion in Ellensburg.
CRP land is environ-
mentally sensitive land the
USDA pays farmers not to
farm. There are 1,251,073
acres of CRP land in East-
ern Washington and FSA is
allowing grazing with no re-
duction in government pay-
ments to landowners, Olson
said.
Grazing may not be prac-
tical on the entire acreage
because of distance, lack of
fencing and lack of water,
she said.
CRP grazing was recent-
ly approved for drought vic-
tims. Wildfire victims need to
get county FSA approval of
National Resources Conser-
vation Service grazing plans
to use CRP lands, but that can
be done quickly, Olson said
Emergency grazing of
CRP land had been approved
only through the end of the
federal fiscal year, Sept. 30.
Dan Wheat/Capital Press
Black Angus cattle graze pasture they normally wouldn’t use until winter at Haeberle Ranch between Okanogan and Conconully,
Wash., Aug. 31. Burned range in background. Ranchers throughout Eastern Washington are coping with loss of grazing grounds
because of wildfires.
The Cattlemen’s Association
and Farm Bureau officials
urged an extension to Dec. 15.
“We have been working
on this but it was contingent
upon weather conditions and
approval from the national of-
fice,” Olson said.
Field said the extension
was the most crucial thing
that can be done for produc-
ers right now. Hundreds of
ranchers in the northcentral,
northeastern, southeastern
and Mt. Adams area of the
state have lost private and
government allotment fall
and spring grazing grounds
to fires, he said. They are
using winter ranges and hay
early to get by and looking
for short-term options for the
fall, he said.
CRP can be a big help but
doesn’t always work because
ranchers have to truck their
cattle to the site and often
have to haul water, put up
temporary electric fences and
run back and forth from their
homes to tend cattle, he said.
“Each producer has to de-
cide if it can work for them,”
Field said. “I’ve rented pas-
ture 200 miles away and it’s
very difficult.”
FSA has a cost-sharing
program for hauling water to
sites, he said.
CRP land is not available
for grazing in the spring
through Aug. 1 because of
bird nesting, he said.
Okanogan County was
disproportionately hit by the
large Okanogan, Tunk Block
and North Star fires, Field
said.
Those fires total 518,540
acres out of more than 1 mil-
lion acres burned in the state,
according to fire officials. A
lot of that land included graz-
ing allotments.
It’s difficult to assess
grazing needs because
ranchers won’t fully know
how many cows they’ve lost
in fires until fall roundups,
Field said.
Jon Wyss, president of the
Okanogan County Farm Bu-
reau, estimated 1,250 head of
cattle are unaccounted for in
the county. He said another
2,000 to 3,000 head probably
will be sold off as ranchers
decide they can’t feed them.
All of that is about 43 per-
cent of the 11,000 head in the
county, he said.
A total of 980 cattle died
in the Carlton fire in the coun-
ty last year, he said.
Mother cows usually calve
for seven years, so this year’s
loss multiplied by seven years
of production could be a $50
million loss in sales value,
Wyss said.
Fewer cattle were sold off
after the Carlton fire last year
because more grazing land
was available, much of what
is burned now, he said.
“It’s unfortunate to be
selling off herds because you
can’t rebuild them overnight,”
Field said. “In some situa-
tions generations of genetics
and breeding are lost. Those
cattle knew those ranges. It’s
difficult to put other cattle out
there on range they were not
raised on.”
Herd reductions are bad
for the Northwest beef indus-
try, he said.
Wyss, who chairs a local
fire recovery group, said 95
homes, 94 cabins, 20 shops
and garages and 89 outbuild-
ings burned in this year’s
Okanogan fire. That doesn’t
include Tunk Block and
North Star and compares with
312 homes, plus outbuildings
burned last year in the Carlton
fire.
Wyss estimated 1,000
miles of fencing burned this
year in the county that will
cost an average of $8,000 per
mile to replace.
More sheep killed by Expert offers options for keeping slugs at bay
Mount Emily wolves
By MITCH LIES
ODFW tallies five
incidents this year
By GEORGE PLAVEN
EO Media Group
The Mount Emily wolf
pack of northeast Ore-
gon continues to prey on
sheep in the Blue Moun-
tains between Umatilla and
Union counties, with five
confirmed attacks so far
in 2015 — all against the
same producer.
The last three incidents
happened less than two
weeks apart on Aug. 15, 24
and 27 in the Umatilla Na-
tional Forest near Ninemile
Ridge. Michelle Dennehy,
spokeswoman with the Or-
egon Department of Fish
& Wildlife, said they have
tried and will continue to
use non-lethal deterrents
such as guard dogs and in-
creased human presence to
keep wolves away from the
area.
Oregon lists wolves as
endangered species east
of highways 395, 78 and
95, though current man-
agement rules would allow
ODFW to consider lethal
control of the Mount Emily
pack if the rancher files a
formal request. That hasn’t
For the Capital Press
happened yet, Dennehy
said.
Program
coordinator
Russ Morgan previously
said their goal is not to kill
wolves, but to find a way
to stop livestock preda-
tion. The focus is on those
non-lethal deterrents, he
said.
A wolf conflict deter-
rence plan is filed for the
Mount Emily pack, which
includes tips for hazing
wolves away from sheep
pastures. ODFW recom-
mends herders should be
stationed near the sheep
and active at night when
predation is likely to occur.
Fladry fencing, guard dogs
and alarm boxes can also be
effective tools, according
to the department.
There are at least 77
known wolves document-
ed in Oregon, most in the
northeast corner of the
state.
The Oregon Fish and
Wildlife Commission will
look at a proposal to re-
move wolves from the
Endangered Species List
in Eastern Oregon during
meetings in October and
November. Wolves in West-
ern Oregon are listed by the
federal government as en-
dangered.
SALEM — Penn State
University entomologist John
Tooker didn’t provide Oregon
growers with any silver bul-
let solutions to slug control
during his visit to the Willa-
mette Valley last week.
But Tooker shared strat-
egies Pennsylvania growers
have used to lower slug pres-
sure and encouraged Oregon
growers to consider imple-
menting some of them.
“I would ask you to think
about ways to incorporate
some of these ideas, recog-
nizing our annual cropping
system in Pennsylvania is
different than what you have
here,” he said at an Oregon
State University Extension
meeting in Salem on Sept.
10. “By implementing these
ideas, a couple of growers
who have fully embraced
them have made their slug
populations go away.”
Slugs are by most ac-
counts among the worst pests
in Oregon grass seed produc-
tion, if not the worst. They
accounted for nearly $100
million in damage to the $500
million crop in recent years.
The mollusk also is respon-
sible for substantial crop loss
in several other field and row
crops.
Tooker, who has become a
leading expert in slug control
Mitch Lies/For the Capital Press
Penn State University entomologist John Tooker, speaking at an Oregon State University Extension
meeting Sept. 10 in Salem, provided Oregon growers with insight into slug control tactics that Pennsyl-
vania growers have incorporated to protect their crops from slug damage in recent years.
in recent years, said growers
and researchers in Pennsyl-
vania have found that use of
cover crops and predator bee-
tles, in the absence of insecti-
cidal seed treatments, can be
a successful formula for keep-
ing slugs at bay.
To start with, he said, slugs
prefer certain cover crops
over cash crops — a prefer-
ence growers can use to their
advantage.
“If you give them a choice
between a rye plant and a corn
plant, they will choose the rye
every time,” he said.
Complementing the direct
benefit of keeping slugs off
grower’s primary crop, rye
and crimson clover plants
serve as hosts for beneficial
insects that feed on slugs.
“The rye distracts the
slugs, allowing them to feed
on something they like bet-
ter than the cash crop, and it
improves the ground beetle
population,” he said. “Those
two things together are taking
the pressure off the cash crop,
letting it get out of the ground
and grow.”
Some growers in Pennsyl-
vania have even started plant-
ing cash crops directly into
a standing green cover crop,
Tooker said. They follow that
with a treatment of glypho-
sate, which kills off the cover
crop, but while the cover crop
is dying, it is still palatable to
the slugs and still fostering
beneficial insect populations,
he said.
OSP asks for information Research opens door to new types of insecticides
about wolf killings
cial insects.
gle-stranded, Scott and Mi- have enzymes in their guts that
By JOHN O’CONNELL
By ERIC MORTENSON
Capital Press
Wolf pups from Northeast-
ern Oregon’s Sled Springs
pair haven’t been seen since
their parents were found dead
within 50 yards of each other
during the week of Aug. 24th,
an Oregon Department of
Fish & Wildlife spokeswom-
an said.
Oregon State Police have
been investigating the killings
since the wolves were found
dead, but didn’t make the case
public until Sept. 16.
“We didn’t want to tip our
hand,” spokesman Lt. Bill Fu-
gate said.
Wolves are protected under
state and federal endangered
species laws, and killing them
is a crime. OSP is asking any-
one with information about
the case to contact Senior
Trooper Kreg Coggins at 541-
426-3049, or call the agency’s
TIP line at 1-800-452-788, or
On-line: The Sled
Springs pair
http: //dfw.state.or.us/Wolves/
AKWA/sled_springs.asp
email TIP@state.or.us.
Fugate said OSP won’t dis-
close the cause of death at this
time.
The investigation began
when a tracking collar worn
by OR-21, a female, emitted
a mortality signal, ODFW
spokeswoman Michelle Den-
nehy said. The female wolf
and her mate were found
dead.
The pair had pups that
would be about five months
old and weaned at this
point, Dennehy said. The
pups hadn’t been seen as of
Wednesday morning, but
wolves are secretive and the
pups should be free-ranging
by now, she said. It’s unclear
how many pups the pair had.
Capital Press
Experimental insecticides
that turn off vital genes in spe-
cific pests through a process
called RNA interference are
more durable and long-last-
ing than previously suspected,
according to new research at
Cornell University.
Cornell entomology pro-
fessor Jeff Scott and his lab-
oratory manager, Keri San
Miguel, believe RNAi tech-
nology could revolutionize
the crop protection industry
due to its ability to avoid col-
lateral damage among benefi-
cial insects that offer biologi-
cal control of pests.
“It has tremendous poten-
tial in pest control since you
might be able to make it very
specific for a pest species,”
Scott said, noting growers
often encounter new insects
of concern after trying a dif-
ferent insecticide that disrupts
a natural balance with benefi-
Their find-
ings were re-
cently
pub-
lished in Pest
Management
Science.
Scott
RNA
is
essentially
a
copy of a DNA strand creat-
ed as a messenger, alerting
cells which proteins should
be manufactured. RNA inter-
ference introduces genes to
destroy targeted RNA mes-
sengers.
Scott and Miguel initial-
ly planned to work with an
expert in sun screen resi-
dues to develop a protectant
to enhance their treatment’s
durability. In nature, Scott
explained the DNA of a de-
composing bird, for example,
is easy to extract, while the
RNA is usually degraded.
But they discovered pro-
tecting the RNA was unneces-
sary. While RNA messengers
used by organisms are sin-
guel utilized double-strand-
ed RNA, which, like DNA,
seems to withstand the ele-
ments.
In their greenhouse trials,
RNA-based insecticide was
effective against Colorado po-
tato beetle for 28 days — and
likely would have continued
working had the experiment
not been disrupted by anoth-
er pest entering the green-
house. The RNA-based prod-
uct worked even after treated
foliage was swirled in water,
simulating rainfall.
Though ultraviolet light
quickly degraded RNA on a
glass slide, the treatment was
unharmed on foliage — poten-
tially because it was absorbed
into cells or shaded by leaf
hairs.
Scott is confident the re-
sults would stand up in field
trials. He said the approach is
highly effective against bee-
tles with larvae that feed on
plants, but some pest species
destroy the double-stranded
RNA before it can enter their
cells. More work is also need-
ed to make RNAi effective on
aphids, he said.
Major chemical companies
have also taken notice of the
technology. In 2012, Syngen-
ta and Devgen entered into a
six-year agreement to jointly
research RNAi technology.
Monsanto researcher Greg
Heck said the Cornell results
are consistent with findings of
his company’s ongoing dou-
ble-stranded RNA research.
Heck said Monsanto has a
transgenic corn product using
RNAi to control corn root-
worm under regulatory review
by agencies around the world.
He believes the product of-
fer a new mode of action that
would forestall development
of chemical resistance. Mon-
santo is also developing a
topical product line utilizing
double-stranded RNA called
BioDirect.