November 6, 2015
CapitalPress.com
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9
Idaho
Blackfoot ag companies host first Tractor Treat
By JOHN O’CONNELL
Capital Press
BLACKFOOT,
Idaho
— From now on, Julie Ann
Morris anticipates dressing up
large agricultural equipment
will be part of the Hallow-
een tradition in this Eastern
Idaho community, and more
of its children will choose
farm-themed costumes.
Morris, a service writer at
the AGCO dealer Agri-Ser-
vice, approached officials
at other Blackfoot agricul-
tural businesses in mid-Oc-
tober to find support for a
new event, which she called
Tractor Treat.
Agri-Service hosted the
inaugural Tractor Treat from
4 to 6 p.m. on Oct. 30, with
plans to rotate the event
among the various partici-
pants into the future.
Local businesses includ-
ing Bingham Cooperative,
Spudnik Equipment, Agri-
Source, Wada Farms, PRB
Feed & Oil, Bingham Coun-
ty Implement and Mick-
elsen Construction sent rep-
resentatives and decorated
equipment to the Agri-Ser-
vice parking lot, where they
hosted games and handed
out candy — or, in the case
of Wada Farms, Easy-Baker
Children line up for candy by the Blackfoot John Deere dealer-
ship’s display for Tractor Treat, hosted Oct. 30 at Agri-Service in
Blackfoot. The display features a “smushed” dummy.
Photos by John O’Connell/Capital Press
Wada Farms hands out chips and microwaveable potatoes at
Tractor Treat, hosted at Agri-Service in Blackfoot, Idaho, on Oct.
30. Local agriculture-related businesses sponsored the Halloween
event for children.
potatoes.
Organizers awarded a
prize to the child with the
best agriculture-themed cos-
tume.
Morris said she was
amazed by the interest from
other businesses when she
and Melonie Fisher, a re-
gional parts manager with
Agri-Service, began knock-
ing on doors.
“Some of us are com-
petitors on any given day,”
Morris said. “It helps us all
remember that we are all
partners in this community.”
Morris said Tractor Treat
is modeled after trunk or
treats, often hosted by
churches and involving
parking cars in a lot to dis-
pense candy in a safe envi-
ronment.
Tish Dahman, execu-
tive director of the Greater
Blackfoot Area Chamber of
Commerce, helped set up
signs to promote the event.
“The Blackfoot mer-
chants haven’t been active
in putting together a Hal-
loween event for children.
That’s been left to the vari-
ous churches and schools,”
Dahmen said. “To see our
agricultural businesses step
up to fill that void — to see
them work together — is re-
ally exciting.”
Dahmen said the unique
concept for the Halloween
event also speaks to the im-
portance of agriculture in the
local economy.
“It celebrates the identity
of the Blackfoot community
because we’re an agricul-
tural-based
community,”
Dahmen said. “It celebrates
our lifestyle and our cul-
ture.”
Though the focus is on
giving back to the commu-
nity, Agri-Service Blackfoot
store manager Rob Fisher
said Tractor Treat also pres-
ents a chance to show off
the store to those who may
have missed an open house
in July. Fisher said Agri-Ser-
vice opened its 12th location
in a trailer in Blackfoot last
October and finished a per-
manent facility this summer.
For
Tractor
Treat,
Agri-Service put a funny
face on a combine and con-
verted a parts truck into a
witch’s hat, utilized for a
ring-toss game.
Travis Sessions, manager
of Bingham County Imple-
ment, a John Deere dealer,
sent a utility tractor and a
“smushed” dummy beneath
a loader. He and his sales
associate chose American
Gothic-themed
costumes,
and they brought brochures
on their equipment in case
any visitors had questions.
“Even though we’re
competitors, we’re work-
ing hand-in-hand,” Sessions
said. “This population really
appreciates community sup-
port, and the more you can
show, the better.”
Tyler Harker, petroleum
manager at Bingham Co-op,
helped transform a company
trailer into a massive spider
hanging over hay bales and
dry-ice fog.
“A lot of times, we miss
these opportunities to net-
work, and work together and
socialize,” Harker said.
Water agreement opens
private recharge opportunity
By JOHN O’CONNELL
Capital Press
Sean Ellis/Capital Press
Corn is harvested in a field near Wilder, Idaho, on Oct. 6. According to USDA estimates, cropland
rental expenses increased in Idaho in 2015 even though commodity prices declined.
Average cropland rental expense
in Idaho increased this year
By SEAN ELLIS
Capital Press
BOISE — Cropland rent-
al expenses increased almost
5 percent in Idaho this year,
despite declining commod-
ity prices. But Gem State
farmers don’t expect to see a
similar increase in 2016.
Cash rent expense for all
cropland in Idaho averaged
$158 an acre in 2015, up $7
an acre compared with 2014,
according to estimates by
USDA’s National Agricul-
tural Statistics Service.
Most ag land rental con-
tracts are signed in Septem-
ber or October prior to the
next season, said Shelley
farmer Stan Searle.
“Most of the ground was
all rented by the time every-
body realized where things
were headed,” he said.
When those contracts for
2015 were signed last year,
“people were not expecting
commodity prices to be as
low as they are right now,”
said University of Idaho Ag-
ricultural Economist Garth
Taylor. “People were ex-
pecting a lot better commod-
ity prices than what they’re
getting.”
According to NASS, the
average rental expense for
irrigated ag land in Idaho is
estimated at $205 for 2015,
up $8 an acre over 2014.
Rental expense for non-irri-
gated cropland was $65 an
acre, up $4 compared with
2014.
Searle said those esti-
mates appear reasonable.
“It’s pretty close,” he
said. “There is ground a lot
higher than that, but there is
also ground that is quite a bit
lower than that.”
Ag land with a pivot ir-
rigation system and good
water rights can go for
$325-$350 an acre if pota-
toes are being grown there,
he said, but rental prices
for some other crops grown
on less favorable land can
be significantly less than
that.
Pasture cash rent expense
in Idaho was estimated at
$12 an acre, the same as
2014.
According to NASS, the
average cash rent expense
for all cropland in Idaho
averaged $139 in 2013 and
jumped to $151 in 2014.
Another factor in the
higher average cropland
rental expense this year is
that many contracts are for
multiple years and some
were signed when commod-
ity prices were high, Searle
said. If those contracts were
renewed today, he added, it
could be another story.
Sen. Jim Patrick, a Re-
publican farmer from Twin
Falls, agreed with that as-
sessment.
“I certainly can’t see them
being up next year,” he said.
“It will be down for sure. It’s
been kind of a shock how
quickly (commodity prices)
fell and that will affect us
next year for sure.”
According to NASS, the
average rental expense for
irrigated cropland in Ida-
ho increased from $177 an
acre in 2013 to $197 an acre
in 2014, while the average
rental expense for non-ir-
rigated cropland rose from
$56 an acre in 2013 to $61
an acre in 2014.
ABERDEEN, Idaho —
The first canal companies to
apply for private aquifer re-
charge water rights within the
Eastern Snake Plain hope to
capitalize on a recent agree-
ment between the system’s
well irrigators and the Sur-
face Water Coalition.
In the past year, Black-
foot-based People’s Canal
Co. and Shelley-based Snake
River Valley Irrigation Dis-
trict were both awarded pri-
vate aquifer recharge water
rights, capped at 10,000 acre-
feet.
Aberdeen-Springfield Ca-
nal Co. has a private recharge
application pending and has
sought Idaho Department of
Water Resources approval to
recharge above the standard
cap.
The initial private re-
charge rights all have 2013
priority dates, junior to the
state’s 1980 recharge right.
The Surface Water Coali-
tion made its water call about
a decade ago, concerned
about declining spring flows
into the Snake River caused
by well use. Conditions of
a terms sheet the parties ap-
proved this summer require
well users to reduce their
consumption by 11 percent
per year on average, among
John O’Connell/Capital Press
The Aberdeen-Springfield Canal flows through Aberdeen, Idaho.
The canal company has applied for its own aquifer recharge
water right, which it hopes to use both to help the state meet its
recharge goals and to ease the burden of a mandatory reduction
in consumptive use for groundwater districts who have entered an
agreement with the Surface Water Coalition.
other measures, to reverse the
aquifer declines.
Aberdeen-Springfield
General Manager Steve
Howser envisions receiving
payments from groundwater
districts, which would then
apply his private recharge ef-
forts toward their mandatory
consumption reductions.
“That is an opportunity to
make money that wasn’t there
a year ago,” Howser said.
He said the water right’s
primary purpose will be en-
abling the company to re-
charge a greater volume for
the state, which has commit-
ted to recharging 240,000
acre-feet per year for aquifer
stabilization. Howser hopes
the state will pay wheeling
fees to offset his company’s
expenses for allowing re-
charge water to seep into the
aquifer through his unlined
system and an adjacent spill-
way, and perhaps a little extra
for the use of its private re-
charge right.
“I’d like to be able to re-
charge 30,000 to 40,000 acre-
feet of the state’s water, plus
30,000 to 40,000 acre-feet of
our own water,” Howser said.
Aberdeen-Springfield
has already recharged 8,200
acre-feet this fall from the
water district’s rental pool to
apply toward reduction re-
quirements of the Bingham,
Bonneville-Jefferson
and
Jefferson-Clark groundwater
districts.
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