14 CapitalPress.com
April 8, 2016
Dairyman faces license revocation for alleged threats
Oregon Department
of Agriculture seeks
restraining order
By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI
Capital Press
A cheesemaker in Central
Oregon faces the revocation
of several licenses for his
dairy because state farm reg-
ulators have accused him of
threatening inspectors.
The Oregon Department
of Agriculture is seeking to
revoke the licenses of Patrick
Sullivan, who runs Cada Dia
Cheese in Prineville. The li-
censes are necessary to oper-
ate a fluid milk facility, a dairy
products plant, a confined an-
imal feeding operation and a
commercial scale.
The agency claims the re-
vocations are warranted be-
cause Sullivan has repeatedly
barred inspectors from com-
ing onto his property and has
subjected ODA employees to
“hostile, abusive, and threat-
ening communications.”
ODA has also filed a peti-
tion for a restraining order to
block Sullivan from “harass-
ing or menacing” its employ-
ees or entering the agency’s
offices.
Sullivan said he plans to
contest both actions by ODA.
“I want to be heard in a
court of law,” he said.
Inspectors must access
Sullivan’s dairy and cheese-
making facility to ensure he’s
following laws pertaining to
food safety and water pol-
lution control, according to
ODA’s revocation order.
Sullivan first refused to al-
low inspectors to collect nec-
essary samples in 2010 and
has since been uncooperative
and intimidating on several
occasions, including sending
emails to ODA about his ha-
tred of government officials,
the document said.
His conduct, as well as
statements that allude to de-
fending himself with a fire-
arm, “are reasonably per-
ceived as written threats to
inflict serious physical inju-
ry on ODA employees,” the
agency said.
In October 2015, the agen-
cy obtained a warrant to enter
Sullivan’s property to perform
inspections and requested
help from the Oregon State
Police, the document said.
However, OSP declined
because it was unable to get
assistance from additional
law enforcement officials,
preventing the ODA from
taking necessary samples, the
agency said.
In 2016, Sullivan has told
ODA that he will be imple-
menting “anti-terrorist pro-
cedures” at his farm and said
he’d travel to the agency’s
headquarters in Salem to
discuss these “terrorist con-
cerns,” according to the revo-
cation order.
Sullivan told Capital Press
his problems with ODA are
part of a broader conflict with
neighbors and law enforce-
ment officials.
“These things don’t hap-
pen in a vacuum,” he said.
Sullivan said he encoun-
tered complaints shortly af-
ter buying the farm in 2009,
when neighbors and county
officials claimed that visitors
to his dairy were causing traf-
fic.
He also said he believes a
dispute with a neighbor who
was formerly a police officer
has resulted in harassment
from law enforcement agen-
cies.
Sullivan said his relation-
ship with ODA also soured
early on, when an inspector
tried to make his dairy license
contingent on county inspec-
tions of his family’s living
quarters.
Since then, Sullivan said
he protested several actions
by ODA, such as an inspector
waiting to chill his milk sam-
ples instead of putting them on
ice immediately and attempt-
ing to hang a milk sampling
device on an unsanitary sink.
Most recently, Sullivan said
he objected to the frequency
of water tests and to an ODA
inspector entering his proper-
ty unannounced to take water
samples.
Sullivan said he believes
the U.S. is “descending into a
police state” and wanted to im-
plement similar procedures for
government officials as peo-
ple must follow before board-
ing an airplane.
“Why shouldn’t I do that
to them when they come onto
my property?” he said.
New irrigation method catching on in West
By JOHN O’CONNELL
Capital Press
IDAHO FALLS — A Uni-
versity of Idaho researcher
anticipates an irrigation meth-
od he helped develop to save
water and electricity in the
arid West will see widespread
use on farms in the region this
season.
Officials with the Idaho
Falls office of USDA’s Nat-
ural Resources Conservation
Service recently confirmed
they’ve received a $300,000
grant to help growers in their
district convert pivots to Low
Elevation Spray Application,
and they expect demand will
far exceed the available fund-
ing.
UI Extension irrigation
specialist Howard Neibling,
who devised LESA with
Washington State University
Extension irrigation special-
ist Troy Peters, said interest
in the method has also been
strong throughout the North-
west and in Wyoming, Colo-
rado, Nevada and California.
The researchers modeled
LESA after Low Elevation
Precision Application, which
was developed about 25 years
ago in Texas, where growers
have the advantage of more
natural rainfall than Southern
Idaho to help germinate and
maintain crops.
Pivots configured for Tex-
as-style LEPA dangle long
hoses to ground level, where
John O’Connell/Capital Press
Mud Lake, Idaho, grower Steve Shively stands by a pivot span converted to LESA, a system utilizing
long hoses and low-pressure nozzles to maximize water-use efficiency and minimize power. In this
alfalfa field, the LESA span produced much higher yields and much deeper soil-moisture penetration
than under conventional spans.
water is delivered into fur-
rows between rows through
bubbler nozzles. LESA sprays
water in a flat pattern from
low-pressure nozzles dan-
gling about a foot above the
ground — low enough to pass
below the canopy of plants
and eliminate drift while still
covering a wider, 15-foot di-
ameter to reduce runoff while
delivering a greater volume of
water than LEPA.
“It’s beginning to take off
this year, and by next year, if
growers see the success I an-
ticipate, I expect it’s going to
be a major conversion,” Neib-
ling said.
Last season, Neibling ran
Idaho LESA trials in Terre-
ton and Arco. LESA demon-
stration pivots were set up in
Northern California and Col-
orado State University, and a
few growers in Colorado and
Eureka, Nev., experimented
with it. Water savings ranged
from 20 to 25 percent in last
season’s trials, due to reduced
drift and LESA’s ability to de-
liver water below the canopy,
avoiding evaporation from the
tops of leaves, Neibling said.
This season, Neibling said
about a dozen new LESA sys-
tems are planned in Nevada,
several growers in Northern
California plan to try LESA
and growers throughout East-
ern Idaho want to try LESA to
meet a mandatory reduction
in groundwater use through-
out the Eastern Snake Plain
Aquifer.
“This is a fairly painless
way to meet that cutback and
maybe even have some water
left over,” Neibling said.
Neibling said LESA was
effective last season on flat,
sandy and sand-loam soils,
and he intends to test it this
season on sloping silt-loam
and clay-loam soils. Anheus-
er-Busch is sponsoring a
LESA trial this season involv-
ing three pivots in Idaho Falls
and one in Burley to test if a
drier canopy will reduce malt
barley diseases, and reduce
tipping of plants that can oc-
cur when heads are saturated.
The pivots will have conven-
tional spans, LESA spans and
an experimental configuration
dragging 70 feet of drip tape.
Proponents estimate it
costs about $8,000 to con-
vert a conventional pivot to
LESA.
NRCS district conserva-
tionist Josh Miller said his of-
fice has also applied for LESA
funding for two more seasons.
His grant helps each grower
up to $7,500 toward convert-
ing a single pivot to LESA.
Growers can also receive up
to $1,500 to install moisture
sensors for LESA analysis. He
anticipates the funding will
cover about 30 LESA sys-
tems, with moisture sensors.
Applications will be accepted
through at least mid-May for
growers in Bonneville, Jeffer-
son, Clark, Fremont, Madison
and Teton counties.
Idaho onion growers get big Rains put California’s strawberry
boost against nutsedge weed production behind last year’s pace
By SEAN ELLIS
Capital Press
PARMA, Idaho — Idaho
onion growers have received
a significant boost to their ef-
forts to control the yellow nut-
sedge weed, one of their top
production challenges.
The Idaho State Depart-
ment of Agriculture has is-
sued a special local need
registration that will allow
the herbicide Outlook to be
applied through drip irrigation
systems in fields where Span-
ish big bulb onions are grown.
Eastern Oregon onion
growers are hopeful the Ore-
gon Department of Agriculture
will soon follow suit.
Outlook, produced by
BASF, is already approved for
surface application in Idaho
and Oregon onion fields but
it wasn’t previously approved
for use in drip systems in on-
ion fields.
Malheur County Onion
Growers Association Pres-
ident Paul Skeen said field
trials have shown Outlook is
more effective in controlling
yellow nutsedge when applied
through a drip system.
“It’s really going to help us
in a huge way,” he said. “Out-
look is one of the best tools we
have to control nutsedge and it
works better through the drip
system.”
Farmers in southwestern
Idaho and Eastern Oregon
grow about 20,000 acres of
Spanish bulb onions each year
and yellow nutsedge is their
main weed problem.
Close to 60 percent of the
onions in the region are grown
on drip systems.
In a letter approving a spe-
cial registration for the herbi-
cide, ISDA officials pointed to
the results of field trials con-
ducted near Ontario, Ore., the
past two years by Oregon State
University weed scientist Joel
Felix.
The letter said the trials
showed that “application via
irrigation drip tape in Spanish
yellow onions is significantly
more effective than surface ap-
plied applications, with minor
or no crop injury.”
In July 2015, Outlook ap-
plied through a drip system
provided between 70-90 per-
cent mid-season control of yel-
low nutsedge in onion fields
compared with 9 percent for
standard foliar application, Fe-
lix said.
“It’s working much better
in drip systems than spraying it
over the top,” he said. “We’re
talking much, much better.”
Stuart Reitz, an OSU crop-
ping systems Extension agent
in Malheur County, said re-
searchers can point to no de-
finitive reason why the her-
bicide performs better in drip
systems.
“We don’t really know why
it works that much better when
applied through a drip system,
but it does,” he said. “It really
worked a whole lot better.”
According to OSU re-
search, severe yellow nut-
sedge infestations can reduce
onion yields by as much as 60
percent.
Felix said the special reg-
istration for Outlook “is going
to benefit a good number of
growers. As of now, it’s our
best tool for controlling yel-
low nutsedge in onions.”
By TIM HEARDEN
Capital Press
WATSONVILLE,
Ca-
lif. — Winter rains have put
strawberry production in
California well behind last
year’s pace, but industry rep-
resentatives aren’t concerned
yet about the prospects for a
down year.
As of April 4, strawberry
fields in the Golden State had
produced nearly 26.7 million
flats, well below last year’s
total to date of nearly 45.4
million, according to the Na-
tional Berry Report.
Imports so far are way up,
as 78,885 flats from Peru and
79,996 trays from Chile have
passed through American
ports this year compared to
12,222 and 21,109, respec-
tively, in 2015, according to
the report.
However, industry insid-
ers believe all the rain has
put fields in position to yield
an abundant crop during the
peak harvest season, which
begins this month and usual-
ly lasts through mid-summer.
“It’s behind where it was
this time last year, but ahead
or behind are kind of rela-
tive issues because we’re so
dependent on weather,” Cal-
ifornia Strawberry Commis-
sion spokeswoman Carolyn
O’Donnell said. “Since we
have rain this spring, that
sets us back about halfway
to where we were in 2015 …
but the good news is we did
get rain.
“We didn’t have damage
or anything like that,” she
said. “The plants look really
healthy with the rainfall, and
Tim Hearden/Capital Press
Organic strawberries from Irvine, Calif.-based Orange County
Produce are ready to be enjoyed. March rains put California straw-
berry production behind last year’s pace, but the industry expects
production numbers to be strong during the peak season, which
begins this month.
we’re about to start entering
our peak.”
Last year’s unseasonably
dry and warm winter enabled
strawberry production to get
off to a blistering start. At the
end of March 2015, Califor-
nia growers had turned out
31.9 million crates compared
to 28.2 million the previous
year, and the Salinas-Watson-
ville area — one of the state’s
three prime growing regions
— had produced 1.8 million
flats compared to 438,969 in
2014, according to the straw-
berry commission.
But this winter’s El Ni-
no-powered storms have
given Salinas above-average
rainfall this water season —
12.84 inches as of April 4,
above its average of 11.44
inches, the National Weath-
er Service reports. As such,
the region has produced only
612,625 flats of strawberries
so far this year compared
to nearly 2.9 million at this
point last year, according to
the National Berry Report.
The slow start comes as the
strawberry industry has seen a
period of modest decline af-
ter almost a decade of record
or near-record production.
Production in 2015 dropped
slightly for the second straight
year.
Growers have told the
commission they’ll plant
32,515 acres in 2016 — a
sizable drop from the 37,438
estimated acres last year
and continuing a trend of
annual declines from the
40,816 acres planted in
2013.
Drought, increasing pro-
duction costs and regulatory
restraints have been blamed
for the drop in production.
The industry has phased out
its use of methyl bromide
and has spent millions of
dollars on research into new
varieties, alternatives to fu-
migants and training farmers
and workers in water effi-
ciency and food safety.
Courtesy of Washington State
University
Kansas State University
president Kirk Schulz will take
over as president of Washing-
ton State University. A WSU
entomology professor who sat
on the presidential search ad-
visory committee says Schulz’s
background at a land-grant
university was a consideration
during the selection process.
New WSU
president will
reach out to
agriculture
Schulz says he’s
drawn to land-
grant mission
By MATTHEW WEAVER
Capital Press
Washington State Uni-
versity’s new president says
he was drawn to the school
because of its land-grant
mission.
“I spent my career at
land-grants, they have a
certain style and philosophy
that I think really speaks
to the state they reside in,”
said Kirk Schulz, current-
ly the president of Kansas
State University, in a tele-
phone interview with the
Capital Press.
Schulz expects to start at
WSU in Pullman, Wash., in
mid-June.
Schulz’s
predecessor,
the late Elson Floyd, was
well-regarded by farmers
for his commitment to agri-
culture research.
Schulz said he expects to
take a similar approach as
WSU president, noting ma-
jor agricultural endeavors
at KSU include beef cattle,
wheat and sorghum.
“When I first became
president, one of the things
I did was ask some of our
alumni to show me how a
feedyard operated, to get
out there and understand a
little bit more about wheat
farming,” Schulz said. “I
expect to do the same sorts
of things in my first year at
Washington State — talk
to some of the folks in the
Washington ag industry and
ask them, ‘What kinds of
things can (WSU) be doing
to help you to be success-
ful? What new markets need
to be there, what kind of re-
search do we need to do, are
you getting great students
from us to work in your in-
dustry?’”
Schulz, a chemical engi-
neer by training, grew up in
Norfolk, Va.
“My appreciation for
agriculture has really been
through working with peo-
ple in the ag industry,” he
said. “I don’t have much of
an ag background, which
means I have to ask lots of
questions. I’m more than
happy to get advice on
things we need to be doing.”
Schulz said he plans to
give himself six months to
get to know the universi-
ty before making big deci-
sions.
Schulz said he was “in-
trigued” by WSU’s efforts
to build a publicly fund-
ed medical school and the
state’s decision to reduce
tuition and backfill tuition
dollars with state funding to
make college more afford-
able for residents. Those,
coupled with the land-grant
mission had a great deal of
appeal, he said.
Schulz said WSU has the
potential to impact a grow-
ing and thriving state econ-
omy.
“I’m going to ask people
to educate me a little bit, but
I put a strong priority on our
college of agriculture here
at Kansas State; I certainly
intend to do the same thing
as president at Washington
State,” he said.