November 18, 2016
CapitalPress.com
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Willamette Valley named 2016 Wine Region of the Year
By ERIC MORTENSON
Capital Press
Oregon’s Willamette Val-
ley wine producers are on a
definite roll. Distinguished
awards for individual vin-
tages, investment by some of
the industry’s biggest names
and now this: Wine Enthu-
siast, one of the industry’s
bibles, has named the valley
its 2016 Wine Region of the
Year.
The Willamette Valley was
up against heady competition:
the Champagne and Provence
wine regions of France, Sono-
ma in California, and the
Greek island of Crete.
The magazine cited the
valley’s rapid evolution, be-
ginning from scratch 50 years
ago when a handful of pio-
neering winemakers — only
one of whom had agricultur-
al experience — began cul-
tivating Pinot noir grapes, a
cool-weather varietal notori-
ously touchy about being ush-
ered into a bottle.
They figured it out. The
valley has since become rec-
ognized as one of the world’s
premier Pinot noir regions,
and is home to 530 wineries
and nearly 20,000 acres of
grapes.
The valley grows multi-
ple other varietals as well,
and skilled viticulturists have
taken up the torch in Southern
Oregon, the Columbia River
Gorge and Eastern Oregon, all
of which are expanding vine-
yard acreage and producing
well-regarded wines.
Big companies from out-
side the state have taken no-
tice, most notably Jackson
Family Wines of California
and Louis Jadot of France,
both of which bought Oregon
vineyards and set up shop.
“Outside investment has
accelerated,” Wine Enthusiast
said in announcing its 2016
Wine Star award winners,
“propelled by the recognition
that Willamette Valley Pinor
noir can challenge Burgundy
(France) in its ability to cap-
ture the nuance and power of
the grape.”
The Willamette Valley
earned the award due to the
“outstanding quality of its
wines and the tectonic shift in
wine investments these have
engendered,” the magazine
said.
Earlier this fall, Wine En-
thusiast chose a Pinot gris by
Eugene’s King Estate Winery
as its best value of the year.
In a prepared statement,
Oregon Wine Board Chair-
man David Beck said the
state’s producers are primari-
ly small- to mid-size farmers,
more than half of whom make
fewer than 5,000 cases a year.
“This award is the direct
reflection of the attention and
care given by Oregon’s grape-
growers and winemakers
from vine to bottle,” he said.
The magazine’s Wine Star
award for American Winery
of the Year went to Bonterra
Organic Vineyards, of Men-
docino County, Calif.
Eric Mortenson/Capital Press
Pinot noir grapes fill a tote in this photo from Oregon’s 2014
harvest. Wine Enthusiast magazine named the Willamette Valley
its 2016 Wine Region of the Year, citing its wine quality and the
outside investment it has attracted.
Regulations, predators top new
CPOW president’s concerns
By MATTHEW WEAVER
Capital Press
Matthew Weaver/Capital Press File
Program specialist Taylor Keeton calculates the falling number for a wheat sample Aug. 9 in the
Spokane Valley, Wash., office of the state Department of Agriculture grain inspection service. At right,
technician Mike Espinoza washes beakers from the test. A grain company has filed a tort claim alleg-
ing that the state didn’t follow federal procedures in performing the tests.
Grain company files tort
claim against state agency
over falling numbers
By MATTHEW WEAVER
Capital Press
A Wilbur, Wash., grain
company claims it was dam-
aged because state grain in-
spectors violated federal pro-
cedure when they adjusted for
altitude while testing wheat
for falling numbers in Spo-
kane.
Glacier Grains Inc. filed a
tort claim Oct. 28 against the
Washington Department of
Agriculture Grain Inspection
Program.
The company claims
$7,869.55 in damages.
Hector Castro, spokesman
for WSDA, said the agency
has 60 days to respond. He
declined to comment further.
Grain elevators use the
Hagberg-Perten falling num-
ber test to measure starch
damage due to sprouting. A
low falling number indicates
a high level of alpha amy-
lase, an enzyme that degrades
starch and diminishes the
quality of wheat products.
Grain with a falling number
below 300 typically receives a
discount in the Pacific North-
west. Rain and temperature
fluctuations are the primary
causes.
“I believe the state de-
partment of agriculture is not
following the federal proce-
dure for conducting the fall-
ing number test,” said Ben-
jamin Wyborney, a Spokane
attorney representing Glacier
Grains. His father and broth-
er, Robert Wyborney and Pete
Wyborney, are listed in the
claim as president of Glacier
Grains.
Discounts for falling num-
ber vary depending on the
elevator, according to the
Washington Grain Commis-
sion. Some companies dock
a penny per point below 300,
so 299 would cause a one-cent
discount. Others discount by
the quarter, meaning that 299
would be docked the same as
276, 25 cents.
This year’s total crop was
157.3 million bushels, ac-
cording to the commission.
Forty-two percent of the sam-
ples tested by WSDA had low
falling numbers.
Under USDA require-
ments, offices must adjust
for altitude at locations above
2,000 feet. The Spokane of-
fice is at roughly 1,920 feet,
Wyborney, the lawyer, said.
He believes the office is
making the altitude adjust-
AIRWAY
HEIGHTS,
Wash. — Agency overreach is
the biggest challenge ranchers
face, the new leader of Cattle
Producers of Washington says.
Kettle Falls rancher Scott
Nielsen was elected president
during the group’s annual meet-
ing in Airway Heights.
“We have a system to deal
with regulations through our
representatives, our elected
government,” Nielsen told the
Capital Press. “We’re being
regulated out of business, and
it’s not being done through our
electeds. Regulation without
representation is tyranny, and I
think we’re experiencing some
tyranny.”
Nielsen said agencies should
work through the legislative
process, as ranchers must.
“I think our legislators would
be appalled to know how some
of those things are,” he said. “I
think we can get our electeds to
put some checks and balances
on the regulators. I think we
Matthew Weaver/Capital Press
Kettle Falls, Wash., rancher
Scott Nielsen is the new presi-
dent of the Cattle Producers of
Washington.
can make headway there.”
CPOW also reaffirmed its
position that predators should
not be able to prey on livestock.
“Agencies are responding
to social pressures, and (Wash-
ington Department of Fish and
Wildlife) should be relying on
science-based
approaches,”
Nielsen said. “We’re going to
hold them accountable to the
things they say.”
CPOW left the state’s wolf
advisory group in 2015, calling
it “inept and pointless.” Niel-
sen said CPOW can still be in-
volved without a representative
on the group.
“That is a classic example
of social management,” he said.
“There’s nothing wrong with
groups trying to do that, I just
don’t like agencies using those
groups as their steering tool.
We should be helping shape
opinions and we will.”
Nielsen doesn’t believe the
12-nation Trans-Pacific Part-
nership trade deal will advance
since it’s so unpopular politi-
cally.
“There isn’t a candidate out
there right now who supports
TPP,” he said.
The most hopeful thing on
the horizon?
“There’s a lot of negative
stuff out there,” Nielsen said,
but he believes the industry is
coming together.
“Ranchers are a bunch of
rogue guys who go do their own
darn thing and they’ve always
been that way,” he said. “Those
guys are starting to recognize
we’re getting slaughtered one
by one. ... But those of us that
are there, they’re recognizing
we’ve got to work together to
come up with a solution.”
ment “arbitrarily.”
“I do not believe they have
authorization to deviate from
the federal procedure,” he
said.
The Spokane laborato-
ry conducts one-third of the
state’s falling number tests.
Other laboratories are in Col-
fax and Pasco, Wyborney
said.
“If I am correct and the
state lab is doing the test
wrong, that is causing about
a 27-second reduction in the
falling number,” Wyborney
said.
State law requires an ad-
ministrative claim to be filed
with the Office of Risk Man-
agement, Wyborney said.
After 60 days, if not satisfied
with the results of that claim,
the company can file a civ-
il complaint, he said. If not
satisfied then, it could appeal
through the court system.
“I don’t know how far it’s
going to go — that is the typi-
cal road map,” he said.
The claim is the only one
from the last decade an ana-
lyst was able to locate pertain-
ing to falling number tests,
said Linda Kent, spokeswom-
an for the Department of En-
terprise Services.
By MATTHEW WEAVER
Capital Press
COEUR D’ALENE, Ida-
ho — Wheat farmers say the
current farm bill doesn’t ad-
equately protect them against
extended periods of low pric-
es.
That was one of the results
of a National Association of
Wheat Growers survey shared
by legislative director Josh
Tonsager during the Tri-State
Grain Growers Convention in
Coeur d’Alene, Idaho.
A majority of respondents
also said the yield data used
to calculate payments is in-
accurate. They would prefer
yield data used by the USDA
Risk Management Agency
and crop insurance be used in-
stead of data from the USDA
National Agricultural Statis-
tics Service.
Most farmers who re-
sponded had purchased reve-
nue protection crop insurance.
The survey will help the or-
ganization identify priorities as
discussions of a new farm bill
begin next spring.
Farmers have until Dec. 15
to respond to the survey.
NAWG CEO Chandler
Goule said the association is
going to keep its game plan for
the farm bill close to the vest.
“It’s very important we
keep this confidential,” Goule
said. “If we come in, put our
farm bill principles together
and then lay them all down on
the table, print them and send
them around, we have pretty
much wiped out our hand of
having anything to leverage.”
Some of the policy chang-
es likely in the next farm bill
will focus on cotton and dairy
farmers. Their insurance pro-
grams haven’t worked as
planned, Goule and Tonsager
said.
NAWG wants to establish
a Wheat Caucus to meet with
congressional leaders and their
staffs about industry priorities.
“The idea would be to have
a venue in place where we can
have champions on the Hill
helping us out to discuss our
issues,” Tonsager said.
“Even some basic edu-
cational things, about the
different classes of wheat,
what they’re used for”
would help members from
non-wheat-producing
ar-
eas understand the crop, he
said.
47-4/#6
NAWG survey reveals issues to resolve in next farm bill