July 14, 2017
CapitalPress.com
3
Washington Strawberry Commission may disband
Chairman says he’s
‘dumbfounded’
by lack of interest
By DON JENKINS
Capital Press
OLYMPIA — Fittingly,
no one from the strawber-
ry industry came to a public
hearing Tuesday at the De-
partment of Agriculture on
whether to disband the Wash-
ington Strawberry Commis-
sion.
The commission’s chair-
man, Lacey berry grower Tim
Spooner, said in a phone inter-
view afterward that the hear-
ing typified the lack of interest
in the commission.
“It’s just like when nobody
shows up for the commission
meetings,” he said. “When you
don’t get participation and in-
volvement, it’s very tough.”
The commission, which
has four vacancies on its
eight-member board, asked
WSDA in April to terminate
it and the half-cent per pound
assessment paid by growers.
Tim Hearden/Capital Press File
The Washington Strawberry Commission, which has four vacan-
cies on its eight-member board, asked WSDA in April to terminate
it and the half-cent per pound assessment paid by growers.
The commission’s revenue
has dropped sharply in the past
15 years, along with the acres
of strawberries planted in the
state.
The commission in 2016
collected $36,144 from 35
growers, less than one-third
the amount raised 15 years
ago. Over the same period,
harvested strawberry acres
have fallen to 900 acres from
1,800 acres, according to the
USDA.
“A lot of it boils down to
labor, labor costs,” Spooner
said. “Labor is getting scary
at times.”
The commission has never
funded marketing, but it does
fund research in Washington,
Oregon and British Columbia.
After administrative expens-
es, the commission has about
$20,000 to distribute, Spoon-
er said.
The commission’s part-
time
manager,
Walter
Swenson, said he isn’t thrilled
about the thought of taking
another pay cut. “I don’t think
the industry is going to die,
but I’m not sure of the need
for the commission,” he said.
WSDA Director Derek
Sandison will decide whether
to put the commission’s pro-
posal to disband to a binding
vote by growers.
WSDA commodity com-
missions manager Teresa
Norman said the department
would like to help re-energize
the commission. She said that
she’s concerned that some
strawberry farmers aren’t at-
tuned to the benefits of a com-
mission.
“It makes me wonder if
they even know what a fine,
PNW cherry crop will likely set a record
functioning commission is re-
ally like,” she said. “My worry
is we’re not really reaching ev-
erybody.”
WSDA also has concerns
about how the commission is
managed.
The commission ap-
proached WSDA last winter
about making every board po-
sition at-large. The idea was to
eliminate districts and make
filling vacancies easier.
WSDA officials told the
commission that it would first
need to comply with a long list
of state rules, such as holding
at least two meetings a year
and following state-approved
bookkeeping procedures.
“I think it would take less
than a week to comply with
all the requirements,” Norman
said.
Spooner said the com-
mission can get its busi-
ness done in one meeting a
year, and it’s tough enough
to get a quorum for one, let
alone two meetings. He said
WSDA does a “wonderful
job” supporting commis-
sions, but added that there
are a lot of requirements put
on volunteer board members.
“They make it pretty com-
plicated now in running a
commission,” he said.
The breaking point, accord-
ing to Swenson, came when
the board dropped to four
members — one fewer than
demanded by state law.
Spooner said that he’s been
chairman for about 20 years
and has tried in vain to get
more growers interested in the
commission. He drafted his
nephew, Puyallup farmer Sam
Spooner, to fill one board posi-
tion. Another board position is
filled by WSDA’s representa-
tive, Tobin Gilbert, who works
in the department’s plant pro-
tection division.
“We just don’t get any in-
terest. It dumbfounds me,”
Tim Spooner said.
He said he started viewing
the commission as a “dying
quail” a few years ago when
growers badly defeated a pro-
posal to raise the assessment
to a penny per pound. Only a
small minority even bothered
to vote, he said.
“I was seeing where this
thing was going,” he said.
Blue-green algae bloom
kills 32 cattle in S. Oregon
By DAN WHEAT
Capital Press
By ALIYA HALL
YAKIMA, Wash. — The
Pacific Northwest fresh cherry
crop is half harvested and now
estimated as the largest in his-
tory.
In May, it was forecast at
22.7 million, 20-pound boxes
but the consensus was it could
easily be larger. In late June,
Northwest Cherry Growers,
the industry’s promotional
arm in Yakima, updated the
estimate to 24.5 million boxes.
If reached, it will surpass the
record crop of 23.4 million in
2014.
“I definitely do think we
will hit that,” B.J. Thurlby,
Northwest Cherry Growers
president, said of the new
number.
There was a time when that
many cherries would strike
fear in shippers and marketers
because packing houses were
not equipped to handle large
volumes quickly.
That’s no longer a problem
with high-speed, electron-
ic sizer-sorters used in most
packing houses, producing
more consistent high quality.
“We can run it all fast and
have great packouts but the
challenge is changing pack-
aging,” Thurlby said. “We’ve
gained time away from hand
sorting but lost it on packaging
a little.”
There are different sizes
of clamshells and bags and
Capital Press
Dan Wheat/Capital Press
A limited amount of hand sorting still occurs on Columbia Fruit Packers’ new high-tech, high-speed
cherry line in Wenatchee, Wash., on June 20. A proliferation of such lines in the last three years is
helping the industry handle what’s likely to end up as a record large crop this season.
different labels and produc-
tion managers are “logistical
geniuses” to keep it all going,
he said.
As of July 10, 12.5 million
boxes had been shipped and
shipments averaged 546,000
boxes per day for the 10 days
leading up through July 7,
Thurlby said. Those are record
shipments for that time of year.
A new single-day shipment re-
cord of 682,000 boxes was set
on June 26, likely the season
peak, he said.
Sales volume was better
than expected through the
Fourth of July but could have
been better, he said. The holi-
day is a key sales time.
With the crop being later
Grass
Expertise.
Over 40 Years
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this year, 7.8 million boxes
were sold in June versus a
record 12.3 million last June,
11.9 million in June 2015 and
9.9 million in 2014.
Weather has been excel-
lent, perhaps the best in recent
memory with no crop-dam-
aging rain or prolonged hot
streaks.
“The hot days we have had
have been followed by cool
nights which is ideal because
it brings on the sugar,” said
Tom Riggan, general manager
of Chelan Fresh Marketing in
Chelan, Wash.
Warm days and cool nights
maintain harvest spread be-
tween he varieties, which is
good, Thurlby said.
The only negative seems to
be too much small fruit pres-
suring prices downward.
“Prices are not good and
LET’S TALK!
packouts are tough. There’s a
lot of small fruit,” said Josh
Koempel, a Peshastin, Wash.,
grower.
Charles Lyall, a Mattawa
grower, echoed that, saying
Rainier prices were OK but
that red cherry prices were not
holding well because there’s
just so many of them.
“Word is out that many
packers have quit packing
12-row size. They are going
to processing or not being
picked,” Riggan said.
Cherries are sized by the
number of cherries that fit in
one row of a 20-pound box.
Early Chelan and Santi-
na varieties and Bing were
about a size smaller than last
year but Canadian varieties,
Lapin and Skeena, which
are now being harvested, are
larger, Riggan said.
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A blue-green algae out-
break in a Lake County, Ore.,
reservoir has killed 32 head of
cattle.
The outbreak began on
KV Bar Ranch about June
12. John Shine, owner of the
south-central Oregon ranch,
said the steers “just started
dying.” That afternoon 11
died, and the rest followed
within 72 hours. Although
Shine is the ranch owner, the
cattle lost belonged to another
rancher.
“We had a reservoir that
cattle have been drinking
out of for 60 years, and nev-
er had a problem. Then this
breeze comes from the north
and carried this layer of scum
3 to 4 feet from the edge and
that’s what they were drink-
ing. We noticed the cattle had
blue legs,” Shine said. “We
thought it was poison at first.
We didn’t know what it was.”
The color and the smell
were the most noticeable
things to Shine.
“It’s a turquoise color;
it’s not green,” he said. “It
smelled like rotten seaweed at
the ocean.”
Despite the name, blue-
green algae are actually
bacteria. It occurs naturally
in many fresh and still wa-
ters, and is recognizable by
a collection of surface scum
that “looks like a green paint
spill,” said Dr. Rod Ferry, a
veterinarian at Lakeview An-
imal Hospital. Although some
blue-green algae species are
harmless, others produce a
toxin that in large doses can
affect the liver or the nervous
system. The toxin can affect
both animals and people.
“It’s unusual to lose 32
(cattle) in one hit,” said Theo
Dreher, a microbiology pro-
fessor at Oregon State Uni-
versity. “It’s probably not
infrequent in cases of ranch
land cattle where a few stock
die, but this is pretty excep-
tional, and points out the dan-
ger that does exist when you
get one of these blooms.”
They suspect that the
bloom formed because of
Oregon’s increased rainwater
this winter and spring, af-
ter several years of drought.
During that time excess ma-
nure may have washed into
tanks, ponds or reservoirs,
which caused an increased
nutrient load for the algae to
feed on and grow, creating the
bloom, Pete Schreder, OSU
Extension livestock agent,
said in an email.
Wind can also help aggre-
gate the clumps of algae.
For producers, losing 32
head “is relatively devastat-
ing,” Schreder said.
After they eat the toxin,
cattle will quit eating, stagger
or be unable to rise after ly-
ing on the ground. Eventually,
they will go into a coma and
die. Death can come up to 72
hours after initial exposure.
“There is no treatment
available. It’s pretty impracti-
cal to treat cattle with a lethal
dose because it just can’t save
Courtesy of Kansas State University
A blue-green algae bloom in a
Lake County, Ore., reservoir
killed 32 cattle. Not all blooms
are toxic, and ranchers and
others should report any out-
breaks so they can be tested.
them,” Ferry said.
Ranchers should be dil-
igent and check all water
sources for anything atypical.
If they see anything suspi-
cious, keep livestock away
from the water and call the
local OSU Extension office.
This is the first reported
case of blue-green algae in
Lake County, Schreder and
Ferry said.
“I’ve been here for 30
years and haven’t seen it in
this county to this degree,”
Ferry said. “It’s not some-
thing experienced here.”
There have been other
sightings of blue-green algae
in Oregon, according to Dre-
her, the microbiology profes-
sor. Toxic species have been
found in the South Umpqua
River, Detroit Lake, Upper
Klamath Lake, South Tensile
Lake and areas of Lake Billy
Chinook, according the Ore-
gon Health Authority’s algae
bloom advisories website.
While some algaecides
are available to treat smaller
ponds, they are temporary and
costly. Any chemical treat-
ments will affect too many
other natural systems in the
water, and would not be feasi-
ble, Schreder and Dreher said.
“We really just have to let
it run its course. It grows and
blooms, and then dissipates
over time,” Schreder said.
Dreher estimated that the
dissipation period can last a
couple of weeks.
“In a small reservoir many
things can happen. The bacte-
ria can die off and be eaten by
other organisms and bacteria,
or it could settle out on the
sediment under the water and
stop growing or it can be dis-
rupted by currents and wind
until the concentration low-
ers,” Dreher said.
Dreher also reminds pro-
ducers to be aware of the al-
gae if they’re irrigating their
pastures, as that might cause
further exposure problems.
After a bloom has formed
once in a reservoir or pond it
can be more susceptible in the
future.
“All water has the capabil-
ity, but it happens when the
stars align just right,” Schred-
er said. “We’re looking into
the summer and can’t predict
if we’re going to have more
blooms; we just have to watch
and see. We want to alert peo-
ple to be diligent and keep an
eye out on ponds and reser-
voirs this year.”