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CapitalPress.com
November 2, 2018
National FFA officer team includes two reps from the West
Leaders elected
at National FFA
Convention & Expo
By GEORGE PLAVEN
Capital Press
Growing up in Bend, Ore.,
Shea Booster was such a chat-
ty kid he earned himself the
nickname “motormouth.”
“I was never shy,” Booster
said. “Every time I met some-
one new, I just loved to talk to
them.”
That outgoing personali-
ty is part of what led Booster
to join FFA as a freshman at
Mountain View High School,
and later serve as Oregon FFA
state president in 2016-17. On
Oct. 27, Booster was one of
six leaders elected to the na-
tional FFA officer team during
the organization’s annual con-
vention in Indianapolis, as the
western region vice president.
Over the next year, Boost-
er, 21, will spend more than
300 days traveling across the
country and overseas to Japan,
speaking to local FFA chap-
ters, farmers and legislators
and spreading the good word
about agriculture education.
He couldn’t have asked for a
more perfect gig.
“I’m super excited,” Boost-
er said. “It still hasn’t really
sank in yet.”
Booster is not a traditional
FFA student. He was not raised
on a farm or ranch. He didn’t
spend summers milking cows
or driving combine. But that is
the beauty of FFA, he said —
in 1988, the “Future Farmers
of America” officially changed
its name to the National FFA
Organization, reflecting its
goal to be accepting and inclu-
sive to all youth.
Today, the National FFA
Organization has nearly
670,000 members in all 50
states, Puerto Rico and the
U.S. Virgin Islands, with local
chapters in 24 of the 25 largest
U.S. cities.
“The FFA has been a highly
diversifying and inclusive or-
ganization,” Booster said. “It
has always made that a prior-
ity.”
Back in high school, Boost-
er said FFA was the one place
he felt he could truly be him-
self. He took immediately to
National FFA Organization
The 2018-19 national FFA officer team. From left are Luke O’Leary,
president, California; Layni LeBlanc, secretary, Louisiana; Shea
Booster, Western region vice president, Oregon; Jordan Stowe,
Southern region vice president, Alabama; Ridge Hughbanks, Cen-
tral region vice president, Oklahoma; and Adrian Schunk, Eastern
region vice president, Michigan.
the group, making it a person-
al rule of thumb to try a new
career development event
every year.
“I was the agriculture rook-
ie,” he said. “Any time I had
the opportunity to try some-
thing new, I would.”
Booster graduated from
Mountain View in 2016, and
is now a sophomore at Oregon
State University majoring in
agricultural business manage-
ment, with a double minor in
communications and Spanish.
He will return to campus from
Indianapolis on Nov. 1 and
wrap up his classes by Thanks-
giving before heading back for
training with the national FFA
officer team on Nov. 24.
The 2018-19 officers also
include Luke O’Leary, of San
Luis Obispo, Calif., who was
Eggert family buys Willamette Valley Cheese Co.
For the Capital Press
The Chuck Eggert family,
which last year sold Tuala-
tin, Ore.-based Pacific Foods
to Campbell Soup Co. for a
reported $700 million, has
purchased Willamette Valley
Cheese Co. of Salem in a move
that will take the cheese com-
pany organic and considerably
increase its production volume.
Charlie Eggert, farm man-
ager for the Eggert family’s
four dairies, said the purchase
“seemed like a good partner-
ship for us with our dairies and
the kinds of things we are try-
ing to do to create jobs in the
Willamette Valley.”
“We are just interested in
keeping good things around
and we’ve always had a lot of
respect for Willamette Valley
Cheese and the products they
create,” he said.
Under terms of the sale,
Willamette Valley Cheese Co.’s
Rod Volbeda will stay on as
facilities manager and cheese
maker at the Salem location.
“The idea of staying the
same and doing what we’ve al-
ways done and then transition-
ing to organic just made me get
excited again,” Volbeda said.
“It was getting hard going
by myself,” he said when asked
why he sold. “The debt load I
had was getting up there, and
I’m at the age where I need to
slow down a little bit.”
Volbeda, 53, said the com-
pany will continue produc-
ing its line of award-winning
cheeses, including Creamy Ha-
varti, Eola Jack, Fontina, Gou-
da and Cheddar, and will con-
tinue operating its tasting room
just west of Salem at 8105 Wal-
lace Road NW.
He declined to give a dollar
amount of the sale, but said he
was satisfied with the terms.
“They gave me a very good job
to run this facility and their plan
is to build more small cheese
operations, and I’m hoping to
be involved in that.”
Willamette Valley Cheese
Co.’s volume is expected to in-
crease five-fold under the new
ownership, he said, from its
current 10,000 pounds a week
to 50,000 pounds once the tran-
sition is complete.
“It is still going to be sin-
gle-herd milk supply,” he said.
“It is just the cows will not be
on this facility, so we will not
be farmstead.”
Willamette Valley Cheese
Co. sold the last of its cows
two months ago and has been
purchasing milk from Darigold
since. That arrangement will
stay in place for the near future,
according to Eggert.
“We haven’t made the
transition yet (to supplying
the cheese company’s milk),”
Eggert said. “We are work-
ing on the details and going
through the process with Or-
egon Tilth on what it is going
to take to turn organic and use
our milk.
“We don’t have any plans
right now as far as when the
changeover will take place,
but that will ultimately be our
goal,” he said. “It is a compli-
cated process and we have nev-
er made organic cheese, so we
are going to learn as we go.”
By LEE JUILLERAT
For the Capital Press
The number of calves
killed in the Fort Klamath
area by the Rogue Wolf Pack
now totals four.
Officials from the Or-
egon Department of Fish
and Wildlife, who over last
weekend confirmed the kill-
ings of three yearlings found
over a three-day period last
week, Tuesday confirmed
a fourth dead calf that was
found Friday morning was
killed by wolves.
The three other dead
calves were found three
different days last week on
Wood River Valley ranch
lands owned by Bill Nichol-
son that are leased to DeTar
Livestock of Dixon, Calif.
The fourth was discovered
Friday on neighboring land
owned by Roger Nicholson,
Bill Nicholson’s cousin.
Tom Collum, wildlife bi-
ologist for ODF&W’s Klam-
ath Falls office, said person-
nel are taking turns camping
in a field near the Nicholson
Ranch where they are using
non-lethal methods, includ-
ing sirens, large bonfires,
strobe lights and the firing of
cracker shells, to try to deter
wolves.
“We’re just trying to em-
ploy some different hazing
devices,” Collum said.
One camper reported
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Pittsburgh synagogue shooting
during the president’s speech
at the convention.
“I haven’t even really heard
the full story yet,” O’Leary
said.
Rounding out the leader-
ship team is Layni LeBlanc,
an animal science-science
and technology major at Lou-
isiana State University, who
was elected national secretary;
Adrian Schunk, a communica-
tions major at Michigan State
University, who was elected
eastern region vice president;
Ridge Hughbanks, an agri-
business major at Oklahoma
State University, who was
elected central region vice
president; and Jordan Stowe,
agriscience education major at
Auburn University, who was
elected southern region vice
president.
Both Booster and O’Leary
said they are eager to see how
FFA is continuing to develop
students across all corners of
the country.
“FFA truly focuses on de-
veloping students,” Booster
said. “Being a part of FFA,
you get to see youth that is
just supremely confident.”
Wolves blamed for fourth dead
calf in a week near Fort Klamath
Fall Forage Festival 2018
Storing Hay - What is the Cost
to Quality?
Glenn Shewmaker, Extension
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Idaho
Overcoming Current Challenges,
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Statewide Producer Round Table
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44-2/106
By MITCH LIES
elected the highest rank of
any FFA officer as national
president. O’Leary previously
served as California FFA pres-
ident in 2017-18, and is now
studying agriculture leadership
and development with a minor
in political science at Texas
A&M University.
Like Booster, O’Leary, 20,
does not come from an agri-
cultural background, though
he does remember spending
summers on his grandfather’s
cattle ranch in Grant County,
Ore. His first class at San Luis
Obispo High School was ag-
ricultural sciences, which he
said only reinforced his pas-
sion for production agricul-
ture.
“It was right from the start
of freshman year that I was
hooked,” O’Leary said.
Being chosen national FFA
president was an incredible ex-
perience, O’Leary said, made
only more surreal by what
happened just before the elec-
tion. O’Leary’s father, Thom,
the lead pastor at a nondenom-
inational Christian church in
San Luis Obispo, was called
by President Donald Trump to
lead a prayer in the wake of the
Deadline is Friday, November 2nd.
Register by email to Jerome Magnuson: jmagnuson@dlfna.com
Include Fall Forage Festival 2018 in the subject. Indicate name(s) and
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on November 16th. No charge for students with valid ID. 44-1/100
Courtesy of Bill Nicholson
Attacked by wolves, this beef
cow died in a ditch.
hearing howling and dis-
tressed bawling about 1:30
a.m. Friday, but no noise
has been reported in recent
nights.
Remote cameras are be-
ing used to help track pos-
sible movement and five
traps have been set in hopes
of capturing wolves so they
can be collared with tracking
devices. Efforts at tracking
wolf movements have been
frustrated because none of
the Rogue Pack wolves, in-
cluding OR-7, have operat-
ing collars.
Nicholson said the num-
ber of wolves in the valley is
uncertain because one cam-
era picked up six, including
OR-7, while five were seen
by another camera in a near-
by field at about the same
time. OR-7 has a collar but it
no longer works.
In 2016, when four graz-
ing cattle were attacked
and eaten alive by wolves,
ODF&W and other game
biologists also stayed over-
night in an effort to deter
wolf predation. At the time,
one wolf had an operating
collar that helped track the
pack’s movements.
On Saturday, when
ODF&W biologists visited
the Nicholson ranch, it was
determined one calf had been
attacked and was bleeding
when it was dragged 500 feet
to a ditch, where it died.
Until last week it was be-
lieved the Rogue Pack was
on the west side of the Cas-
cade Range. In September it
was determined a large dog
guarding cattle near Prospect
had been killed by a wolf.
Before the recent killing, the
last confirmed cattle attacks
by the Rogue Pack were in
January, when two calves
were killed two days apart
near Butte Falls.
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STORAGE
2680 Cherry Ave. NE
Salem, OR 97301
(503) 399-7454
AUCTION
SAT., NOV. 10TH, 2018
at 10 A.M.
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Unit 132
Unit 218
Regan A Liddle
Savannah Johnson
Advanced
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Frias Construction
Unit 173
Sandra Patty
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Shana Sullivan
Unit 169
David Holmes
Unit 11
Kevin Keller
Unit 138/AS-72 Norma Palacios
CherryAvenue Storage
reserves the right to
refuse any and all bids.
43-2-1/999