LIVESTOCK & HORSE SPECIAL SECTION | INSIDE
EMPOWERING PRODUCERS OF FOOD & FIBER
Friday, December 6, 2019
CapitalPress.com
Volume 92, Number 49
$2.00
Dan Wheat/Capital Press
The FFRobotics robotic apple picker mounted on an Automated Ag Bandit Xpress picking platform.
PROGRESS REPORT
Companies race to improve performance
of their robotic picking machines
By DAN WHEAT
Capital Press
he first season of limited commer- a lot of custom automation from the start. We’ve
cial robotic picking of U.S. apples fell seen too many things break too often to say we’re
short of its goal, but a key fig-
ready to manufacture a lot of machines,”
ure in the effort believes it will
Steere said. “We’re focusing on reinforc-
ing the durability of what we’ve built and
soon reach the mark.
I don’t think we are too far away from
“The results of have been encour-
aging and challenging. Up and down.
reaching that durability.”
The encouraging part is when systems
Robotic harvest has been a dream of
have worked the way they are designed,
the U.S. apple industry for years, par-
ticularly in Washington, where 65% of
they are doing the job. We’re getting the
results we want,” Dan Steere, CEO of Dan Steere the nation’s fresh apple crop is grown.
Apples are the state’s top agricultural
Abundant Robotics of Hayward, Calif.,
said of his machine’s work in Central Washing- commodity with an annual farmgate value of
ton’s apple harvest this fall.
$2.5 billion.
“However, we’ve been limited by too many
See Robotics, Page 12
mechanical hardware failures. We had to invent
T
Abundant Robotics
An Abundant Robotics apple picker at a T&G Global orchard in
New Zealand in February.
Christmas tree growers grapple with tight supplies
Oregon industry recovering from past oversupply
By GEORGE PLAVEN
Capital Press
SALEM — A large semi-
trailer backed into the outdoor
shipping yard Monday after-
noon at BTN of Oregon, where
workers loaded tightly wrapped
Christmas trees for delivery to
stores and tree lots from Califor-
nia to Texas and across the bor-
der into Mexico.
BTN of Oregon grows
approximately 2,500 acres of
Christmas trees east of Salem,
including popular Noble and
Douglas firs. Business is moving
practically nonstop as the calen-
dar flips to December.
“A lot of praying goes on this
time of year,” said Ben Stone,
president of the family-owned
company. “A lot of sleepless
nights.”
Tight supplies are again chal-
lenging Christmas tree ven-
dors as the industry continues to
recover from a massive glut of
cheap trees in the mid-2000s that
caused wholesale prices to crash,
forcing hundreds of Northwest
farms to go out of business or
switch to less labor-intensive
crops.
Stone, who runs BTN of Ore-
gon with his brothers, Tyler and
Nathan, said they are receiving
calls daily from people they’ve
never talked to before looking
for trees.
“We just can’t help,” Stone
said. “It’s unfortunate.”
Oregon is the leading pro-
ducer of Christmas trees nation-
wide, with 383 licensed growers
selling about 4.6 million trees
in 2018, according to estimates
from Oregon State University.
That is down significantly
over the last decade, when there
See Trees, Page 12
George Plaven/Capital Press
Workers load Christmas trees into a
truck on Dec. 2 at BTN of Oregon near
Salem.
‘Faces of Snake River’ campaign
targets dam breaching misinformation
By MATTHEW WEAVER
Capital Press
Pacific Northwest Waterways Association
Fairfield, Wash., wheat grower Marci Green
and her family are featured in the “Faces of the
Snake River” campaign to target misinforma-
tion about breaching dams on the river system.
Northwest agricultural transportation advo-
cates are backing a new advertising campaign
to combat environmentalists’ “simplistic mes-
sages” about removing four dams on the Snake
River.
“Snake River Faces,” sponsored by the
Pacific Northwest Waterways Association, tells
the story of several people who have personal
connections to the river, including a wheat
farmer, a family winery and a port director who
welcomes commercial tour boats and kayaks on
the river in her free time.
Environmental groups have for years called
for the removal of the Ice Harbor, Lower Mon-
umental, Little Goose and Lower Granite dams,
See Campaign, Page 12
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