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CapitalPress.com
Friday, July 23, 2021
Volume 94, Number 30
$2.00
SOLVING THE
DRYLAND PUZZLE
George Plaven/Capital Press
Christina Hagerty, a plant pathologist at the Columbia Basin Agricultural Research Center, serves as one of the project leaders for the station’s Resilient Dry-
land Farming Appropriation.
Researchers seek effi ciency, want to tap into carbon credit market
By GEORGE PLAVEN
Capital Press
tural Research Service unlock the secrets of dry-
land farming and its impacts on climate change.
One appropriation seeks to develop dryland
farming techniques that can improve soil health
and save farmers money by requiring less fertilizer,
herbicides and other inputs.
The other is to study soil carbon sequestration
and the overall carbon footprint of dryland farms
in the region — critical information to determine
whether growers can profi t from participating in
future carbon markets.
“Dryland wheat farmers are the most innovative
folks you will ever meet,” Hagerty said. “We need
to fi ght for the good work our growers are doing.”
The funding also marks a dramatic change of
fortune for the station after years of fi ghting for its
budgetary life.
See Carbon, Page 9
Crop prices spur farm machinery spending
By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI
Capital Press
Higher crop prices have
lifted farmers’ spirits in 2021,
spurring a powerful appetite
for new farm machinery after
years of lackluster demand,
experts say.
Unit sales of new trac-
tors over 100 horsepower
rose 23% during the fi rst half
of the year, while unit sales
of four-wheel drive tractors
surged 32%, according to the
Association of Equipment
Manufacturers. Unit sales
of self-propelled combines
increased 11% in that time.
“Commodity prices are a
pretty good indication of how
farmers feel, and if they feel
good, they’re going to invest
in capital equipment,” said
Curt Blades, AEM’s senior
vice president of ag services.
Large machinery sales
plummeted during the early
days of the coronavirus pan-
demic but recovered enough
to end 2020 on a positive
note.
An upswing in commodity
prices, partly buoyed by for-
eign demand for U.S. crops,
has convinced farmers to
spend more readily on major
purchases in 2021, Blades
said.
Exciting new automa-
tion technology has also
helped, as has the solid mar-
ket for used machinery that’s
ensured high trade-in values,
he said.
“You don’t invest a
half-million dollars in a com-
bine unless you feel pretty
good about your future in the
next few years,” Blades said.
Growers are now proba-
bly seeing their strongest net
returns since 2013, which
also marked a high point
of investment in machin-
ery before years of weaker
demand, said Michael Lange-
meier, a Purdue University
agricultural economist who
tracks the industry.
“Looking at the U.S. as a
whole, 2021 is going to be
better than anything from
2014 to 2019,” he said.
With a better income out-
look, farmers are now more
willing to replace their
machinery — both because
some of it’s wearing out, and
also to reduce their tax obli-
gations, Langemeier said.
See Prices, Page 9
George Plaven/Capital Press
A fi eld of wheat at the Columbia Basin Agricultural Re-
search and Extension Center north of Pendleton, Ore.,
with the Blue Mountains in the distance. The area re-
ceives more precipitation, up to 18 inches annually, com-
pared to other areas of the Columbia Basin.
Bootleg Fire devastates Southern
Oregon farmers, kills livestock
By SIERRA DAWN McCLAIN
Capital Press
FREMONT-WINEMA NATIONAL
FOREST, Ore. – The Bootleg Fire, Ore-
gon’s third-largest wildfi re ever recorded,
has devastated farm communities in
Southern Oregon.
The fi re, according to the Incident
Information System, had burned more
than 390,000 acres as of July 21, an area
larger than Los Angeles. It has killed and
maimed livestock, consumed pasture-
lands and blanketed crops with smoke.
“It’s been awful,” said Connie Wil-
lard, leader of Project Spirit, a nonprofi t
horse rescue.
The past two weeks, Willard and her
volunteers have been helping small farms
evacuate hundreds of animals. Willard’s
team has rescued cows, sheep, goats,
emus, pigs, chickens, ducks and turkeys.
The Bootleg Fire has been especially
hard on cattle ranchers.
“It’s been horrifi c and devastating,”
said Geneva Jayne, a rancher who runs
cattle with her husband and in-laws on
Courtesy of Jana Walker
Trees on fi re in a pasture bordering
the Sycan River.
Forest Service land near where the fi re
started.
The fi re, Jayne said, burned her entire
permit where 180 cows were grazing,
killing about 15 of her cows and one bull.
“We had to euthanize several because
they were so badly injured — hooves
missing, udders burned,” she said.
She started crying.
See Fire, Page 9
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P
ENDLETON, Ore. — Experimental plots of
wheat unfold across the Columbia Basin
Agricultural Research Center like a patch-
work quilt of amber and gold.
Christina Hagerty, an assistant profes-
sor of cereal pathology at the station 7
miles north of Pendleton, walked through the fi elds
on an early July morning pointing out various trials
— everything from tests of new wheat varieties to
new techniques for managing weeds and diseases.
Each trial could ultimately impact farmers’ bot-
tom lines. “As researchers, we need to lose our shirt
before the farmer does,” Hagerty said.
The purpose of the center, commonly known as
CBARC, is to improve dryland farming practices in
a region that receives little precipitation.
Research funded by two new congressional
appropriations will help the center’s scientists from
Oregon State University and the USDA Agricul-