FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 2017
THE BAKER COUNTY PRESS — 5
Local
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CONTINUED FROM
PAGE 1
She said, “It’s often that
you have a failure from a
GPS collar, either from a
battery, or technical fail-
ure... There’s an awful lot
of technology in those GPS
collars, and they’re quite as
expensive, as well.
“The price of the VHF
collar is much, much less,
and there are less things
to go wrong...As we have
more and more packs in
Oregon, we need to not
have to collar them so
often...”
ODFW has used wolf
radio-collar products from
three suppliers, Vectron-
ics, Lotek, and Telonics,
and Brown said that a
VHF collar costs around
$400, and a GPS collar
costs from around $700 to
$3,500.
She added that each pack
scenario presents a dif-
ferent collaring decision,
and, “The Minam Pack has
never depredated, they’ve
never had an investiga-
tion on them, and they’re
mostly in the wilderness,
so, they’re a good option
for a pack to have a VHF
collar...”
She said that she’d like
to see a GPS collar placed
on one of the wolves in
the pack, but she noted the
difficulty in capturing one
of them.
Troy Woydziak, co-
owner and co-operator
of Baker Aircraft, with
his wife, Gen, flies for
ODFW on a regular basis,
to conduct animal number
surveys, including wolves
(Brown said the wolf count
is normally completed
during the winter), and he
assisted Brown in locat-
ing OR46, so she could
tranquilize him, and place
the VHF collar.
“Normally, they’ll put a
GPS collar on...” Woyd-
ziak said, and, like Brown,
he noted the historical is-
sues with the GPS collars,
but he also said that a GPS
collar could be placed at a
later date.
The GPS collars ODFW
uses log location data,
which can be used to
produce range maps for the
wolf packs, and to notify
livestock producers of wolf
presence, but the VHF
collars, while cheaper and
less prone to failure, don’t
provide that same capabil-
ity, Brown said.
Woydziak said, “If that
wolf decides he’s going
to take off, and head to
southern Oregon or Cali-
fornia unless you have an
airplane following him ev-
ery couple of days, you’re
going to lose track of him.
“We can only pick him
up from maybe fifteen,
twenty miles away, up in
the airplane or helicopter,
with those (VHF) collars...
“If he takes off, and just
heads out, and goes several
miles a day, it doesn’t take
too many days, before he’s
going to be out of range,
and you’re not going to
know where to go...
“He could go back to
Idaho, he could go to
Washington...”
Woydziak said that, fly-
ing the three-passenger,
yellow and blue Robinson
R-44 Raven II, with the tail
number N1795J, he honed
in on the largest and dark-
est wolf in the group that
he and Brown saw, which
is usually the alpha male,
though, in this case, that
isn’t confirmed yet.
ODFW staff will present
the 2016 Wolf Annual Re-
port and an updated draft
of the Wolf Conservation
and Management Plan to
the Oregon Fish and Wild-
life Commission, during
the Commission’s Friday,
April 21, 2017 meeting, in
Klamath Falls, according
to ODFW.
Sumpter poker run, outhouse
races provide fun—in the rain
BY MEGHAN ANDERSCH
Meghan@TheBakerCountyPress.com
The Sumpter Valley
Blue Mountain Snowmo-
bile Club’s annual Poker
Run/Outhouse Races this
Saturday saw leaden skies
that brought snow in the
morning and rain by the
afternoon.
Despite the sog factor,
enthusiastic participants
turned out to purchase
Master Poker Cards at
the Sumpter Community
Center Friday night and
throughout the day on
Saturday.
Members of the Snow-
mobile Club and Sumpter
Valley Community Volun-
teers manned seven check
stations in town and one at
Blue Springs Snow Park.
Sumpter check stations
included the Sumpter Mu-
seum and Public Library,
Elkhorn Saloon, Depot
Inn Motel, Soda Moun-
tain Pet Supplies, Rustic
Realty, Stage Stop Gas Sta-
tion, and the Community
Center.
Participants drew a chip
at each of seven stations
for each Master Card, with
the best five cards drawn
per hand counting.
The deadline to turn in
poker cards was Saturday
at 2 p.m.
Barbara Malone, Snow-
mobile Club treasurer,
confirmed that 168 players
participated with a total of
302 Master Cards sold.
In addition to poker
cards, the Snowmobile
Club sold 2,942 raffle
tickets.
Malone said that it is
expected that profits from
the event will be sufficient
to allow the club to accom-
plish its goal of support-
ing “charities and/or civic
projects.”
Cash and raffle prizes
were awarded at the
Sumpter groomer shed in
the evening.
The top five poker hands
belonged to Team Green-
field with five 10s, Kelly
Green with four sevens and
a king, Ryan Felin with
four sevens and a queen,
Marcus Boier with four
sixes, and Doug Leather-
man with four fives.
In total, $3,100 was paid
out to 24 winners.
Lori-Jean Pruitt and Jane
Leatherman were in charge
of the afternoon’s outhouse
IRS scam
strikes
The Baker County Sheriff’s Office would like to warn
residents about a fraud/money scheme that is surfacing in
the area.
There has been a report of a citizen being contacted by
phone and told they owe money to the IRS. Caller ID
shows the suspect originates out of Texas and provides a
US Treasury number and Employee Code to the potential
victim.
The threat of an arrest warrant issued by the Baker
County Sheriff’s Office is also used to try and scare the
potential victim into action.
The suspect was able to mask our Sheriff’s Office busi-
ness line (541-523-6415) and uses the name of “Deputy
Mark Anderson” in an attempt to seem more legitimate.
The Baker County Sheriff’s Office does not issue IRS
Warrants and will not be collecting fees for the IRS.
This is a scam. If you are a recipient of this type of call,
please do not hesitate to notify local law enforcement.
In this case, the potential victim became aware that
it was a scam when the caller requested payment using
“iTunes.”
Warrant scam
also strikes
The Baker County Sheriff’s Office would like to warn
residents about the most recent fraud/money scheme that
is occurring in Baker County.
There has been a report of a citizen being contacted by
phone and told that there is a warrant for their arrest.
The suspect then gives them the phone number to
the Baker County Consolidated Dispatch Center (541-
523-6415) to confirm that the warrant is valid. Please be
advised that this is a scam.
If you are a recipient of this type of call, please do not
hesitate to notify local law enforcement.
‘Good Food,
Bad Food’
coming to the
library
Meghan Andersch / The Baker County Press
Lila Young manning the Community Center check station.
Oregon boasts a multibillion-dollar agricultural
economy that includes both industrial agriculture and
small-scale efforts such as community supported agri-
culture memberships, farmers’ markets, and community
gardens. These smaller, community-based efforts are on
the rise as means to nurture community and create local
and autonomous food systems.
Are these choices as consequential as consumers would
like them to be? Does voting with your dollars signifi-
cantly shape our agricultural systems?
This is the focus of Good Food, Bad Food: Agriculture,
Ethics, and Personal Choice, a free conversation with
Kristy Athens on Saturday, March 11, 2017 at 1:00pm at
Baker County Public Library, 2400 Resort Street, Baker
City, Oregon. This program is hosted by Baker County
Library District and sponsored by Oregon Humanities.
Athens is the author of Get Your Pitchfork On! : The
Real Dirt on Country Living. Her food systems work
includes presenting at conferences at Chatham and Yale
universities, a TEDx Talk, and a chapter in the anthol-
ogy Food Justice in US and Global Contexts. She lives
in Wallowa County, where she works at the NE Oregon
Economic Development District as outreach specialist
and serves on the board of the Wallowa County Farmers’
Market.
Theater
auditions
February 27
Meghan Andersch / The Baker County Press
Some local kids test drive the outhouses for fun.
races, with Kurt Clarke
assisting with officiating.
Clarke’s ultralight twenty-
four pound outhouse on
snowboards was used
for the official race, with
John Young’s “Old Yeller”
model also available to run
on the track.
Neil Bork’s stoutly-built
outhouse was used as a
“race office” to keep rain
off the entry forms.
This year’s event fea-
tured kids’ races, with the
steady drizzle by that time
perhaps discouraging any
adult participants.
After a timed round, the
kids proceeded for the next
half hour or so to joyfully
haul the outhouses up and
down the course, even
persuading several of the
grown-up onlookers to
help them for a run or two.
Eastern Oregon Regional Theatre is proud to announce
the auditions for their next production “Spitfire Grill” the
musical.
Director Leanne Hinkle is looking for four women
and three men to perform in this production which opens
April 2017.
Auditions will be Monday, February 27th and Tuesday,
February 28th at 6 p.m. at the Ironate Theatre located in
the Basche Sage Mall in Baker City, Oregon.
“The Spitfire Grill” musical has had more than 500
productions.
Based on the award-winning film by Lee David Zlot-
off, the musical depicts the journey of a young woman
just released from prison who decides to start her life
anew in a rural Wisconsin town.
She precipitates a journey within the town itself toward
its own tenuous reawakening.
The folk and bluegrass tinged score is unlike that for
any other musical.