Illinois Valley News, Cave Junction, OR 97523 February 12, 2003
Page 9
Ore. greenhouses happy
to pay tax for bug control
Fourteen businesses and two organizations attended the Fed-
eral Forestry Contracting Workshop on Saturday, Feb. 8. Bill
Duke, who has been helping small contractors in Lakeview for
Sustainable North West, facilitated the discussions. Duke shared
some of his experiences and provided a number of hints on how
to find, prepare for, and obtain Forest Service, BLM, and RAC
contracts.
One of the main strategies Duke has used is to work with the
agency contracting officers to shape contracts that are more user-
friendly (smaller acreage and longer duration) for the small busi-
ness.
The group who attended decided to form an association as a
way to explore how to work together to keep these contracts in
Illinois Valley for local businesses. The association is an attempt
to influence the contracting process and to provide services to
members.
Since many of the contracts are announced on the web, com-
puter skills are important; we will be organizing a computer class
for those who want to sharpen their skills.
There also may be advantages in terms of meeting licensure
requirements in forming a cooperative. An umbrella co-op busi-
ness might also be a way to increase the capacity of individual
small businesses by bringing together the equipment, workforce,
and experience each has individually in order to bid on larger
jobs. The idea of a co-op will be explored to determine if there is
value in coming together.
To join the association, attend the next meeting on Saturday,
Feb. 22 at 9 a.m. at the Josephine County Building. Phone the
CRT office for more information.
National Fire Plan Applications
Applications are due for the next round of Fire Plan projects
on February 27. The IV Forestry Contractors Assoc. has asked the
CRT to apply for a grant to fund thinning in the wild-land-urban
interface.
For those not familiar with federal terminology, that means
private property where we live adjacent to federal lands. The ac-
tual work would be performed by members of the association.
There is another type of project - Fuels Utilization and Mar-
keting - that can be applied for as well. The CRT currently has
such a project to assist local wood product businesses in market-
ing. The group met last week and decided to purchase a digital
camera, lights, and backdrop for taking product photographs. The
group also decided to contract with Original Web Solutions to
build an IV Wood Product portal web site.
Any woodworker wanting to improve their marketing is eligi-
ble to participate in this program. Please contact the CRT office
for details.
The purpose of the Fuels Utilization and Marketing grants is
to create value for the thinning off-take. A category of grant is for
new product development using small diameter poles. Any ideas
on products that could be produced out of this material should be
directed to CRT. They might be included in the next proposal.
The deadline for submission is less than three weeks.
Community Fire Education Workshop
A fire education workshop is scheduled for Monday, Mar. 3
at 7 p.m. at the county building, . The committee has invited sev-
eral people who actually do this kind of work to come talk about
their approach to creating defensible space. In addition to meeting
the people to hire to do thinning and clearing work, there will also
be an explanation of the free assessments available from the For-
estry Action Committee and the Oregon Dept. of Forestry pro-
gram and how to qualify for the $330 it pays for this work.
Then on Saturday, Mar. 15, each of the presenters has agreed
to take a group to visit a home site where the work has already
been done or will be done. There will be a chance to plan a per-
sonal defensible space then compare the selection to the plan
worked out between the homeowner and the contractor.
In Memory of Winnie Renfro
Perhaps you sent a lovely card or sat
quietly in a chair, perhaps you sent a floral
piece, if so we saw it there. Perhaps you brought
some food our way and helped us through the day,
Perhaps you spoke the kindest words that
any friend could say. Perhaps you were not
there at all but kept us in your heart.
Whatever you did to console our grief,
we thank you so much for your part.
Winnie Renfro’s Family
With a production value
of $680 million, Oregon’s
greenhouse and nursery indus-
try is a major economic
player, particularly in the ur-
ban counties of the Portland
metropolitan area. So when a
pest or disease problem shows
up on Oregon nursery stock, it
can have potentially damaging
results.
That’s why the industry
values research to the point of
literally taxing itself so that
researchers can help. Part of
the fee collected by the Ore-
gon Dept. of Agriculture
(ODA) for nursery license
goes to support a nursery re-
search grant program that an-
nually awards funds for wor-
thy projects, ranging from
finding biological control
agents that fight plant pests to
developing hardier landscape
plants.
One project involves bat-
tling a disease that has been
found in a small corner of
Oregon but has caused major
damage in Northern Califor-
nia.
“Industry support for
nursery research is critical for
Oregon growers to maintain
their competitive advantage,”
said Mark Krautmann of
Hetritage Seedlings, Inc. in
Salem, and current president
of the Oregon Association of
Nurserymen
(ODN).
“Especially now, when tradi-
tional Oregon State University
research funds are being cut
drastically during the current
state fiscal crisis, Oregon
nursery growers realize that
our independent funding for
research is key to keeping
Oregon “The Nursery State.’”
ODA collects and admin-
isters the money used in the
grant program. A nursery ad-
visory committee and mem-
bers of OAN decide which
projects should be funded and
by how much. For 2003,
$130,029 has been allocated
to seven projects and to the
Horticultural Research Insti-
tute, which issues additional
grants. The industry and OAN
kick in more money so the
best of the proposals are
funded as fully as possible.
Three holdovers from pre-
vious years are on this year’s
list of funded projects, includ-
ing biological control of an
insect pest known as cherry
bark tortrix. ODA entomolo-
gist Dr. Barry Bai has worked
on a project that is now being
funded for the fourth straight
year. Along with principal
investigator Dr. Lynell Ta-
nigoshi of Washington State
University’s Vancouver Re-
search and Extension Unit,
Bai has been trying to find a
natural enemy of the damag-
ing moth. The grant provides
an additional $4,000 to con-
tinue the project.
“The pest attacks cherry,
peach, plum, and apple trees
among other plants,” said Bai.
“We have landscape trees of
these varieties planted along
streets and in parks. The pest
can get into orchards and
cause damage to the fruit pro-
ducing industry as well. Quar-
antines are certain to be estab-
lished with an infestation.”
In the adult stage, the tor-
trix moth is harmful only be-
cause of reproduction. But in
the caterpillar stage, tortrix
bores deep into the bark and
can effectively girdle the tree.
That can lead to damage and
eventually death of the tree.
Pesticide treatments can be
expensive and not always ef-
fective.
After infesting trees in
British Columbia in the late
1980s and Washington in the
1990s, cherry bark tortrix was
eventually detected in Oregon
in July 2000, continuing its
southerly migration. The co-
operative project between
ODA and WSU has resulted
in some promising biological
control tools.
In particular, a parasite of
the pests eggs, Trichogramma
cacoeciae, is successfully be-
ing reared in a laboratory fa-
cility and then distributed in
cherry bark tortrix breeding
areas in Portland with high
hopes that a natural enemy
can halt the spread of a dam-
Animals have some unique methods of communicating with
other animals, particularly within their own species. It may not be
as precise or complex as human speech, but animals can share
large amounts of information. Most people know about tail move-
ments of a dog, the rattling and hissing of snakes and especially
the various calls of birds.
Scientists have learned a lot about birds and can identify
many methods as well as reasons for bird communication. Bird
call are thought to announce territory boundaries and breeding
availability and so bird singing is more noticeable in spring and
summer. Also, bird calls in social birds, such as crows and ravens,
can communicate food sources and also danger to other members
of their colony.
Woodpeckers are not noted for their singing ability but they
can also communicate with sounds. Last summer, an acorn wood-
pecker trained me to move away from the bird bath area when it
was time for his afternoon drink. I can’t describe the sounds that
he made but I learned that he was there and I should move out of
his territory at least temporarily.
Acorn woodpeckers have another method using sound to
communicate, probably for other members of their social group.
It’s called “drumming,” and it can be very annoying to someone
trying to sleep, when they began “drumming” on the side of the
house. These woodpeckers will drill large numbers of holes in
poles, barns, houses, dead trees and other structures in order to
store acorns.
However, scientists have observed them drumming on hol-
low, resonant structures, and even sheet metal roofs and never
attempting to store acorns. Other woodpeckers will also drum on
trees to communicate, but nobody has learned to decipher their
secret codes yet.
Acorn woodpeckers also use color to send messages. The red
spot on top of their head, the flashy black and white pattern on
their feathers, and particularly the large white rump which is ex-
posed when they fly suddenly away, are all used as signals to
other members of their colony.
Oak trees are a basic requirement of acorn woodpeckers
which are never found in areas which are lacking oak trees. They
range from the coastal areas of southern Washington, south
through western Oregon and California into Mexico wherever oak
trees are abundant.
The woodpecker’s scientific name is Melanerpes formi-
civorus and relates to their feeding habits and coloring.
“Melanos” is Greek for “black” and “erpes” from “herpes” which
is Greek for “creeper.” “Formica” is Latin for “ant” and “vorus”
is Latin for “eat” or “devour.”
Therefore, they are the black creepers that eat ants. Actually
they also eat acorns, nectar, fruit, flowers, as well as many differ-
ent insects. They have also been seen eating grass seed and other
bird’s eggs.
Acorn woodpeckers look like the clown of the forest but they
have a very complex social life. This involves sharing mates and
raising their young in a communal pattern. This relationship in-
volves much communication and acorn woodpeckers have many
methods to make sure it occurs.
Closed
Tuesday & Wednesday
Publication
by OSU help
forest owners
How “green” is the forest?
For forest owners and
managers, that question has
bearing on forest practices,
conservation and marketing.
In the last several years,
forest certification has devel-
oped as a way to identify for-
est products in the market-
place that come from forests
being managed with conser-
vation-minded practices. But
not all certification processes
demand the same standard or
carry the same credibility.
A new publication from
Oregon State University
(OSU) Extension Service sorts
out various systems of forest
certification to help forest
owners and managers choose
the best system for their for-
ests and markets.
Written by a team of for-
esters from OSU and the Uni-
versity of Wisconsin, the pub-
lication explores the opportu-
nities, limitations and costs of
forest certification.
“Forest certification is no
longer a new topic in forestry,
but new systems and features
are always developing,” said
Rick Fletcher, one of the pub-
lication’s authors and an OSU
Extension forester in Fenton
County.
“Certification is now a
worldwide reality in forest
product markets and looks like
it will be with us for some
time to come,” said Fletcher.
Don’t drink and drive.