SIX - Heppner Gazette-Times, Heppner, Oregon Wednesday, July 15, 2015
Beards receive Garden Highlights
recognition
Anne and Casey Beard won the annual Garden Highlights
recognition for their rural home between Heppner and Lex-
ington. –Photo by Kay Proctor
By Kay Proctor
Anne and Casey
Beard’s home and yard
designed to blend into its
rural, hillside settings has
been honored by the Hep-
pner Volunteers with their
2015 Garden Highlights
recognition. This recogni-
tion is given just once per
year to an exceptional yard
outside Heppner city limits.
Located between Hep-
pner and Lexington, the
Beards have views of the
Willow Creek Valley and
beyond to Mt. Adams.
Casey grew up in Outlook,
WA in a rodeo family and
Anne is from the Chinook
Lake area. Casey’s Army
career took them around the
world. Living in England in
a 500-year-old home with
a walled garden kicked off
their gardening interests.
A lot of thought, plan-
ning and hands-on work
have gone into establish-
ing water-wise plants for
the windy, harsh, dry local
climate. The undulating
berms outlining the yard
were designed to purposely
follow the curves of rolling
hills on the horizon. A dry,
rocked creek bed meanders
at the bottom of the berms
leading to a dry pond. The
house’s gutter system drains
into the grounds to provide
moisture.
Graveled paths wander
around plantings such as
Gro-Low sumac, blue fes-
cue grass, salvia, yarrow,
Turkish speedwell, blanket
flowers, cornflowers, Mexi-
can Hat flower, fern bush,
sage, Apache Plume tree,
Buffalo Berry, Missouri
Evening primrose, Scarlett
hedge nettle, hybrid Lydia
broom ‘Bangle,’ creeping
thyme ‘Pink Chintz’, gaura,
blue flax, several varieties
of lavender, silver sage
Artemisia, Russian sage,
mugho pines, threadgrass,
Potentillas, daylilies, and
prairie zinnias.
With such high country
plants, a green lawn is not
needed and is not missed,
showing that careful plant
selection can replace mow-
ing.
Wildlife enjoys visit-
ing. Bees are everywhere
and hummingbirds espe-
cially love the agastaches
and penstemmons. Pheas-
ants and partridges are
seen. Returning robins and
flycatchers have nested un-
der the deep, wraparound
porch. Casey and Anne
provide birdseed for gold-
finches and towhees. The
combination of birds and
Some of the rabbits in the
Beards’ yard are real...and
some are metal. -Photo by Kay
Proctor
hardy plants means insects
are not a problem.
However, gophers were
a problem. To stop them,
the Beards dug trenches
around the entire yard and
sunk 6’ x 3’ metal roofing
panels. Problem solved.
Wild, cotton-tailed
rabbits are such frequent
visitors that Anne acknowl-
edged them with metal gar-
den art depicting running
rabbits staked throughout.
Irrigation is provid-
ed by a system of pop-up
sprinklers that would also
help in case of grassfire.
Off the back patio is
Anne’s herb garden with
a Tarragon plant thriving
to over 6’ tall. Anne’s fa-
vorite plants include the
penstemmons; Casey favors
their exceptional Texas Red
yucca.
The couple deeply
commits to their life’s in-
terests; Anne now designs
and builds furniture and in
the past received the West-
ern Fashion ‘Design of the
Year’ award multiple times
for her clothing art. After
his Army career, Casey
served as the CCSEP Man-
ager for Morrow County
until its completion, then
took on the challenge of be-
ing the first full-time gener-
al manager of the Pendleton
Round-Up/Happy Canyon.
Their devotion reflects in
the unique surroundings
the two have created on
their south Morrow County
property.
The Garden Highlights
recognition honors those
with exceptional seasonal
highlights, special outdoor
projects or rural locations.
For any suggestions for this
annual recognition, contact
Kay Proctor of the Heppner
Volunteers.
OSU Master Food Preservers answer
questions statewide
CORVALLIS, Ore.—
Oregon State University’s
food preservation and safe-
ty hotline returns for its 35 th
year beginning July 13.
With a renewed interest
occurring within food pre-
serving, the statewide hot-
line is as important as ever,
according to Nellie Oehler,
who helped create the OSU
Extension Service’s Master
Food Preserver program.
The program trains volun-
teers to answer questions on
the help line, as well as at
events like farmers markets
and county fairs.
For many of the people
who sign up for the eight-
week course, food safety is
one of the major reasons for
their commitment to the 48
hours of class time and 40
to 70 hours of volunteering,
said Oehler, coordinator
for the program in Lane
County. In 2014, more than
250 people were certified or
recertified as Master Food
Preservers and they gave
back more than 25,000
hours.
“It’s so important be-
cause there’s so much mis-
information on the web,”
she said. “For canning reci-
pes, it has to be research-
based or it can be lethal.”
Correct information is
all the more relevant today
because at least a genera-
tion has grown up without
anyone in the family to pass
down their experience and
knowledge, Oehler said.
Jacqui Richardson, a Master Food Preserver for Oregon State
University’s Extension Service in Douglas County, answers a
question about preserving and food safety on the statewide
hotline. –Contributed photo by Barbara Anderson
“The biggest learn-
ing curve was throwing
away what you know—or
think you know—and us-
BEO has roots in
agriculture .
Russell Seewald
Loan Officer
Joe Perry
Loan Officer
Our Agricultural Loan programs can help your business grow.
Ask us about Term Loans, Lines of Credit, or
Ag & Commercial Real Estate Loans.
Heppner: 541.676.9125 || Ione: 541.422.7466
Member FDIC
beobank.com
ing tested recipes,” said
Ruby Moon, who came to
the once-a-week class in
Linn County from Siletz.
“In the Master Food Pre-
server classes you learn
precisely what to do. This
has changed the way I can.”
The hotline (800-354-
7319) runs through Oct.
16 and again during the
Thanksgiving holiday from
9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday
through Friday. When the
hotline is closed, callers
can leave a message. Ad-
ditionally, many Extension
offices offer free pressure
gauge testing.
Moon, Martin and other
Master Food Preservers in
20 of Oregon’s 36 counties
share their knowledge at
events, while those trained
in Douglas and Lane coun-
ties staff the hotline that
gets thousands of questions
a year—3,040 in 2014.
“You name it, we’ve
been asked it,” said Rose-
burg volunteer Rayma
Davis, who is serving as
hotline coordinator for the
second year. “There was
one lady who called in
and wanted to know if she
stacked 10 pounds of books
on top of her pot, would
that give her 10 pounds of
pressure in her canner. We
explained that wasn’t the
way it worked.”
Davis and other ho-
tline volunteers refer to
thick binders of recipes
and research-based infor-
mation vetted by the U.S.
Letters from Iraq
Editor’s note: Sheena
Christman, Ione native
and graduate of Ione High
School, is volunteering with
World Orphans in northern
Iraq. She is sending home
weekly updates to family
and friends, which the G-T
was lucky enough to also
receive. We plan on publish-
ing these updates as space
allows. She writes:
1. A Yazidi Wedding.
It was a lot of fun to attend a
Yazidi double-wedding cel-
ebration at Akoyan Camp
on Thursday. While I was
there, the Yazidis served a
huge meal and took lots of
wedding photos of the two
couples. Unfortunately,
there was no dancing—one
of the Yazidi men told us
that they cancelled that
portion of the celebration
because they are ‘exiled
from their homeland.’ The
Yazidis served chicken,
rice, liver, beef, and salad
to celebrate the weddings.
I’m the only one who tried
the beef, and I am the only
I’m staying with two Amer-
ican families, I get to eat a
lot of American meals, but
some of my favorite Kurd-
ish meals include chicken
and beef kebabs and falafel
sandwiches.
3. Making Bread. The
Yazidis built a ‘stone oven’
to bake their flat bread. To
bake the bread, they place a
piece of dough on a thick,
round oven mitt; using the
oven mitt, they slam the
dough against the inside
wall of the stone oven; the
bread sticks to the inside
wall of the oven and the
coals in the bottom of the
oven then bake the bread.
4. Dental Clinics. We
hosted several dental clinics
at the three refugee camps.
Alan, a dentist working in
Soran, offered to volun-
teer his time. Alan is from
Makmour, a town between
Mosul and Erbill. ISIS is
within a few miles of Mak-
mour, so he relocated first
to Erbil, and then to Soran
for safety.
Yazidis baking bread in their stone oven. –Contributed photo
one who got really bad food
poisoning. It was awful!
2. Living in Soran—
Food. Town Center is the
first western-style super-
market in Soran. It opened
approximately two years
ago and offers local shop-
pers a chance to buy ev-
erything they might need at
just one store. Traditionally,
however, people in Soran
have bought their groceries
at shops that ‘specialize’ in
a particular good (e.g. if you
want chicken, you go to the
butcher; if you want fruit
and veggies, you go to the
fruit and veggie stand; and
if you want cheese, you go
to the dairy shop). Many
(perhaps most) continue
to shop for groceries from
store to store to store. Since
5. Meet Yusra. Yusra is
a 35-year-old Shabuk Kurd-
ish woman from Bartella,
Iraq. She married when she
was 15 years old, which
is when Shabuk women
marry, according to Yusra.
Yusra has three daughters,
two sons, and one grandson.
She currently lives with her
family at Camp Kawlokan.
6. Camp Basirma. On
Sunday, we visited Camp
Basirma. Camp Basirma is
a UN refugee camp located
between Soran and Er-
bil. It was established two
years ago for approximately
5,000 Syrian refugees. An
American couple (Paul and
Wendy) from Arizona teach
English language classes
twice a week at Camp Ba-
sirma.
DA’s Report
Morrow County Dis-
trict Attorney Justin Nelson
has released the following
report:
- Wi l l i a m R i c h a r d
Brooks, 58, was convicted
of Harassment, a Class B
misdemeanor. The sentence
of 90 days jail time was
waived and the defendant
sentenced to 18 months
bench probation, to include
20 hours of community
service, no offensive physi-
cal contact with the victim,
and completion of anger
management evaluation and
any recommended treat-
ment. An additional count
of Assault IV – Constituting
Domestic Violence was dis-
posed without conviction.
Fines, fees and assessments
totaled $60.
Department of Agriculture.
The answers aren’t always
obvious.
“It’s about critical
thinking,” Davis said.
“Someone might ask what’s
the time required to can
pickled fish. Well, you can’t
can pickled fish. A new vol-
unteer would probably not
know that, so they’d have to
know how to look it up. It’s
kind of a trick question. We
get them all day.”
Not all questions cause
serious concern, though.
Second-year volunteer Jac-
qui Richardson of Roseburg
still chuckles about a call
she got last summer.
“The woman asked if
she could put salsa in jelly
jars,” Richardson remem-
bered. “I paused and said,
‘You know, I think you
could.’”
Most commonly, peo-
ple ask about preserving
salsa, tomatoes and tuna.
OSU Extension offers pub-
lications on each: Salsa
Recipes for Canning, Can-
ning Seafood and Can-
ning Tomatoes and Tomato
Products.
Master Food Preservers
focus on safety, but they are
also excited to learn about
canning, pickling, drying
and other forms of preserv-
ing food for themselves and
for sharing with others. The
camaraderie they find with
the fellow volunteers is
important, too.
“We have this thing that
connects us,” said Moon.
“It’s my favorite part of
the week. I go home and
say, ‘Guess what I did in
canning class?’ It’s like
Christmas.”