The 2019 wildfire season was mild compared to the previous few years, allowing combustible fuel to grow in the forests around our state. Couple the fuel loads with the recent dry spring, the anticipated warm temperatures for the months to come, and the possibility of fewer fire crew members …
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In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Oregon Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) adopted temporary emergency rules, which apply to employer-provided housing and labor-intensiv…
Parts of the rural Northwest have finally received permission to start to reopen. If it were up to some, this day might never have come.
We were pleased to see President Donald Trump ask for a Department of Justice investigation into the meatpackers. We believe that, to have a free market, all sides must operate on a level play…
“We live in unprecedented times and need to take unprecedented measures.” I don’t know how many times I have heard this in the last two or three months. I know it is true, but I sure would lik…
We want to trust our leaders, but, how can we? In the “best of times,” they tax and spend, abuse power, ever expand government control, will not honestly balance the budget (their constitution…
Last week saw Gov. Brad Little move Idaho into stage two of the Idaho Rebounds plan. Bars reopening was moved from stage 4 to stage 3, 95% of businesses being able to reopen in some capacity, …
A Seattle-based federal judge will soon decide the fate of some 1,600 Southeast Alaska salmon trollers — fishermen who are already looking at the lowest allotment of chinook in 20 years, large…
No one likes to fail. But anyone who has been successful in life is going to tell you that failure is part of a learning curve necessary to be successful.
State legislatures have largely allowed the governors of their states to exercise extraordinary and far-reaching powers without oversight during the ongoing COVID-19 outbreak.
We hesitate to invoke a dusty metaphor that politicians love — that the coronavirus pandemic is a “war.”
Producers and processors are scrambling to protect workers from COVID-19 while ensuring that they can bring an affordable product in an adequate supply to market. It’s not an easy task, but if…
“Alone together.” I believe that is the mantra for staying at home and trying to flatten the curve of COVID-19. If we stay separated from others, together we can continue to combat this virus.
This virus is a convenient excuse to impose more control on us and destroy the Constitution.
Oregon Gov. Kate Brown has indicated that she’s willing to take a regional approach to reopening businesses in the state and will consider plans produced by individual counties to deal with ea…
Every once in a while, the Washington Supreme Court hands down a decision that defies logic.
Have you been to the grocery store lately only to find many of the shelves and coolers picked over? Maybe you went in for a loaf of bread or a couple gallons of milk, but had a hard time findi…
Sustainability is the key to addressing the effects of climate change. What does this mean? In the big picture, it means that people living on the planet must somehow adapt as our niche in the…
It's sad to see all of these postings on social media of the waste I see happening. Every day we see dairy farmers having to dump milk because the co-ops will not take the milk because they ha…
We’ve all heard the old story about coming into the kitchen and finding the water on and the sink overflowing — the first thing to do is turn off the water. That’s what we need to do with the …
As our country continues to grapple with the unprecedented health crisis from the COVID-19 outbreak, the 50th anniversary of Earth Day has come upon us as a reminder of another challenge for t…
The good news was that agriculture was designated an “essential service” when the powers that be decided to shut down most of the U.S. economy to protect us from the COVID-19 coronavirus.
We never would have believed it had you told us just a month ago that several governors would, by decree, shut down large swaths of their states’ economies and throw hundreds of thousands of t…
Managers at the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife are missing a bet. Brad Manke, the sheriff of Stevens County, has offered to help overloaded and underfunded WDFW staffers trap wolve…
Information and guidance regarding COVID-19 is continually evolving. Although this can be frustrating and confusing, especially when recommendations change or are expanded, we can expect these…
I keep hearing people talking about “non-essential” workers and “non-essential” jobs. I’m curious, as a small business owner for 18 years and dying a slow and steady death, what makes a busine…
This is for all the ranching and grazing community in Southeast Oregon.
‘Mandatory cattle identification” are three words that conjure up all sorts of reactions among ranchers. Whether and how the federal or state government can make a rancher tag a cow or calf is…
Count us as among those still struggling to process the impacts of the ongoing COVID-19 outbreak on the lives of Americans and the economy.
When I was in high school, I was introduced to John Steinbeck’s work. As a high schooler, I devoured “The Grapes of Wrath” while on a road trip across west Texas and made an extreme effort to …
We’ve had epidemics and catastrophes in the past and will experience them in the future.
With COVID-19 guidance changing daily, agricultural employers have many challenges ahead. Below are several important agriculture-related laws and recommendations to keep in mind.
The $2 trillion stimulus package that Congress passed last week produced good news amid the storm of dismal reports about the impact COVID-19 has had on people and the economy.
Judging by what we’ve seen in local grocery stores, it’s fair to say that many people have gained a heightened awareness of the food supply.
If you’re looking for engaging new picture books to read to the little ones in your life, consider “Tales of the Dairy Godmother: Chuck’s Ice Cream Wish” from Feeding Minds Press.
Everyone knows, from Aesop and Horace, the story of the Town Mouse and the Country Mouse, although they fail to tell us that all food comes from the country (the farm).
Most people in the Pacific Northwest don’t think a lot about the rivers flowing through the hearts of our communities and states and all they provide us, but farmers certainly do.
Every day we get the latest on the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic. How many people tested positive, and how many have died. The number rolls higher and higher every day as our political leaders…
“Pass the mashed potatoes, please.” When that heaping dish of fluffy goodness comes your way, you might think to thank the person passing it to you, or the person who prepared them. However, r…
Oregon Gov. Kate Brown has signed an executive order directing state agencies to reduce Oregon’s greenhouse gas emissions through more stringent standards for fuels, new buildings and consumer…
The problem for agriculture will likely be centered not on growing the food but getting it to market.
Recent opinions have attempted to discredit active forest management as part of a political campaign to prohibit fuel reduction projects on 500,000 acres of national forests. Yet there is a br…
It is despicable that the coronavirus outbreak is being weaponized and politicized against President Trump. Trump responded quickly to stop people from China and other countries from coming in…
The 2020 session of the Oregon Legislature ended without the passage of a controversial cap-and-trade scheme, or much of anything else.
There was a time not too long ago when anyone who talked about growing wine grapes in Oregon or Washington state would be greeted with a cocked head. Wine grapes had been produced in the Pacif…
In the coming days your household will receive an invitation to participate in the 2020 census. It’s part of a constitutional mandate for the federal government to count every man, woman and c…
Why is our governor so bent on destroying the economy of the rural part of Oregon?
As today’s politics swirls, and a big city New York candidate shows he neither knows nor respects farmers, as Oregon’s Left forgets or never learned the need for farms and basic extractive ind…
On behalf of the Northwest wheat producing states, we strongly support the findings in the Columbia River System Operations Draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS), specifically the Preferr…
There’s something inspiring about bringing together nearly 1,000 enthusiastic current and aspiring farmers.
We’ve said it would be a bad idea to breech the dams on the Lower Snake River. A report commissioned by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Bonneville Power Administration and Bureau of Reclamat…
Earlier this year, I traveled to Austin and spoke at the Texas Global Food Security Summit held on the sidelines of the American Farm Bureau Federation’s annual convention. The meeting brought…
Because my family didn’t have television on the farm, for most of my growing up years, it was a special treat to watch TV when I would stay with my grandparents in Walla Walla during the summe…
There is a fierce battle of ideas and political willpower being waged at Oregon’s Capitol.
Democratic presidential hopeful Michael Bloomberg is finding out that things you said in the years prior to the campaign can come back to haunt you.
