ONTARIO, Ore. — Research by Oregon State University scientists relating to the Food and Drug Administration’s new produce safety rule is benefiting onion growers.

And onion growers have themselves to thank for that, industry leaders say, because they’re the ones who funded a good portion of the research through their checkoff dollars.

“That has been money well spent, no doubt about it, and I think everybody agrees with that,” said Kay Riley, marketing order chairman for the Idaho-Eastern Oregon Onion Committee. “It wasn’t a hard sell to the (IEOOC) research committee to fund those studies.”

Researchers at OSU’s Malheur County experiment station conducted several trials over the past four years that collectively showed onions are not at risk of being contaminated by irrigation water containing large amounts of bacteria.

Those studies helped FDA change its mind on some of the agricultural water standards originally contained in the produce rule, in a way that benefits bulb onions growers.

Beyond that, the research could also help growers who face industry-required Good Agricultural Practices audits, said OSU Extension cropping systems agent Stuart Reitz.

Many of the 300 onion growers in the Idaho-Oregon onion growing region face GAP audits, and some of them face several other types of audits as well, he said. Those audits require them to show they are growing onions in a safe and sanitary manner.

OSU researchers are starting to get the produce rule-related studies published in peer-reviewed scientific journals — one has already been published and another has been submitted for review. That will allow onion growers to incorporate the findings of that research into their GAP audits, Reitz said.

“We’re trying to finish getting some of the studies we’ve done published so we have scientifically valid studies that growers can incorporate into the farm safety plans that GAP audits require,” he said.

Clint Shock, director of the OSU experiment station in Malheur County, said the studies included loading irrigation water with large amounts of bacteria and then tracking E. coli contamination in the field and on onions.

Despite loading the water with bacteria, no traces of E. coli were ever found in an onion, Shock said.

Another study showed that using plastic bins instead of the wooden ones used for decades resulted in no difference in detectable levels of E. coli.

“There is no difference between plastic and wooden bins in terms of food safety,” Reitz said.

That research helped convince FDA to drop a produce rule provision that could have required growers to switch to plastic bins.

There are about 1 million wooden onion bins in the region, and replacing them with plastic bins would have been expensive, said Riley, who is also manager of Snake River Produce.

Plastic bins cost three times as much as wooden bins and hold two-thirds as much onions, he said.

A public-private partnership between the Indie Hops company and Oregon State University has yielded its first new hop cultivar after roughly seven years of research.

The variety, dubbed “Strata,” combines the sought-after citrus aroma with the “dank” smell often associated with cannabis, said Jim Solberg, CEO of Indie Hops.

“We’re pretty confident the hop will catch on and be a strong new variety,” he said.

Breeder Shaun Townsend collected the seed that would become Strata in the winter of 2010, when Indie Hops began contracting with OSU to develop new cultivars for craft brewers.

A field of female Perle hops had been open-pollinated by multiple male varieties from a nearby research yard, producing seed that germinated into roughly 10,000 plants with a wide range of characteristics.

At the time, the relationship between OSU and Indie Hops was controversial in Oregon’s hop farming community because a public facility would be used to develop controlled private varieties that aren’t widely available to growers.

Farmers had built trellises and other infrastructure at OSU that would no longer be used for public research, said Michelle Palacios, administrator of the Oregon Hop Commission.

“There was a lot of heartburn over that,” she said.

Since then, though, Oregon hop farmers have mended their relationship with OSU, which continues to cooperate with the industry on plant pathology and fermentation science, Palacios said.

“I think the industry has accepted it as it is,” she said of OSU’s public-private partnership with Indie Hops.

Disputes over public-private partnerships aren’t unique to the hop industry, said Ann George, executive director of the Hop Growers of America.

The “strings attached” to private money granted to public universities is a common point of debate, she said. “There’s always going to be that difficulty, when you have public research institutions that are not entirely funded publicly.”

Strata was one of roughly 10,000 seedlings that were exposed to mildews and other diseases in an OSU greenhouse, with the aim of weeding out plants susceptible to pathogens.

Those that survived were planted out to an experimental yard at OSU where they weren’t treated with fungicides and generally were not fussed over, as they would be at a commercial farm.

The goal was to identify naturally disease-resistant plants that would thrive without much encouragement, said Solberg. “They’re pretty hard on the plants at the experimental yard.”

As the plants were being evaluated for their agronomic traits, their cones were analyzed for chemistry and brewing potential on a small scale.

Hops that showed promise in the field and at the brewery were then moved to an advanced nursery trial in which their vegetatively propagated descendants were grown in about 30 different locations.

Strata was seen as having potential to stand out in the market, leading to further study in a commercial pilot where it was planted to five acres at several farms.

Strata’s vigorous growth, strong root system and decent early yields convinced Indie Hops to plant it commercially on three farms totaling 95 acres this year, with the first commercial crop to be harvested in 2018.

The cultivar had to be unique enough to warrant a commercial release at a time when growers have many more varieties to chose from than a decade ago, said Solberg.

Strata also came of age during a tough hop market, he said. “It’s definitely a market that’s oversupplied with hops.”

The new variety is now one of 84 on the official Hop Growers of America list of cultivars, said Ann George, the group’s executive director.

The list isn’t comprehensive, since some likely future varieties have yet to be added to it while some older varieties have fallen out of favor, she said.

More hop cultivars are now available to growers, but farms are also cultivating a greater diversity of them, George said. A typical grower now produces 12 or more varieties, up from the traditional six to eight.

“Most growers will agree they’re growing double the number of varieties than they used to,” she said.

LAS VEGAS (AP) — Trial opens Tuesday in Las Vegas for Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, two of his sons and a co-defendant accused of leading an armed standoff in 2014 against government agents in a decades-long cattle grazing dispute.

Prosecutors will tell a jury that the 71-year-old Bundy, sons Ryan and Ammon Bundy, and co-defendant Ryan Payne of Anaconda, Montana, conspired to enlist a self-styled militia to defy government authority at the point of a gun.

Defense attorneys say the men didn’t conspire with anyone, didn’t wield weapons and didn’t threaten anybody.

The standoff near Bunkerville, Nevada, about 80 miles northeast of Las Vegas, was an iconic moment in a decades-long turf battle about federal control of vast rangelands in the Western U.S.

The men are accused of calling for a “range war” to stop government enforcement of lawful court orders to round up Bundy cows for failure to pay federal grazing fees and penalties.

The Bundys and Payne have been jailed since early 2016 as a danger to the community and at risk to not follow court orders or return for hearing dates.

The defendants have been attending court wearing red jail scrubs, to protest their nearly two-year detention without trial. Ryan Bundy is serving as his own lawyer.

Each man refused to enter a plea, saying he didn’t recognize the authority of the government. A magistrate judge entered not-guilty pleas for the men, who are expected to testify.

Bundy argues that his family has used the same public range for more than a century and the land belongs to the state, not the U.S. Bureau of Land Management.

Acting U.S. Attorney Steven Myhre argues that the federal agency was enforcing lawful court orders to remove Bundy cows from what is now Gold Butte National Monument after the rancher racked up more than $1.1 million in unpaid fees and penalties.

Bundy’s lawyer, Bret Whipple, says Bundy was willing to pay his fees, and even tried to send a check in March 1994 to Clark County. It was returned with a letter saying the payment should go to the federal government.

Federal prosecutors in Nevada have twice failed to win full convictions at trial of men who had guns during the tense confrontation involving hundreds of protesters who stopped government agents from rounding up Bundy’s cattle.

Defense attorneys cast the standoff as a peaceful protest, with no shots fired and no one injured before overreaching government officials abandoned the cattle roundup and went home.

The men each face 15 felony charges, including conspiracy, assault and threats against federal officers, firearms counts, obstruction and extortion. Stacked together, convictions on all charges carry the possibility of more than 170 years in prison.

John Huffman, a Republican from the Dalles, has received one of the plum political appointments from the federal government.

Huffman left the Oregon House in October after 10 years to become Oregon’s director of rural development for the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

The position has frequently been filled by legislators. Huffman’s predecessor, Vicki Walker, is a former Democratic state senator from Eugene who filled the job during the Obama administration.  Former House Speaker Mark Simmons, R-Elgin, was appointed to the job in 2005 during the Bush administration.

In his new position, Huffman heads a staff of more than 50, in six offices around the state.

Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue on Friday announced appointees for the jobs in states around the country. Agency officials did not say how much Huffman will be paid in his new job.

But Walker, who left the job in January when Donald Trump became president, said she expected that Huffman would be paid between about $135,000 and $143,000 a year.

Walker said she encouraged Huffman to apply for the post and added that she thought Rep. Greg Walden, played a big role in helping him get the job.

The Oregon Hay & Forage Association Conference and Hay King Contest are scheduled for Nov. 17-18 in Lakeview, Ore.

The conference will be held in the Memorial Hall of the Lake County Courthouse on Nov. 17. Presentations will include a forage seminar by Oregon Tilth with information on how to become an organic hay grower, information on growing low carb hay for horses and a discussion and demonstration on the use of drones in agriculture.

The Hay King Contest will be held Nov. 18 in the shop building at SS Equipment in Lakeview.

More information on the hay conference and the contest can be obtained by calling Dan Roberts, the president of the Lake County Hay & Forage Association, at 775-742-0905.

— Craig Reed

KLAMATH FALLS, Ore. (AP) — Another gray wolf has been found dead in Oregon, marking the third such death of a federally protected wolf in the past year, state and federal wildlife officials said.

The wolf was found dead Oct. 29 in Klamath County on state forest land. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is offering a $5,000 reward for information on the killing, authorities said Monday.

The wolf was known to biologists as OR-25 and was believed to have killed a calf at a private ranch near Prospect earlier this year, according to state wildlife officials.

OR-33, a collared male, was found shot dead April 23 about 20 miles northwest of Klamath Falls in Fremont-Winema National Forest. OR-28, a collared female, was found dead Oct. 6, 2016, in Fremont-Winema National Forest near Summer Lake.

All three investigations remain open, and authorities do not believe the latest wolf died of natural causes, Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife spokesman Brent Lawrence told the Mail Tribune.

Killing gray wolves in the western two-thirds of Oregon is a violation of the federal Endangered Species Act and of Oregon state game laws. The federal offense is punishable by up to a $100,000 fine, a year in jail or both. The maximum state penalty is a fine of $6,250 and a year in jail.

Wolves in Oregon hunt deer, elk, bighorn sheep and goats. But they also can target livestock and are loathed by many livestock owners.

State wildlife officials say 141 livestock or domestic animals have been killed by wolves in Oregon since they began returning to the state in the late 1990s.

In 2016, wildlife officials estimated a minimum of 112 wolves lived in Oregon in 11 packs that included eight breeding pairs.

Last week, an elk hunter shot and killed a gray wolf in eastern Oregon in self-defense after he said the wolf charged at him while he was hunting alone and he mistook it for a coyote. The hunter, who contacted authorities after realizing he had shot a gray wolf, will not be prosecuted because the shooting was ruled self-defense.

A retired U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist with 30 years experience said it is unlikely a wolf shot by an Oregon elk hunter was attacking the man.

Carter Niemeyer, who lives in Boise and oversaw or consulted on wolf recovery work throughout the West, also said descriptions of the bullet trajectory — in one shoulder and out the other – raise doubt about the hunter’s account that the wolf was running at him when he fired.

“That’s a broadside shot, not a running-at-you shot,” Niemeyer said. “If the bullet path is through one side and out the other, it indicates to me an animal could have been standing, not moving, and the shot was well placed.”

A bullet that hit the wolf as it was running forward most likely would have exited out the hips or rear end, Niemeyer said. He acknowledge the bullet or fragments could have deflected off bone, but said a forensic exam would have to explain that. Michelle Dennehy, Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife spokesman, said the agency did not request a necropsy because the cause of death — gunshot — was known.

Niemeyer said the hunter’s account of taking a “snap shot into a ball of fur” is unlikely.

“I have to tell you I doubt the story,” he said.

Niemeyer, 70, said he’s hunted predators for 52 years as a government hunter and a taxidermist, and has dealt with fellow sportsmen and shooters for decades. “I’ve heard every story,” he said. “This story is very suspect to me.”

The elk hunter, Brian Scott, 38, of Clackamas, Ore., told Oregon State Police that the wolf ran straight at him. Scott told police he screamed, took quick aim and fired his 30.06 rifle once. Scott said he saw nothing but fur in the rifle’s scope as the wolf ran at him, according to published reports.

In an interview with outdoor writer Bill Monroe of The Oregonian/Oregon Live, Scott said he was terrified.

“People envision this jerk hunter out to kill anything, but that’s not me,” he told Monroe. “It frustrates me they don’t understand. I’m a meat hunter. I was looking for a spike elk. This wasn’t exciting. It ruined my hunt.”

Scott told Monroe he didn’t think he had time to fire a warning shot. He could not explain the bullet’s path, which entered the wolf’s right shoulder and exited the left, other than perhaps the wolf turned at the last instant or the bullet deflected.

Niemeyer, the retired wildlife biologist, said wolves will “turn around and take off” when they realize they’re near a human. Niemeyer said he had “many, many close encounters with wolves” while doing trapping, collaring and other field work for USFWS in Idaho, Oregon and elsewhere. He said wolves sometimes ran at him and approached within 6 to 8 feet before veering away.

Wolves are potentially dangerous, he said, “but all my experience tells me it would be fearful of a human.”

People in such situations should stand up if they are concealed, show themselves, and yell or throw things, Niemeyer said. Hunters could fire a shot into the ground or into a tree and “scare the hell out of them,” he said.

“That would have been the first logical thing to do,” he said. “The gunshot and a yell from a human would turn every wolf I’ve ever known inside out trying to get away.”

He also suggested people venturing into the woods should carry bear repellent spray, which certainly would also deter wolves, cougars or coyotes.

“If everyone shoots everything they’re afraid of, wow, that’s not a good thing,” he said.

Niemeyer acknowledged his reaction is based on years of experience with wolves.

“People say, ‘That’s easy for you to say, Carter, you worked with wolves for 30 years and you’re familiar with their behavior,’” he said.

The shooting happened Oct. 27 in ODFW’s Starkey Wildlife Management Unit west of La Grande, in Northeast Oregon.

Scott, the hunter, told police he was hunting and had intermittently seen what he thought might be coyotes. At one point, two of them circled off to the side while a third ran at him. Scott said he shot that one and the others ran away.

Scott went back to his hunting camp and told companions what had happened. They returned to the shooting scene and concluded the dead animal was a wolf. The hunter then notified state police and ODFW, which investigated. Police later found a shell casing 27 yards from the wolf carcass. The Union County district attorney’s office reviewed the case and chose not to file charges.

The Portland-based conservation group Oregon Wild raised questions about the incident. Rob Klavins, Oregon Wild’s field representative in Northeast Oregon, said he’s seen wolves in the wild several times and backed away without trouble or harm. Even the late OR-4, the fearsome breeding male of the infamous Imnaha Pack in Wallowa County, retreated and barked when it encountered Klavins and a hiking party.

“This (hunter) may have felt fear, but since wolves returned to Oregon, no one has so much as been licked by a wolf, and that’s still true today,” Klavins said.

“What has changed is we now have wolves on the landscape, 10 years ago we didn’t,” Klavins said. “Especially in the fall (hunting season), armed people are going to be out encountering wolves.”

Oregon Wild believes poachers have killed several Oregon wolves, and USFWS on Nov. 6 offered a $5,000 reward for information about a collared wolf designated OR-25 that was found dead Oct. 29 in South Central Oregon.

Klavins said wolf shooters might now use a “self-defense” claim as a “free pass to poaching.”

Intensifying foreign competition hasn’t dimmed farmer Frank Tiegs’ enthusiasm for the frozen fruit business.

With his recent purchase of two processing companies — Rader Farms of Lynden, Wash., and Willamette Valley Fruit Co. of Salem, Ore. — Tiegs is betting on the industry’s resilience.

“There’s always going to be a place for U.S. grown fruit,” he said. “I wouldn’t have bought them if I didn’t think it was a good investment.”

For Northwest crops such as blackberries and raspberries, anxiety about the future of the U.S. frozen fruit industry springs from the easy availability of lower-priced imports from Mexico and South America.

Blueberries also compete on a global scale, with new plantings and production rising steadily around the world in recent years.

Tiegs said he’s not fazed by the industry’s changing dynamics, recalling the nervousness surrounding the Chinese apple industry in the 1980s and 1990s. Decades later, U.S. apple growers continue to find ways to compete.

In his time as a farmer, Tiegs has found it’s often wiser to invest during periods of uncertainty.

“My own experience has been to plant what’s not the hot thing,” he said.

In the 1970s, Tiegs began his agricultural career doing tractor and truck work for other farmers, then began buying land for himself in the 1980s.

Eventually, he moved into fresh packing of apples and potatoes, then invested in processing fruits and vegetables. Now, Tiegs owns about 15 facilities across Oregon, Washington and Idaho.

This “seed to fork,” vertically integrated approach allows Tiegs to better withstand agriculture’s economic cycles, he said.

When crop prices are high, growing his own supply of raw product helps mitigate costs at his processing facilities. When prices are low, the processing facilities add value to crops.

Though he primarily considers himself a potato grower, Tiegs regularly rotates this mainstay crop with sweet corn, onions, peppers, carrots, peas and green beans for processing.

Frozen fruit offers interesting opportunities for innovation, such as the retail smoothie mix kits that Rader Farms sells under the licensed “Jamba” brand.

Under Tiegs’ control, the newly acquired facilities in Oregon and Washington will generate more product for food manufacturers than previously, requiring an investment in building inventories.

Increasing the amount of crops processed at the facilities will also reduce their down time.

“I usually try to run plants as close to capacity as I can get them,” said Tiegs, who plans to buy crops from more farmers in the Skagit and Willamette valleys.

“We’re hoping to expand our grower base,” he said.

Inventure Foods, the previous owner of Rader Farms and Willamette Valley Fruit Co., was hindered by serious financial problems dating back to a food recall in 2015.

The recall was prompted by the detection of listeria, a bacterial pathogen, at its Fresh Frozen processing facility in Georgia.

Inventure lost money in every quarterly period since the recall, though the company also blamed the losses on lower frozen food prices and reduced distribution of certain products.

Before the recall, the company was reporting solid financial gains to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

In 2014, Inventure’s revenues topped $285 million, more than double from five years earlier. Its annual profits shot up from less than $4 million to nearly $20 million in that time.

By 2016, the company’s sales slid to $269 million and it lost more than $30 million.

Financial pressures led Inventure to sell its Fresh Frozen division to the Pictsweet Co. for $23.7 million and to sell Rader Farms, Willamette Valley Fruit Co. and other assets to Tiegs for $50 million.

Most recently, Inventure was taken over by Utz Quality Foods for $165 million.

THE DALLES, Ore. — An enthusiastic audience cheered on the 50-plus contestants who competed in the 70th Annual Oregon Make it With Wool contest held Oct. 28.

Traditionally held during the Oregon Sheep Growers Association annual convention, the event took place during the Columbia Gorge Fiber Festival on the Columbia Gorge Community College campus in The Dalles. Children and adults of both sexes competed in the event. Sponsors included the Oregon Sheep Growers Association, Oregon Sheep Commission and Pendleton Woolen Mills.

The first-place Senior winner was 19-year-old Sara Treichel of The Dalles. The first-place Junior winner was 16-year-old Becca Zeigler of Cloverdale, and the first-place adult winner was Quinn Hanna of LaGrande.

They will represent Oregon in the national competition in San Antonio, Texas, during the American Sheep Industry Association Convention on Jan. 31-Feb. 3.

The first place Pre-Teen winner, which does not advance to the national competition, was 10-year-old Tora Jo Timinsky from The Dalles.

Treichel and Zeigler will model in the national competition while Hanna will compete by submitting her garment, photos and a video.

Chandra Worman, director of Oregon MIWW contest since 2012 and National MIWW fashion show director since 2013, was thrilled to see this year’s competition was such a success.

“I set a goal of 50 contestants and 60 entered,” she said. “It took a lot of volunteers and sponsors to put it on but it was definitely one of our best.”

Contestants were judged on quality of construction, fit, poise and marketability of the outfit.

“Years ago, it was common to see business suits in the Junior and Senior categories, but now it has shifted to age-appropriate garments that reflect the contestant’s lifestyle,” Worman said. “Sara won with houndstooth wool skirt and skirt length vest ensemble, Becca won with a wool skirt and a hooded wool coat made from a Pendleton Woolen Mills Melton and Tora Jo’s outfit was a wool summer dress.”

Hanna, a first-year sewer whose daughter challenged her to enter the contest, won with a pencil wool skirt and open front vest.

In addition to other prizes, each contestant received 1½ yards of Pendleton wool fabric, which many will use in the garment they enter next year, Worman said.

The 2018 Oregon MIWW contest will be at The Dalles Middle School on Oct. 27; deadline for entry is Sept. 20. For more information, visit oregonmiww.com or contact Chandra Worman at cwloves2sew@yahoo.com.

BOISE, Idaho (AP) — Governors of 19 Western states are pressing the federal government to do more to prevent the spread of damage-causing invasive mussels from infected federally managed waterways.

The Western Governors’ Association on Thursday sent a letter urging Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to put in place by spring 2018 controls to prevent the spread of zebra and quagga mussels.

The governors are asking that federal agencies conduct mandatory inspections and decontamination of boats leaving infected water bodies.

The governors say they’re particularly concerned about the mussels reaching the Columbia River Basin, Lake Tahoe, and the Colorado River Basin above Lake Powell.

The mussels can clog water pipes, damage boat motors and affect other aquatic life.

Many states have spent millions on efforts to stop the mussels from infecting state waterways.

DENVER (AP) — With most private institutions and credit unions still avoiding the legal cannabis industry, many marijuana businesses remain without bank accounts.

But one idea is gaining acceptance among marijuana entrepreneurs and a growing number of cities and states: the formation of public banks to serve the cannabis industry.

The problem? It’ll be a while before any open their doors.

Cities that are looking into creating such financial institutions include Los Angeles, Oakland and Santa Rosa in California; Philadelphia, and Santa Fe, New Mexico. The states of Arizona and Maryland are also entertaining the idea.

“It’s important for local jurisdictions to do what they can to facilitate a successful cannabis industry,” said Dan Kalb, an Oakland City Council member who’s supporting his city’s efforts to study the feasibility of a public bank.

“It’s important for local governments to help their success, and the lack of banking services is a gap that no other industry faces. So, it’s important for local governments and elected leaders to step up and try and solve that problem.”

There currently is only one public bank in the United States — the state-owned Bank of North Dakota (BND).

The Bismarck-based bank was founded in 1919 to serve farmers and small businesses in North Dakota who felt they weren’t getting fair treatment from commercial banks, and it remains popular today in a solidly conservative state.

The state, not the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., insures BND’s deposits, and the North Dakota Department of Financial Institutions, not federal bank examiners, has oversight of the bank.

North Dakota’s medical marijuana program is due to go online in 2018, and a BND spokeswoman declined to discuss whether the bank would work with the state’s new medical marijuana companies. So banking could also soon be an issue for North Dakota’s medical marijuana businesses.

For state-compliant marijuana businesses — which are still considered illegal under federal law — the ability to bank at institutions that are regulated by local governments, rather than federal agencies, would be quite welcome.

Those financial institutions wouldn’t have to worry about losing a federal license or incurring some other punishment for banking businesses that violate federal law, and therefore would be more likely to accept marijuana plant-touching clients.

Backers of public banks are supportive of the concept because they would support small, local businesses and community projects — but they have also made no secret of their desire for these banks to serve local marijuana businesses.

“We have to figure out a way to make this industry work,” said Los Angeles City Councilman Herb Wesson, who recently explained to the council why he supports a public bank in his city.

Both Wesson and Kalb have said they’ve been in contact with marijuana businesses that support the idea of local government-owned banks.

Efforts to explore such institutions are in various stages of progress:

—Santa Fe paid for a feasibility study that showed support for a municipally owned public bank, then established a Public Banking Task Force whose mission is to decide whether the city should apply for a state banking license.

—The Northern California cities of Oakland, Berkeley and Richmond as well as Alameda County are jointly exploring the merits of establishing a public bank to serve their communities. The municipalities have chipped in $130,000 for a feasibility study.

—Researchers at Commonomics USA, a California organization that supports public banks, are drafting a template for how the state — which is responsible for issuing commercial bank licenses — could also issue public bank licenses. The goal is to get lawmakers to turn that template into a bill that could be considered as early as next year, said Marc Armstrong, a Commonomics official working on the draft. “If such a license exists, then a lot of governance problems go away,” he added.

While public banks can operate independent of some federal agencies, they still need to obtain a so-called master account from one of the nation’s 12 federal reserve banks. Financial institutions need master accounts to open accounts, process checks and interact with the rest of the nation’s financial system.

That issue has prevented Colorado’s canna-centric Fourth Corner Credit Union from opening. Although Fourth Corner possesses a Colorado state banking charter, the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City has turned down the institution’s application for a master account.

Proponents acknowledge that federal reserve banks can withhold master accounts from financial institutions that serve marijuana businesses. But that’s far less likely to happen if the public bank intends to serve many industries, not just marijuana.

“The reason Fourth Corner didn’t get (a master account) is because they were too concentrated in one industry, and the risk associated with that went way up,” Armstrong said.

Marijuana businesses should temper their hopes about public banking because it could take at least two or three years before such an institution jumps through the necessary bureaucratic hoops and accumulates enough capital to open.

And by then, industry observers said, it may be too late. A growing number of commercial banks are becoming open to accepting marijuana businesses as clients, so in a few years, public banks will face much more competition for cannabis cash than exists now.

“Public banks are a good idea, but by the time anyone gets around to opening one, you’re going to have - as far as California goes - more financial institutions for marijuana businesses to choose from,” said Lance Ott, CEO of Guardian Date Systems, a canna-centric financial services company in the Golden State.

“(Public banking) process could take years. By the time they launch it, they’re going to be too far behind to make a large impact unless they offer some very attractive incentives to potential customers to come on board.”

SALEM, Ore. (AP) — Oregon has approved a developer’s plan to truck pesticide-contaminated soil from a proposed residential development in northeast Salem to a farm 6 miles away.

The soil, contaminated with dieldrin, would pose ingestion, inhalation and skin contact hazards for new residents, but “should be safe for farm use,” regulators said in a response to public comments on the controversial proposal.

Dieldrin is a breakdown product of the insecticide aldrin, which was banned for crop use in 1970. It persists in soil for years and can accumulate up the food chain.

Neighbors and government agencies raised alarms when the plan was announced in July, saying it had the potential to contaminate groundwater and surface water and could spread contaminated dust as the dirt is trucked through neighborhoods, passing three schools. They also questioned the safety of using the soil to grow crops.

In a written response to their comments, the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality said its toxicologists do not expect risk standards to be exceeded in the air or dust during soil removal or trucking.

They also will require the developer to use dust-control measures.

Elizabeth Sagmiller, environmental and technical division manager for the city of Keizer, said that isn’t good enough.

The farm where the soil will be dumped is in Keizer, less than half a mile away from Clear Lake. The dirt would have to be trucked through Keizer neighborhoods.

“They used words like ‘DEQ does not expect there to be a problem.’ They don’t say ‘DEQ guarantees there won’t be a problem.’ That doesn’t give us a lot of confidence,” she said. “I was less than happy with their response but they’re the regulating agency and it’s up to them to make the decision.

As a result of public input, DEQ will require the contractor to cover the contaminated soil at the new site with three feet of cleaner fill soil before the farmer grows crops in it.

The farmer also has indicated he will plant hazelnut trees, which are unlikely to take up significant levels of dieldrin, said Don Hanson, DEQ’s Western Region cleanup manager.

The permit now specifies that the contractor must obtain floodplain and wetland permits from Marion County, the Department of State Lands and the Army Corps of Engineers before the southern quarry is filled.

Nichole Tarter, who lives near the proposed development, organized a community meeting in September, where neighbors heard from state environment, health and agriculture officials.

“We were told that the soil contamination is so minimal that we shouldn’t be concerned basically,” she said. “So the general consensus from those that I talked with was, why dig it up at all and move only part of it to a new location? It doesn’t sound right.”

“It still left neighbors wondering why the soil needs to be moved at all, if it isn’t a threat to us,” Tarter said.

Some neighbors had asked DEQ to approve a different option, such as taking the soil to a landfill licensed to handle the waste or treating the soil with an additive that lessens the contamination.

But Hanson said DEQ must choose the least expensive option that still protects human health and the environment.

“By law we get into trouble if we start requiring people to do more than is really required under the law,” he said.

The proposed residential development in northeast Salem includes plans for a community called Northstar, with 500 home lots, plus duplexes and apartments.

The soil will be taken to a farm at Windsor Island Road, where it will be used to fill two former quarry pits.

DEQ has allowed the developer to excavate soil from the east side of the contaminated property and temporarily stockpile it on the west side, where it is fenced, graded and seeded to prevent erosion.

Underground utilities will be installed over the winter, and streets will be paved in the spring.

Contaminated soil is tentatively scheduled to be removed between April and August 2018.

An Oregon elk hunter shot and killed a wolf he said was charging him, Oregon State Police and ODFW said.

The hunter, a 38-year-old man from Clackamas, Ore., who was not named in a news release, will not be charged in the case. The Union County district attorney’s office reviewed evidence and said the man acted in self-defense.

ODFW’s acting wolf program coordinator, Robyn Brown, said it was the first known incident of a wolf being shot in self-defense. Wolves are protected under state and federal law and killing them is a crime except in defense of human life and in certain cases where livestock are being attacked.

The incident happened Oct. 27 about 11:30 .am. in the Starkey Wildlife Management Unit in Northeast Oregon, where most of Oregon’s wolves live. The man told state police and ODFW he was hunting elk alone and repeatedly saw three animals he thought were coyotes moving around him. One of them eventually ran directly at him while another appeared to circle to the side.

The hunter said he yelled at the charging animal, then fired a single shot, killing it. The other two disappeared. State police later estimated the wolf was 27 yards away when the man fired. Police spokesman Capt. Bill Fugate said a shell casing from the man’s 30.06 rifle was found 27 yards from the wolf carcass.

The man returned to his hunting camp and told his companions what had happened. Uncertain whether he’d killed a coyote as he first thought, the hunters returned to the site and concluded it was a wolf. The hunter who fired the shot notified state police and ODFW, according to a news release. A wildlife trooper and an ODFW biologist responded to the hunting camp, went to the scene and took custody of the carcass for examination.

Fugate, the state police spokesman, said the finding of self-defense was based on the man’s statement, the shell casing location and the fact that the man “self-reported” the incident, which Fugate described as “compelling.”

ODFW said the dead wolf was an 83-pound female associated with a male, OR-30, that wears a tracking collar. Initial examination indicated it was not a breeding female, but the wolf’s DNA will be analyzed at the University of Idaho to make sure, according to ODFW.

Brown, the ODFW wolf coordinator, said dangerous encounters between people and wolves, cougars, bears and coyotes are rare. The animals usually avoid humans and will leave an area when they see, hear or smell one, she said in a prepared statement.

She said people who see a wolf should talk or yell to warn it off. Those carrying a firearm could fire a warning shot into the ground, she said.

Groups representing Oregon counties and timber companies want to resume litigation against the federal government’s expansion of the Cascade-Sisikiyou National Monument.

However, a federal judge is delaying proceedings in the two lawsuits until Dec. 1 to give the Trump administration more time to consider scaling back the monument’s size.

The monument’s boundaries were increased from about 66,000 acres to 114,000 acres in the waning days of the Obama administration, angering livestock producers and timber companies that rely on the public land for grazing and logging.

Most logging is prohibited within the monument and the designation also has the potential for grazing restrictions.

The Association of O&C Counties and the American Forest Resource Council both filed complaints against the expansion, arguing the national monument can’t include federal property that’s dedicated to timber harvest.

Those cases were stayed after the Trump administration decided to review the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument and others created in the past two decades.

During the summer, Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke submitted recommendations implying the monument should be reduced by roughly 16,600 acres that were previously open to logging under resource management plans.

The Association of O&C Counties is dissatisfied with this proposal, since Zinke did not address the inclusion of more than 35,000 acres of so-called O&C Lands in the monument.

O&C Lands were once granted to a railroad but then repossessed by the federal government and devoted to logging, with Western Oregon counties receiving a portion of the timber revenues.

The counties’ lawsuit against the federal government should be re-activated since their fundamental problem would not be resolved under the recommendations delivered during the summer, according to the Association of O&C Counties.

“Since that time, however, the Secretary has completed his review and submitted his final report to the President and there is no clear prospect of relief. If anything, the opposite is true,” the group said in a court brief.

The American Forest Resource Council likewise argued that its lawsuit might as well be resumed since it won’t be mooted by anything other than a complete reversal of the expansion.

“This inevitableness means that a stay only kicks the metaphorical can down the road, while continuing to worsen the harmful impacts the Monument expansion is having on the timber industry,” according to AFRC’s court brief.

The timber group claims the monument’s expansion has effectively shut down timber harvests that were planned for the next 10 years in the U.S. Bureau of Land Management’s Klamath Falls Resource Area.

“Timber on federal lands is highly regulated, and the sudden evaporation of millions of board feet of timber in one resource area is not easily absorbed in another area that is under similar sustainable management,” the brief said.

Attorneys for the federal government said it “simply is not accurate” that timber harvests have completely ceased in the region, noting the expansion did not cancel timber sales that were already approved.

Delaying the litigation until Dec. 1 would prevent the court from wasting resources, since the Trump administration may reach a decision that “could simplify or moot the issues.”

Senior U.S. District Judge Richard Leon sided with the government in both cases and agreed to prolong the stay until Dec. 1, when the parties will submit a joint report on the status of the litigation.

Craft brewers hope to give private hop breeders some more competition by funding a USDA-administered public breeding program based in Oregon.

The goal is to develop new public hop cultivars that are resistant to common fungal diseases and can be cultivated without licensing agreements by farmers in the Northwest and elsewhere.

In recent years, the trend has increasingly been for new varieties to be patented by private breeders, said Michelle Palacios, administrator of the Oregon Hop Commission.

“We’re seeing the public varieties become less and less competitive,” Palacios said.

Private breeders often want to closely control distribution of their hop cultivars, so their agreements with farmers are similar to contract production, said Fred Geschwill, a farmer near Woodburn, Ore., and president of the Hop Research Council.

“Their licensing agreements are very tight,” Geschwill said. “I grow it, give it back to them, then they sell it to the marketplace.”

Private breeders can better regulate supply and demand under this scenario, but farmers have less control over planting decisions and brewers have fewer suppliers competing for their business, he said.

While growers can still turn to traditional public cultivars, some of them have been losing their resistance to powdery mildew and other diseases over time.

For example, Cascade aroma hops have long been an industry staple but now they’re getting “long in the tooth,” said Chuck Skypeck, technical brewing projects manager with the Brewers Association, which will contribute an undisclosed sum to public breeding over five years.

“You can’t live on your good graces forever. You need to keep things in the pipeline,” said Skypeck.

As public funding for hop breeding has dried up in recent decades, the U.S. brewing industry has seen a resurgence — from fewer than 100 breweries in the 1970s, the number is expected to reach 6,000 by the end of 2017, he said.

“That landscape has changed,” he said.

Craft breweries don’t just need hops to impart bitterness, they rely on aroma varieties to create unique flavors that differentiate their brands, Skypeck said.

Unless they have desirable agronomic qualities and disease resistance, though, even the tastiest hops won’t gain traction on the farm, he said.

There currently isn’t a reliable mechanism for new hop varieties to be tested by brewers and growers, Skypeck said.

Aside from providing funding to USDA for breeding, the Brewers Association plans to form an advisor panel with members from both industries to guide research, he said. Trials of potential cultivars will also be studied in breweries and on farms.

“There are usually a lot more misses than there are hits,” Skypeck said of the breeding process.

Money from the Brewers Association will pay for one post-doctoral breeder position as well as a technician, said Ryan Hayes, a geneticist with USDA’s Agricultural Research Service. The hiring process has already begun for the post-doctoral position.

Once the initial five-year deal with USDA expires, the Brewers Association can enter into another agreement with the agency, he said.

Cultivars suited to moist Western Oregon may also be successful in New York and other regions where hop production is seeing a revival, said Geschwill.

As long as they source a certain portion of their ingredients from within New York, for example, farmers in that state can launch on-site breweries, he said.

Farmers in Michigan and Wisconsin are also experiencing more hop production, which would be aided by new public cultivars, said Skypeck said.

“They’re our partners in this industry,” he said. “It’s a unique solution, but we are a unique industry.”

A solar power project planned for 80 acres of high-value farmland in Oregon’s Jackson County has been shut down by the state’s Land Use Board of Appeals.

Earlier this year, Jackson County’s board of commissioners approved the project by excepting it from Oregon’s land use goal of preserving agricultural land.

Solar facilities on prime farmland must obtain such an exception if they’re larger than 12 acres.

The county’s decision was challenged by the 1,000 Friends of Oregon conservation group before LUBA, which has now agreed the project doesn’t qualify for such an exception.

LUBA’s ruling “re-establishes that these projects have to comply with statewide land use goals,” said Meriel Darzen, attorney for 1,000 Friends of Oregon.

Darzen said 1,000 Friends of Oregon doesn’t oppose solar energy but would prefer that sites are not developed on high-value farmland.

“I would still assume there are a lot of options,” such as industrial areas within “urban growth boundaries” or marginal lands, she said. “Just as with any energy facility, we think the siting considerations are important and should not be bypassed.”

Origis Energy, the project’s developer, said it’s too early to know if the ruling will have broader implications for solar energy siting in Oregon.

“The decision is certainly disappointing and our team is currently discussing and vetting all options at our disposal. We will make a decision on how to proceed shortly,” said Michael Chestone, a consultant for the company.

The project’s developer claimed that Jackson County was obligated to promote renewable energy under another statewide land use goal.

LUBA rejected this argument, finding that Oregon’s goal of energy conservation is not a requirement to build new renewable energy facilities.

Jackson County was also incorrect to approve the project due to its “comparative advantage” of being located in an area with adequate sunlight and topography near an electrical substation, the ruling said.

“That the subject property is flat, 80 acres in size and exposed to the sun does not render the property a ‘unique resource’” under Oregon law use rules, according to LUBA.

The project’s proximity to an electrical substation within the City of Medford’s “urban growth boundary” also doesn’t justify the land use goal exception, the ruling said.

It’s typical for industrial sites such as the substation to be located on the outskirts of an urban growth boundary near farmland, LUBA said.

If proximity to these areas were a legitimate reason for converting farmland, such “exceptions would become commonplace given the strong economic incentives” for new development to occur near cities on inexpensive land, the ruling said.

Such an interpretation “could easily subvert one of the principal structures of the statewide land use program: the urban growth boundary,” according to LUBA.

BORING, Ore. — A fire that destroyed a barn on the property of Oregon Farm Bureau President Barry Bushue may have been started by an electrical problem, but a fire inspector could not pinpoint the cause because the building was a complete loss.

Clackamas Fire District #1 spokesman Steve Hoffeditz said the cause will be listed as “undetermined.” The district estimated damage from the Oct. 26 fire at $40,000 to the building and $40,000 to the contents, which included shop equipment.

A passer-by saw the fire at Bushue Family Farm and reported it at 1:30 a.m., about the time the property owner awoke and did the same. Clackamas Fire, aided by firefighters from nearby Gresham, Ore., was able to confine the fire to the barn. No one was injured; the family was able to release goats that were in a corral next to the barn.

Bushue Family Farm grows berries and vegetables and at this time of year also has a pumpkin patch and hosts tours by schoolchildren. The farm resumed tours despite the fire. Barry Bushue could not be reached for comment.

Invasive, crop-damaging insects such as Spotted Wing Drosophila, Japanese Beetles and Brown Marmorated Stink Bugs cause alarm and get research attention, but the latest problem bug to emerge is a home-grown pest that hasn’t been a factor for decades.

Researchers in Oregon and Washington say they’re hearing reports of damage from Pacific Flatheaded Borers, a beetle that seeks out weakened plants and can kill young fruit and nut trees. Oregon State University staff recently found several damaged trees in its new cider apple nursery beds, which were planted as a research response to the increasing popularity of hard cider drinks.

Nik Wiman, an assistant professor and orchard specialist with OSU, said he knows of a young commercial cherry orchard that was hit hard and said the borers are a threat to “All those brand new hazelnut trees out there.”

The damage to trees is caused by the beetle larvae, which bore into trees and chew “galleries” or “mines” between the bark and wood. They can “girdle” and kill a young tree by chewing their way all the way around it.

Wiman and others said borers are a difficult pest to work with because there are no traps or pheromones developed to attract them. Spraying for them is problematic because they spend much of their life sheltered under bark. They begin to emerge in late spring, but there doesn’t seem to be a regular schedule for that.

To that end, Wiman is collecting infected wood from damaged trees, the idea being to rear larvae under controlled conditions and learn more about when adult beetles fly. “We want to get an emergence curve,” he said. “We want a predictive model.”

Flatheaded borers are not a new pest. Scientific literature on the borer dates to the 1930s or 1940s, but it hasn’t been studied for decades, said Betsy Beers, a professor and entomologist at Washington State University’s Tree Fruit Research and Extension Center in Wenatchee.

“We’ve seen so little of it here in Washington, I think most entomologists have forgotten about it,” Beers said. “The ones I saw a couple of years ago were the first ones I’d seen in my professional career.”

In that case, damage reports surfaced from tree nurseries in British Columbia. Washington State obtained borer larvae and reared them as a research project.

An OSU Extension publication from 1982 said the boring larvae almost always begin their work on the sunny side of a tree, and may bore 1 to 2 inches deep. If they tunnel all the way around, they can kill the tree or infested branches. Growers should look for darkened areas of bark and fine bits of sawdust low on the tree.

Adult borers are up to a half-inch long, with metallic copper-colored spots on their wings, according to the OSU publication.

The adults fly for three to five weeks and make a buzzing sound when flying, according to the publication. “They are active insects, and will quickly conceal themselves or fly away when approached. Being sunlovers, they are inactive and rarely seen on cloudy days,” it said.

James LaBonte, an entomologist with the Oregon Department of Agriculture, said Flatheaded Borers and similar pests take advantage of trees damaged by equipment or weakened by sunburn, drought or even excess water. The act of planting can stress young trees as roots are disrupted, he said.

“Anything that makes a tree feel less than great is going to set them up for attack,” he said. “All of these can predispose these plants to attack.”

Extreme weather swings, whether brought on by climate change or not, may bring on more insect damage to stressed trees, LaBonte said.

He said Christmas tree growers, for example, are seeing more damage from the Douglas Fir Twig Weevil, which doesn’t kill trees but can reduce value by making them look ugly.

“I anticipate we will see more of this,” he said.

WENATCHEE, Wash. — The Washington Apple Commission and The Pear Bureau Northwest have severed relations with a contract promoter in India after audits found they had apparently been overcharged more than $720,000.

The Apple Commission was overbilled $573,182 for services — including some that had not be performed, a state audit found, and the Pear Bureau is conducting an audit and has found discrepancies of about $150,000, spokeswoman Kathy Stephenson said Tuesday.

As a result of the audits, the Apple Commission, in Wenatchee, and The Pear Bureau, in Portland, broke ties with Keith Sunderlal, owner of SCS Group, New Delhi, India. Sunderlal told The Wenatchee World that doing business in India is complex and that he’s confident his firm will be absolved.

The “potential overbilling” was made public by a special investigation by Washington State Auditor Pat McCarthy. His spokeswoman, Kathleen Cooper, declined to call it fraud, saying that implies criminal conduct and that the auditor is not a criminal investigator. She used the term “questionable costs.”

The auditor’s report called it “significant discrepancies,” but Apple Commission President Todd Fryhover called it “fraud.” He alleged that invoices were falsified and that he was very surprised because Sunderlal has worked for the commission since 2004. Discrepancies spanning five years were uncovered but may go back farther, Fryhover said.

The commission withheld $505,138 in payments to SCS and notified the USDA, which plans to refer the case to the U.S. Office of Inspector General for further review, according to the auditor’s report.

“The Office of the Inspector General can analyze it from a criminal perspective, which we can’t,” Cooper said.

There’s no evidence the Apple Commission did anything wrong, Cooper said. It had controls in place to ensure accountability of public funds and has strengthened those controls at the auditor’s recommendation, she said.

“We will be doing more direct payments to vendors, especially large ones, to prevent this,” the Pear Bureau’s Stephenson said.

The Apple Commission spends $7.8 million annually to promote Washington apples in 30 foreign markets. The money includes $4.8 million from the federal Market Access Program and $3 million from a 3.5-cent per box grower assessment on the annual crop.

In March, an SCS subcontractor told the Apple Commission that its invoices did not match invoices for its work that SCS was submitting to the commission, Fryhover said.

The commission hired an outside accounting firm, which compared invoices the contractor submitted to the commission with a subcontractor’s original invoices from July 1, 2015, to June 30, 2016, and found “many discrepancies, including formatting, letterheads, references to non-existent India service tax numbers, bill numbers and amounts,” the auditor’s report states.

The accounting firm found invoices for promotions not performed and overbilling for promotions that were performed, the report says. The commission reported the information to the USDA, which asked the commission to expand its review to the past five years.

In April, the commission asked the state auditor to perform an expanded review.

The auditor looked at invoices paid by the commission to the contractor from Aug. 3, 2011, to May 3, 2017. During that period, the contractor sent 1,336 invoices totaling $5 million from various subcontractors to the commission.

The state auditor looked at original invoices from two subcontractors who billed at high levels and found $573,182 in “potential” overbilling. A total of 470 invoices for $358,547 from one subcontractor were for services not provided and other bills to the commission contained information not in original subcontractor invoices that increased bills, the audit report states.

The contractor told the state auditor it was easier to submit one summary invoice to the commission and that off-the-books cash payments account for 25 percent of operations and is a partial reason for significant discrepancies, the audit report says.

One subcontractor told the state auditor it keeps two sets of invoices, one for direct billing and one for off-the-books cash payments.

There was no bank statement proof of off-the-books payments and no way to trace them, the audit report says.

“Our investigation indicated all of the subcontractor invoices that were submitted to the commission were not original invoices even though they were supposed to be,” Cooper said.

Fryhover said the commission thought it was receiving original invoices but realized it wasn’t only after being contacted by the subcontractor.

He said the $505,138 in payments to SCS that the commission has withheld is for all invoices from SCS for the second half of the 2016-2017 season.

He said the commission has hired a new India representative.

India was Washington’s third-largest apple export market at 4.8 million, 40-pound boxes in the 2016-17 season. It was behind Mexico and Canada.

SALEM, Ore. (AP) — Americans will pay more for pre-cut Christmas trees this year as shortages deepen from the country’s top two producers, Oregon and North Carolina.

Joe Territo sells Oregon trees in San Jose, California. But he’s becoming increasingly frustrated with rising costs, from the trees to labor. Territo says the only figure going down is profit.

“It seems like every year, it’s harder and harder,” Territo said. He expects to sell 6-foot Noble firs for about $75 a piece this season, up from about $69 last year.

The problem is one of supply. Christmas tree growers are coming up short as their 2017 harvest enters its critical period, with trees being shipped coast-to-coast and abroad.

Around the time of the Great Recession, growers had an oversupply of trees after planting too many in the early 2000s. Subsequent low prices forced many farmers out of the Christmas tree business, leaving other growers to tend to the market.

But now, with only so many trees to go around, remaining farmers can’t keep up with demand — and they might not catch up for years. It can take nine years before some trees are ready to be cut and sold.

Oregon farms harvest the most trees in the United States, exporting them to places like Asia and California. Trees from North Carolina are generally shipped to states east of the Mississippi River, such as Florida.

Casey Grogan is a manager at Silver Bells Tree Farm, a few hundred acres outside Oregon’s capital city, Salem. He reckons the farm has received 20 times its normal number of customer inquiries.

“We just have enough to supply the customers we’ve been supplying, so we’re not able to help them,” Grogan said.

But Grogan is optimistic for fellow Oregonians who should be able to find fresh fir trees. And there are many u-cut tree farms.

“The people that are really gonna suffer from this, I think, are going to be people in Southern California, Arizona, Texas, places like that,” he said.

Tim O’Connor, executive director of the National Christmas Tree Association, denies a shortage, but acknowledges, “Supply is tight.”

“Everyone who wants a tree will be able to get one,” O’Connor said.

Christmas tree farmers aren’t so confident.

“Right now, there’s a tree shortage. It’s been coming down the line for the last eight or 10 years, or so,” said Jason Hupp, who helps manage Hupp Farms near Silver Falls State Park in Oregon.

“So our biggest challenges are having enough trees to supply customers and just getting phone calls after phone calls after phone calls of people desperate for trees that don’t exist,” he said.

One recent morning, a helicopter piloted by Terry Harchenko swooped over Hupp Farms, snatching up bundles of trees after Raul Sosa, a lone worker clad in high-visibility orange, connected them to a hook on the chopper’s dangling line.

It’s dangerous work — the hook could swing and strike Sosa — but worker and pilot worked gracefully in concert.

“It’s like air ballet. It’s crazy,” Hupp said beforehand.

The helicopter dropped the heavy trees in a nearby lot, where other workers pulled away ropes holding them together. Many Hupp Farms trees will head down south to California.

Wholesale growers estimate they’re raising prices at least 10 percent year-over-year. Growers don’t expect normal harvest levels for Christmas trees to return until at least 2021 or 2025.

Like Hupp Farms in Oregon, Barr Evergreens in North Carolina can fulfill wholesale orders for its existing customers but has to turn away new ones, said owner Rusty Barr.

Barr expects to raise prices $2 to $3 for pre-cut Fraser fir trees at his retail outfit. That’s on top of the $60 to $80 they’ve sold for in the past, depending on size.

North Carolina harvested an estimated 3.5 million trees in 2016, according to the Pacific Northwest Christmas Tree Association. The state was followed by Michigan (3 million), Pennsylvania (2.3 million) and Washington (1.5 million).

By contrast, Oregon cut down approximately 5.2 million trees.

For Oregon growers, popular Noble firs are especially lucrative — but they only grow so fast, often spending nine years in the ground to grow to 6 feet in the Pacific Northwest.

“That’s the Cadillac of the industry,” said Bob Schaefer, general manager of Noble Mountain Tree Farm. The Salem, Oregon, area wholesaler is massive, usually harvesting about half a million trees a year from the more than 4,000 acres the company grows on in the Willamette Valley.

One of the factors driving the shortage was a practically nonexistent crop of Noble fir cones for 15 years, with a good crop finally returning in 2016, Schaefer said. Without cones, there’re no seedlings and no trees.

Limited supplies of the Noble fir seedlings led Noble Mountain to fill production holes with Douglas firs, assuming customers would still want a Christmas tree of some sort. But some buyers aren’t eager to branch out.

“There’s a lot of pent-up demand for Noble fir that, you know, probably, to some extent, won’t be met this year,” Schaefer said.

He expects Noble fir harvest levels to return to normal in 2025 or 2026.

California is Noble Mountain’s biggest customer, but the company sends trees elsewhere in the U.S., and even down to Mexico, where the market is hot for its abundance of Douglas firs.

“This year, we’re shipping more to Mexico than we’ve ever shipped before,” Schaefer said.

Even as shortages affect the Pacific Northwest, competitors in North Carolina don’t keep Schaefer up at night.

For starters, cross-country freight prices tend to keep the competition at bay. “I won’t say it’s prohibitive, but it pretty much prices their product out of the realm of reason for the consumer in most cases,” he said.

Barr, the North Carolina wholesaler, agrees. With freight costs, “it’s getting pricey to go to Denver,” he said.

There’s also a rule of thumb among Christmas tree farmers: West Coast trees remain west of the Mississippi, and East Coast trees stay east of the river. Scattered exceptions crop up, such as when wholesalers compete for Lone Star State customers.

“We kind of bash heads in Texas,” Schaefer said.

Shortages and rising prices are fueling concerns among growers that customers will turn to artificial trees, whose shelf lives long outlast those of their natural competitors.

Oregon growers sold 4.7 million real trees in 2015, falling more than a quarter from sales five years earlier, according to the United States Department of Agriculture.

Artificial trees accounted for nearly 81 million of Christmas trees displayed in the U.S. in 2016, while nearly 19 million were real, according to estimates from the nonprofit American Christmas Tree Association.

With a dramatic shortage that’s not expected to reverse for another six or eight years — if not longer — Hupp, in Oregon, is worried customers will buy artificial because they can’t find the real thing.

“Their families will get used to that being the norm,” he said