BANDON -- The Class of 2016 will graduate from Bandon High School at 7 p.m. Saturday, June 11, at Otis K. Murray Court.

Wilderness Poets Oregon Cranberries (Sweetened with Apples) - Dried Cranberries, 8 Ounce (227 Grams)  Amazon.com

All kinds of things are happening…just not at United Cranberry!  With the 2015 crop, all of our members transferred their contracts to Cranberry Growers Cooperative, or CranGrow for short.  CranGrow has a little bit different structure than UCGC and was organized under a different WI statute for business reasons.  You can find out about that co op at www.crangrow.com

United Cranberry members have reason to be proud!  Our efforts began in 2010 with a goal of organizing independent growers.  We led with the BeBerryAware promotion and used our resources to fingerprint a cranberry. UCGC started handling fruit in 2012-2014 and developed a significant customer base for our dried cranberries that we sold under Wisconsin’s Best Cranberries.  With both UCGC and WBC being wound down, the future is CranGRow!  All of the success of CranGRow will have started with a hand full of growers back in 2010 thinking that something had to change!  Thank you all.

CranGRow has a new processing plant under construction in Warrens, WI. We will keep the blog going under United Cranberry unless we find something better!  Stay tuned for pictures and info on CranGRow!

“There was a meeting of independent cranberry growers in Wisconsin Rapids on June 2nd, 2016. Attorneys from Lawton & Cates provided an update on the lawsuit against Ocean Spray and reviewed options going forward. Various growers expressed an interest in joining the case and proceeding as individual plaintiffs. If you missed the meeting and are interested in an update on the case and hearing about your options going forward, you should contact Jim Olson, Scott Hassett or Dan Lenz at Lawton & Cates, (608) 282-6200.”

As our front page story today indicates, we have a potential disaster on our hands in the advancing threat of sudden oak death, the fungal infection that’s devastated timberland in California and has been slowly advancing in the last decade…

BROOKINGS — Curry County Commissioner David Brock Smith's eyes widen in amazement as he scans the landscape near Brookings.

June 3, 2016 Scale Update  Oregon Cranberry Growers Association

COOS COUNTY – Nearly 10 months have passed since the Coos County Sheriff's Office had to prematurely say goodbye to K9 Neeko, but his successor has already begun to put his best paws forward.

NORTH BEND — “Kids need to know they are part of something that's been here a long time,” said historian Steven Greif about a project he's been working on since 2010.

The lawyers for the plaintiffs have asked me to post the following:

To:​All Independent Cranberry Growers

We will be holding a meeting at the Mead Hotel in Wisconsin Rapids on Thursday, June 2, 2016 beginning at 7 pm to discuss the impact of the recent court decision denying Plaintiffs’ motion for class certification and to outline options going forward. All independent cranberry growers are invited to attend. If you have or have had a contract with Ocean Spray since 2009, please contact this office before attending. 

Lawton & Cates, S.C.

608-282-6200

BANDON -- Beginning Memorial Day weekend, the Bandon Historical Museum will be open seven days a week. The museum runs its summer Hours from Memorial Day through the Cranberry Festival in September. The rest of the year the museum is…

I was very excited to get an email this morning from my friend Gary Carter in Port Orford. He, too, is a plant lover and cares enough to share resource information valuable to anyone who wants to help save our…

COOS BAY — Oregon Coast Culinary Institute students are getting an education in the distinctive foods of the Celtic nations in time for the South Coast Celtic Fest on May 7.

5-2-16 Scale Update  Oregon Cranberry Growers Association

BANDON -- The Bandon Cranberry Festival is seeking members for the 2016 Cranberry Court.

BANDON -- Jack Hackett has almost 900 rhododendrons, 100 hydrangeas, many azaleas and dozens of other flowering trees and bushes, berries and even lemon, avocado and orange trees on his property north of Bandon. It all makes him happy, but…

BANDON — MarLo Dance Studio will host a free story and dance outreach event at 2 p.m. Saturday, May 7, in the Bandon Public Library located at 1204 11th St. This fun learning opportunity, open to the public, is a…

KALISPELL, Mont. (AP) — Two environmental groups have filed a lawsuit against the federal government over the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s plan to recover threatened bull trout.

Alliance for the Wild Rockies and Friends of the Wild Swan filed the lawsuit on April 19 in U.S. District Court in Oregon, accusing federal wildlife officials of not doing enough to help the trout and saying the recovery plan violates the Endangered Species Act with its inadequacies.

The agency released its Bull Trout Recovery Plan in September outlining actions to boost bull trout populations in six recovery units spread over Idaho, Oregon, Washington, Montana and a tiny portion of Nevada.

A spokesman with FWS said the agency wouldn’t comment on pending litigation, but biologists with the federal agency have defended the plan as realistic.

BANDON -- Jack Hackett has almost 900 rhododendrons, 100 hydrangeas, many azaleas and dozens of other flowering trees and bushes, berries and even lemon, avocado and orange trees on his property north of Bandon. It all makes him happy, but…

KLAMATH FALLS, Ore. — Proponents of certain water solutions in the Klamath Basin say an energy bill amendment that passed the U.S. Senate provides key support for improving facilities and other initiatives.

The amendment by Oregon Sens. Jeff Merkley and Ron Wyden, both Democrats, authorizes measures first proposed as part of the 2010 Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement, although it doesn’t address the controversial removal of four dams on the Klamath River.

The provision allows the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation to help farmers in the basin deal with reduced water supplies as a result of future water-sharing agreements and to provide reduced-cost power for irrigation, the senators said in a news release.

The provision, which also enables the bureau to do certain upgrades of irrigation facilities, was part of an energy bill that passed the Senate, 85-12, on April 20 and now heads to a Senate-House conference committee.

“It’s really good news,” said Beatty, Ore., cattle rancher Becky Hyde, who represents the Upper Klamath Water Users and is a long-time proponent of the KBRA. “The nice thing is, we’re slowly … starting to put regulatory assurances for species back into place for agriculture. This facilities bill resurrects some of the power stuff (in the KBRA).

“We still have a long way to go on water balance, but we’ve got some good things happening,” she said.

As is often the case in the Klamath Basin, the measure is not without controversy. Lawrence Kogan, an attorney for the Klamath Irrigation District, and representatives of U.S. Rep. Doug LaMalfa, R-Calif., were meeting with Reclamation officials on April 21 to discuss the objections of basin irrigators to some of the plans.

Kogan said the bureau is using coercive tactics to pressure the KID to accept terms of a government loan to replace a nearly 100-year-old flume on one of its main canals by linking future water deliveries to the district’s acceptance of the contract.

“It’s a poison-pill bill that will kill the basin because Congress doesn’t even know what it’s put in the bill,” Kogan said. He accuses proponents of “deception,” arguing their true aim is to turn much of the basin into non-productive wildlands.

But the senators insist that their amendment, along with other parts of the newly resurrected Klamath Basin plan, will benefit agriculture as well as fish and wildlife. The aim is to bring down power costs for basin irrigators, whose electricity costs are higher than those in similar Reclamation projects, officials say.

The plan will “help ensure that Klamath agriculture is a sustainable foundation of the local economy,” Merkley said in a press release.

It’s been a decade since the expiration of a 50-year contract between the U.S. Department of the Interior and PacifiCorp caused power rates in the region to skyrocket from a half-cent per kilowatt-hour to as much as 10 cents, Hyde said. The lower rates were a trade-off for the ability to pump water through the project for its Klamath River hydroelectric facilities.

While the bill doesn’t identify a funding amount, it enables the bureau to find lower-cost power for irrigators with projects that promote energy efficiency and renewable energy, the senators said. One solution could be putting in micro hydro facilities along irrigation canals or the river, Hyde said.

“Micro hydro is a really interesting concept,” she said. “One of the things (the bill) asks for is to study in a really expedited way what’s the best return for dollars invested in energy infrastructure upgrades, so that means solar could play a role or micro hydro could play a role.”

The bill’s passage in the Senate comes two weeks after top state and federal officials gathered in Klamath, Calif., on April 6 to sign the final version of a dam-removal plan they announced in February. The plan calls for a nonprofit organization to take control of the four dams from owner PacifiCorp and seek a go-ahead for their removal from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

In addition, the parties signaled a plan to revive the KBRA, a companion to the original Klamath Hydroelectric Settlement Agreement, with federal legislation that would provide money to operate two diversion dams within the basin that PacifiCorp would turn over to Reclamation so irrigators wouldn’t have to pick up the cost, Craig Tucker of the Karuk Tribe has said.

Most of the 42 original signatories have been working for the past few months to revive provisions in the original agreements, which expired when Congress failed to authorize dam removal by the end of 2015. Going through FERC for dam removal could make it more politically palatable for lawmakers to support other aspects of the agreements.

“I’m very hopeful” the amendment will survive the House-Senate conference, Hyde said. “I think it’s a great thing. I’ve been hopeful in the past … but my sense is the thing has got momentum.”