Flowering rush, an aquatic weed that clogs irrigation canals, has spread to multiple new sites near McNary Dam along the Columbia River since its discovery in the area last year.

Meanwhile, the federal government must again clear environmental regulatory hurdles before removing new patches of flowering rush found growing below the dam, which is under the jurisdiction of a different regional office of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

“Because we’re part of the federal government, we have to follow federal laws and regulations,” said Diana Fredlund, spokesperson for the Army Corps’ Portland District.

Flowering rush was first found growing on the Oregon side of the Columbia River in August 2014, with surveys eventually locating 15 sites near McNary Dam.

That portion of the river is governed by the Walla Walla District of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which had to obtain approval under the National Environmental Policy Act, the Endangered Species Act and the Archeological Resources Protection Act to remove the weed with diver-assisted suction hoses.

“This should be straightforward. We’re just going in and by hand removing some small sites,” said Tim Butler, Oregon Department of Agriculture’s noxious weed program manager.

By the time the agency cleared those hurdles and scheduled a dive team to yank the flowering rush patches in August 2015, the weed had expanded to 45 total sites in the area.

While divers were able to treat 39 of those sites, six of them were growing on the Columbia River below McNary Dam, which means they come under the purview of the Army Corps’ Portland District, said Mark Porter, an integrated weed management coordinator for ODA.

For that reason, the process of obtaining clearance under NEPA, ESA and ARPA must now be repeated by the agency’s Portland office, which is unlikely to occur in time for the patches to be removed before next year, he said.

The agency expects that the regulatory processes will be completed over winter, when the plants disappear below the water line, so they can be covered with mats or removed when they re-emerge next spring, said Fredlund.

“We do want it to keep it from becoming a bigger problem,” she said.

The Army Corps’ Walla Walla District can continue removing the weed without re-clearing regulatory barriers, and its experience is expected to speed up the Portland District’s compliance with those statutes, said Damian Walter, wildlife biologist for the agency.

Apart from sites on the Columbia River, there’s a large population of flowering rush upriver on the Yakima River in Washington, which state regulators are attempting to control, he said.

“There is a constant source currently in the system,” Walter said. “We’ve got to address the source of it.”

As part of long-term plans to battle flowering rush, Washington State University is studying predatory beetles in Central Europe that feed on the weed’s roots in that region, limiting its spread.

The weed poses a serious threat if it’s able to enter irrigation systems along the Columbia River or its tributaries, said Porter. Flowering rush grows so thickly that it greatly slows the movement of water and changes aquatic ecosystems.

“This plant seems to be a very aggressive aquatic invader. This isn’t just another weed,” he said. “it has the big potential to do some harm.”

Around Hanukkah, we usually spend a lot of time thinking up new things to top our latkes with. After all, the potato pancakes themselves are pretty simple. Shred some potatoes, bind them into …

ONTARIO, Ore. — Idaho and Oregon onion growers say they can live with the water quality provisions included in the FDA’s final produce safety rule, which was released Nov. 13.

Two years ago, they were worried the proposed water quality provisions in FDA’s originally proposed produced rule could put them out of business. But industry officials said the FDA heard their concerns and re-wrote the rule in a way that onion growers are OK with.

To go from a rule that would have seriously impacted the economics of the onion industry “to a rule that’s livable for us and allows us to stay in business is a huge victory,” said Kay Riley, chairman of the Idaho-Eastern Oregon Onion Committee.

When FDA first proposed its produce safety rule in 2013, it included water quality standards limiting how much generic E. coli bacteria could be present in agricultural water.

If the water didn’t meet those standards, farmers had to immediately stop using it. Virtually none of the surface water used by onion growers in Eastern Oregon and Southwestern Idaho meets those standards.

The water quality standards still exist in the final rule.

But FDA altered them to allow growers to meet the standards, even if their water exceeds the minimum bacteria levels, if they can show through scientific evidence that bacteria dies off at a certain rate from the last day of irrigation until harvest.

The bulb onions grown in this region are left in the field to dry for a few weeks following harvest. Field trials by Oregon State University researchers have shown these onions will meet the so-called die-off provisions.

“The thing that’s great about it is they actually listened to us,” Riley said. “I would deem it a tremendous victory compared to what it could have been.”

But the final rule still requires farmers to test their water annually, even if they meet the die-off provisions. Onion growers say the testing will be costly and time-consuming and they hope to be able to skip them.

“They are still going to require testing and that’s going to be the hardest thing to deal with,” said Stuart Reitz, an OSU cropping systems extension agent in Ontario. “The final rule is not ideal but it’s not that bad. It’s one onion growers can live with.”

Reitz said the industry is working with FDA to see if it’s possible an entity such as an irrigation district could conduct water quality tests in canals and have the results apply to a large group of farmers.

“That would get each individual farm out from having to do the testing themselves,” he said. “We really need to get some more details from FDA on what type of format that would potentially be.”

According to the FDA rule, farmers may use data collected by a third party, such as an irrigation district, but the “testing data may only be shared if there is no reasonably identifiable source of likely microbiological contamination between the sampling sites and the farms involved.”

A Baker City, Ore., man who told state police and wildlife officials that he’d shot a wolf while hunting coyotes on private property has been charged with killing an endangered species.

Brennon D. Witty, 25, also was charged with hunting with a centerfire rifle without a big game tag, Harney County District Attorney Tim Colahan said Monday. Both charges are Class A misdemeanors, each punishable by up to a year in jail and a $6,250 fine. Witty will be arraigned Dec. 2 in Grant County Justice Court, Canyon City.

The shooting happened in Grant County; the neighboring Harney County DA handled it as a courtesy because his Grant County counterpart was acquainted with the hunter’s family and wanted to avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest.

The incident happened Oct. 6, when Witty voluntarily notified ODFW and Oregon State Police that he’d shot a wolf while hunting coyotes on private property south of Prairie City. Police recovered a wolf’s body on the property.

Oregon’s action to remove wolves from the state endangered species list has no apparent bearing on the case. Wolves were listed under the state Endangered Species Act at the time of the shooting; the ODFW Commission on Nov. 9 removed wolves from the state list. Regardless, they remained on the federal endangered species list in the western two-thirds of the state.

The wolf was identified as OR-22, a male that has worn a GPS tracking collar since October 2013 and dispersed from the Umatilla Pack in February 2015. He was in Malheur County for awhile, then traveled into Grant County. Wildlife biologists don’t believe he had a mate of pups. Young or sub-dominant wolves often leave their home packs to establish their own territory and find mates.

OR-22 was the third Oregon wolf known to have died since August, when the Sled Springs pair in Northeast Oregon were found dead of unknown cause. The state now has a minimum of 82 wolves.

SPOKANE — The Pacific Northwest agencies representing grain farmers will unite to take a proactive approach against what they say is misinformation about the value of dams.

The Idaho Wheat Commission, Oregon Wheat Commission and Washington Grain Commission made the decision Nov. 11 in Spokane during a tri-state commission meeting.

Kristin Meira, executive director of the Pacific Northwest Waterways Association, outlined recent efforts by groups to revive arguments in favor of removing dams on the Snake River.

The outdoor clothing design company Patagonia is the reason the argument recently resurfaced, Meira said. The company’s founder and CEO is in favor of dam breaching and produced a documentary, “Dam Nation,” that’s “filled with inaccuracies,” Meira said. Protest flotillas in Seattle, Portland and the Lower Granite Dam near Lewiston, Idaho were assisted by funding from Patagonia, Meira said.

The groups’ arguments include the claim that removal of the dams will help save orcas in the Puget Sound, Meira said. Orcas eat large Chinook salmon from the Columbia-Snake river system.

“Then they make the leap to, ‘If we just breach the four Snake River dams, they’ll have a lot more Chinook to eat,” Meira said. “The problem with that argument is, the reason the orca populations were decimated 40 to 50 years ago is because until the mid-1970s, people were out there rounding up the orcas in nets and hauling them away to Sea Worlds around the country.”

Orca populations have been slowly increasing since the 1970s.

There are also more fish in the river system than before Bonneville Dam was constructed in the 1930s, Meira said, citing information from the Bonneville Power Administration and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The Snake River system averages a juvenile fish survival rate of 97 percent as they move through the dam.

“We’re approaching levels that they’re not even achieving in undammed rivers,” Meira said. “This is the latest, very extreme argument (opponents) have tried to put forth. To argue this is the time we should be talking about dam breaching is a really hollow cry.”

Roughly 10 percent of U.S. wheat exports go through the Snake River dams, Meira said. Farmers need to speak out about the importance of the system to their operations, she said. The waterways association maintains a website to combat misinformation.

The dam-breaching groups are speaking to universities and reaching out to professors to back up their message, Meira said.

“They have found they have not been successful in the courts or in Congress,” Meira said. “All you have left is the press and going to colleges and doing flotillas and things like that.”

Blaine Jacobson, executive director of the Idaho Wheat Commission, said the industry needs to take a proactive approach against the protestors’ messages.

“We’ve got a great story, and it’s not getting out there,” Jacobson said. “The concern we have is that we’re playing defense. They’re setting the agenda instead of the people who really matter setting the agenda.”

The three commissions will discuss further action at their respective meetings.

BOISE — Researchers with the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality and Oregon State University say analyzing insect populations is often the best way to assess water quality, and the data can create opportunities for agricultural land owners.

IDEQ regional water quality manager Lynn Van Every served on a committee that recently published an updated technical document to help guide the department’s water-quality analysis of Idaho waterways, based on aquatic invertebrates.

Van Every explained the department assessed roughly 100 stream reaches known to be healthy for a picture of fully functioning waterways and will use the document to compare insect life within water bodies statewide. While water samples provide a snapshot of water quality, insects offer a long-term look at health.

The new publication is the third revision of the technical document analyzing aquatic invertebrate populations. The original version was released in the late 1990s. Van Every said the document will undergo a public comment period and should be available for use some time next year.

“It’s directly associated with implementing best-management practices to address streams that are impaired,” Van Every said.

Implementation of projects aimed at improving water quality are voluntary for farmers and ranchers. Van Every said IDEQ often works with USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service or local soil and water conservation districts to design and implement cooperative, incentivized water-quality projects on agricultural land, such as buffer strips along field edges by streams, cattle fencing or off-site watering.

Van Every said IDEQ is in the midst of analyzing how aquatic life in Pebble Creek — which flows through agricultural land near Lava Hot Springs — has responded to a recent restoration of original channels.

OSU researchers Sandra DeBano and Dave Wooster have extensively studied agricultural buffers and their affects on aquatic invertebrates.

Generally, Wooster said, healthy streams are rich in desirable aquatic insects such as caddisflies, mayflies and stoneflies. The absences of those insects, and often the presence of midges or segmented worms, bodes ill for stream health, he said.

The OSU researchers’ positions were created about 15 years ago, when Eastern Oregon farmers were concerned about potential farm buffer zone requirements, similar to those in place along streams in Western Oregon forest land, to protect salmon. They’ve found the length of buffer zones they studied in Eastern Oregon is more important to water quality than width. Furthermore, data collected in 2012 and 2013 from Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program buffers along Eastern Oregon wheat fields shows the width of buffers is more critical than the type of vegetation. The data, which is still being analyzed and awaits publication, finds little difference in water quality between grass or forested buffers.

“If you have limited money and limited land, probably the most important thing to do is focus on having a continuous buffer, regardless of width,” DeBano said. “And if you have more money or time, then you may focus more on increasing width.”

The researchers also used aquatic insects to assess streams for the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation, and they’re partnering with the tribes to assess the effectiveness of a recent restoration project, removing cattle ponds on camp creek near Enterprise, Ore.

They weren’t on the agenda when the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife Commission voted Nov. 9 to take wolves off the state’s endangered species list, but Oregon’s elk and deer population likely will be key factors in wolf management decisions in the years ahead.

Mark Henjum, a retired wildlife biologist who was ODFW’s original wolf program coordinator, said healthy deer and elk populations are a buffer between livestock and the state’s increasing number of predators.

Oregon has 25,000 to 30,000 black bears, an estimated 6,200 cougars and a minimum of 82 wolves, according to ODFW.

Biologists fully expect the state’s wolf population to continue growing. Wolves occupy only 12 percent of their potential range in the state, and continued dispersal from Northeast Oregon will put them in contact with elk and deer and possibly in competition with other predators. Bear and cougar are much more widely dispersed in the state.

Sharp, localized drops in ungulate prey, as deer and elk are known, could drive predators to attack sheep, cattle or other domestic animals, Henjum and other biologists say.

Bears are primarily omnivorous but will take young deer and elk, especially in the spring. Cougars, meanwhile, are solitary ambush hunters and can take just about any animal at will, Henjum said. “They’re amazingly good at what they do,” he said.

Wolves travel in packs and chase down prey. They can kill solitary adult cougars, or females and kittens, and chase cougars off carcasses. Pressure from wolves can force cougars into steeper, brushier terrain. The competition for ungulate prey could produce a bad turn for livestock.

Biologists say wolves prefer elk, but attacks on livestock are what anger cattle and sheep producers and gain media attention. From 2009 through June 2015, Oregon’s confirmed losses to wolves stood at 79 sheep, 37 cattle, two goats and two herd protection dogs. Ranchers believe wolves are responsible for much more damage, saying livestock often disappear in wolf country. In addition, many livestock attacks are written off as “probable” or “possible” wolf depredations.

“This buffer thing is one of the main reasons we haven’t seen so high a rate of loss of livestock,” Henjum said. “I think down the road, trying to maintain the ungulate populations is something that‘s going to be more important as we move on.”

Although wolves were taken off the state endangered species list, their existence in Oregon is still governed by a wolf management plan. Hunting and trapping are not allowed, and there’s no sport season for wolves. The plan does allow “controlled take” of wolves in cases of chronic livestock attacks or decreases in prey.

Phase 3 of the wolf plan, the next step after delisting, calls for wolves to be managed “in concert with its wild prey base,” a move strongly supported by groups such as the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation. “Oregon’s wolf population is rapidly approaching the point where human tolerance and unacceptable impacts upon the wolf’s deer and elk prey base must be addressed,” the foundation said in a letter to the ODFW Commission.

Jerome Rosa, executive director of the Oregon Cattlemen’s Association, said his organization’s members report seeing fewer deer and elk in some areas, and more in others.

What’s ahead for wolves might be found in Oregon’s cougar management plan, which allows for targeted killings to address problems. In October, the ODFW Commission authorized killing 95 cougars in four wildlife management units during 2016. One area was chosen because of human, livestock and pet safety concerns, and three were selected to help mule deer recover. The kills, to be done by ODFW employees, federal wildlife service agents, or contractors, are in addition to whatever other cougar deaths occur.

ROMULUS, N.Y. (AP) — Hundreds of ghostly white deer roaming among overgrown munitions bunkers at a sprawling former Army weapons depot face an uncertain future after living and breeding largel…

In the beginning, there was a paper coffee cup — bright red on top, shading to a darker cranberry below. That much seems beyond doubt.

In the beginning, there was a paper coffee cup — bright red on top, shading to a darker cranberry below. That much seems beyond doubt.

A controversial proposal to expand a landfill on farmland in Oregon’s Yamhill County has been dealt a setback due to an adverse land use ruling.

Oregon’s Land Use Board of Appeals found that, in approving the proposal, the county government improperly shifted the burden to farmers to prove they’d be harmed by the 29-acre expansion.

Due to this error, LUBA has now sent the approval decision back to Yamhill County for reconsideration.

Under Oregon law, certain non-farm uses such as landfills can only be approved if they don’t “force a significant change” in farm practices on surrounding farmland.

In this case, LUBA found that the county incorrectly discounted evidence of harm from the Riverbend landfill on properties beyond one mile from the facility.

The county also erred by disregarding evidence of bird damage because the farmers didn’t quantify the amount of destruction, LUBA said.

It’s up to landfill’s owner — Waste Management — to prove the harm isn’t significant, but the county didn’t fault the company for not quantifying the extent of damage from birds attracted to the facility, the ruling said.

Similarly, LUBA said the county insufficiently considered the impacts of wind carrying plastic bags and other trash from the landfill onto nearby fields, complicating hay baling.

The county also should have considered the negative effects of noise on a nearby pheasant farm as well as “odor and visual impacts” on farm stands and other direct marketing operations, LUBA said.

Ramsey McPhillips, a landowner and longtime opponent of the landfill, said the LUBA decision is a victory because Oregon’s environmental regulators can’t permit the expansion until Yamhill County revises its findings or the ruling is reversed on appeal.

It will be difficult for the county’s commissioners to again ignore evidence of harm to farmers, but if they do, opponents will again challenge the approval, he said.

“We’re not going to give up. We’re going to just keep going and going and going,” McPhillips said.

The best case scenario for opponents would be if Yamhill County turned down the expansion proposal, especially since the legal controversy is prompting landfill customers to examine other dumping options, he said.

“The tide has turned more in that direction,” he said.

Waste Management noted that LUBA rejected most of the “assignments of error” alleged by the opponents, which “shows we are on the right track,” said Jackie Lang, senior communications manager for the company, in an email.

The finding on farm impacts indicates LUBA want more information, but Waste Management hasn’t yet decided whether to appeal that aspect of the ruling, she said.

“We are reviewing the decision now to understand the full intent and determine our next steps,” Lang said. “There have been many steps to this process over the last seven years. We are continue to look forward and take it one step at a time.”

Tim Sadlo, the county’s general counsel, said the commissioners have until Dec. 1 to decide whether to challenge LUBA’s ruling before the Oregon Court of Appeals, but such an outcome isn’t likely.

The ruling held that Yamhill County did not misconstrue land use law by allowing a landfill in a farm zone, which a major point in favor of the county, Sadlo said.

As for the county’s analysis of farm impacts, “that’s the kind of thing that can usually be cured on a remand,” he said.

In the beginning, there was a paper coffee cup — bright red on top, shading to a darker cranberry below. That much seems beyond doubt.

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Bird flu took a bite out of the turkey supply. Heavy rain washed out the pumpkin crop. Yet Thanksgiving groceries likely won't cost Americans much more than last year, and n…

Sisters, Ore. — A key part of Marc Thalacker’s original job description was drying up the stream from which his irrigation district drew water.

Entirely drying up Whychus Creek in summer ensured growers within the Three Sisters Irrigation District got as much water as possible, but by the late 1990s, it was clear the practice was bound to come under regulatory scrutiny, said Thalacker, the district’s manager.

Steelhead and bull trout were gaining federal protections as threatened species, and it appeared likely the district would face problems under the Endangered Species Act, he said.

“Why wait for the regulatory hammer when you can get out in front of it?” Thalacker said.

At the same time, the irrigation system was inefficient: Of the 35,000 acre feet of water diverted by the district, only 17,000 acre feet were delivered to farmers, he said. “The rest would seep into the ground through our leaky canals.”

Since then, the district has replaced 50 miles of its 63 miles of canals with high-density plastic pipes. When the system is fully piped in about five years, the rate of water loss will fall to 10 percent, down from more than 50 percent with canals.

Farmers are now able to get more water while diverting less from the creek.

Piping provides additional benefits: The irrigation system is pressurized by gravity, which allows farmers to stop pumping and thus save electricity. Last year, the district also installed a hydropower turbine that generates more than 3 million kilowatt hours a year, or enough to power 75 homes.

Money generated from selling electricity will help pay off loans taken out for the piping project. Meanwhile, the district plans to install four smaller turbines next year as part of a demonstration project for growers and invest in a second large turbine by 2020.

While the $2 million cost of the first turbine was heavily subsidized with grants from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and the Energy Trust of Oregon, a non-profit funded by state ratepayers, Thalacker expects such projects will one day pencil out financially on their own.

As Pacificorp and other major power utilities reduce their reliance on coal burning over the next decade, electricity rates are expected to rise and make such renewable energy projects economically feasible, he said.

“When we’re burning a lot less coal, this will make a lot more sense,” Thalacker said.

Three Sisters Irrigation District is one of seven districts in Oregon that have retrofit their systems to generate hydropower, and another six are examining the possibility as part of broader modernization efforts, said Jed Jorgensen, renewable energy program coordinator at the Energy Trust of Oregon non-profit.

“It is an idea that is just starting to take off,” Jorgensen said.

Hydropower turbines are often associated with piping projects, particularly when a system doesn’t have a sudden drop in elevation — in such cases, pipes are necessary to build enough pressure to power the turbine, he said. For a hydropower turbine to make sense, there has to be enough spare pressure in a system beyond what farmers need to eliminate pumps.

“You don’t want hydropower to be in conflict with how farmers get their water,” Jorgensen said.

Energy Trust of Oregon funds such hydropower retrofits that are on the verge of being financially viable but can’t quite make it on their own, he said.

Even when the revenues from hydropower alone may not make a project attractive enough, districts and ditch companies are drawn to other advantages of irrigation modernization, such as reduced electricity use from pressurization, decreased costs for upkeeping canals and fewer environmental headaches, Jorgensen said.

“That water savings is worth a lot of money and is a tremendous environmental benefit,” he said.

Aside from economic factors, the technology is more accessible because recent legislation has removed regulatory barriers to installing hydropower turbines, said Dan Keppen, executive director of the Family Farm Alliance, a group that advocates for irrigators.

In 2013, two bills — House Resolutions 267 and 678 — were passed into law, which streamlined the federal government’s approval of small hydropower facilities, Keppen said.

Previously, hydropower retrofits were lumped in with larger projects even though they modified existing irrigation systems and had no environmental impact, he said.

The time and expense of obtaining permitting was often greater than building the project itself, but now many of these impediments have been removed, Keppen said.

Irrigation systems across the West are often reliant on gravity, with water being pulled from behind a dam or distributed by flowing from higher to lower elevations, so they’re already designed to accommodate hydropower, he said.

“You’re going to have Mother Nature on your side,” Keppen said.

Oops, I missed the auction that happened a week or two ago and the GOOD NEWS is that the average price per gallon of $17.04 was up 8% over the July 2015 price!  Not sure what exactly brought this about, but it is certainly good news.  Maybe it was the crop numbers that look to be consistent versus last year, and down versus projections.  Still a strong crop, but fortunately not a huge crop.

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Bird flu took a bite out of the turkey supply. Heavy rain washed out the pumpkin crop. Yet Thanksgiving groceries likely won't cost Americans much more than last year, and n…

NAMPA, Idaho (AP) — Land management officials say they have begun reseeding the giant burned area along the Idaho-Oregon border where a wildfire scorched valuable sage grouse habitat and grasslands needed by ranchers.

KIVI-TV reports that the U.S. Bureau of Land Management has started drilling grass, forbs and shrub seeds into the ground. The agency plans on dispersing 2.4 million pounds of seed.

Cindy Fritz, a natural resource specialist for the BLM, says that reseeding will help reduce the spread of invasive grass species. However, she added that it will take at least 15 years for the area to return to normal.

The fire earlier this summer charred a 443-square-mile area, often fueled by invasive cheatgrass and burning up to 125 square miles in a day. It easily leapt fire lines put down by retardant bombers.

Lattes get all the pumpkin spice buzz, but wouldn't it be more fun to get those flavors — and that buzz — in a Thanksgiving cocktail?

SALEM – After nearly 11 hours of emotional testimony, back and forth discussion and two timeouts for legal advice from a state attorney, the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife Commission voted 4-2 Monday to take gray wolves off the state endangered species list.

In making the decision, commission members agreed with an ODFW staff appraisal that the state’s wolves have expanded in number and range to the point that they no longer need protection under the state Endangered Species Act.

Oregon’s wolves remain covered under the federal ESA in the western two-thirds of the state, and ODFW officials say the state wolf management plan remains in effect and will protect wolves from illegal hunting.

The decision doesn’t close the book on Oregon’s work to manage wolves. Some commission members made it clear they preferred to delist wolves only in the eastern third of the state, where most of Oregon’s 82 confirmed wolves live, but were prevented from doing so by language in the state law.

Meanwhile, conservation groups are expected to file a lawsuit over the commission’s decision.

“I think that’s very likely,” said Amaroq Weiss of the Center for Biological Diversity. “I think they’re in violation of the law. They didn’t pay attention to the science.”

Conservation groups believe Oregon’s wolf population is too small and too fragile to delist, and is present in only 12 percent of its potential territory.

“There’s no other species we would delist when it’s absent from almost 90 percent of its habitat,” Weiss said.

Oregon’s ranchers, who had urged the ODFW commission to follow the guidelines of the wolf plan and the recommendations of the department’s biologists, cheered the decision.

“I’m relieved,” said Todd Nash, wolf committee chairman for the Oregon Cattlemen’s Association. “This sends a message to cattle producers that the ODFW Commission will stand by its commitment.”

Nash said ranchers would not have supported a partial delisting.

“When we were paying the price (of livestock attacks) in Eastern Oregon, we fully believed we were doing it for the whole state,” Nash said. “And we were proud to do it.”

More than 150 people packed the ODFW hearing room and 106 signed up to testify. Activists opposed to delisting wolves, many of them wearing matching orange T-shirts, made up a majority of the audience. A sprinkling of men in cowboy hats – Eastern Oregon cattle ranchers who have borne the stress and cost of wolf attacks on livestock – clustered on one side of the hearing room.

The testimony echoed the arguments that have been made since Oregon’s wolf population reached the number of breeding pairs that trigger consideration of delisting under the management plan.

Conservation groups and their allied argue that the state’s biological status report on wolves was flawed and should have been peer-reviewed by other scientists. ODFW staff belatedly circulated the report to biologists they knew, but conservationists said that was insufficient.

“If this commission chooses to delist it will make a very sad and powerful statement about who and what it serves,” said Jonathan Jelen, development director for the conservation group Oregon Wild.

Livestock producers, however, argued they’d followed the wolf plan in good faith and expected the ODFW Commission to to the same.

“Oregon ranchers honored their obligation to follow the plan,” said Jerome Rosa, executive director of the Oregon Cattlemen’s Association. “This is one of the reasons wolves multiplied in our state.”

SALEM — A packed meeting room is expected today as the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife Commission decides whether to remove gray wolves from the state’s endangered species law.

Livestock producers strongly favor the idea and conservation groups are just as deeply opposed, and a full day of emotional, conflicting testimony is likely. The wolf delisting is the only item on the commission’s agenda.

State wildlife biologists recommend delisting wolves. Under the state’s wolf recovery plan, the commission can take wolves off the endangered list if they determine:

Wolves aren’t in danger of extinction in any portion of their range; their natural reproductive potential is not in danger of failing; there’s no imminent or active deterioration of their range or primary habitat; the species or its habitat won’t be “over-utilized” for scientific, recreational, commercial or educational reasons; and existing state or federal regulations are adequate to protect them.

Conservation groups aligned as the Pacific Wolf Coalition have described the staff recommendation as flawed. They believe state law requires that the study be peer reviewed by other scientists. The coalition includes Oregon Wild, Cascadia Wildlands and the Center for Biological Diversity.

If the ODFW commission agrees with the staff recommendation, it would mean wolves in the eastern third of the state are not protected under either state or federal endangered species laws. Federal ESA protection would still be in force in Oregon west of Highways 395, 78 and 95.

Delisting wouldn’t mean open season on wolves in Eastern Oregon, however. The state wolf plan would remain in force, and it allows ODFW-approved “controlled take,” or killing, of wolves in cases of chronic livestock attacks or if wolves cause a decline in prey populations, chiefly elk and deer. Ranchers, as they can now, would be able to shoot wolves caught in the act of attacking livestock or herd dogs. None have been killed in that manner.

Oregon’s wolf plan does not allow sport hunting of wolves in any phase of the recovery timeline, department spokeswoman Michelle Dennehy said.

Oregon has 82 confirmed wolves. The number stood at 85 in July, but the Sled Springs pair was found dead of unknown cause in Wallowa County, and a man hunting coyotes shot a lone wolf, OR-22, in Grant County. ODFW’s wolf program coordinator, Russ Morgan, estimates Oregon has 90 to 100 wolves and said the population might reach 150 within three years.