Food, agriculture and animals

In a world of calamity and climate change, just don’t mess with my fries! A hundred Northwest farmers and scientists stood in a Quincy-area field recently to make sure the golden goodness lives on despite future restrictions on pesticides, diminished ag lands, limits on water and a changing climate.

Light wheat is a problem this summer harvest in the Northwest. Farmers say the plants are stressed by heat and little rain. A fresh U.S. Department of Agriculture report says winter wheat crops in the Northwest are forecast to be down this year.

It’s peak cherry season in the Northwest. The fruits are typically grown outdoors in an orchard. This business in southeast Washington is doing things a little differently.

Across the Northwest crops are late. Cool spring weather has held back asparagus, potatoes and alfalfa. Even tree fruit blooms were late to flush open. Then, record-warm weather hit.

At issue are fertilizer leaks at the former Lost Valley Farm. The Easterdays, who now own the site, say they’re not responsible.

During spring’s prime calving season, lots of newborn calves have been dying from the cold.

The science of getting rid of more than a million Northwest chickens infected with highly pathogenic avian influenza

Northwest rancher Cody Easterday recently turned himself in to a minimum security prison camp at Lompoc just south of Santa Maria, California. Easterday carried out one of the largest cattle swindles in U.S. history, from near Pasco, in Washington state.

More than a million chickens at a farm in Franklin County, Washington, are set to be destroyed because of bird flu. Officials are now deliberating on how to transport, bury, compost or incinerate the birds.

A big-time Northwest rancher has snatched himself a last two-week extension of freedom, before he goes into federal prison.