2016 Ag Journal - Spring

Ag Journal Daily Record Spring 2016

Cattlemen of the Year ■ Hay outlook ■ Grazing on state land ■

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Table of contents

Ag Journal 2016 Cattlemen of the Year: The Schmidt family

Editor Joanna Markell Publisher Heather Hernandez

Page 4

Advertising Contact us: Ag Journal 401 N. Main Street Ellensburg, WA 98926 509-925-1414

Hay industry outlook

The Ag Journal is published three times a year by Kittitas County Publishing LLC. Contents copyrighted 2015 unless otherwise noted.

Page 8

Ag appreciation day is April 12 Page 22

Grazing on state lands

On the cover: Jesse Major / Daily Record

Justus Schmidt, 8, and his father, Andy Schmidt, break off hay to feed their cattle.

Family farm in Snohomish saved

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Kittitas County Cattlemen of the Year

Jesse Major / Daily Record

The Schmidt family pauses for a family photo while feeding their cattle.

Ranching is a way of life

By JESSE MAJOR staff writer

F

arming a way of life that spans generations for the Schmidts, who own a ranch a couple miles east of Ellensburg.

Every generation of Andy and Michell Schmidt’s family works together to raise their cattle, and

without the help from family and friends, it would be impossible, said Andy.

Andy and Michell care for their cattle on their ranch with their children and with Andy’s parents, Melva and Bill.

Their dedication to ranching helped earn them the Cattle Family of the Year award from the county

Cattlemen’s Association earlier this year.

When the family earned the award, Bill said he was shocked.

“My immediate reaction was, it’s all about Melva,” he said.

He wasn’t alone — everyone in the family said Melva deserves the recognition. She still helps feed Andy and Michell’s cattle, even though she sold

4 | Spring 2016 Ag Journal

the last of her cows in December.

If the weather is right, nothing will stop Melva, who is now 82, from hopping on the back of the trailer and cutting hay off for the cows.

Andy, who took over the ranch from his parents, said he’s offered to pay his mother for the work she does, but she wants nothing to do with it.

“She said, ‘no I need the exercise,’” Andy said with a smile.

Roots in Nebraska The family’s farming roots go back to southeast Nebraska. Bill and Melva were both born in Johnson, Neb. Melva always enjoyed the outdoors. She did farm work, fed animals and milked cows.

When Bill called Melva for their first date, he was told that she was busy milking. Melva’s father believed in mixed farming and raised various crops such as corn, wheat, oats, milo and hay, and raised horses, pigs and cattle. The farm was known for a large barn built by her grandfather. It was recognized as the largest barn in the county and one of the largest in the state.

Shortly after settling in Ellensburg in 1963, the Schmidts found an acreage near town and were talked into buying some cows from their neighbors.

“I remember an old saying, ‘You can take the girl out of the state of Nebraska, but you can’t the Nebraska farm out of her,’ ” Bill said.

When the local beef 4-H Clubs were full, Melva, “ahead of her time as a woman,” Andy said, started a new 4-H Club, in which he and his sister were founding members.

The Schmidts’ herd continued to grow over the years and they needed to expand their ranch.

They bought 20 acres, then 70.

Selling calves each year helped make the purchases possible, Bill said.

Worked in town As their ranch continued to grow, both Bill and Melva held full-time jobs in Ellensburg.

Bill was a professor at Central Washington University, where he supervised the media program and taught video and audio production courses during his nearly 40 years at CWU. At one point, he had to switch his contract from 12 months to 10 months so that he could work on the ranch in the summer.

Melva, worked as a nurse at Kittitas Valley Healthcare. She was director of nursing for a while, and helped run the hospital

Jesse Major / Daily Record

Melva Schmidt prepares to feed her family's cattle. twice when it was without an administrator.

Melva downplays it, saying it was only a temporary position.

While most people stop working once they get home from their jobs, that’s when the work begins, said Andy, who works with Ward Rugh.

Even when he gets home after dark, he still needs to check the cattle.

“If it wasn’t for flashlights and headlights, we wouldn’t be able to do it sometimes,” he said.

As technology has advanced, Andy’s generation has it a little easier than his parents’.

“When we were doing it, we did everything by hand. Then Andy comes along and he gets all this automatic stuff,” Bill said, laughing.

As Bill and Melva began to ‘downsize’ their ranch, they were able build their dream home.

“We sold some of our lots on the other side, that enabled to us to build our dream house,” Bill said.

“It’s not exactly downsizing.”

Jesse Major / Daily Record

Rio, left, and Izzy, help keep cattle away from the trailer during feeding.

Andy and Michell While Bill and Melva balanced working full-time jobs with managing a growing ranch, Andy began building a cow and calf herd, running them under separate brands.

5 | Spring 2016 Ag Journal

Andy and Michell are continuing to grow their cow numbers.

See Family, Page 6

Jesse Major / Daily Record

FAMILY Continued from Page 5

Justus Schmidt, 8, and his father, Andy Schmidt, break off hay to feed their cattle.

Their herd is comprised of Angus based cows with a small percentage of Simmental.

Like Andy, Michell is also the fourth generation of her family to raise and produce livestock.

The couple met in Las Vegas while Andy was attending the National Finals Rodeo.

They have three children, Derek, Kacy and Justus.

If they choose to eventually raise livestock, they will be the fifth generation on both sides of the family to ranch.

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Jesse Major / Daily Record

The Schmidt family drives into their pasture to feed their cattle.

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Mike Johnston / Daily Record file photo

Kittitas Valley timothy hay grower Brad Haberman checks a field left unwatered last fall in order to go dormant because of early irrigation water turnoff during last year’s drought. There’s a big question mark for the coming 2016 crop: will the timothy plants not watered last year for a second cutting exhibit drought damage as they grow this spring, lowering a field’s quality of hay?

A complicated picture Many factors spell uncertainty for Kittitas Valley hay this year

By MIKE JOHNSTON For the Daily Record

T

he two words that some Kittitas Valley hay exporters use to describe the international forage market right now are complicated and uncertain.

“It’s complicated and might get even more uncertain, at least price wise, before we start to get

some kind of stability,” said Rollie Bernth, president/general manager of Ward Rugh Inc. in Ellensburg.

“The demand for export-quality timothy hay and alfalfa is up there, it’s still strong, but at what price?

The pressure from our overseas buyers has been continuous to keep lowering our price.”

Some hay exporters say the price per ton of inventories of baled,

middle-grade timothy hay going overseas has dropped dramatically, down by $60 to $70 a ton compared to ending prices in 2014. Some express it as percentages, with price cuts ranging from 25 to 35 percent depending on grade, with others saying it’s more like up to a 40 percent drop.

The drop in prices has been more dramatic in the lower grades of

8 | Spring 2016 Ag Journal

export hay starting with the 2015 crop.

An exporter said alfalfa recently heading overseas at $120 to $140 a ton reflects a drop from $160 to $180 or more a ton.

Mark Anderson, president of Anderson Hay and Grain Co. Inc. based in Ellensburg, described the current situation as a “perfect storm.”

Timothy hay acreage was still high in the Kittitas Valley and Columbia Basin last year, when a four-month West Coast port slowdown hurt shipments. Excellent weather last summer led to a good, abundant harvest, but a weak yen has affected buying power. As a result, the remaining 2014 and 2015 crop inventories are way behind in being sold overseas.

Market correction Anderson said hay processors, exporters, growers and agriculture economists have acknowledged for some time that the continuing climb in the price of export-quality timothy and alfalfa year after year would sooner or later face a market correction in response to supply and demand forces.

The prices in 2014 hit all-time record highs for the best-quality timothy from the Kittitas Valley.

Reports were of up to $340 to $360 a ton paid to growers for the top-quality timothy hay for horses, $240 to $280 for higher-quality dairy cattle hay.

“As we sit now, we have seen dramatic price drops and too much supply in the pipeline,” Anderson said. “While all shippers are pushing hard to sell out old crop, most likely there will be carry over further impacting pricing this summer.”

Anderson said it’s been an ongoing realization that prices could not continue increasing forever and, eventually, a correction likely would occur. But more factors than expected have complicated that correction.

“I expect an overcorrection given the circumstances for the 2016 crop before we see a drop in acreage and a balance in supply and demand moving forward,” Anderson said.

“Weather will play a big factor on how grades and pricing line up.”

Those circumstances include a continuing strong U.S. dollar against the weaker Japanese yen, which lessens the yen’s buying power.

Japan is the single largest customer for Kittitas Valley, Columbia Basin and other Western U.S. forage crops for dairy cows, cattle and race horses. This puts pressure on

The value of timothy hay The value to growers of all hay produced in Kittitas County is estimated at more than $50 million annually, with timothy estimated to value up to $45 million of that total. These estimates are for a typical good harvest year with stable hay prices. Timothy and alfalfa hay grown for the export market is the single-largest agricultural product raised in Kittitas County.

In a good harvest year, about 90 percent of the timothy hay crop is exported overseas to Japan, South

Korea, United Arab Emirates, Vietnam and other Pacific Rim countries, with Japan being the single largest export customer. Several Ellensburg-area commercial hay companies buy hay in the Kittitas Valley and the Columbia Basin from growers, and the hay is later exported in agreements with overseas customers. The local firms process the hay, transport it and export it through the ports of Seattle and Tacoma.

— Federal Census of Agriculture, online information, local exporters.

overseas buyers to look elsewhere for less expensive forage.

In addition, there’s a significant oversupply of stored and baled hay from Western U.S., a factor created mostly by the November 2014-February 2015 West Coast port slowdown in export shipments and its lingering effects.

There’s also strong competition

from other countries growing lower priced export forage. Australia, Canada and Spain sold hay to customers last year who usually buy more U.S. hay but couldn’t get it when they needed it because of the port slowdown created by unresolved labor contract issues.

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By MIKE JOHNSTON Fort the DAILY RECORD Mark Anderson, president of Ellensburg-based Anderson Hay and Grain Co. Inc., said another timothy hay supply and marketing factor that is influencing the current market and oversupply is related to the 2011 earthquake and tsunami.

Japanese nuclear power plants were damaged in the tsunami and impacted surrounding Japanese dairy farmers. In the aftermath of the disaster, the Japanese government offered to subsidize hay purchased by the dairy operations for a number of years.

“Many of those farmers

According to a Farm Credit Services market report, some overseas buyers during the port slowdown bought hay from South Africa.

Hay exporters are concerned overseas buyers, now that they bought from other customers during the port slowdown, will gravitate that way again if other hay growing countries have good crops this year.

Looming in the background are reports that Australia recently has had a good oat hay crop, putting it in position to sell lower-priced hay to Japan and other Pacific Rim countries.

preferred timothy hay given it was subsidized,” Anderson said.

“Long and short, this gave us a bump in historical demand for timothy hay which helped support increased acreage.”

The hay subsidization program was phased out in stages starting in 2014 and fully ended in fall 2014, but the cutback in timothy growing acreage in response has been slow.

For the alfalfa export market, the impact of the West Coast port slowdown on supply movement and the continuing strong U.S. dollar also are dampening prices.

Spiral down pricing There’s no telling at this point where the bottom will be in response to overseas buyers wanting to keep spiraling down the price of hay, said Don Schilling, president of

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“Yes, it’s complicated, very complicated,” said Schilling about the market situation. “There’s no single factor that’s dominating, although the basic over supply of hay tends to keep coming on strong as the big one. Right now, whatever price export-quality hay can be sold for, well, that’s the market. There’s a lot of exporters selling overseas at a loss compared to what was paid to the farmer.”

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prices, he said.

“There’s only so much you can do to cut your costs, and then you have to consider reducing prices even further,” Schilling said.

It’s likely Kittitas Valley timothy growers won’t have a firm price with exporters/processors during the 2016 first cutting because of the market uncertainty, Schilling said, “and perhaps we’ll see prices go down more.”

He said national agricultural commodity prices recently have been on a downward track, which exerts an influence on forage pricing, too.

The four-month West Coast port slowdown has been estimated to have cut scheduled shipments of hay to overseas customers by at least 50 percent, said Jeff Calaway, president of Calaway Trading Inc. of Ellensburg.

“That’s equivalent to two solid months of not shipping anything, as if exporters just shut down for two full months,” Calaway said.

For hay exporters and processors,

that means about 500,000 to 600,000 tons of export hay that was ready to go didn’t get shipped from West Coast ports on time, he said.

Calaway said there was no political leadership exercised by the federal government and the Obama administration to pressure port operators and longshoremen to settle their labor contract without hurting the economy, so the slowdown lingered.

“It impacted everyone, nearly everyone in U.S. agriculture who relies on selling their products overseas,” he said. “The president, in my perspective, just sat on his hands while it (the continued port slowdown) just robbed everyone in the export agricultural trade.”

He said it was highly likely that inventories of the 2015 timothy crop won’t be all sold by the time the 2016 harvest begins. It looks like everyone involved in export hay will have to ride out the cycle of supply and demand until the huge oversupply gets worked through.

See Hay, Page 13

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HAY Continued from Page 11 “It might take this year and next before we really see things stabilize,” Calaway said. “I think all the exporters are taking an economic hit, and we’ll probably keep getting hit.

Ultimately, it’s the farmer who will get hurt, and it’s not the exporters’ fault. I guarantee it will hurt our farmers economically.”

Although demand for export hay continues to be at a “decent level,” Calaway said the exporter/processors were hurting because their largest overseas customer, Japan, was hurting with the weak yen.

“When our customers are hurting, then we’ll be hurting,” Calaway said.

Difficult year Brad Haberman, partner in the family operation of No. 9 Hay Trading Co. in the Kittitas Valley, believes hay inventories in the Kittitas Valley will mostly be shipped out sometime during the first cutting of timothy hay, but not in other areas, including the Columbia Basin.

The highest quality hay, rated as hay for horses overseas, is mostly holding its price, but middle and lower grades have faced drastic price reductions, he said.

“It’s going to be a very difficult year,” Haberman said, adding he doesn’t expect overseas buyers to visit Kittitas Valley fields and hay barns during or after the first cutting of timothy, as they have done in the past to inspect new hay. They likely will be waiting to come as prices go down further, he said.

High quality hay will always sell, Haberman said, and the Kittitas Valley’s reputation for producing the best timothy hay will be important to uphold in the 2016 crop. He’s concerned that last year’s drought that cut irrigation water to valley lands might have hurt fields of timothy plants that were put into dormancy after the plants’ first cutting, stopping growth

Jesse Major / Daily Record file

Farmers in the Yakima River Basin can expect a full water supply this irrigation season if projections hold true, according to the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. for a second cutting.

“The quality of the hay plants may have been damaged in some fields, and that means the possibility of lesser quality of hay coming from those spots,” Haberman said. “We just don’t know until we start to see much more growth.”

The ongoing goal is to regain the trust of overseas buyers that West Coast hay suppliers, including the Kittitas Valley and the Columbia Basin, are a reliable source of high-quality hay.

Ward Rugh Inc.’s Rollie Berth, company president, said the overarching concern is to sell and move 2014 and 2015 hay as fast as possible to make way for the 2016 harvest,

reducing old hay inventory’s influence in reducing prices.

“I’m still optimistic the market will rebound; of course, a strong surge in sales will really help,” Bernth said. “We have got to move that old hay out and steer away from more price reductions.”

Schilling, of Wesco International Inc., said the hope is the same as it’s always been at this time every year: That growing conditions in 2016 will allow Kittitas Valley growers to produce the “very best hay we can provide, the highest quality we can have” to uphold the valley’s reputation and attract overseas buyers.

GMO Continued from Page 10

China and GMOs Anderson said U.S. export alfalfa that passes China’s GMO (genetically modified organism) testing standards seems to be moving much better than alfalfa that does not.

“China has even more strict testing limits for GMO than we have in the U.S. so any alfalfa that has any trace of GMO is not accepted in China, Anderson said. “Most farmers up and down

the West Coast are working hard to plant varieties that will pass China’s test so they are not limited to markets that accept their hay.”

China has been importing more non-GMO alfalfa than in past years to support its growing commercial dairy industry, according to a Farm Credit Services market report.

Between October 2014 and October 2015, alfalfa and other forage sales to China went up more than 19. 3

percent, and the increased sales are expected to continue.

The market report said the demand for high-grade timothy hay and alfalfa for export continues, but overall Western U.S. hay production is expected to decline with the biggest concern by overseas buyers the continuing strong U.S. dollar over other currencies.

The outlook report by the Farm

13 | Spring 2016 Ag Journal

Credit Services said the market, currency value and supply conditions may cause many timothy growers to plan for only one cutting and reduce their hay acreage for an alternative crop, although the growing season in the Kittitas Valley limits what crops are available.

“Overall, timothy production should be down in Washington (state) in 2016,” the report said.

Marty Stingley Photography

The Stingley family restocks a watering pond with fresh water for their cow-calf cattle operation on leased shrub-steppe land east of Ellensburg. Elk, deer, birds and other wildlife also benefit from the water as well as plants around the pond and at satellite water distribution points in the area.

Wise management Cattle grazing on wildlife lands balances a variety of interests

By MIKE JOHNSTON For the DAILY RECORD

D

omestic beef cattle grazing on state-owned shrub-steppe lands in eastern Kittitas County at one time was a contentious issue.

Now those leased grazing operations are often viewed as a successful model for balancing a variety of interests and environmental concerns.

To many it shows how careful management of grazing can benefit diverse interests: the cattle rancher raising calves for the beef market and those wanting to protect wildlife, shrub-steppe habitat, and soil and water quality.

That’s a lot of different interests, but animal grazing specialist Doug Warnock believes the balancing act and the all-around benefits, ongoing

since 2006, have clearly and repeatedly proven themselves.

“The key to a healthy ecosystem and higher forage production is not determined by the number of (grazing) animals present in an area,” Warnock said in written comments, “but how well the grazing is managed.”

Come together That management came about

14 | Spring 2016 Ag Journal

through efforts beginning in 2004 that resulted in the Wild Horse Coordinated Resource Management project. The effort focused on state Fish and Wildlife Department lands in the Whiskey Dick-Quilomene Wildlife Area, the Puget Sound Energy-owned Wild Horse Wind and Solar Facility property and other nearby state and private lands.

See Grazing, Page 16

Rancher works hard to make things work

By MIKE JOHNSTON For the DAILY RECORD The Coordinated Resource Management (CRM) model continuously monitors impacts from cattle grazing operations on wildlife, water, soil, plants and other natural resources, and immediately adjusts grazing operations if necessary.

Rancher Russ Stingley pays for leases to graze on about 15,000 acres of state wildlife agency land and property owned

by Puget Sound Energy and the state Department of Natural Resources. His ranch operation is a family effort, with his adult children Ryan, Ruley, Rustin and Katie joining in to make it work.

Russ’ wife, Marty Stingley, helps out when needed. Moving and rotating cattle to different grazing areas, to minimize environmental impacts, is mostly done on horseback.

The operation follows a grazing plan that requires cattle to be moved often and gives ample time for grazed areas to recover with new, fresh growths of wild grasses,

the kind favored by the large resident elk herd, said Tip Hudson, Kittitas County’s WSU Extension office director.

“Access to that grazing land (by Stingley’s family) has come at a high personal cost in terms of time rather than money,” Hudson said.

Russ Stingley recently said he has about 160 head of cattle on the leased lands in the CRM project area, with a total of 700 on family ranch property and all leased lands.

“We’ve definitely seen more grass come up on average in the last five years,” Stingley said about the CRM project area. “It’s having the effect everyone wanted. It looks like it is working out very well, despite what some groups thought at the beginning.”

Stingley pays for stock water to be hauled in by truck to a pond site and has put in a half-mile of piping for water distribution to different sites so animals don’t concentrate on any one site. Local elk, deer, other mammals and many types of birds also drink the water, he said.

“We’ve seen bear over there, too,” Stingley said.

Marty Stingley Photography

Kittitas Valley rancher Russ Stingley on horseback as he moves his cattle to a different grazing area on shrub-steppe lands east of Ellensburg.

Joining in the family operation are Stingley's adult children, Ryan, Ruley, Rustin and Katie. Stingley's wife, Marty Stingley, also helps out when needed.

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GRAZING Continued from Page 14

WSU-Kittitas County Extension photo

Wildland grazing experts check the condition of the ecosystem in connection with cattle grazing on leased shrub-steppe land in PSE's Wild Horse Wind and Solar Energy Facility east of Ellensburg during cold and windy weather.

Kittitas Valley rancher Russ Stingley, who had been leasing state Department of Natural Resources and private land in the area since 1986, joined efforts by the nonprofit, collaborative Big Game Management Roundtable to find solutions to an ongoing problem. Herds of elk were making their way onto private lands at lower elevations to graze and, as a result, were damaging fields, pastures, fencing, irrigation pipes and related control structures, shrubs and small trees. They also presented safety risks to drivers on county roads.

The focus of the roundtable group, made up of state, federal and local government agencies, environmental, conservation and wildlife

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groups and tribal officials, was how to keep the herd at its higher-elevation wintering and calving area and away from damaging lower-elevation farms, cattle and horse ranches, and rural homes.

The roundtable, according to Warnock, joined with an even wider group of interested agencies, recreation representatives and landowners seeking a direction in holding back the elk.

The meetings were facilitated by Warnock, a 36-year veteran of Washington State University’s Extension program (heading Kittitas County Extension for 18 of those years), and Dick Wedin of Ellensburg, then a state DNR official involved with leasing state lands.

Both were skilled in building consensus among diverse interests.

Also heading the meetings was Tip Hudson, WSU Extension’s regional rangeland and livestock specialist and educator. He’s currently director of the Kittitas County Extension office.

Better grass for elk

Contributed

See Grazing, Page 18

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Ranchers listen to a grazing expert, wearing a hood, during an on-the-ground workshop on the management of cattle grazing on wildlands.

An agreed upon solution after much discussion (a solution that also had to be tested and monitored) was to improve the quality of grass and small shrubs in the higherelevation area, making the natural feed more attractive to grazing elk.

In essence, to make the grass more delicious to elk.

To accomplish that it was proposed that beef cattle grazing in a carefully controlled and managed way likely would do the trick. The grazing would be carried out using the coordinated resource management (CRM) model.

17 | Spring 2016 Ag Journal

GRAZING Continued from Page 17 It calls for scientific inventorying and monitoring of plants, soil, wildlife, water and other factors before applying cattle grazing, and to determine what the capacity the land has for both cattle and elk grazing in a way that doesn’t harm the ecosystem.

Selective areas for grazing by a limited number of cattle for a limited time can result in cattle eating away more of the old grasses and mature low shrubs not favored by elk, according to Warnock.

This, in turn, Warnock said, stimulates new growth and regenerates the plant food reserves in roots and crowns of plants, the activity that makes grass more tender and likely sweeter to the elk. Some land managers believe the newer grass that comes up after grazing is more abundant and also curbs the spread of wildfires on rangelands because new growth is much more moist.

The idea is to keep the higher-up wildlands a preferred grazing area so elk won’t want to wander as much to look for food elsewhere, he said. Continuous monitoring has shown that this is working in east Kittitas County, he added.

“Total rest (no grazing) in an arid climate results in old, coarse plants, which add little organic matter to the soil and don’t support much soil organism activity,” Warnock said. “Hardened soil surfaces (from undisturbed soil around old plants) don’t absorb precipitation and, instead, allow water to run off, eroding the soil.”

A cooperative management plan was established with Stingley who worked closely with CRM participants to follow the grazing guidelines, Warnock said.

Regular monitoring guides changes where and when they are necessary for ecosystem, and wildlife improvement or protection.

“This is an adaptive management approach and is not done according to the calendar,” Warnock said.

“Decisions must be made continually and based on the information coming from the monitoring process.”

Beef market demands Hudson said the success of the Wild Horse CRM and Russ Stingley’s cow-calf operation couldn’t come at a better time.

As demand goes up for beef products, especially for U.S. beef exported overseas, ranchers are finding it harder to expand their herds to respond to the growing market. Pasture lands available to lease are becoming too expensive or the amount of pasture property is steadily shrinking and scarce due to development or other pressures to change land use, Hudson said in written comments.

Recent drought conditions around the United States also has curbed the size of herds and the ability to expand. Hudson said the price to the consumer for beef has been going up because of supply and demand, with the lack of herd expansion lands a major factor.

See Grazing, Page 20

WSU-Kittitas County Extension photo

WSU Extension faculty Tip Hudson, a livestock and rangeland specialist and educator, gets a sample to evaluate the condition of wild grasses on shrub-steppe lands east of Ellensburg. The grasses there are eaten by elk and domestic beef cattle. A cattle grazing plan aims to keep the elk in a higher-elevation range around the Kittitas Valley.

18 | Spring 2016 Ag Journal

2010 SEPA lawsuit settled In early 2010, the Western Watersheds Project, a nonprofit environmental advocacy organization based in Idaho, filed suit to stop the grazing of commercial beef cattle on state property managed by the state Department of Fish and Wildlife east of Ellensburg.

The court ruled that the state wildlife agency hadn’t followed the State Environmental Protection Act (SEPA) process when it allowed grazing in the eastern Kittitas County wildlife area.

SEPA rules to evaluate environmental impacts and recommend ways to lessen them are not required when a grazing lease has existed during the previous 10-year period. A lease agreement had existed but was found to be verbal only and undocumented, thus it couldn’t be legally recognized.

An out-of-court settlement agreement was reached between WDFW and Western Watersheds Project in January 2011 in which the eastern half of the state wildlife area, approximately 35,000 acres, would not be grazed for 20 years.

Grazing would continue on the western part of the area through the ongoing use of the Wild Horse Coordinated Resource Management plan, and monitoring data was to be collected and used for an evaluation of the effects of grazing over the 20-year period.

Since then, grazing has continued on the western half of the area following a grazing plan that is developed and reviewed annually by the Wild Horse CRM grazing committee. The grazing committee includes representatives of the U.S Natural Resource Conservation Service, the state departments of Natural Resources and Fish and Wildlife, WSU Extension experts and the grazing lease holder.

In addition, regular, on-the-ground monitoring of the grazed area is being conducted and the data collected is used to guide and modify management decisions based on the current environmental conditions at the grazing sites.

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GRAZING

Marty Stingley Photography

Continued from Page 18

Dust rises around cattle being moved by the Stingley ranching family to a designated grazing area on leased public or private land east of Ellensburg. The cattle are moved often to lessen the impact of herds on the shrub-steppe ecosystem. The rotation is prescribed by a coordinated resource management plan that aims to allow limited cattle grazing on public and private land, which, in turn, helps keep elk in their higherelevation range.

“What goes up nearly always goes down, and prices will go down but not until cattle numbers come back up,” Hudson said.

Most Americans likely think nearly all beef cattle are fed through huge feed lots, but Hudson said most U.S. cattle production occurs on grass “and the availability of land with grass limits the supply side of the beef market.”

With large amounts of public land managed by federal and state agencies in the nation’s West, it would seem a valid conclusion that more of this land could be utilized via leases for commercial cattle grazing using the CRM model. The model aims to protect ecosystems and wildlife and preserve a variety of sustainable uses and values of the wildland, including for recreation and their scenic value, Warnock said.

Instead, the trend by government agencies has been to reduce the number of leases on public lands for cattle grazing,

Warnock said.

“The product of the reduced grazing is loss of rangeland health and less forage and poorer habitat for wildlife,” Warnock said.

The most successful grazing management on rangelands optimizes the time of plant recovery from grazing, Warnock said.

“So the key is not how many animals are grazing an area, it is how the animals are managed while there. It’s all about management,” he said.

Warnock said the reduction in the number of animals allowed to graze on public lands through leases and CRM plans is “taking away some of the tools that a grazing manager has in managing land.”

“Grazing animals, when properly managed, are a very powerful means of regenerating a depleted or low-producing area,” Warnock said. “Planned grazing along with monitoring and adaptive management produces the best results.”

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Brian Myrick / Daily Record

Kids pet a horse during Elementary Agriculture Appreciation Day at the Kittitas County fairgrounds last year.

Discovering agriculture Elementary Ag Appreciation Day planned April 12 For THE DAILY RECORD The Kittitas County fairgrounds in Ellensburg will turn into a place of agricultural discovery on April 12 for more than 400 third-graders as they learn what it takes to farm and ranch in Kittitas County.

The 15th annual Elementary

Agriculture Appreciation Day will bring local farm equipment, live farm animals, crop displays, irrigation equipment, on-farm conservation demonstrations and much more to the fairgrounds.

The program invites third-graders, their teachers and parents to discover the importance of agricul-

ture and the farming life. They explore aspects of cattle ranching, raising livestock, dairying, hay and grain production, irrigation, water and soil conservation, weed control and more at 10 learning stations.

They also learn the importance of thoroughly washing their hands.

The program is sponsored by

22 | Spring 2016 Ag Journal

several local farm, ranch, and natural resource organizations. Free curriculum and other educational materials are shared with teachers to share with students before they come to the fairgrounds.

Last year 349 students and 74 parents, grandparents, guardians, and teachers participated.

About 400 students are expected at this year’s event.

Schools participating this year are Mount Stuart, Lincoln, Valley View, Kittitas, Thorp, Cle Elum-Roslyn Elementary School, Ellensburg Christian School and the homeschool community.

Elementary Agriculture Appreciation Day provides students with a glimpse of what it takes to put food on their table. In the last 100 years, on farm food production has become highly specialized and is an increasingly rare lifestyle. The vast majority of youth in America do not know where their food comes from.

This lack of awareness carries over into adulthood. As a result, the general public does not adequately appreciate the importance of agricultural production.

It is a Washington State University Extension program.

Financial support is provided

by Kittitas County Cattlemen’s Association, Kittitas County CattleWomen’s Association,

Kittitas County Farm Bureau, Kittitas County Conservation District, and Kittitas County Water Purveyors. The groups pay for school bus transportation to the fairgrounds and other costs.

The Kittitas Valley Event Center provides the facilities.

Students learn and retain more of what they have learned when they get hands-on experiences and one-on-one time with local farmers, ranchers, and agriculture business people who work every day to produce food for consumption by the public.

Volunteers help make the Elementary Agriculture Appreciation Day a successful event. 4-H Club senior members and FFA students participate as group leaders, present stations, and provide help with stations. In addition, 4-H adult leaders assist with timing and class rotations.

The Kittitas County CattleWomen group provides lunches for the volunteers and station presenters and helpers.

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Brian Myrick / Daily Record

Eric Sorensen, with Washington Tractor, talks to a group of students from Thorp School during Elementary Agriculture Appreciation Day at the Kittitas County fairgrounds last year.

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Ian Terry/The Herald via AP

An old dairy barn is seen on a hill on the Bailey Farm in Snohomish, Wash. The Bailey family made a deal to keep developers at bay as quaint countryside turns into cookie-cutter neighborhoods of tract houses.

Saving for future family 270-acre Snohomish farm saved for generations to come

By AMY NILE The Everett Herald SNOHOMISH — Sprawling suburbia won't swallow a 103-yearold farm here.

As quaint countryside turns into cookie-cutter neighborhoods of tract houses, the Bailey family made a deal to keep developers at

bay.

Now, 270 acres in the pastoral Snohomish River Valley are protected for agriculture. The Bailey Farm will keep growing vegetables, berries and cash crops in picturesque fields along Springhetti Road for years to come.

The family signed a conservation easement in December with the

nonprofit PCC Farmland Trust and Snohomish County.

About half of the money for $1.1 million agreement came from a county Conservation Futures Program grant.

The rest came from the trust. It was started by PCC Natural Markets but is now run independent of the Seattle-based co-op. Since 1999, the

24 | Spring 2016 Ag Journal

trust has preserved 17 farms across the state.

The deal allows the Bailey family to keep tending the newly safeguarded land, just as they have for five generations.

In 1888, Albert and Ellen Bailey arrived on the shores of the Snohomish River. After their honeymoon, the English couple settled.

They started farming on 40 acres along the river in 1913.

Their son, Earle Bailey, expanded the family business and started a dairy in 1918. Later, he passed it down to his son.

Cliff Bailey took to farming. The former state senator and county councilman said he wasn't much of a student.

When he married his Snohomish High School sweetheart almost 70 years ago, Cliff, now 89, had to ask his mother for permission. But his younger bride, Rosemary, now 88, didn't.

Back then, men had to be at least 21 to wed while the age for women was set at 18.

Unlike many Snohomish farm wives of her day, Rosemary Bailey didn't learn to drive a tractor or milk a cow.

"Luckily, Cliff's dad didn't believe in women out in the barn," she said.

The couple raised three sons, David, Dan and Don Bailey.

Now, Cliff and Rosemary's sons run the farm with help from a few

of their nine children and five grandchildren.

As milk prices shrank in the 1990s, the Baileys shut down the dairy and changed their business.

Today, it includes composting, raising Christmas trees, growing hay and silage corn and pasturing for heifers for other dairies.

There's a pumpkin patch for a festival in the fall. From June to October, all kinds of produce, including cucumbers, peppers, green beans, sweet corn, raspberries and strawberries are grown.

People can pick and buy the fresh food on the farm.

After years of writing $1.29 checks for pitchers of beer as a student at Walla Walla's Whitman College, Don Bailey took a job at a Spokane bank. It wasn't long before he ditched his suit and came home to his Carhartts.

"After I tried banking, the farm looked pretty good," he said.

Now, the 61-year-old runs the composting business, which started in 1995.

See Family, Page 26

Ian Terry/The Herald via AP

Cliff and Rosemary Bailey sit on the front porch of their home on the Bailey Farm in Snohomish, Wash. The Herald reports the Bailey family made a deal to keep developers at bay as quaint countryside turns into cookie-cutter neighborhoods of tract houses.

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FAMILY Continued from Page 25 It turns about 15,000 tons of yard waste from nearby cities into compost every year. It is then sold and used on the farm instead of commercial fertilizer.

The business has adapted with changing weather, too. After a couple of dry, hot summers, the family started irrigating fields for the first time in decades.

The growing season is also a couple of weeks longer than it used to be, Don Bailey said.

His daughter, Annie Bailey Freeman, returned to Snohomish after college, too. She runs the u-pick vegetable stand and pumpkin patch with her sister, Elizabeth.

Unlike her grandmother, Annie started driving tractors at 10.

Now, she even manages to put in straight rows of potatoes with a relic planter from the horse-drawn farming era.

“When you get it out of the barn every year, you just hope it works,” said Don Bailey, crediting his daughter’s knack for neat rows of crops.

Bailey Freeman, 31, is bringing up the family’s sixth generation on the farm. She plans to carry her 3-month-old daughter, Kate, on her back as she tends 350 newly planted apple trees this summer.

The orchard is the latest addition to the Bailey’s u-pick operation.

More demand for locally-grown food has boosted business during the past 10 years, she said.

The farm now focuses on selling directly to those who come to pick produce from the fields.

“It’s a new experience for a lot of people,” Bailey Freeman said. “It’s kind of a treat.”

She often sees parents coming from cities and suburbs to show their children that vegetables, berries and even Christmas trees don’t come from the grocery store.

As shopping centers and housing developments continue to gobble up rural land to serve the county’s

Ian Terry/The Herald via AP

Don Bailey looks over an old tractor that he still uses often on his family's 300acre farm in Snohomish. swelling population, the Bailey Farm will remain a place where people can learn about agriculture.

That’s important as many turn away from mass-produced food,

instead opting for fresh, locallygrown eats, Cliff Bailey said. It’s a return to the way things used to be.

“That’s the future of farming,” he said.

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