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Spring 2024

Agriculture

Winter 2002

Columbia Valley wineries double

 

Arthur Linton, center, assistant dean and director of Washington State University’s Irrigated Agriculture Research and Extension Center (IAREC) in Prosser, and Julie Tarara, a USDA research horticulturist, explain the effects of temperature on grape yields to Washington secretary of state Sam Reed during his visit in July. The IAREC is home to WSU’s Viticulture and Enology Program. During the past decade, the number of Columbia Valley wineries has doubled, making Washington the second largest wine-growing region in the nation behind California. Reed, who holds two WSU degrees (’63 Social Studies, ’68 M.A. Political Science), traveled to China on a trade mission in September 2001 … » More …

Winter 2002

Living and gardening in the Pacific Northwest

In Washington State, it has been over 200 years since indigenous peoples described where they lived as “the place where camas blooms” or “the place where wild onions nod.” In other parts of the country, it has been even longer.

Where Native Americans lived-and the plants and animals that lived there-determined if they lived. Survival required intimate contact with the natural world. Without guidebooks, maps or Internet access, they knew weather patterns, ocean tides, hydrology, topography, and the life cycles and habits of plant and animals in the places they lived. They had a very strong “sense of place.”

Now, most Americans are able to … » More …

Winter 2002

A summer job that meant something

An entomology undergrad combats the worm in the apple

When they hatch, they’re so tiny you can barely see them. Then they eat. They bore their way inside an apple and consume it from within. After two weeks, they’re half an inch long, pinkish orange, and engorged, with tiny dark heads. They’re also translucent, so if you look closely, you can see their food moving along their digestive tracts.

They’re codling moth larvae, the number one adversary of Washington apple orchard growers and the subject of her fascinating summer of research at the Washington State University Tri-Cities’ Food and Environmental Quality Lab. With faculty members … » More …

Winter 2004

Livestock Advisors Celebrate 20 Years

While the nationally recognized Master Gardener Program celebrated its 30th anniversary last summer, another Washington State University Extension volunteer program observed its 20th year of lending good advice.

The early 1980s saw a growing a back-to-the-land movement in western Washington, says Mike Hackett (’76 M.S. An. Sci.), who at the time was a limited-resources farming agent in Snohomish County.

“But nobody was getting help,” he says. “So from 1980 to about 1982, it seemed like all I was doing was answering the phone or making farm visits. I was overwhelmed with questions.”

As it turned out, the answer to his problem sat in the office … » More …

Winter 2004

The Circle of Life and the Farmer's Daughters

Determined that, contrary to popular assumption, bread flour could indeed be grown in the Inland Northwest, a few years ago Fred Fleming ’73 and Karl Kupers ’71 started growing Terra, a new variety of hard red spring wheat developed by Washington State University wheat breeder Kim Kidwell. They named their business Columbia Plateau Producers and their flour Shepherd’s Grain.

Visualize how a small operation under the big skies of eastern Washington moves into the full-court press of deep-pocketed global business activity. Farmers talking to millers, bakers, and consumers. Convivial conversations that put loaves of bread on the table and spread the message about soil health … » More …

Fall 2004

McDonald at home on the range

At 77, Esther Johnson McDonald is still active in the day-to-day operation of the 9,000-acre Triangle Ranch in Philipsburg, Montana, with her husband of 51 years, John W. “Pat” McDonald. The two met at a bull sale in Missoula. Her mother operated a ranch in Darby, so Esther had an idea what she was getting into. She also had the foresight to earn a degree in animal sciences in 1948.

In years past, she cooked for ranch hands, while raising three sons and five daughters. The ranch is 75 miles southeast of Missoula in a mile-high mountain valley. “Some of the best feeder cattle come … » More …

Fall 2004

Cougar in the corn

Philipp Schmitt fashioned this elaborate Cougar Country corn maze on 14 acres east of Spokane near Liberty Lake last October. Each fall for the past five years, he’s used global positioning-coordinates beamed by satellite-to figure out where to plant the corn. Last year, he opted for the cougar-head logo, and relied on hand mapping to get all the details, including the whiskers, just right. The Pasco farmer attended Washington State University for five semesters from1994 to 1998.