Nearly 83,000 acre-feet of “water reservations” in Oregon’s Hood River basin have been renewed by state regulators, opening the way for new water rights development.

The Oregon Water Resources Commission voted in favor of extending water reservations in the region for another 20 years during its Aug. 18 meeting in Hermiston.

Oregon lawmakers allowed state agencies to “reserve” water for economic development when they established minimum in-stream flows nearly 30 years ago.

More than 300,000 acre-feet of water were reserved by the Oregon Department of Agriculture in five river basins — Hood, Grande Ronde, Powder, Malheur and Owyhee — but few farmers used the program to actually develop water rights.

Lack of awareness and concerns about environmental barriers limited participation in the program, but the ODA believes there’s now a greater recognition of the need to develop water supplies.

Most water reservations were set to expire between 2016 and 2020, so the ODA has been working to win approval for their renewal by the Oregon Water Resources Commission.

The commission renewed a portion of the Powder River basin’s reservations earlier this year — roughly 26,000 acre-feet — but the 82,900 acre-feet renewed in the Hood River basin was the largest chunk of reservations up for consideration.

Water supplies are a concern in the region because some irrigators rely on flows from glaciers around Mt. Hood that have been shrinking over time, said Margaret Matter, ODA’s water resource specialist.

Irrigation districts in the Hood River basin have already made great strides in modernizing their systems and saving water by piping open canals, which prevents seepage, she said.

“They can’t tighten up their systems much more. If the want water, they need new sources,” Matter said.

In terms of financing storage projects, it doesn’t hurt that the area produces several high-value orchard crops, she said.

John Buckley, manager of the East Fork Irrigation District, said the water reservations would be useful if the district built a reservoir to capture flows in early spring.

The district doesn’t currently have any storage, which would be useful in adding water supplies that can be used during the late irrigation season, when flows are lower, he said.

“With snow depleting on the mountain, we will struggle,” said Buckley.

The Farmers Irrigation District is currently planning to raise a dam, which should provide adequate water capacity, but the renewed water reservations will provide added flexibility, said Les Perkins, the district’s manager.

“A lot of it has to do with keeping the door open to future possibilities,” he said.

Extending the water reservations has not been without controversy, however.

WaterWatch of Oregon, an environmental nonprofit, opposed the renewal proposal because it would “put in-stream values at serious risk,” according to a letter to the commission.

ODA also failed to provide the commission with progress reports for the water reservation, as required by the rules for program renewal, the group said.

The Confederated Tribes of the Warm Springs Reservation, meanwhile, urged the commission to assess the renewal’s impacts on endangered species due to streamflows declining since the reservations were established.

“The Tribes do not support the proposed 20-year extension unless environmental safeguards are included in the amended basin program,” according to a letter to the commission.

CONDON, Ore. — It’s a limited pallet this time of year in the Columbia Plateau counties. Blue sky above brown fallow, with combines of John Deere green or Case IH red moving in slow, shrinking circuits around golden wheat fields.

It’s an empty landscape, most ways you look. Few buildings and no traffic. And in that emptiness, you can lose track of the broader world. The wheat kernels tumbling into the hopper on Chuck Greenfield’s combine are the reminder of the connection. From Gilliam County, Ore., with fewer than 2,000 people, it will go to flour mills in Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and the Philippines.

“Feed the world,” Greenfield says.

It is a diminished group of farmers who can make a living doing that. Greenfield’s employer, Marc Pryor, said the county had about 150 wheat farmers in the 1970s. Now he estimates the number is in the teens. It’s a classic example of the economy of scale: Like most crops, wheat’s narrow profit margin makes it critical to spread input, equipment and labor costs over more acreage, and it forced many farmers to get bigger or get out.

In 1950, Oregon had 34,000 farms of one to 49 acres. Now it’s down to 21,800 in that size category. The state lost 8 percent of its farmers between the 2007 Census of Agriculture to the next one in 2012.

The weather, crop diseases, equipment breakdowns and the market don’t care. Wheat that sold for $7 a bushel one year brings $5 the next. There may be enough rain to germinate and nourish a dryland wheat crop through the bone-dry summer, and there may not. “It’s pretty tough right now,” Pryor says.

He’s 66 and trying to maintain the farming operation that flourished under his father, Earl Pryor, now retired. His stepmother, Laura Pryor, was the Gilliam County judge for many years. The family business, now called Prycor LLC., farms about 3,500 acres. Marc Pryor monitors the farm from Los Angeles, where he lives and has a business, and returns home to Condon for harvest.

Marc Pryor is president of an engineering forensics business, which involves finding out why materials, products, structures or components fail, or don’t work like they should. Farmers have their own structural problems.

Some are putting land into conservation reserves and making money that way, Pryor says, but that takes land out of production and limits expansion possibilities. Estate taxes can make it difficult to pass farms along to heirs, and in some cases the previous generation still needs to be supported by the farm’s revenue. A strong U.S. dollar can make U.S. wheat more expensive than competitors’, crucial to Pacific Northwest producers whose wheat is exported.

But to people who question the business, Pryor has a ready answer. “Well, we produced over six million pounds of food this year, what have you done?

“And it’s in our blood,” Pryor adds. “That’s why we’re still doing it.”

Chuck Greenfield, the combine driver, talks about the same thing. He turns 72 in September and is the Prycor field manager. He’s worked for the family 35 years.

“You’re kind of independent, you don’t have to deal with a lot of people,” he says. “If you work in a factory, you’re basically a number.”

He glances over, taking his eyes off the machine’s spinning header for a second.

“As far as I’m concerned, this is a good way of life,” he says. “It’s not always bad to sit and listen to the combine.”

His grandson, Justin Waggoner, is driving the red Case IH combine. He went school to learn welding, but returned to the wheat fields.

“I didn’t ask him to come back,” Greenfield says. “He’s got farming in his blood.”

Greenfield and his grandson circle in to the trucks to unload. Truck driver Buster Nation, who says he’s “16 running on 17,” manipulates an auger transferring wheat from a smaller truck to a larger one, which will haul the load to a grain elevator.

The teen says he didn’t know how to do anything when he started this summer; now he can operate every piece of equipment out here.

“This is one of the best learning experiences I’ve ever had,” he says.

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Prosecutors plan to call seven Interior Department employees to testify at the upcoming trial of Ammon Bundy and others charged with conspiring to impede workers during last winter’s 41-day occupation of an Oregon bird sanctuary.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Barrow told U.S. District Court Judge Anna Brown at a pretrial conference that the employees will explain their work at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge and how they were prevented from doing their jobs. They will also identify photos from the refuge and identify defendants driving government vehicles.

The Oregonian/OregonLive reports the judge agreed with a defense lawyer that the employees can’t simply testify about subjective fears they felt during the occupation.

Monday was the first of what is expected to be several days of pretrial conferences to determine what evidence will be allowed during next month’s trial.

U.S. Rep. Dan Newhouse may become the lone Pacific Northwest voice on Republican Donald Trump’s agricultural advisory committee.

Three Californians are already on it.

The Trump campaign on Aug. 16 released a list of more than 60 people on its ag committee chaired by Charles W. Herbster, owner of Herbster Angus Farms near Falls City, Neb., and owner of an agriculture and animal health products company.

The committee includes 10 former and current governors, members of Congress, farmers, ranchers and heads of agricultural trade associations.

The identities of everyone on the committee were not readily clear, but it appeared there was no one on the list from the PNW.

Washington state Sen. Don Benton, R-Vancouver, director of Trump’s Washington campaign and coordinator for the campaign in Oregon, Idaho, Montana, Alaska and Hawaii, said there was no intention to slight the Northwest.

Advisory committees are added to as they go, he said, adding he’s gained campaign approval to add Newhouse and is awaiting word from the Republican congressman, who serves Washington’s 4th District and is a Sunnyside farmer. Newhouse is on the House Agriculture Committee and is former director of the Washington State Department of Agriculture.

“The folks on the committee are top notch but it wouldn’t hurt to have someone from the PNW on grain exports and other issues somewhat unique to us,” Benton said.

Newhouse campaign manager Sean O’Brien couldn’t be reached for comment but earlier said Newhouse supports the Republican nominee.

Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., was on Mitt Romney’s committee in 2012 but is not on Trump’s. Her staff did not respond to questions.

State Sen. Mark Schoesler, a Ritzville, Wash., wheat farmer and majority leader of the state Senate, said he’s voting for Trump and would serve on the committee if asked.

People may have reservations about Trump, “but there are not many Hillary fans out there,” he said, speaking of Eastern Washington.

Heather Hansen, executive director of Washington Friends of Farms & Forests, said the farm labor shortage and trade are important to Washington and it would be good for Trump to hear a PNW perspective on those issues.

Barry Bushue, president of the Oregon Farm Bureau, said no comment when asked why no one from the PNW is on the committee and if he supports Trump. Bushue said he’s had no contact with the Trump campaign and that his time is taken up with other things.

Jeff Stone, executive director of the Oregon Association of Nurseries, did not respond to a call for comment.

Tom Nassif, president and CEO of Western Growers in Irvine, Calif., A.G. Kawamura, former California agriculture secretary and John Kautz, CEO of Ironstone Vineyards north of Sonora, Calif., are on the committee. Nassif and Kawamura served on Romney’s agriculture committee.

Nassif met Trump at a rally in Fresno, Calif., in May and rode on the candidate’s plane with him to San Diego. They talked for 15 to 20 minutes, mainly about immigration, Nassif told Capital Press.

“It was a rare opportunity to talk face-to-face about an important issue to a person who might be president,” Nassif said.

“I knew when I brought up the subject that we had a difference of opinion on immigration reform,” he said. “I wanted to point out that agriculture is a completely different animal than any other industry.

“I wanted to give him sound reasons why we should take into consideration the need to have loyal, hardworking people have a path to citizenship or legalization.”

Nassif said he talked about the need for a new foreign guestworker program for future flow of workers to meet labor shortages.

“He was listening and saying how complicated the issue is. While he never agreed or disagreed, he encouraged me to talk to his staff, and I did. I didn’t ask to be on the committee but volunteered to be an adviser. They put me on,” Nassif said.

Western Growers has not endorsed Trump but he personally supports Trump, Nassif said.

Capital Press has not been able to determine if anyone from the region is on Rural for Hillary, a group not directly affiliated with the Clinton’s Democratic campaign.

In late July, Rural for Hillary, held its first meeting after several months of groundwork. It’s aimed at building support for Clinton in rural communities and agriculture groups.

USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack and former USDA Secretary Dan Glickman are involved, as are Pam Johnson, a farmer and past president of the National Corn Growers Association and two dairy owners in New York.

Wildfires are scorching more than 357,000 acres across the West, including major blazes in Idaho, California, Oregon and Washington state.

The largest single blaze is the Pioneer Fire in the Boise National Forest, burning more than 96,000 acres.

Though the exact amount of ranch land burned or threatened is not known, “we know there’s ranching, we know there’s commercial timber, and public land and recreation,” fire information officer Tom Turk told the Capital Press.

The fire is typical for the forest, Turk said.

“They tend to be large in nature when we have these dry periods,” he said.

The multi-agency InciWeb website provided updates for major wildfires in the last 24 hours.

As of Aug, 22, major fires included:

• The Soberanes Fire in the Los Padres National Forest in Southern California is burning more than 86,000 acres. The Rey Fire is burning roughly 24,000 acres in the same national forest.

• The Blue Cut Fire is burning roughly 37,000 on the San Bernadino National Forest, also in Southern California.

• The Cedar Fire is burning nearly 20,000 acres on the Sequoia National Forest, also in California.

• The 50,000-acre Cherry Road Fire on brush and grass 16 miles west of Homedale, Idaho, near Lake Owyhee in Oregon. The fire is being fought by the Vale District of the Bureau of Land Management.

• The Rail Fire has burned more than 30,000 acres west of Unity, Ore. Fuels include mixed conifers and insect-killed lodge pole pine stands. The total burned area includes 26,610 acres on the Wallowa-Whitman Natural Forest, 3,650 acres on Malheur National Forest and 13 acres of private land.

• The Kahlotus Fire in Washington state, estimated at 22,000 acres and growing, is threatening homes and crops, according to the Washington State Patrol.

• The Hart Road Fire 9 miles north of Davenport, Wash., is burning 6,000 acres in Stevens County and 2,500 acres in Lincoln County, according to the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office.

• The Yale Road Fire north of Spangle, Wash., is burning roughly, 4,000 acres. The cause is under investigation.

“I don’t have any specifics as far as acres burned or livestock that have been lost, but we know that has occurred, and we’ll be working to assess that in the near future,” said Jeff Sevigney, information officer for the state patrol, about the Yale Road Fire.

Some farmers have plowed a portion of their ground to reduce the fire risk.

“We’ve had tremendous help from the local ag resources in the area, working closely with firefighters to help us establish containment lines, oftentimes utilizing their own equipment,” Sevigney said.

The Spokane Interstate Fairgrounds is being used for livestock and animals evacuated from the fire, Sevigney said.

He blamed warm weather, low relative humidity and high winds for adding to the situation.

“Any time we have extreme fire weather conditions, we have the potential for large fires, and we definitely have a large fire here we’re working on today,” he said.

Sundays

KINGSTON, Ontario (AP) — The rock concert did not begin with a rock song. Instead, it started with flag-waving fans breaking into a national anthem, "O Canada."

TORONTO (AP) — A delirious sold-out crowd and countless Canadians watching live TV from their homes took in the final concert by their rock band The Tragically Hip, whose lead singer and songwriter Gord Downie has been diagnosed with terminal…

SALEM — The 151st Oregon State Fair will feature new attractions, including an FFA greenhouse, a motorsports competition and a new carnival.

The fair runs from Aug. 26 through Sept. 5.

Fair spokesman Dan Cox said fair management this year is focusing on increasing attendance and drawing new audiences to the fair.

Fair management has also restructured several programs for efficiency. Managers combined the 4-H and FFA horse competitions and several other programs.

As a part of the agricultural exhibits, FFA constructed a new greenhouse for horticulture displays with the help of sponsor GK Machinery.

In 2015, fair management was shifted from the Oregon State Parks Department to a public corporation. Cox said this gave the fair more flexibility and allowed it to operate more efficiently.

The restructured management increased fair attendance by 18.9 percent in 2015 and Cox expects that number to grow again in 2016.

“As a quasi-public corporation, we are able to function more like a business with more flexibility and nimbleness,” Cox said.

The biggest addition to the fair will be Machine Mania, which offers a variety of motorsport competitions each day. It will feature tuff trucks, a demolition derby, freestyle motorcycles, truck and tractor pulls, flat track motorcycle racing, outlaw kart racing, professional speedway kart racing and monster trucks. Admission is free with paid admission to the fair.

Portland-based Rainier Amusements will provide carnival rides and attractions to the fair. Rainier will bring Bobsled, a full roller coaster, to the carnival.

Cox said while the fair is adding alot, it is holding onto all of its popular recurring programs.

In 2015 the Oregon State Fair drew 268,000 attendees, not including employees or vendors.

The fair will be the first in the nation to host a cannabis exhibit in 2016. The Oregon Cannabis Business Council will exhibit nine non-budding plants in a secure greenhouse for attendees 21 and over.

Oregon State Fair

Admission: $8 for adults, $5 for children and $1 for seniors. Admission is cheaper if bought in advance online. Military veterans, first responders and immediate families get free admission on Labor Day, Sept. 5.

Dates: Aug. 26-Sept. 5

Parking: $5

Location: 2330 17th St. NE, Salem

Website: http://oregonstatefair.org/

STANFIELD, Ore. — Standing on a stage at the first ever Ag Drone Rodeo, organizer Jeff Lorton compared the day’s events to those in 1903 at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, the site of the first manned flight.

The attendees of Thursday’s events were primarily concerned with unmanned flight, as dozens of people from across the state gathered at Ron Linn Airfield east of Stanfield for a series of drone demonstrations focused on agriculture.

Hosted by the Pendleton Unmanned Aerial Systems Range and Oregon Future Farm, drone manufacturers and vendors like RDO, Insitu and MicaSense flew their UAS. Each company talked about their drone’s crop imaging capabilities and ease of use while piloting it on a short mission.

Lorton said UAS would be a regular part of farming operations within 10 years and there was one working already on Hill Ranches near Pendleton.

“This drone thing you’ve heard so much about is a reality,” he said.

It’s certainly a reality for a group of students at Yamhill-Carlton High School, who are building a drone from scratch.

A Yamhill County farmer commissioned the drone so he could use the unmanned aerial vehicle on his blueberry fields and other crops, Yamhill-Carlton math teacher Jordan Slavish said.

The farmer agreed to pay for half of the cost to build it. A dedicated afterschool group of 6-7 students now gets a hands-on experience building their own drone.

Slavish was accompanied by Jeff Breazile and his son Zach, one of the students working on the drone.

Breazile, an engineer at Intel, said his employer is covering the expenses of the trip to Eastern Oregon, which the contingent is using as an opportunity to find the software they need to compile agricultural data.

Curt Thompson, the career technical education coordinator for the Pendleton School District, said he plans to incorporate some of the ideas from Yamhill-Carlton’s program into Pendleton High School’s UAS classes, which will start in December when the Pendleton Tech and Trade center opens.

Although many in the agricultural industry see drones as a part of the future of farming, some don’t know how quickly it will be integrated.

Todd Thorne, a member of the Pendleton Airport Commission and a former wheat farmer, said he could definitely see drones being used now to help growers of high-value crops like potatoes and tree fruits. But the current cost of investing in a UAS might be too cost prohibitive for a lower-value crop like dryland wheat.

While a quadcopter drone can now be bought for well under $100, the price tag for many of the professional-grade drones being demonstrated cost were in the thousands.

Don Wysocki, a soil scientist with the Umatilla County Oregon State University Extension Service, concurred with Thorne. He said he saw drone operators leasing out UAS services to farmers rather than growers buying drones of their own.

The Ag Drone Rodeo wasn’t the first series of demonstrations for farmers.

Phil Hamm, the station director of OSU’s Hermiston Agricultural Research and Extension Center, said his organization hosted some UAS demonstrations at the HAREC field days a few years ago.

Hamm said there’s a great deal of potential for farmers.

For instance, Hamm said UAS can better pinpoint the spots where pests are destroying a crop, allowing the farmer to target that spot rather than blanket a large area with expensive, unnecessary pesticide.

With many growers not having enough time to learn and operate drones themselves, Hamm also thought leasing drone services would probably be the most immediate way UAVs would be integrated into farming.

While he did note that farmers in the Columbia Basin are progressive in their ability to adapt to new technologies, Hamm said drone companies will have to appeal to growers’ business sense.

“You have to prove to them that they can save money,” he said.

SALEM, Ore. (AP) — Nine living marijuana plants will be displayed at the Oregon State Fair in a first of its kind event for the United States starting next Friday.

The exhibit of the non-flowering, immature plants brings pot cultivation more into the agricultural mainstream less than two years after Oregon voters legalized recreational marijuana. The Oregon Cannabis Business Council, which organized the exhibit, says it’s the first time live cannabis will be shown at a state fair anywhere in the U.S.

The group last year had an informational booth about marijuana at the fair and there were no complaints — a key factor in allowing them to go one step further and offer live plants for viewing this year, said Dan Cox, spokesman for the Oregon State Fair.

The specimens were selected by judges at a competition last weekend who chose three winners each in the sativa, indica and hybrid categories.

The entire exhibit will be housed in a translucent tent and extra security will be on hand to check identification so only people 21 and over can enter, Cox said.

None of the plants are allowed have buds, which are more potent than the leaves.

That’s because the Oregon Liquor Control Commission, which will regulate the recreational marijuana business, is still finalizing regulations for the nascent industry and it’s currently illegal to transport a flowering plant, said Donald Morse, director of the Oregon Cannabis Business Council.

Those regulations and a licensing process for recreational producers are expected by 2017. The industry hopes to have plants with buds at the fair next summer, Morse said.

The event has raised some eyebrows, but Cox said the Oregon State Fair has always played a role in displaying the latest and sometimes controversial fads in agriculture and state culture. Nearly 20 years ago, he said, the fair had an exhibit on tattoo body art that caused a similar sensation.

“It is a showcase for traditional things. And yet it’s always been a show place for the new, the different and the innovative,” he said.

Oregon voters legalized recreational marijuana in a November 2014 ballot initiative after medical marijuana was legalized years earlier.

Recreational marijuana remains illegal in 46 states and under federal law. But in Oregon, the pot business has been booming.

Anticipated state revenue from recreational marijuana through June 2017 was recently quadrupled by Oregon’s Legislative Revenue Office, from $8.4 million to $35 million.

Cox said there aren’t plans to expand pot’s place at the fair beyond the small exhibit, which is in a space rented by industry proponents.

But for weed fans, just getting a place at the table is worth celebrating.

“It’s pretty awesome to be judging actual cannabis plants that are going to go into a state fair,” said Tom Lauerman, one of six judges and an organic marijuana grower who was once arrested in a law enforcement drug raid targeting pot. “It kind of gives me goose bumps even talking about it.”

The fair runs from Aug. 26 to Sept. 5 in Salem, Oregon.

SALEM, Ore. (AP) — Gov. Kate Brown has asked a judge to quash a subpoena that seeks her testimony at Oregon standoff defendant Ryan Bundy’s criminal trial in September.

Through her lawyer, Brown says she has no information pertinent to Bundy’s guilt or innocence in the case.

The Oregonian/OregonLive reports she cites federal doctrine that protects high-ranking officials from “harassing and burdensome requests” for testimony.

Ryan Bundy, his brother Ammon Bundy and six co-defendants are scheduled for trial Sept. 7. They are charged with conspiring to impede federal employees at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge through intimidation, threats or force.

Ryan Bundy issued the subpoena Tuesday for Brown to appear at the trial and to produce any emails or memos between her and the FBI or other law enforcement agencies regarding the 41-day refuge occupation that weren’t already turned over to prosecutors.

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Oregon’s wildfire season is picking up just as much of the state prepares for triple-digit heat.

A fire west of Sunriver led officials to warn people in a subdivision they might have to evacuate. The same situation played out in the southern Oregon town of Paisley, where an 800-acre blaze was one of four that started Wednesday afternoon in Lake County.

In Eastern Oregon, crews set intentional blazes to rob the Rail fire of fuel as it burns about 10 miles southwest of Unity. The wildfire that has scorched 37 square miles produced a large column of smoke that could be seen from Baker City.

Firefighters won’t have comfortable conditions to battle the flames. The forecast for Thursday and Friday calls for temperatures near or above 100 in Western Oregon and it’ll be in the 90s east of the Cascades.

The fire near Sunriver was relatively small, less than a square mile, but its location near the resort community got attention.

Crews worked through the night and continued to focus on the southeast corner, the direction the fire had been moving and an area with homes, said Patrick Lair, spokesman for Central Oregon Interagency Dispatch Center. Crews got a line around the fire at about 2:30 a.m. Thursday and did back-burning through the night. About 250 people continued to fight the blaze.

The fire northwest of Paisley was moving toward private and Fremont-Winema National Forest lands. The evacuation notice means residents in town of about 250 people should monitor the news and be ready to potentially leave home.

The other fires in Lake County, which borders California and Nevada, were small and posed no threat.

BEND, Ore. (AP) — An environmental group is suing the U.S. Forest Service over its plan to thin trees in an Oregon forest.

The Bulletin reports that the nonprofit League of Wilderness Defenders filed a lawsuit in federal court Monday arguing the Forest Service illegally avoided an environmental review of its thinning plan.

The agency in December 2015 approved the Walton Lake Restoration Project, which calls for thinning, replanting and other work on about 176 acres near the lake in Ochoco National Forest.

According to the project, some of the conifer trees around the lake have a root disease that could call the tree to fall, even though it might look healthy. The agency says the process has environmental benefits but could pose a safety risk to people.

BEND, Ore. (AP) — More advocacy groups have filed lawsuits seeking injunctions to stop researchers from surgically sterilizing more than 200 wild mares in Central Oregon.

The Bulletin reports the American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign and The Cloud Foundation jointly filed a lawsuit on Monday against the Bureau of Land Management arguing that the agency had violated the groups’ First Amendment rights by rejecting their request to record the procedures.

Bureau officials say they are still reviewing the latest lawsuits.

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management has said the research in Hines, Oregon, would help determine whether the three methods to be studied could be safely used to control the wild horse population.

Front Range Equine Rescue and Friends of Animals have also sued the agency over the proposed sterilization.

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Oregon’s wildfire season is picking up right as much of the state prepares for triple-digit heat.

A fire burning west of Sunriver led officials to warn people in a subdivision they might have to evacuate. The same situation is playing out in the southern Oregon town of Paisley, where an 800-acre blaze is one of four that started Wednesday afternoon in Lake County.

In Eastern Oregon, crews set intentional blazes to rob the Rail fire of fuel as it burns about 10 miles southwest of Unity. The wildfire that has scorched 37 square miles produced a large column of smoke that could be seen from Baker City.

Firefighters won’t have comfortable conditions to battle the flames. The forecast for Thursday and Friday calls for temperatures near or above 100 in Western Oregon and it’ll be in the 90s east of the Cascades.

ALBANY, Ore. — Linn County shouldn’t be allowed to represent other counties in a lawsuit seeking $1.4 billion from Oregon over its forest management practices, according to the state’s attorneys.

It’s also impractical for the case to proceed as a class action due to the different forest circumstances in each county, the state’s attorneys claimed during oral arguments Aug. 17 in Albany, Ore.

The county filed a lawsuit against the State of Oregon earlier this year, arguing that insufficient logging had cost 15 counties more than $1.4 billion.

The complaint claims these counties turned over ownership of forestlands to Oregon in the early 20th Century with the expectation the state would maximize timber revenues, but since 1998, forest managers have instead prioritized wildlife habitat, water quality and recreation values.

More than 650,000 acres were donated to Oregon by Benton, Clackamas, Clatsop, Columbia, Coos, Douglas, Josephine, Klamath, Lane, Lincoln, Linn, Marion, Polk, Tillamook, and Washington counties.

Linn County is seeking class action status for the lawsuit, permitting it to represent the other counties in the case.

Scott Kaplan, an attorney for Oregon, said the problems in managing the case as a class action would be “enormous.”

The counties donated 183 separate parcels of land to the state, each of which contains different slopes, tree types, waterways and federally- protected species, he said.

Determining how much timber could have been generated from each parcel would devolve into 183 mini-trials, he said.

“How can we decide if revenue has been maximized on a particular parcel unless you consider all of those issues?” Kaplan said.

Linn County is also an inadequate representative of the other counties for multiple reasons, he said.

The litigation costs are currently being paid for by timber groups and lumber companies — Oregon Forest & Industries Council, Sustainable Forests Fund, Stimson Lumber and Hampton Tree Farms.

Linn County is simply lending its name to a lawsuit that actually represents private interests, according to Oregon’s attorneys.

“It’s not a public interest case. It’s a case to benefit one particular group,” said Kaplan.

Unlike the counties, which appreciate tourism and other benefits from uses besides logging, the timber interests funding the lawsuit primarily want to change the state’s “greatest permanent value” rules for forest management to emphasize harvesting, he said.

Much of the alleged damages are for lost future timber revenues, which may force the state to change its logging policies, he said.

“That would directly challenge the interests of the other counties,” Kaplan said.

The case also doesn’t qualify as a class action because of the lack of “commonality” among the counties, which donated their land to Oregon during different times and under specific terms, he said.

The presence of threatened and endangered species, which constrain logging, varies widely by county and affects the damages calculation, he said.

“It’s a complicated issue involving federal agencies,” Kaplan said.

Chris McCracken, an attorney for Linn County, rejected the argument there’s a lack of commonality among the counties.

They all face the same issues, such as whether the state has violated its contract to maximize timber revenues, he said.

“We have common questions in droves,” McCracken said.

The Oregon Department of Forestry does not manage each parcel individually but instead treats them according to regional forest plans, he said.

Deciding the counties’ contractual rights collectively is more efficient than trying separate cases with potentially conflicting verdicts, he said.

McCracken also disputed that the lawsuit’s funding mechanism should disqualify it as a class action.

The Davis Wright Tremaine law firm would be entitled to 15 percent of any financial award in the case.

Contingency fees aren’t unusual in class action lawsuits, particularly since the counties are strapped for cash and could not afford such litigation on their own, McCracken said.

“There are no disabling conflicts between Linn County and the class members,” he said.

It’s irrelevant whether some counties prefer the forests to be managed for ecological or recreational benefits, McCracken said.

The lawsuit’s outcome won’t affect these priorities, he said.

“All that is sought here is money damages,” he said. “This lawsuit is not seeking to change the management of the forests.”

Linn County Circuit Court Judge Daniel Murphy said he would issue a ruling by Sept. 19 on the class certification issue as well as the state’s motions to dismiss.

CORNELIUS, Ore. (AP) — A small fire on an Oregon farmer’s field whipped up several firenados — tornados comprised of flames and smoke.

The smoky twisters cropped up in the field after a piece of farming equipment on Friday sparked the fire, which ultimately burned about 7 acres.

Cornelius Fire Department spokesman Matt Johnston said erratic winds contributed to the flaming phenomenon. He said the fire sucks in oxygen to fuel itself and the heat rises, causing the spinning column of flames and smoke.

Johnston filmed one in an adjacent field that swirled for about two minutes and shot up about 200 feet.

While Oregon has had a tame wildfire season so far, Johnston said three days of expected triple digit heat has crews worried.

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — The first defendant in the armed takeover of an Oregon wildlife refuge early this year has been sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison for his role.

The Oregonian/OregonLive reports that Corey Lequieu, 46, was sentenced Tuesday, the first person to be sent to prison in the federal conspiracy case.

U.S. District Judge Anna J. Brown also sentenced Lequieu to three years of supervised release after prison and an amount of restitution to be determined later.

In May, Lequieu was the first of 26 standoff defendants charged with conspiracy to plead guilty. He admitted to impeding federal employees through threats, intimidation or force from working at the refuge outside Burns, Oregon.

The conspiracy charge carries a prison sentence of up to six years. But federal prosecutors recommended less time as part of a plea agreement, at least partly because Lequieu was the first in the case to take responsibility.

BURNS, Ore. — A recent decision by the federal government kept sage grouse off the Endangered Species List, but Harney County ranchers, displeased with the BLM’s range management plan amendment, are considering taking their complaint to court.

Louie Molt, chairman of the Harney County Soil and Water District, said the agency disregarded input from rural communities.

“When they were writing the Range Management Plan Amendment they asked counties and soil and water districts to come up with their own ideas about how to protect sage grouse and keep the rural community viable,” Molt said. “The BLM took our rural alternative and threw it in the trash.”

The county filed a protest, Molt said, and is now considering legal action. Out of a list of 10 or so complaints, Oregon Cattlemen’s Association Chairman John O’Keefe, a rancher in neighboring Lake County, said one of the biggest concerns is conflicting research over stubble height.

“It’s the implementation phase that is being challenged,” O’Keefe said. “There is research that has come out that the seven-inch minimum stubble height requirement has flaws in the science.”

O’Keefe said peer-reviewed research from the University of Nevada, Reno, raises questions about whether sampling bias might affect the estimates of cover needed for ground nesting birds. Daniel Gibson, Erik Blomberg and James Sedinger from the Program in Ecology, Evolution and Conservation Biology analyzed the timing of nest survival surveys to determine required vegetative cover.

“One of the biggest concerns about the Resource Management Plan is they placed a lot of emphasis on habitat assessment including seven-inch stubble height,” O’Keefe said. “If we are going to manage for additional vegetation with additional wildfire, we are concerned where the BLM is going.”

The bias, according to the study, lies when stubble height is measured — at nest failure from predation or its height at predicted hatch date. Based on the study, the measurements taken at predicted hatch date more accurately predicted the influence of grass height on nest survival.

“Gibson showed if you remove the bias from sampling it shows grass height is not related to nest success,” O’Keefe said. “The BLM is over-emphasizing stubble height at the expense of wildfire, and that concerns us. We are worried they will cut permits on a non-existing nesting threat to the detriment of a fire threat and in a lot of these areas the grass matures at or below the seven-inch level,” O’Keefe said.

Fearing negotiations through the protest would fail; Harney County started raising money to launch a lawsuit. Molt said the district set a minimum goal of $50,000 before it would consider going to court; by Aug. 12 the soil and water district had raised $51,000.

“We are certainly willing to go back to the table with them, but we need to have the right people at the table, possibly (Interior) Secretary Jewell. “We’d like to try to collaborate one last time - we collaborated until we are blue in the face and we have nothing to show that works for us,” Molt said. “We will not proceed with filing suit until we give them one last opportunity to come back to the table to give us something we can live with.”

Jerome Rosa, executive director of Oregon Cattlemen’s Association said his organization supports Harney County’s actions and donated $5,000 to the fund.

“Oregon Cattlemen are still trying to negotiate with the BLM on the implementation and on this rule and if we were to sign on to this suit we give up our ability to negotiate on this, but we support our local cattlemen’s group in what they are doing here,” Rosa said.

Molt said now that the original goal has been met the second goal is to raise $100,000 and the far, outreaching goal is $250,000.

Molt said it comes down to protecting the livelihoods of ranchers dependent on public use permits.

“We will all be extremely affected if the permits are canceled. “Who am I going to sell my bulls or my hay?” Molt said. We have got to look out for our own country, if we don’t no one else will. Rural America is getting choked out. The people who live here, who would like to continue to live here, are the best stewards on the ground. People think we are destroying it. Are we that dumb that we would destroy our own livelihood?”