Country Life Wednesday, July 15, 2020 • lyndentribune.com • ferndalerecord.com
Dairy • A12 Gardening • A11 FFA/4-H • A11
Nooksack Valley FFA team wins state helping Good To Go Meat Pies
In early sun at 6 a.m. Randy Kraght loads up his pickup with raspberries already picked for Barbie’s Berries fresh sales of the day. (Calvin Bratt/Lynden Tribune)
If weather stays good, raspberry crop can be too From left, the Nooksack Valley FFA Marketing Plan team that took first in state consisted of Aubree Bird, Nikki Vermeer and Faith Bartl. (Courtesy photo)
Marketing Plan team kept working through COVID challenges By Hailey Palmer hailey@lyndentribune.com
EVERSON — The coronavirus may have put a stop to just about every high school activity this past spring, but students of the Nooksack Valley FFA chapter got their chance to compete virtually in state competition anyway — and they did well. The FFA Marketing Plan team presented its work to a panel of judges over Zoom and
won the state competition while a Milk Quality and Products team entered testing online and placed fourth in the state. The Marketing Plan students were Aubree Bird, Faith Bartl and Nicci Vermeer. On Milk Quality and Products were Gaby and Andrew Levine, Colten Cuperus, Riley VanBoven and Grace Shintaffer. Advisor Rhonda Juergens said her students were very fortunate, and thankful, they were still able to compete for a trophy in the middle of the pandemic. “It was pretty neat the state allowed for virtual opportunities for the kids,” Juergens said. “It really took a lot of work on their part, so the kids still had the opportunity.”
The Marketing Plan team worked with Holly Bumford, owner of Good To Go Meat Pies locally, and developed an extensive plan for that business. Juergens said the three girls on the team did intensive research not only on the business itself, but also on the surrounding market in order to find a way to improve and remarket for Good To Go Meat Pies. “Our kids focused on rather than having pasties in the freezer, let’s look at how we can remarket those frozen pasties,” she said. “They talked about putting family packs together so that people could come and just grab.” The team also looked at goSee FFA on A11
Growers battled cool and rainy conditions through last week By Calvin Bratt editor@lyndentribune.com
WHATCOM — Dry weather to start this week raised hopes that the 2020 raspberry crop can indeed turn a corner toward quality and profitability. The first two to three weeks weren’t so good. Too much moisture and coolness have until now spoiled — literally, in some cases — the big commercial raspberry harvest that began in late June. “It’s got to straighten out one of these days,” said veteran grower Randy Kraght on Monday. “Hopefully we’re over the hump and these guys can have a fairly decent season.” Kraght is in a different situation than most other local grow-
ers in that his family’s Barbie’s Berries 25-acre operation is mostly fresh-market, in contrast to the vast commercial mechanical harvest for freezing taken from about 9,000 acres in Whatcom County. Still, Kraght knows the horticulture of berrying from his start with Curt Maberry Farm many years ago. It seemed on Monday that the mold — botrytis, to be technical — was receding, and the weather forecast for this week was “getting better,” Kraght said. Ideal conditions, he said, would be about 70 degrees with a little breeze. At this point local raspberries can do just fine without any more rain, being fed by drip irrigation at their roots anyway. The first nine days of July brought far from an ideal scenario, with well over an inch and a half of rain and average daytime high temps way too cool at around 66. See Raspberries on A11
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Wednesday, July 15, 2020 • lyndentribune.com • A11
FFA: First top finish ever
On the Milk Quality and Products team were, from left, Andrew Levine, Gaby Levine, Colten Cuperus, Grace Shintaffer and Riley VanBoven. (Courtesy photo) Continued from A10
ing to more farmers markets and expanding use of Facebook as tools of marketing for Bumford’s business, especially the target audience of busy moms. The students also looked at trends of selling for eat-out, created contingency plans, researched other industries and conducted surveys in the community to further research and collect data for Good To Go Meat Pies. Juergens said the Nooksack Valley team had to initially be picked as one of the top eight in the state to compete in the Marketing Plan finals. Eight teams were chosen to be on a virtual Zoom call, with kids in separate chat rooms in their official dress, to defend and an-
swer questions for up to 10 minutes, the adviser said. Moving the state competition to online definitely brought challenges for the teams’ preparation. Whatcom County’s move to Phase 2 on June 5 could not have come at a better time, with the competition taking place June 10-12. “We had already done a lot of the research and we just had to finalize little bits and pieces of the plan and that we could do all by email and online,” Juergens said. “What was hard was practicing the questions. We were just so grateful to move into Phase 2 so we could get social distancing and practice a couple days before that interview. That was really hard — not being able to practice in person.”
As for the Marketing Plan team winning it all, Juergens said it’s the first time the school has placed first in any part of the competition. “It was so awesome,” she said. “We’ve always been in the top eight, but we’ve never gotten first. It was just so exciting to finally win.” The only downside to winning the state competition is not being able to compete at nationals this fall in Louisville, as that level has been canceled. Juergens said this team still has a chance to compete at nationals in 2021, however. On the Milk Quality and Products team, Gaby Levine placed as the third highest individual in the entire state contest.
Raspberries Continued from A10
Less than ideal quality means, for the county’s 67 growers, that fruit cannot be processed for the top grade of IQF (individually quick frozen). It must go into the lower grades for puree or juice. From a roadside view, if the fruit is going into a barrel on the mechanical harvester out in a Whatcom field, it means the end product is a juice — not the best money maker for the grower. But the situation may now be improving, and hardly a day too soon. “The quality looks good,” said grower John Clark of raspberries harvested so far. “We’ve just got to get it into the right container.” Softness after rain is what has kept fruit from being packed IQF, although Clark expects the firmness
IN BLOOM
Gardening in the summer that hasn’t quite arrived I don’t mean to be a complainer, but is it too much to ask for just something about 2020 to be normal? So far, this summer has been the coolest since 2002, and after so many warm summers in recent memory, I’m beginning to wonder if warm summer weather is ever coming. With weekly rain showers along with cooler than average temperatures for this time of year, some aspects of gardening may take extra effort for success. As you work around the yard this month, here are a few tips to keep your garden going strong. First, the damp weather we’ve had for much of the last couple of months has made growing beautiful petunias a struggle for even the most experienced gardeners. Just when the flowers start to hit full bloom, another shot of rain spoils them and sets the plants back for a week or more. Eventually, consistent drier weather will show up, so continue to fertilize and water regularly, and use an iron-rich fertilizer like Jack’s Classic Petunia Feed to keep your plants growing strong. Alternating weekly with a 1030-20 blossom-boosting fertilizer will also help encourage continued flowering. Second, as if the rain wasn’t enough to keep your petunias from looking their best, budworm season has begun, and these hungry caterpillars can work seemingly overnight to eat the flowers and buds off petunias, geraniums and calibrachoa. But hey, it’s 2020, so let’s count our blessings — at
Customer Delores Jensen of Blaine buys boxes of all four types of berries available at Barbie’s. can be there in the next pass through his fields — if the weather holds up, he said, crossing his fingers, alongside the Clark’s Berry Farm on Birch Bay-Lynden Road. He knows that the demand for frozen berries at the grocery store is solid from consumers who are more cooped-up at home in the COVID pandemic
By David Vos least budworms haven’t started attacking people! To kill budworms and allow your plants to continue to bloom, spray with Captain Jack’s Deadbug Brew or B.T., both of which are effective options. I typically spray once in July and once more in mid-August to keep my pots and hanging baskets free from budworm damage. Third, last month I wrote about dealing with fungus issues, and now in the continued damp weather fungus problems persist. Keep a close eye out for powdery mildew, watching for a gray dusty film covering leaves of roses, maples, zinnias or even the aforementioned petunias (really, they usually are easy to grow!). Thankfully, powdery mildew can easily be controlled when caught early. Many common plant fungicides are effective, and I especially like neem oil for both mildew control and for killing aphids. Fourth, on a more positive note, one benefit of this summer’s cool weather is how lush everything has stayed, even with minimal watering. If you’ve struggled in recent
years to keep your lawn green through summer heat, or even had trouble with it recovering at all in the fall, that likely won’t be a problem this year. In fact, if reseeding your lawn is a project on your late summer or fall to-do list, it’s a great time to do so even now. While July’s long days and warm weather are great for getting grass seed started, keeping enough water on the grass seed or newlysprouted turf can typically be a challenge, but not this year! So don’t be afraid to tackle that reseeding project — you’ll be amazed at how quickly it can get established. Similarly, gardens are loving the regular rains. With the notable exception of peppers — which, frankly, even in a normal summer need all the extra heat they can get in our corner of the world — most other vegetables are growing like crazy. If this is your first year growing a garden and it hasn’t taken off like you’d hoped, you may need to fertilize. Even if you added compost at the beginning of the season, if your plants are small or yellowing, they may need additional fertilizer. Sprinkle some organic granular fertilizer around your plants and water it in to help green up your crops and encourage production. Someday soon, we’ll hopefully turn a corner into the Pacific Northwest summers we’ve enjoyed in recent years, filled with long stretches of dry, warm weather. In the meantime, keep up with the pest and disease control, trusting that warmer, nicer days are ahead!
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A12 • Wednesday, July 15, 2020 • lyndentribune.com
COVID impact help available to farmers Some eligibility is expanded WASHINGTON, D.C. — On July 9 U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue announced additional agricultural commodities added to the Coronavirus Food Assistance Program that helps offset price declines and additional marketing costs due to the coronavirus pandemic. There was also expansion of eligibility for seven commodities already listed, and those included apples, blueberries, potatoes and raspberries — CARES Act funding for sales losses because USDA found these commodities had a 5 percent or greater price decline between mid-January and mid-April as a result of the
COVID-19 pandemic. Originally, these commodities were only eligible for marketing adjustments. Producers were able to apply for the assistance starting Monday, July 13, and continuing through Aug. 28. USDA’s Farm Service Agency is handling the process; the local office is at the southeast corner of Hinote’s Corner, 914 Citadel Drive, Everson, phone number 360-318-8121. Already eligible in the orginal aid bill were raspberry and strawberry crops, dairy farmers and cattle ranchers, and USDA says additional commodities may still be announced. Producers have several options for applying: • Using an online portal, accessible at farmers.gov/ cfap, allows producers with
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secure USDA login credentials — known as eAuthentication — to certify eligible commodities online, digitally sign applications and submit directly to the local USDA Service Center. • Completing the application form using the CFAP Application Generator and Payment Calculator found at farmers.gov/cfap. This Excel workbook allows customers to input information specific to their operation to determine estimated payments and populate the application form, which can be printed, then signed and submitted to their local USDA Service Center. • Downloading the AD3114 application form from farmers.gov/cfap and manually completing the form to submit to the local USDA Service Center by mail, electronically or by hand delivery to an office drop box. In some limited cases, the office may be open for inperson business by appointment. Visit farmers.gov/ coronavirus/service-centerstatus to check the status of your local office. USDA Service Centers can also work with producers to complete and securely transmit digitally signed applications through two commercially available tools: Box and OneSpan. Producers who are interested in digitally signing their applications should notify their local service centers when calling to discuss the CFAP application process. You can learn more about these solutions at farmers.gov/ mydocs.
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MIELKE MARKET
Milk prices go from famine to feast — for a few months What a difference a month makes! In June I reported the May benchmark Federal Order Class III milk price had dropped to $12.14 per hundredweight (cwt.), its lowest level since 2009. On July 1 the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced the June Class III price at $21.04 per cwt., a record monthto-month pole vault of $8.90 from May and $4.77 above June 2019. It is the highest Class III price since November 2014. The July 2 Class III futures settlements projected a July Class III price at $22.97, August at $20.95, September $18.81, October $17.74, November $17.16 and December $16.36. And amazing gains in cheese sales stoked Class III futures even hotter last week: to $24.20 for July (40 cents shy of the $24.60 record of 2014) and $23.61 for August. The June Class IV price was $12.90, up $2.23 from May but $3.93 below a year ago. Space limits an explanation for such a roller-coaster ride, but COVID best explains it. At first, restaurant and food service demand plummeted, sending repercussions all the way back to the farm gate — you’ll recall milk was even being dumped and vegetables buried. Contributing to the turnaround were: innovation in the restaurant industry, general reopenings, increased consumer demand at the grocery store, and dairy farmer cuts in milk output, along with renewed exports. But Uncle Sam likely was the biggest player with the Farmers to Families Food Box program. The government bought and is still buying millions of dollars worth of fruits, vegetables, meat and dairy products for food banks and feeding programs to keep outof-work people fed and farmers producing the food we all depend on. And this: Forget gold. Invest in cheese. One could almost say that last week as the Chicago Mercantile Exchange cheddar blocks set another record
By Lee Mielke
high Friday, closing at $2.9150 per pound, up 24 cents on the week and $1.13 above that week a year ago. For a little history, the wholesale 50-pound block cheese price at the CME had plunged to $1.00 per pound on April 15, a 17-year low. It closed July 3 at $2.6750 per pound after having set a record high on June 23 at $2.81, and then it kept going up. In contrast, the 500-pound cheddar barrels got to $2.40 per pound last week and closed Friday at $2.34, a record 57.5 cents below the blocks. Twenty-three train cars of block traded hands on the week at the CME and only two of barrel. [Explanation break: Cheese blocks are predominantly for “cutting,” ending up on cheese platters. Barrels, on the other hand, have more of a commercial application and often work their way into shredded or processed products. They may also be cut down into smaller units.] The glowing milk prices have resulted in fewer dairy cows being slaughtered. Butter continued in meltdown, however, closing July 10 at $1.69 per pound, the fifth consecutive week of decline, and it is 72.25 cents below a year ago. Grade A nonfat dry milk drew strength from the Global Dairy Trade auction and climbed to $1.0325 per pound July 7 but finished the week at $1.0150. Dry whey finished Friday at 28.75 cents per pound, down 4.25 cents on the week, the low-
Puyallup fair also cancelled
The Washington State Fair, which usually takes place each September, is the latest event to be cancelled due to COVID-19. (Photo courtesy of Kelty Pierce) PUYALLUP — The 2020 Washington State Fair, originally set for Sept. 4-27, has officially been cancelled, another victim of the coronavirus. “Though it was a hard decision, it was really the only decision
possible based on what we currently know,” the fair said in a July 8 media announcement. “It was a decision made in what we feel are the best interests of the health and safety of all of our guests, our employees, our exhibitors
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est CME level in eight months. Speaking of the global market, July 1 began the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), but U.S. dairy farmers are not celebrating, according to the National Milk Producers Federation. American dairymen are concerned about possible bad-faith actions from Canada, NMPF reports. At issue are Canada’s announced Tariff-Rate Quota allocations, which NMPF says “undermine the trade deal by thwarting the ability of the U.S. dairy industry to make full use of the trade agreement’s market-access opportunities and violating some of the treaty’s provisions.” There have been years of hard-fought negotiations to break down trade barriers and get fairer rules to improve the flow of U.S. dairy products throughout North America, the organization says, “and dairy farmers and cooperatives stand ready to increase deliveries of U.S. dairy products to Canada,” but the TRQ action undercuts the progress. “Canada needs to change its course and abide by its commitments,” said Jim Mulhern, NMPF president and CEO. Meanwhile, U.S. dairy exports in May were the strongest for the month on record, amounting to a combined 498.2 million pounds, driven by demand for milk powders, according to HighGround Dairy. The Northwest Dairy Association makes these price projections for the Class III price and Pacific Northwest blend price: Month Class PNW III Blend June $21.04 $15.35 (current) July $23.75 $17.85 Aug. $23.45 $18.40 Sept. $20.75 $18.50 Oct. $18.40 $16.50 Nov. $17.35 $16.10 Dec. $16.30 $15.80 Jan. $15.85 $15.60 Lee Mielke, of Lynden, is editor of the Mielke Market Weekly. Whatcom County has about 70 dairy farms.
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and all our fair friends.” “We realize this action will have severe impacts, both emotionally and financially, on all of our partners. We know that not having a fair this year creates a hardship for many, but people are the most important component in the incredibly complex equation of what makes up our fair. Health and safety are our greatest concerns.” The potential limitations brought on by needed social distancing would not have created good future memories of the 2020 fair, its managers said. The Washington State Fair is one of the biggest in the world and the largest in the Pacific Northwest. It started in 1900 in Puyallup, and welcomes more than a million guests to the single largest attended event in the state. For more information, visit www.thefair.com.