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Klamath agriculture sends message to rest of Oregon
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6/9/2010
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Article Content Suggested lead
Farmers and ranchers in the Klamath Basin continue to face a challenging year in the wake of drought and water curtailment:
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Agriculture in the Klamath Basin is trying to cope with severe cutbacks in the amount of water available for irrigation. With both state and federal drought declarations already in place, farmers and ranchers in the area want the rest of Oregon to realize that agriculture is viable in the basin:
ADDINGTON: "I think so often that people think of Klamath in sort of negative sense- the water wars, people using water and fighting about water. But the fact is, we're growing a lot of food that people use every day." :13
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Greg Addington is with the Klamath Water Users Association and says irrigators are looking at about 30 percent of the normal surface water delivery from Upper Klamath Lake this year. That provides a challenge to growers of potatoes, onions, mint, alfalfa, and beef cattle so prominent in the basin. He has hopes an agreement for the future will help after this year:
ADDINGTON: "It's all about water here. Good, bad, or otherwise, that's the deal. We've worked very hard in the last four or five years with, frankly, traditional enemies- people we've been in courtrooms with, we've sparred politically with." :14
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As a result of collaboration, the complex Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement signed earlier this year moves towards a settlement that essentially gives agriculture certainty and reliability of future water releases from Upper Klamath Lake even if the amount is less than what irrigators are used to. But it will take a few years to implement. Meanwhile, irrigators are bracing for a tough summer ahead. In Salem, I'm Bruce Pokarney.
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ADDINGTON says the Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement is a compromise between agriculture and all other uses of the water:
"My direction from the people I work for, the irrigators here, is that we need a secure and predictable supply of water. Maybe we can live with less water in certain circumstances, if it's more reliable." :12
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TRACEY LISKEY, a Klamath Basin farmer and new member of the State Board of Agriculture, says a unified approach is needed to solve the Klamath Basin water issues, and that's what farmers and ranchers are trying to do:
"Everybody's got to work for a common goal to get everybody through instead of I've got to have mine and nobody else gets there's. So we've all got to come through in the middle and hopefully we can get there." :10
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Full story
http://oregon.gov/ODA/news/100609klamath.shtml |
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