Agriculture

YAKIMA VALLEY – The challenges facing the Washington hop farmer are aplenty, mused Jeff Perrault, while staring out at several hundred acres of lush trellises on his family farm a few miles west of Toppenish.

The National Lentil Festival may be the only place in the world where a person can get a high-five from a chickpea mascot, slurp up a bowl of lentil chili straight from a 325-gallon cauldron, and peruse 100 vendors selling anything and everything related to legumes.

The number of invasive Japanese beetles trapped in Pasco and Kennewick is up significantly this year, but Washington state Department of Agriculture officials are hopeful that a new method of eradicating them will be successful. “It is quite alarming, the population increase this year,” said Camilo Acosta, the department’s beetle eradication coordinator, in an update to the Franklin County ...

Aug. 8—The potential exists for a near-record apple crop in the state this fall, but picking all those apples depends on whether enough workers are available during the upcoming harvest. Officials with the Washington State Tree Fruit Association released their forecast for the 2025 fresh apple crop, and the 142 million standard 40-pound boxes predicted would be a significant increase over last ...

LIND, Wash. – Conversations buzzed with talk of soil conservation, crop rotations and winter wheat breeding as grain trucks rolled out for the first tour of the day.

WASHINGTON – Amid a recent surge in arrests of immigrants allegedly living in the country illegally, some raids by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement have drawn quiet concern from Republicans in Congress who largely back President Donald Trump’s mass-deportation project.

Eastern Washington farmers are set to gain a more reliable water source, thanks to a $45 million state investment in a major irrigation project.

BZ CORNER, Wash. – In a remote stretch of Klickitat County in southern Washington, third-generation apple grower John Riggleman is playing a bit part in the most ambitious and highest-stakes new product rollout attempted by the United States apple industry.

May 9—A bipartisan group of lawmakers in Congress, including Rep. Dan Newhouse, reintroduced a piece of legislation this week that aims to reform immigration policy and agricultural labor. The Farm Workforce Modernization Act, which was first proposed in 2019, would give farmworkers a path to legal status and citizenship, update the foreign guest worker program and implement a nationwide ...

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump has escalated his trade war, raising tariffs on Chinese goods to 145% last week even as he paused some taxes on imports from other countries. But another part of his administration’s plan to compete with Beijing’s influence could hit Washington state farmers even if they don’t send their crops to China.

BOISE, Idaho — Idaho’s agriculture industry has faced labor shortages, and the country’s immigration system has for decades heard calls for reform. Now, two Idaho lawmakers are attempting to find a state-specific solution. House Bill 297 would create a year-round agricultural guest worker program — for which there is no current federal equivalent. Employers would have to register with the ...

Washington State Dairy Federation Executive Director Dan Wood doesn’t carry around papers proving his citizenship in America.

Washington State University has developed a new strain of grass. And no, it's definitely not for smoking.

A perfect storm of economic challenges is pushing Washington apple farmers out of business.