Anna King/NW News Network
Audio for this story will be available soon.
Nearly 12,000 acres of Easterday family farmland in Benton County will likely sell for more than its $210 million asking price, according to court documents and sources with knowledge of the deal.
Two big players are vying for the sweeping property near the Columbia River: Farmland Reserve’s AgriNorthwest, which is backed by the The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and Seattle-based Bill and Melinda Gates’ Cottonwood Ag Management.
The highest bidder will be confirmed at a bankruptcy auction held next week.
The deal is subject to the federal court’s sale hearing on July 14.
Sometimes I feel as low as this cold-early-morning snail on the Richland river path. June 3 marks a year since COVID-19 blasted through my immune system .
It’s bone dry from Spokane, near the Washington-Idaho border, clear to Harney County in Southern Oregon, with triple digit temps on the way even later this week for some parts of the Northwest.
Nicole Berg wades into her stunted wheat field.
It’s so short and sparse, she doesn’t think the combine can even reach the wheat without eating rocks.
“Combines don’t like dirt and rocks,” Berg says. “They get indigestion.”
Berg is a dryland wheat farmer in the sweeping Horse Heaven Hills of south-eastern Washington. She shows off one head of half-turned golden wheat amid a sea of them. Besides being too short, the plant’s kernels didn’t fill out properly.
“See how the wheat head is curled like that?” Berg asks. “And then you break into it, you might have some berries down here, but this will be empty. There is no wheat inside the wheat head. It’s a sad situation. It’s farming though. You know, thank goodness for crop insurance.”
Courtesy of Franklin County, Washington
Just how do you miss 200,000 phantom cattle over several years? That’s what some people in the Columbia Basin cattle-feeding industry are wondering in an ongoing saga between Tyson Fresh Meats and Easterday Ranches.
“It’s hard to believe,” says Mike DeTray, who runs a 4,000-head operation outside of George, Wash.
An accurate count of cattle is essential to cracking the case of Easterday Ranches and Easterday Farms two arms of the large Easterday family empire, which Tyson Fresh Meats has accused of inventing and feeding 200,000 cattle on paper. After Tyson filed suit seeking $225 million, Easterday filed for federal bankruptcy.