Romain Recall & Machinery Maintenance

Romain Recall & Machinery Maintenance plus Food Forethought. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Northwest Report.

Once again a Northern California produce supplier is recalling lettuce over fears of a possible E. coli contamination. The recall is limited to single lot of Field Fresh Wrapped Single Head Romaine that was available at retail stores starting Aug. 2. The lettuce has been shipped to 19 states including Washington State and also to Puerto Rico and Canada. There has not been any reports of illness and the company is conduction the recall with the aide of the FDA. Nearly 2100 cases of romaine lettuce have potentially been affected.

With wildfires now continuing to burn throughout the northwest and into California there are fears that more fires could be ignited. One source though can be prevented as Mark Hinze of University of Nebraska Extension says proper farm machinery maintenance which will help minimize the risk of a wildfire.

HINZE:  That includes looking at your belts, looking at your chains, looking at the sprockets making sure it’s well lubricated, regular maintenance and oil changes and so forth also apply here. The place where we have moving parts whether those parts are worn or badly frayed like dry belts those types of things, these things can all created excessive wear and tear on the machine so these areas need to be specifically looked at, studied ahead of time before you use the machine or taking it out into a potentially dangerous, threatening environment.

Now with today’s Food Forethought, here’s Lacy Gray.

I felt privileged this week to witness pine white butterflies in and around our backyard. Privileged for a couple of different reasons. First, it seems they are something of a rarity in our neck of the woods, and second, once taking their butterfly form the pine whites only live for about a week before they die. They are quite lovely really, with their snow white wings veined in black, reminding me of what fairies would look like dancing through the tree tops. Of course there is a dark side to this lovely little flutter by, their larva feed on conifers. In fact, they’ve been described in the past as “one of the most destructive insect enemies of ponderosa pine in the Northwest”. Nature though has a way of taking care of such things, in this case certain wasps help to control the pine whites numbers by parasitizing the larva, along with other predators and parasites and winter egg mortality. I know I’m not supposed to enjoy you, but for now pine white butterfly you needn’t worry about including me on your list of predators. I’m content to watch your dance throughout the tree tops, knowing that your time here on earth is very short-lived indeed.

Thanks Lacy. That’s today’s Northwest Report. I’m Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.