Farming

U.S. farms have faced worker shortages for years. Now compounding the problem: The children of farmworkers are leaving the fields, forcing farm owners to look to other countries for labor.

Jose Martinez has picked America's food for decades. With all that experience on different farms, he saw workers lacking labor protections. Now he works to give farmworkers more rights.

Washington state is among a handful of states with new laws granting farmworkers the right to earn time-and-a-half for overtime work. But for many workers, things haven't turned out as expected.

A family-owned apple and cherry orchard business has agreed to pay the amount to settle a lawsuit filed by the state Attorney General's Office in 2021. The workers will each get about $1,000.

Amid extreme heat, there are few federal protections for workers during hot temperatures. The Biden administration wants to change that but the rule making process is long and the heat won't wait.

Born into the flower business, Scott Chang grew from being resentful of the long summer hours to having deep respect for his family's hard work. Discover the subtle beauty of See Lee Farm and the Hmong family who runs it.

Across the Northwest crops are late. Cool spring weather has held back asparagus, potatoes and alfalfa. Even tree fruit blooms were late to flush open. Then, record-warm weather hit.

Upingaksraq Spring Alaska Schreiner is finding innovative ways to continue her native plant business and seed sharing in the face of water shortages. The plants’ resilience and that of the people who have grown those plants since time immemorial give Schreiner confidence — even in the face of Oregon’s drier future.

You may have heard there’s a shortage of live Christmas trees in the region this year. KNKX environment reporter Bellamy Pailthorp talked with some local growers to find out why.

Giant pumpkins are a fixture of the fall. And this year the certified giant-est one belongs to Jeff Uhlmeyer, a retired Washington State DOT pavement engineer from Olympia.