Race to the bottom: How big business took over Oregon’s first protected aquifer

The warnings were hard to miss on a forsaken stretch of Highway 26 in Eastern Oregon. A sign reading “Travel at own risk” clung upside down to a weather-beaten post. A private driveway forewarned: “If you haven’t been invited into our ranches, you are not welcome.”

At the end of the road, a gray-haired man stepped out of a mobile home and frowned. Marv Farley was having a bad day, the kind with too much work and not enough help.

“We’re clearing everything out,” said the 67-year-old, who was in the process of packing up a sprawling cattle ranching business that’s been in his family for generations.