The Times - Serving Waitsburg, Dayton and the Touchet Valley

DAYTON - Barely three months ago, Dayton-based real estate broker Blaine Bickelhaupt sold a 1,700-acre farm in Whitman County for about $1,600 an acre.

If he sold the same property today, he could probably get $1,900 per acre.

"I have investors from across the country looking for farm ground," said Bickelhaupt, owner of Windermere Real Estate/Blue Mountain realtors, who has a client base of about 10 potential buyers interested in crop land in the Pacific Northwest. Two years ago, he had perhaps two or three who were interested, he said.

That's how fast interest in agricultural land has shot up...