NEWS ROUNDUP

Saving lives of moose and men When elk amble across Highway 101 here on the Olympic Peninsula of western Washington, radio collars around their necks set off flashing lights up and down the busy road. A continent away, when moose wander across Route 4 in the mountains of western Maine, their hulking bodies break an infrared beam that triggers flashing lights on moose warning signs. On reengineered highways between the wireless elk and the beam-breaking moose, there are underpasses for tortoises in California, vibration-detectors for deer in Wyoming and a 52-foot-wide overpass for deer, foxes, coyotes and opossums on Interstate 75 in Florida.... Board moves step closer to Ponderosa Ranch deal at Tahoe A local board has approved a letter of intent to purchase the Ponderosa Ranch property in Incline Village, but stressed a final deal faces many hurdles. In taking the action last week, the Incline Village General Improvement District board signaled its intent to be the lead agency in a public buyout of the 548-acre Western theme amusement park on Lake Tahoe's north shore. The U.S. Forest Service, Nevada Transportation Department, State Lands Division and Washoe County have expressed an interest in joining a buyout of the prime real estate being put up for sale by its owners.... Grouse listing would impact all desert activities But even as the strutting continues over centuries, the sage grouse are facing the equivalent of a major housing crunch. Their habitat, the vast, scrubby lands of the sage-steppe ecosystems, has undergone an extensive assault over the past 100 years, said Mike Gregg, a wildlife biologist for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. He has studied sage grouse since 1988. As a result of the habitat loss, the sage grouse populations have dropped in numbers. Habitats have become isolated, and birds that once had neighbors with which to mate — and therefore diversify the gene pool — find themselves among the same sage grouse. The habitat loss results from a variety of things, experts say. Livestock grazing on public lands, road building and off-highway vehicle use, mining and more disrupt the scrubby habitat the birds live in.... Warm Climate's Effects Striking in West Forget talk of global warming and speculation of what it might do in 50 years, or 100. Here and across the West, climate change already is happening. Temperatures are warmer, ocean levels are rising, the snowpack is dwindling and melting earlier, flowers bloom earlier, mountain glaciers are disappearing and a six-year drought is killing trees by the millions. Most scientists agree humans are to blame for at least part of that warming trend, but to what degree?.... Forest boss working with Nature Conservancy White River National Forest supervisor Martha Ketelle is temporarily working for The Nature Conservancy in Boulder as part of a federal leadership training program. The job swap started three weeks ago and will last a total of 12 weeks. "The purpose of leaving the job you're in is to look at leadership from a different perspective than your own agency," Ketelle said. "We can do that in another agency, or by going outside government and looking at agencies that work with us,". Top level officials in the Forest Service and The Nature Conservancy signed an agreement in 2001 calling for cooperation between the two organizations, so the connection was already established, she said.... Officials Mull Beetle Infestation Plan Government officials are considering cutting down ash trees in a miles-wide swath across three states in an attempt to contain the infestation of a tree-killing beetle. The goal is to create a natural barrier against the emerald ash borer that could extend in a semicircle south from Michigan into northwestern Ohio and northeastern Indiana, according to state and federal officials. The pesticide-resistant beetle has wiped out millions of ash trees in southeast Michigan and has been found in all three states. In theory, the barrier would stop the beetle from spreading from its core infestation in Detroit by denying it food. No route has been determined. The barrier would be three to six miles wide because it's believed the ash borer does not travel farther than half a mile on its own.... Fire is the catalyst for forests to change with climate High in the rugged Klamath Mountains, an old-growth stand of Brewer spruce, left over from the last mini-Ice Age, was killed when the Biscuit fire burned across 500,000 acres of southwestern Oregon forest two summers ago. Dominick DellaSala does not expect this stand of Brewer spruce to grow back. The reason: The climate is now warmer and drier than it was 275 years ago when the trees got their start. And fire, the great catalyst for change in the West's forests, has opened the way for something else to move in that better fits the new climate. Across the West, forests are showing signs of a changing climate: bigger and hotter wildfires, hardwoods and brush moving into conifer forests after they burn, more insect infestations, and trees moving into high-altitude meadows once too cold to support them.... Editorial: Concrete is not salmon habitat A fter the U.S. government turned drought to disaster by cutting off their irrigation water in 2001, Klamath Basin farmers drilled more than 100 new wells as insurance against going dry again. The Bush administration has put them to new use. It's paying farmers to irrigate crops with billions of gallons of water from the wells, leaving lake and river water for protected fish. But now the underground reservoir that feeds the wells is shrinking -- the water table is down 20 feet in places -- and some wells show signs of failing. Few farmers or agency officials think the record pumping can or should last. Yet they say it's the only way they have to keep crops going when government biologists say fish need water that would otherwise flow to their fields.... Editorial: Feds get realistic about fish policyA dose of realism is about to be injected into the federal government's approach to the protection of salmon in Northwest rivers: The Bush administration has decided to quit making a distinction between fish bred in hatcheries and those which hatched in the wild. This is a huge change, foreshadowed by federal Judge Michael Hogan in Eugene when he ruled in the Alsea case in 2001. The gist of that ruling was that as long as there were no genetic differences between hatchery and wild coho, the federal government had to take them all into account when deciding whether a run was threatened or endangered. Many fish experts disagree with that finding. They note that there are distinct behavioral differences between the two kinds of the same species. But regardless of this same-or-different-fish controversy, it is sensible to count the hatchery runs as part of the natural fish populations we want to maintain in the rivers of the Northwest. Why? Because that was the intent when many of the hatcheries were built.... Drought Settles In, Lake Shrinks and West's Worries Grow At five years and counting, the drought that has parched much of the West is getting much harder to shrug off as a blip. Those who worry most about the future of the West — politicians, scientists, business leaders, city planners and environmentalists — are increasingly realizing that a world of eternally blue skies and meager mountain snowpacks may not be a passing phenomenon but rather the return of a harsh climatic norm. Continuing research into drought cycles over the last 800 years bears this out, strongly suggesting that the relatively wet weather across much of the West during the 20th century was a fluke. In other words, scientists who study tree rings and ocean temperatures say, the development of the modern urbanized West — one of the biggest growth spurts in the nation's history — may have been based on a colossal miscalculation.... Vital mountain snow is melting early Frank Gehrke skied out on an unseasonably warm March day to take the final Sierra Nevada snowpack measurements of the season near this mountain pass south of Lake Tahoe -- only to be stopped short by a muddy meadow where usually there would be deep snow. Something is happening to the snowpack, according to measurements Gehrke has collected for 20 winters as chief of California's water survey program. Near-record snows are melting under record-setting early temperatures this year, a harbinger of the Sierra Nevada spring -- and of a trend that is bringing vast changes across the West.... Colorado River drought forces tough choices The Colorado River runs cold and fast past Grand Canyon walls, a ribbon of emerald green woven through postcard perfection. But for those who ride its rapids, this is a manmade illusion, more water park than wilderness. There's a lot less to the river than meets the eye. The Colorado once roared wild, muddy and magnificent through these canyons, defying early explorers who often perished in its foaming waters. Decades of federal management and political compromises tamed it and turned it into a vast plumbing system of dams and canals that makes life possible in much of the American West.... Calf owner recalls wolf attack near Gadiner The young beef calf killed by wolves on the Yellowstone National Park border last week was a bottle-fed pet that had spent most of its time in a dog kennel, its owner said Saturday. The animal's name was Moojoo, said Bob Beede, who owns a resort that borders the park and the Yellowstone River. "It was a pet, basically," he said. He said his daughter had asked to take it home after it had been orphaned on a friend's ranch.... Enough eagles The furor started with a report last January of an attack on a dog out for a neighborhood walk on a leash. A lurking eagle swooped down and sunk its talons into the Labrador's haunch while the owner hit the pavement screaming. Federal and state biologists who interviewed the dog owner after she chased away the eagle called her story very unusual, given that the dog outweighed the bird by at least five times. But angry Homer residents were soon marching on City Hall to call for a ban on the growing backyard practice of feeding eagles.... Hundreds gather to protest Pine Nut closure More than 200 off-road vehicle enthusiasts -- from babies to near-octogenarians -- gathered Sunday at a restricted area of the Pine Nut Mountains east of Gardnerville to protest closure of 2,340 acres of the popular recreation area to protect vertebrate fossil remains. Bureau of Land Management officials ordered an emergency closure of the site last week to protect the area from what they claim is soil erosion and disturbance of the fossils because of activities by motorized off-road vehicle users....Lacking a permit, Jeeps travel canyon True to his word, San Juan County Sheriff Mike Lacy, with the County Commission chairman close behind, defied the U.S. Bureau of Land Management and led a caravan of 30 off-road vehicles through Arch Canyon on the opening day of Jeep Jamboree USA, an annual gathering of four-wheel-drive enthusiasts. Lacy escorted the group, which included drivers from across the country including Colorado, Oregon and California, into the canyon southwest of Blanding on Friday morning -- even though the BLM earlier this year turned down the event organizer's request for a permit.... Arizona Trail seeks U.S. title The Arizona Trail — a grass-roots effort that hundreds of East Valley volunteers have helped sustain over the past 15 years — stands to join the ranks of the nation’s most treasured wilderness trails. Sen. John McCain and Rep. Jim Kolbe, both R-Ariz., recently introduced bills in Congress intended to qualify the Arizona Trail for designation as a National Scenic or Historic Trail. The planned 800-mile recreation trail through Arizona from Mexico to Utah — now about 100 miles short of completion — probably has a better shot at the scenic title, said Larry Snead, director of the Arizona Trail Association.... Longtime forestry feud shows signs of healing Environmentalists and the U.S. Forest Service can agree on one thing: Clear-cutting is good. And that's no small thing, considering that the two are often at odds over logging projects and that for decades clear-cuts have been almost universally derided. But now, thanks to science coming out of Colorado, scientists are agreeing that clear-cutting in certain types of trees is needed to open the path to a healthier forest and better wildfire management. For many, that means supporting a practice that in the past has represented all that was wrong in forestry.... Editorial: Ghost roads haunt public land Trees uprooted near Jamestown. Off-road-vehicle tracks wrecking the tundra near Ouray. And in many places uncertainty among thoughtful drivers about where they can or can't take their ORVs. Across Colorado and the West, there's growing confusion and controversy about what dirt roads and backcountry tracks are open or closed to motorized travel. A key problem is an antiquated federal law, RS 2477. Congress passed it in 1866 to encourage settlement of the West, letting counties build roads across federal land. Congress repealed it in 1976 but never defined what old road claims were legitimate.... Column: Bill Calvert, bolt cutters and the long road home It all began when Bill Calvert, who was on the road a lot selling garage door openers, had trouble getting back to his ranch in the Yuba Goldfields, along the Yuba River near Marysville. By the late 1980s much of the land around his ranch had been acquired by a large Texas-based conglomerate, Centex, that had begun to mine the Goldfields' immense reserves of gravel. In 1987 Centex's subsidiary, Western Aggregates, declared the road to Calvert's ranch a private road and put locks on the gates at both ends.... Activists accused of 'crying wolf' on climate AN ACADEMIC spat has been sparked by an Oxford research group which claims that environmentalists have been using scaremongering to gain greater funding. In a paper titled "Crying Wolf on Climate Change and Extinction", four Oxford academics from the university’s Biodiversity Research Group have stated that these groups failed to use the full information available, in order to grab headlines and attract more donations. The study focused on reports that appeared in the media during January, which claimed that research by Leeds University showed that by 2050, one million species would have gone extinct. The Oxford researchers said, however, that the story was generated by alarmist press releases sent out by environmental bodies and scientists, in which only the worst-case scenario were publicised rather than the less apocalyptic alternatives.... On The Edge Of Common Sense: Gimmick as good as a gift for smokers It is human nature to try and justify or lessen our own stupidity or bad habits. "I admit I ate every bit of little Tammy's birthday cake before the party, but I didn't leave a mess." "OK, OK, I smoked marijuana, but I didn't inhale." "How would you expect me to know I was speeding? I was talking on the phone!" Bill sent me an ad from a national magazine that promoted American Spirit. It is a new brand of cigarettes whose selling point is: "100 percent additive-free natural tobacco certified under USDA standards - 100 percent U.S. grown tobacco!"....