NEWS ROUNDUP

DeFazio offers plan to boost timber harvests Congressman Peter DeFazio today proposed legislation to increase timber sales on federal forests but prohibit the cutting of trees older than 120 years. "Some would like to go back and fight the old forest wars, but there is a better way," DeFazio said in a statement. "By protecting old growth and increasing timber production from second-growth stands, we can finally move past the ideological gridlock that has virtually shut down our forests and make the Northwest Forest Plan work better for rural communities, the timber industry and wildlife." He said his bill would increase timber harvests on federal land in western Oregon and Washington to 500 million board feet a year, up from 143 million board feet last year. The bill would amend the Northwest Forest Plan, adopted in the early years of the Clinton administration as a way to protect the northern spotted owl, a threatened species. Timber-cutting targets of the plan have never been met....
Emaciated Tre Arrow seeks refugee status The increasingly malnourished Tre Arrow was unsuccessful in his latest attempt to get out of jail and gain Canadian citizenship. Arrow, the environmental activist accused of setting fire to logging and mining trucks in Oregon, showed up in an immigration court in Vancouver, British Columbia, on Wednesday weighing less than 100 pounds after four months of incarceration, according to his Canadian attorney, Rudolf Kischer. Arrow is trying to gain refugee status and become a Canadian citizen, arguing that he can never get a fair trial in the United States on arson charges because the federal government has labeled him an ecoterrorist. Kischer acknowledged that Arrow faces an uphill battle....
Trails and tribulations in the great outdoors One recent sunny afternoon at Coyote Point Recreation Area in San Mateo, Bonnie Lewkowicz guided her motorized wheelchair down a hard-packed dirt trail. A Berkeley resident who is helping to write a wheelchair riders' guide for the California Coastal Conservancy, Lewkowicz had her sights set on getting to the park's beach. She got about 400 feet from the beach, only to find a 3-inch curb with no curb cut. For most people, it would be an easy step. But for Lewkowicz, those 3 inches represented a big disappointment -- and potentially the end of her sojourn....
Groups want snail listed Scientists are asking the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to place two Oregon snails and one Wyoming snail onto the endangered species list. One of the Oregon snails is the Harney Lake springsnail, found only in Eastern Oregon, and the other is the Columbia springnail, found only in the lower Columbia River. The Wyoming snail is the Jackson Lake springsnail, found only in Jackson Lake, Wyo....
Gray wolf killed in Idaho Federal wildlife officials killed one gray wolf Friday and may take up to two more animals from the Hazard Lake pack in the backcountry north of McCall, authorities said. The male adult was trapped and killed Friday, a week after authorities exterminated the largest wolf pack in Idaho a few miles to the west. The Hazard Lake pack, which had seven wolves but now has six, is believed to be responsible for the killing of several domestic sheep and leaving dozens of others injured or missing. A guard dog was also injured and another is missing from the attack Thursday morning, said Jeff Foss, field supervisor for the Snake River Fish and Wildlife Office. The animals belonged to the same rancher who lost more than 100 sheep during previous weeks to the Cook pack. All nine wolves of that pack were also killed....
Michigan looks for ways to avoid wolf-human conflicts Eric Wallis insists wolves were responsible for the disappearance of more than 80 lambs from his farm in the eastern Upper Peninsula several years ago, although he can't prove it. "I have seen wolves on my property numerous times," Wallis said. "They're out there." He hasn't lost any lambs the past two years, since acquiring Great Pyrenees dogs to patrol the premises, and is hosting researchers who are testing nonlethal means of keeping wolves away. Still, he chafes at being legally barred from taking shots at them....
Wyo sues Interior over wolf documents The Department of Interior's Fish and Wildlife Service in November rejected the state's wolf management plan, and now Wyoming demands the release of at least 69 undisclosed records or groups of records to explain the decision, according to a lawsuit filed in federal court Thursday by Wyoming Attorney General Pat Crank. "If the court forces (the Fish and Wildlife Service) to produce the documents, it shows the fallacy of their rejecting the plan put forward by the Wyoming Game and Fish Commission," he said. It's not that the state hasn't tried to get the documents....
Fishermen, environmentalists cheer Klamath report Commercial fishermen and conservationists on Friday today applauded the release of the California Department of Fish and Game’s final report on the causes of the tragic 2002 fish kill on the Klamath River. The exhaustive, peer-reviewed report’s primary conclusion — that low water flows resulting from upstream irrigation diversions were at the heart of the kill — is consistent with previous analyses conducted by the US Fish and Wildlife Service and the Yurok Tribe....
Klamath River fish kill may be worse than originally thought The massive 2002 Klamath River fish kill, already counted as one of the nation's largest, could have killed twice as many fish as previously projected, the California Department of Fish and Game said yesterday. Commercial fishermen said the larger projected kill could result in even more harm to their industry next year as the offspring of that fall's salmon run begin to return upstream from the ocean. They complained conditions this year could spark a repeat of the disaster. "Maybe as much as half the run died in one fell swoop," said Steve Pedery of the Oregon Natural Resources Council....
Investigation Sought For Death of California Condor The Center for Biological Diversity has called for an investigation by the California Attorney General and the California Environmental Protection Agency into the role of the Tejon Ranch Company in the death of an endangered California condor last year. The Tejon Ranch Company is currently seeking a blanket "incidental take" permit from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) which would allow it to harm, harass, and even kill endangered condors during construction and operation of a proposed series of major developments north of Los Angeles. Tejon Ranch is located on 270,000 acres of wild country north of Los Angeles. It lies at the geographic center of California condor habitat....
Streamlined pesticide approvals benefit farmers, wildlife The US Fish and Wildlife Service and NOAA Fisheries yesterday finalized new regulations establishing a more efficient approach to pesticide approval. The rules, which were developed with the US Environmental Protection Agency and USDA, provide a framework to ensure necessary measures are taken to protect fish and wildlife, while ensuring that farmers have the pest-control products they need. Because of the complexity of examining the effects of pest-control products, there have been almost no consultations completed in the past decade, and a recent court decision cited that lack of consultations in limiting the use of essential agricultural pest-control products....
NCGA Endorses New Endangered Species Regulation The National Corn Growers Association (NCGA) today announced support of the administration's new regulation streamlining the process for approval of pest control products. The regulation ensures endangered and threatened species are protected as part of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) pesticide approval process. "Corn growers support scientifically sound efforts to protect endangered and threatened species and their habitat," NCGA President Dee Vaughan said. "We believe this new process will help protect these species, while ensuring growers still have access to vital pest control products."....
Adirondack sightings stir a 4-footed debate It may sound like an X-Men comic or a North Country tall tale, but recent unconfirmed sightings of wolverines in the Adirondacks have wildlife experts both baffled and abuzz. With at least three reports in as many years, there is mounting evidence that the mysterious mammal known for its strength and cunning may be making sporadic reappearances after an absence of more than 160 years. The closest large wolverine population is in northern Ontario, Canada, about 1,600 miles from the Adirondacks. Studies have found that wolverines -- fierce, long-clawed scavengers known as "devil bears" -- can wander up to 4,200 miles round trip from their home range....
Anglers Demand Mercury Emissions Controls Frustrated by the fact that you can't catch your fish and eat it too, Northern New England fisherman are joining environmentalists to demand strict federal mercury emissions controls. "Knowing what I know about it I wouldn't bring anything home for my family to eat, that's for sure," said Dan Hall, council chairman for Trout Unlimited of New Hampshire. A report put out Thursday by the National Wildlife Federation criticizes the Bush administration's proposal for a cap-and-trade program for mercury emissions, saying it does not adequately safeguard health, the environment or the recreational fishing industry....
Construction funds for Grand Canyon projects disappear Already under fire by lawmakers over unchecked expenses, the National Park Service has apparently lost more than $2 million through contract mismanagement at Grand Canyon, pushing dozens of small businesses in Utah and Arizona to the brink of bankruptcy. Members of Congress want to know why Grand Canyon National Park doled out $17 million in publicly funded construction jobs to a California company without securing insurance bonds required by federal law to assure the work would be completed and the suppliers and subcontractors would be paid. The prime contractor that received the money, Pacific General Inc. (PGI), went out of business in March, owing nearly 50 canyon subcontractors an estimated $2.5 million and unable to explain to park officials where the money went....
Panel Faults Handling of Funds at Statue of Liberty nonprofit charity that solicits donations for the Statue of Liberty pays its executives excessively high salaries, has done a poor job overseeing the millions of dollars it collects and has tried to undermine the efforts of other organizations to raise money for the preservation and operation of the national monument, according to Congressional investigators. The Senate Finance Committee began examining the work of the charity, the Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation, in April after news reports, including articles in The New York Times, raised questions about the organization's role in efforts to partially reopen the statue after it was closed in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks. The articles reported that the foundation had chosen not to finance the reopening with its $30 million endowment, but rather mount a national fund-raising effort....
Wyoming natural gas boom flattens out An 18-year string of rising natural gas production from Wyoming's booming fields is expected to skid to a halt this year, according to the state's top oil and gas official -- even as higher natural gas prices are spilling an additional $1.2 billion in tax revenues into state coffers. Natural gas production in Wyoming, hailed as the heart of the resurgent Rocky Mountain natural gas business, is expected to be about 1.8 billion cubic feet. That's nearly flat from 2003's figure and breaks an 18-year run of increasing production numbers, said Don Likwartz, supervisor of the Wyoming Oil and Gas Conservation Commission.
He blames the flat forecast on the federal government, specifically the Bureau of Land Management, for being slow to issue permits to drill new wells on federal land in Wyoming and particularly in the Powder River Basin, the state's top-producing natural gas basin....
'Green elephants' worry about voting Marshall is a liberal-bashing, Bible-believing, gun-toting hunter, just like many of the White men at the core of the GOP's base, and he voted for George W. Bush four years ago. But he is disgusted by the administration's environmental record, including its proposal in July to open more untouched national forest to roads. "Conservation is conservative," he said. "Bush is a gross liberal." Marshall, 55, is a leading member of REP America, a group of GOP conservationists who call themselves "green elephants." He and like-minded members are torn over how to vote this year since they feel they can't support Bush but can't stomach John Kerry....