NEWS ROUNDUP

Theft of Petroglyphs Nets Prison Terms Two men convicted of stealing ancient American Indian rock etchings from a national forest were sentenced Wednesday to short prison terms. Defense lawyers said they will appeal because the men did not know -- and federal prosecutors failed to prove -- the petroglyphs were valuable archaeological artifacts....
Forest dams lead to lawsuit A group led by a man who once managed the Emigrant Wilderness is now suing the Forest Service over a decision to maintain rock-and-mortar check dams within the protected borders of the area. High Sierra Hikers Association and Wilderness Watch, environmental groups concerned with the protection of federal wilderness, have filed suit against the U.S. Forest Service, Regional Forester Jack Blackwell and Stanislaus National Forest Supervisor Tom Quinn in the U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, which is in San Francisco....
Forest Guardians appeal decision The Forest Guardians say a “numbers game” with cattle is running out the clock for endangered species in the Lincoln National Forest and in the Sacramento Mountains of Otero County. “It’s time to stop playing a numbers game and allow this degraded landscape to heal by stopping cattle grazing entirely,” said Billy Stern, the organization’s grazing program coordinator. The Forest Guardians on Tuesday appealed a U.S. Forest Service decision to allow continued grazing on the Lincoln’s Sacramento and Dry Canyon allotments....
Roadless-rule public comment period extended The Forest Service Wednesday extended its public comment period 60 additional days for a proposed rule on protecting roadless values in national forests and grasslands based on several requests from the public. The original comment period was slated to end Sept. 14; comments must now be received in writing by Nov. 15....
County sides with enviros in roadless debate Pitkin County commissioners decided yesterday to wade into the fight over roadless areas in national forests by opposing changes proposed by the Bush administration. Commissioners Dorothea Farris, Shellie Roy and Jack Hatfield directed their staff to send a letter to the U.S. Forest Service expressing support for former President Bill Clinton's Roadless Rule, which would prohibit most road construction and timber harvesting on 58.5 million acres nationwide....
Man Pleads No Contest to Starting Wildfire A man has pleaded no contest to a federal misdemeanor for starting a fire in the Mendocino National Forest a year ago that burned 6,058 acres and cost $33 million to suppress. Jason Hoskey, 25, entered the plea Tuesday to a charge of leaving a fire unattended and unextinguished....
Draft management plan would allow ranchers to kill wolves A task force creating a plan to manage gray wolves that stray into Oregon is recommending that the predators be allowed to establish in the state, but that ranchers be allowed to shoot them on sight if they attack livestock on private land. After more than a year of sometimes contentious meetings, the panel is to present its first draft to the state Fish and Wildlife Commission at a special meeting Thursday in Salem....
Column: Gale Norton Cries Wolf Again It just goes to show how divisive the issue of reintroduction has been that the elk foundation, a self-proclaimed conservation group, could not give up the conventional wisdom that hunters and wolves are natural enemies. In my experience, most hunters express a begrudging respect, if not awe, for wolves, not to mention mountain lions, coyotes, bears and other competitors. Predators make deer, elk and antelope smarter, goes their logic, and that increases the reward of a successful hunt. Still, most would agree that while lost hunting opportunities are one thing, lost property in the form of livestock is more serious. I celebrate efforts by the nonprofit Defenders of Wildlife and other environmentalists to reimburse ranchers who lose livestock to wolves. When such alternatives are available, it's tough to see a pack slaughtered, but the government's ability to kill "problem" wolves was the bargaining chip for their experimental return....
West Nile hits already troubled sage grouse The West Nile virus is emerging as a formidable threat to the sage grouse, an increasingly rare native bird that inhabits parts of western South Dakota and is fast disappearing across the entire American West. Field observations and laboratory tests in Wyoming and Montana have confirmed that sage grouse are especially susceptible to West Nile, showing limited, if any, resistance to the disease so far....
State set to reel in several fishing sites Saltwater anglers might be feeling like an endangered species with the announcement that the California Department of Fish and Game (DFG) is restarting the process of implementing a statewide system of marine protected areas (MPAs). The MPAs, which would protect marine habitat and biological diversity in the state's ocean waters threatened by coastal development, water pollution, and other human activities, were mandated by the state legislature in the Marine Life Protection Act of 1999. But implementation of the act was shelved earlier this year because of the state's budget woes....
Groups file lawsuit notice over Bonneville cutthroat Four environmental groups said Wednesday they will file suit over a decision not to list the Bonneville cutthroat trout under the Endangered Species Act. The Biodiversity Legal Foundation filed in 1998 a request to list the subspecies as threatened. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced its decision not to list in October 2001....
Bison Range costs debated Officials at the first of two informational meetings in western Montana on a federal-tribal funding agreement for the National Bison Range couldn't answer the first question that popped up Tuesday night. How much more will it cost taxpayers if tribal government takes over about half the jobs at the federal facility in Moiese? The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said it believes it will cost taxpayers more, perhaps substantially more, to run the Flathead Reservation portion of the refuge system by sharing control with the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes. Tribal officials, however, said they were unaware of any increased costs due to shared management....
Ex-Chief Didn't Heed Superiors, Witness Says A federal official behind the firing of U.S. Park Police Chief Teresa C. Chambers testified yesterday that the chief's troubles began months before she went public with concerns about staffing and money. Donald Murphy, deputy director of the National Park Service, told an administrative law judge that Chambers had flouted agency protocols and failed to follow orders from superiors before the comments that led to her suspension in December. Chambers never was permitted to return to work and was fired in July....
Owners end negotiations to sell Hacienda to NPS The owners of the Hacienda -- the first hotel-casino U.S. 93 travelers from Arizona see after they cross Hoover Dam -- have ended negotiations to sell the property to the National Park Service. The Hacienda's owners, all executives of the Mandalay Resort Group, began formal talks with representatives of Lake Mead National Recreation Area last month after Secretary of Interior Gale Norton green-lighted spending $20 million for the purchase and restoration of the property south of Boulder City....
Yellowstone snowmobile rule offered Up to 720 snowmobiles will be allowed into Yellowstone National Park every day this winter under a Bush administration proposal that attempts to settle a fractious debate over winter recreation in the landmark area. Park Service officials said the plan, announced Tuesday, would permit roughly the historic average of snowmobiles to enter the park for two or three winters until a permanent plan can be developed. The new rules specify that snowmobilers must ride only new, cleaner machines on guided tours....
2 Utahn men indicted in slayings of horses Two Utah men were indicted Wednesday for allegedly killing wild horses on federal land in 2002. Fred Eugene Woods, 47, and Russell Weston Jones, 29, both of Enterprise, were indicted by a federal grand jury for allegedly shooting and killing the free-roaming horses on Bureau of Land Management property in Iron County. The indictment includes one count of injuring property of the United States that exceeds a value of $1,000, a felony, and nine counts of causing the death of a wild free-roaming horse, a misdemeanor....
Nevada files suit over nuke railroad State officials filed a lawsuit Wednesday against the Energy Department over its plan to ship radioactive waste across the state to a planned nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain. The case, filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, claims the government did not complete required environmental studies before picking a 319-mile rail route dubbed the “Caliente Corridor.”....
On the range, gas trumps wildlife Wednesday, in the biggest sale of its kind in Utah history, the federal Bureau of Land Management (BLM) offered at auction oil- and gas-exploration leases on more than 360,000 acres of rugged back country - including UT-201, a 120-acre chunk of Green River flood plain that abuts Sand Wash, and another 16,000 acres a few miles away. Not long ago such remote regions seemed on track to one day become officially protected wilderness areas. Now they're part of a huge debate over the proper use of public lands in the United States. At issue: When does energy security trump wilderness protection?....
Wildlife thirst aid challenged As he gazes into a stagnant cistern notched into the Orocopia Mountains east of Indio, Leon Lesicka, a hunter and water sources coordinator for Desert Wildlife Unlimited, points out quail bobbing nearby and bighorn sheep droppings. He sees the guzzler, an artificial watering hole that his group installed, as reparation for concrete-lined canals and freeways. Next to Lesicka stands Elden Hughes, chairman of the Sierra Club's desert committee, who says guzzlers upset an already traumatized ecosystem. He says they should be used only in places where animals might otherwise wander into irrigation channels and across highways in search of water. "Most of the guzzlers are there to increase herds for hunting," he says. "It is game farming."....
Activists Warn Of Plan To Build Offshore Gas Terminal Greenpeace warned Tuesday that plans to build liquified natural gas terminals along Mexico's northern Pacific coast threatened rare birds, plants and gray whales. The environmental group sent a 164-foot vessel around Mexico's Coronado Islands to protest ChevronTexaco Corp.'s plans to build a $650 million offshore terminal. Several Mexican activists set foot on island shores to call on the Mexican government to give the area special status to protect it from plants like ChevronTexaco's....
Udall: Navajo water settlement too expensive U.S. Rep. Tom Udall, D-N.M., crossed partisan lines by agreeing with U.S. Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., that a $1.2 billion federal price tag for the proposed Navajo Nation water rights settlement on the San Juan Basin was too high to be passed by Congress. “I’m hoping the finalized settlement — which we don’t have yet — comes in at a lower figure,” Udall said during a quick sweep through northern New Mexico last week before Congress resumed. “I agree with Sen. Domenici about the difficulty of passage. ... $1.2 billion is much more expensive than any (water) bill we’ve seen on the House side.”....
Legislators back Valley irrigators A Texas Senate committee Wednesday threw its support behind Rio Grande Valley irrigators and farmers pressing a $500 million claim against Mexico for previous failures to release water to the United States in accordance with a 1944 treaty. The Senate Select Committee on Water Policy told a panel of Valley claimants they would lobby officials in Washington to make a settlement with Mexico a priority....
State water-needs study criticized as inaccurate Utility managers and environmentalists on Wednesday pummeled the credibility of preliminary findings in a $2.7 million statewide study of Colorado's water needs. The taxpayer-funded Statewide Water Supply Initiative indicates that utilities can provide 90 percent of the water for the state's growth through 2030. That finding, however, drew heavy criticism....
Experiments may reduce possibility of future water wars A method that uses roughly only one-hundredth the fresh water customarily needed to grow forage for livestock may leave much more water available for human consumption, as well as for residential and industrial uses. As a byproduct, it also may add formerly untapped solar energy to the electrical grid. The method for lessening water use is being tested by 42 wireless sensors being installed in a forage-growing hydroponic greenhouse built barely a stone’s throw from the Mexico border....
City Council votes to spend $15M on water rights The Flagstaff City Council voted Tuesday to move forward with purchasing the Red Gap Ranch about 40 miles east of Flagstaff -- along with the water sitting below the ranch's approximate 20,000 acres. The purchase agreement approved at Tuesday's council meeting doesn't seal the deal, however. It simply allows the city until the end of the year to conduct its own hydrology tests to decide for sure if it wants to go ahead with the deal, said Utilities Director Ron Doba. If approved, the purchase would spend all of the $15 million voters approved last May for purchasing additional water rights....
This Time, Man Defeated Nature The most remarkable feature of Hurricane Frances was not its gargantuan size, which helped it drench almost all of Florida, or its glacial speed, which helped it dump as much as 13 inches of rain during its leisurely jaunt across the state. The most remarkable feature of Frances was its flooding -- or, more precisely, its lack of flooding. Millions of people in South and central Florida live in low-lying flood plains that were wetlands in their natural state, and officials had worried that a big slow storm such as Frances would cause enormous water damage. But thanks to the world's most extensive and expensive water-control system, featuring thousands of miles of canals and levees as well as hundreds of powerful pumps, most of those flood plains did not flood....
Brazil Wins Trade Battles Against U.S., EU Latin America's agricultural giant scored two trade victories Wednesday against rich countries' farm subsidies after the World Trade Organization agreed with Brazil that its farmers have been hurt by government assistance for U.S. cotton farmers and European Union sugar beet growers. Brazilian officials and the development charity Oxfam International hailed the rulings by the 147-nation WTO as evidence that farm subsidies considered lavish by poor countries violate global trade rules and must be eliminated. American officials vowed to appeal parts of the cotton decision within two months, and a spokesman for the European Union said it would decide soon whether to appeal....
A Native Spirit, Inside the Beltway MORE than the corn, the willows and the sunflowers stirring in the late summer wind, Donna House cultivates memory. When Ms. House, a Navajo ethnobotanist, steps gingerly through the barbed wire fence into her backyard — a former alfalfa field along the Rio Grande now brimming with native plants framed by a distant mesa — there is a sense of homecoming, of reunion, of land returning to its origins....
Rodeo Notes With four world titles and 15 Wrangler National Finals Rodeo saddle bronc qualifications, it would seem there are no new frontiers for Billy Etbauer. However, Etbauer had never garnered a coveted gold-and-silver trophy belt buckle at the Ellensburg Rodeo, a traditional Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association show that's conducted in Washington state each Labor Day weekend. But on Monday, Etbauer, of Edmond, Okla., snared his first Ellensburg title after winning the final round and the aggregate title. He earned $7,972....
Earhart clues sought in Alaska wreckage Researchers trying to solve the mystery of Amelia Earhart's disappearance searched for clues in the wreckage of a plane that crashed 61 years ago in Misty Fiords National Monument. Gillam and Earhart had been flying the same type of plane - the Lockheed Electra. The researchers wanted to know if parts from the Alaska wreckage matched those they earlier found on a South Pacific island....