NEWS ROUNDUP

Water and wilderness While the 40th anniversary of the Wilderness Act marks a long period of environmental management, many questions remain about how the act is preserving water and keeping the designated areas "untrammeled by man." But the question of the act's success, especially in how water is managed in the wilderness areas, remains. About 14 percent of water runoff in the contiguous United States land area comes from National Forest lands, much of it collecting as snow on some of the 106 million acres of formally designated wilderness land. Many of these areas are situated in the headwaters of major drainages that provide water -the U.S. Forest Service estimates the water is worth about $3.7 billion annually - to downstream cities and metropolitan areas like Denver, whose residents receive water from transcontinental pipes pushing water from the wilderness-dominated Western Slope....
'Out of whack' forests require year-round work to avoid wildfire Snow dusts the San Juan Mountains, hunting season is in full swing, and fire season is over with hardly a whimper. So why are there 18 thinning projects and prescribed burns either planned or under way - right now - in the forests surrounding Pagosa Springs, Durango and Dolores, covering some 5,000 acres? It's because wildfire is never far from the thoughts of Western foresters, who know the next catastrophic burn is one dry spell, and one lightning strike, away....
A 'patchy mosiac' In Colorado and across the West, natural fires historically swept through ponderosa pine forests every 15 to 35 years, burning up litter, needles and limbs, and killing young vegetation coming up. The large trees, with their thick, fire-resistant bark, survived. "Over time, as people have moved in and wanted fires suppressed, those fires haven't occurred," said Denny Truesdale, assistant to the deputy chief for state and private forestry for the U.S. Forest Service. Hence, the dense - and dangerous - forests we have today. "The historical forest would have had almost no places where you couldn't see through the woods for some distance." said Forest Service Research Forest Ecologist Merrill Kaufmann of the Forest Service's Rocky Mountain Research Station in Fort Collins....
The business of thinning But Stone is no logger, in spite of the fact he expects to create some 70,000 stumps before he and his crew are done working along the eastern shore of Vallecito Reservoir, north of Bayfield. His company, Stone Forest Services, received a contract from the U.S. Forest Service to thin 160 acres along the reservoir, transforming the dense forest into the open woodlands forest officials say would be there had fires not been suppressed for the last hundred years or so. "It's a true forest-restoration project, an overall thinning for ponderosa pine health," Stone said....
Homeowners urged to create defensible space Firefighters sometimes find themselves frustrated by dream homes built in the best places, only to see them destroyed by wildfire - at the tops of wooded ridges, for example. Fires love to burn upslope. To make matters worse, many homeowners resist creating a defensible space around their houses, which means clearing out trees and brush in a radius of up to 200 feet. That's not what they had in mind for their homes in the woods. But it's what firefighters need....
Saving Big Sur/Why California's prized coastline is at risk Big Sur is one of the most famous and recognizable landscapes in the world. In 1542 Spanish explorer Juan Cabrillo sailed along Big Sur and recorded this simple but elegant description of the area: "There are mountains which seem to reach to the heavens, and the sea beats on them." Sam Farr, who represents Big Sur in Congress, says it is the greatest and most accessible meeting of wilderness and water in the world. But this magnificent coastline faces a series of unprecedented challenges. How these challenges are met will shape Big Sur for decades to come....
Forest Service approves five-year helicopter skiing permit The Forest Service has approved another five-year permit for a helicopter skiing company to operate in the Wasatch Range and nearby mountains. The permit signed Friday by supervisors of the Uinta and Wasatch-Cache national forests allows Wasatch Powerbird Guides to run helicopters and drop skiiers off on certain ridges from Weber Canyon in the north to Hobble Creek Canyon in the south....
Timber industry, mill workers cry foul over voters drive Patagonia Inc., an upscale outdoor gear-maker and clothier, is under fire from the timber industry and a mill workers' union for a $300,000 drive to register Western voters who have spent past election days camping, kayaking or climbing instead of casting a ballot. The ad campaign, with testimonials and vivid photographs depicting damage to the outdoors, urges nature lovers to turn their environmental enthusiasm into political participation to help protect the nation's forests, streams and wildlife. But a timber industry group is taking exception to a stark photograph it says the giant outdoor company is using to misrepresent the big picture — an image of a "nasty clearcut" shot in 1983 in Canada. "They are trying to shut down the U.S. timber industry by using a photo from Canada," said Chris West, vice president of the American Forest Resource Council in Portland, Ore. "They are using a Canadian forestry operation to fearmonger in the U.S. election."....
Federal law on mining not so simple Small-scale miners and large companies must adhere to a multitude of regulations and laws that vary according to whether the prospectors are on Bureau of Land Management Land or National Forest System land. In Dan and April Moore's case, the U.S. Forest Service has authority regarding surface land management. U.S. Forest Service District Ranger John Borton notified the Moores in an April 9, 2004, letter that they were out of compliance with federal regulations, citing sections of both the 228s for not submitting a plan of operations and the 261s for residing on the claim longer than allowed by the Forest Service without authorization. He also provided the Moores with copies of the pertinent regulations - Section 261.10. However, a nugget of text at the beginning of the 261s that identifies the scope of the rules reads: "261.1 ... (b) Nothing in this part shall preclude activities as authorized by the Wilderness Act of 1964 or the U.S. Mining Laws Act of 1872 as amended." Therein lies the rub: Miners claim forest rangers have overstepped their bounds....
The politics of public land-use create a sticky debate Other small-scale prospectors and many small industries that rely on fish, trees or minerals also are feeling the pinch between two giants in the natural resources fight: environmental groups on one side and large corporations on the other. The small-scale users are the unwilling victims of changes made during different federal administrations - restrictions made tighter during administrations leaning toward environmental protection, such as during Clinton's tenure, and relaxed during administrations that focus more on other issues rather than the environment. But while political debates over public lands use wend their way through the courts and Washington, D.C., channels, rangers in the U.S. Forest Service try to strike a balance between the needs of all public users, including miners. Prospectors, however, remain steadfast in their determination to exercise their rights to live on their claims in the public forests of the West....
Highlands act will provide $100M to preservation efforts A bill that will provide $100 million over 10 years to help purchase and preserve some of the last wild lands in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains -- including portions of 750,000 acres in Pennsylvania -- unanimously passed the U.S. Senate Tuesday. Called the Highlands Conservation Act, the bill closely resembles a similar one passed in the U.S. House of Representatives late last year. It will provide federal matching funds to land preservation efforts in a 2 million-acre swath of roughly contiguous forest that stretches from the Pennsylvania/Maryland border, through New Jersey and New York and into northwestern Connecticut....
Standoff in Congress Blocks Action on Environmental Bills For another year, the confluence of partisan tensions, ideological differences, regional conflicts and interest group politics has blocked action on key environmental legislation including reducing air pollution and protecting endangered species, according to lawmakers, advocates and academics. Some analysts warn that the long-standing impasse is reaching a crisis point, as some federal programs are running low on funds and public health threats such as asthma and respiratory problems and pollution of lakes and streams are rising. The stalemate has prompted the Bush administration to resolve environmental questions through changes in federal regulations, effectively leaving Congress on the sidelines. "We are in a stalemate," said House Resources Committee Chairman Richard W. Pombo (R-Calif.)....
Election dominated by big issues worries environmentalists, industry Since Oregonians last voted for president, the state has endured the West's hardest fought Water Wars, one of the nation's worst salmon die-offs and the most ravaging wildfire in its recorded history. And in the wake of the 2001-02 Klamath Basin water crisis and the Biscuit Fire of 2002, President Bush's water, salmon and forest policies have drawn praise from resource-using industries, and scorn from environmentalists and Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry. Although the Pacific Northwest's natural-resource policies are driven by the White House, Oregon voters find themselves judging Bush and Kerry largely by the same measurements used by the rest of the country: Iraq, terrorism and the economy....
Quail releases halted as success eludes 2-decade program Biologists have released more than 25,000 masked bobwhite quail here since 1985, when the federal government bought a ranch for nearly $9 million and booted cows from the grasslands south of Three Points. But within a year of being set free, more than 90 percent of the endangered birds are dead, most of them picked off by hawks. Today, 100 to 200 of the quail survive in the wild. Now, with the refuge's manager for its first 19 years deposed over allegations he illegally moved frogs, officials have decided to halt releases of the quail so they can figure out what's going wrong....
Flats deer hunt raises concerns: Two animals test positive for traces of radioactive elements To eat or not to eat - that is the question hunters may face one day if they are allowed to hunt deer at the Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is considering a controlled hunt for youth hunters and disabled adults a few weekends a year to help manage the number of deer on the 6,500-acre former nuclear weapons plant, south of Boulder. Mark Sattelberg, a senior contaminants biologist for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service at Rocky Flats, said last week that there are about 140 mule deer and 12 white-tails that permanently stay on the site. To ensure that eating venison from the site would be safe, the service randomly culled 26 deer from the buffer zone around the weapons production area earlier this year....
A call for works program to help restore nation's parks A proposal to revive the Civilian Conservation Corps, a successful public works program created in 1933 by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, is gaining support from retired members of the National Park Service. The original program, commonly known as the CCC, put 3 million unemployed men, 18 to 25 years old, to work during the Depression. An enrollee had to be single, physically fit, and sign up for six months. The work was largely manual labor in forestry, conservation, and the construction of park facilities such as campgrounds. In exchange, he was housed, fed, clothed, and paid $30 per month, with $25 going home to a dependant. The 21st-century version, as the Coalition of Concerned National Park Service Retirees envisions it, would tackle the $6 billion maintenance backlog at federal parks, monuments, and historic sites....
Electric enforcement: Rangers use Tasers to make parks safer Tasers, which have become increasingly popular in metropolitan police departments, are now finding a place among rangers in a handful of national parks. Yellowstone began buying them about a year ago and now has enough for each officer during each shift. Rick Obernesser, Yellowstone's chief ranger, said park officials began looking seriously at Tasers after departments using them experienced dramatic decreases in injuries for officers and suspects. Eventually, Yellowstone officials hope to buy enough Tasers for each of the 100 or so permanent and seasonal rangers....
Land in conflict The Ebertses have been to the brink of a sale and back again, more than once. They have faced down criticism from other ranchers, who say it's not a good idea to take a private ranch out of the economy. They say the ranching tradition is the big loser in the equation.Others said making the ranch into public land would impair oil development, hunting and grazing and county tax revenue. Most recently, the Billings County Commission issued notice that it plans to take a road on the Eberts ranch for a river crossing, an action the Ebertses say is intended to interfere with the locally unpopular sale and follows the county's own criticism of the idea....
Some outdoormen to consider backing Kerry --Bob Elderkin's vote would appear to be a sure bet for President Bush on Nov. 2. He is a hunter, part of a conservative-leaning group of outdoorsmen that is 38 million strong and avidly supports gun rights. But after backing Bush in 2000, Elderkin and some like-minded outdoorsmen say the Republican won't get their vote again because of his environmental policies. Sid Evans, editor of Field & Stream magazine, said American sportsmen are divided on the president's environmental policies, finding themselves torn in some cases between the GOP's Second Amendment backing and a push to make more public land available for energy development....
Column: Time for a reality check on natural drilling Critics of natural gas development on public lands consistently fail to address the ultimate goal of these programs - to provide the energy that powers our lives. More than half of our electricity comes from coal-fired power plants. But today, natural gas is replacing coal in a majority of new plants, increasing efficiency and decreasing pollution. This is good news, yet proposals to produce natural gas on public lands have been met with stiff criticism from the very people who press for clean air....
Column: Cappuccino vs. the cowboys Welcome to the Cappuccino West, where cowboys and loggers are giving way to artists, writers, high-tech entrepreneurs and retirees - where a town like Nevada City, once known for its booming gold mines and rowdy redneck bars, now boasts art galleries, theaters and circuit design labs. Parts of the West are shifting from resource-based rural economies to those that are recreation-and service-based. Refugees from the cities are settling in cultural centers like Nevada City and Sedona, Ariz., and in recreational playgrounds like Aspen, Colo., and Bend, Ore. These rural immigrants are reinventing local economies with new ideas and non-traditional businesses. And they typically take a very different view of the resources - the land, the rivers and forests - that have long been the backbone of the rural West's economy....
On The Edge Of Common Sense: Cowboys offer all-purpose excuse: I messed up Even when you have good intentions, it is possible to make a complete wreck of the situation. It is normal to cast about for something to blame, i.e., "The horse ducked his head." "I hit a pothole." "I thought it said two pounds!" "She was leaning on me." "The light was bad." "I always do it that way!" As my disasters have accumulated over the years, I have finally realized that sometimes I just mess up. It's the truth, and who can argue with it?....