NEWS ROUNDUP

State agency proposes paying compensation due to wolf kills State wildlife officials are beginning to work out the details for a program that would pay ranchers for livestock lost to wolves, the first such program in Montana. How the program would work, and how much it would cost, are unknown at this time, said Chris Smith, chief of staff for the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks. However, officials are hoping to improve on similar programs in other states and Canadian provinces and on the existing program in Montana, which is funded voluntarily by the environmental group, Defenders of Wildlife....
Hage Case to Go To Judge For Judgement Wayne Hage, a Tonopah, Nevada rancher reported at the last Nevada Live Stock Association’s (NLSA) Directors’ meeting on December 10, 2004 that his case is now squarely before Judge Loren Smith of the United States Court of Federal Claims. Judge Smith, at the completion of closing arguments in Reno, Nevada in October of this year, had strongly urged the parties to enter into settlement discussions. At the NLSA meeting, Wayne Hage and his wife, NLSA Chairman, Helen Chenoweth-Hage, who was conducting the meeting, received confirmation from their attorneys in San Francisco that settlement was impossible; the two parties were too far apart. Chairman Chenoweth-Hage told the directors and others present that many people had been contacting them asking them not to settle, to “please take this case to completion.” Now that will be possible....
Enviros sue over bull trout habitat Two Montana environmental groups have filed a federal lawsuit challenging the Bush administration's decision to cut habitat protection for bull trout by 90 percent. They contend the administration relied on uncertain local protections, ignored economic benefits of restoring fish, and did not consider the best science. The Alliance for the Wild Rockies and Friends of the Wild Swan, two Montana environmental groups filed the lawsuit Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Portland. It seeks an injunction to compel Fish and Wildlife to designate adequate habitat for bull trout, allowing the bull trout to be removed from threatened and endangered species lists. This is the latest development in a continuing fight between environmental groups and the Bush administration over enforcement of the Endangered Species Act, particularly the provision that calls for earmarking habitat critical to getting a species off the threatened or endangered species lists....
Decision by federal court holds up growth rule Even though the Bush administration last Friday reissued a rule that is key to western Riverside County's growth plan, officials said this week the county's plan cannot yet count on the controversial "no surprises" rule. That rule gives a blanket assurance to the county and developers that they will face no further requirements once they have a federally approved plan to set up a reserve system to protect endangered species. The rule's aim is to speed up development outside the reserves with fewer environmental restrictions. But earlier this year, a federal judge sided with environmental groups and blocked the no-surprises rule, saying it lacked adequate public comment, just as the county was getting federal approval for its plan....
Grizzly arguments take shape Conservationists Wednesday criticized a U.S. Forest Service proposal outlining habitat criteria for grizzly bears, saying the agency's preferred plan doesn't go far enough. At the same time, county commissioners in Fremont County passed a second resolution saying bears are not wanted in their area, even though the northwest part of the county is known habitat for the bear. Commissioners in Sublette County are expected to pass a similar resolution next week....
Environmental group petitions to protect shovel-nose snake An environmental group on Wednesday petitioned federal wildlife officials for protection of the Tucson Shovel-nosed snake. Under the Endangered Species Act, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has one year to determine whether the snake is eligible to be listed as threatened or endangered. The Center for Biological Diversity and Coalition for Sonoran Desert Protection contend the snake's population has been driven into decline by urban sprawl and agriculture....
Drilling Fears Not Addressed, Groups Say Federal biologists had concerns about protections for wildlife and plant habitat on Otero Mesa early in the planning for oil and gas drilling there. Environmental groups now charge that many of those concerns were never addressed by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management in its plan to expand resource development in the southern New Mexico area. The BLM insists that the concerns were taken into consideration and that adequate protections have been incorporated in the proposed plan. Handwritten notes, taken by Fish and Wildlife Service biologists during meetings with the BLM, were obtained by Earthjustice and the New Mexico Wilderness Alliance through a Freedom of Information Act request. "The Fish and Wildlife Service had serious questions with the BLM and the BLM ignored their inquiries as they ignored our inquiries," said wilderness alliance Executive Director Stephen Capra....
Wyoming joins suit against ban on snowmobiles The state of Wyoming has joined a tourism group's lawsuit that challenges National Park Service snowmobile rules in Yellowstone National Park. The lawsuit, originally filed last month by the Wyoming Lodging and Restaurant Association in U.S. District Court, seeks to loosen restrictions that limit the number of snowmobiles allowed in Yellowstone and nearby Grand Teton National Park. The Park Service has issued temporary rules that restrict the number of snowmobiles in Yellowstone to 720 a day and would require all recreational snowmobile users in the park to travel with a commercial guide. The rules allow 140 snowmobiles, with no guiding requirement, in Grand Teton and on the parkway connecting the two parks....
Leadership puts Eberts ranch buy on fast track Money to buy the Eberts ranch in the Badlands for a first-ever state preserve could be one of the first items taken up by the Legislature in January. Senate Majority Leader Bob Stenehjem, R-Bismarck, said he'll try to fast-track a bill to appropriate the state's share of the $3.5 million purchase. Stenehjem said it's possible the bill could be heard in committee by Jan. 7, the opening week of the 2005 session....
Loads of 'history' on D.C. to-do list The 108th Congress has turned out the lights for the year with some important business left undone. No, we're not talking about intelligence reforms, federal finances or the like; lawmakers returned to Capitol Hill to take care of those issues. Rather, left in Congress' "to do" stack was a massive package of bills, passed by the Senate but ignored by the House, that would designate a potpourri of national historic sites, trails, districts, heritage areas, wilderness and even boundary adjustments for national parks. Most, if not all, will be reintroduced next year....
Column: Green bigots international First they destroyed the gasoline station, so that you have to drive miles out of your way to get gas. Then they destroyed a parking lot. Now they want to destroy a dam and a reservoir that supplies more than 2 million people with water. No, these are not al-Qaeda terrorists. These are our own home-grown fanatics -- and the places mentioned are all in Yosemite National Park. They call themselves environmentalists but a more accurate term would be green bigots. What makes someone a bigot is that he wishes to deny other people the same rights he has. That is the hallmark of the environmental zealot....
Column: The Prophets, False Prophets, and Profiteers of Kyoto Actual satellite and weather balloon data – as well as historic and geologic records of numerous warming and cooling cycles – contradict computer models, theories and assertions that humans are causing disastrous weather events and climate shifts. Arctic temperatures were even higher in the 1930s, before cooling again for several decades. Science’s editors didn’t mention countless studies that analyze natural warming and cooling cycles – or the fact that 18,000 scientists have signed a petition saying they see “no convincing scientific evidence” that humans are disrupting the earth’s climate. All the countries in the world together are responsible for less than 3% of the Earth’s total greenhouse gas emissions (the rest are natural), and the U.S. emits only 1/5 of this. The Kyoto treaty would force the U.S. to slash emissions and fossil fuel use by some 25% over the next decade – an impossible task that would cost millions of jobs and over $300 billion annually, according to government and other studies....
Kyoto format should be ditched if US, China, India remain outside: Italy The Kyoto Treaty may have to die a natural death after 2012 and be replaced by bilateral deals if the United States and big developing countries refuse to make specific promises about curbing greenhouse-gas pollution, Italian Environment Minister Altero Matteoli was quoted on Wednesday as saying. In its present format, the UN's climate-change pact is opposed by the United States, the world's biggest carbon polluter, and it does not require fast-growing developing countries like China and India to make targeted cuts in their emissions....
Mistletoe: It's not just for kissing Mistletoe - the white-berried and green-leafed cluster commonly found hanging above doorways during the holidays - is part of a fairly old kissing ritual for people, but it's also important in other ways. Mistletoe provides essential food, cover and nesting sites for an amazing number of critters in the United States and elsewhere, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. In fact, USGS researcher Rob Bennetts said, some animals couldn't even survive without mistletoe, including some birds, butterflies, and insects....
Water war begins to brew "In California, whiskey's for drinking and water's for fighting over," said Jim Edmondson of California Trout. In the Eastern Sierra, they're ready to rumble. The fight is over whether water from Mammoth Creek should be irrigating golf courses and flushing toilets in new $1 million condominiums in the ski town or be left in streams to sustain wild trout. CalTrout, an anglers' conservation group that works to protect and restore the state's wild trout and steelhead, said this amounts to a water grab that will seriously hurt the area's prime fishing streams....
Big farms found to get most water subsidies California's corporate farms are guzzling a disproportionate share of subsidized federal water, a new study concludes. The report by the Environmental Working Group analyzed federal and state records from 2002 to compile a list of the top recipients of subsidized agricultural water from the Central Valley Project, the huge federal water delivery system that supplies roughly one-fifth of the state's domestic and irrigation water - about 7 million acre feet annually. About 6,800 farms use project water, accounting for about 2.7 million acre feet of the deliveries. Central Valley farmers typically pay a fraction of the cost south state urbanites pay for the federal water....
Nevada study looks at paying California to desalinate water Nevada doesn't have an ocean, but it has money and a thriving thirsty city where officials are beginning to consider paying Southern California to convert salt water to fresh water. The idea would be to seek in return some of California's allocation of water from the Colorado River, said McClain Peterson, a Colorado River Commission of Nevada natural resources manager. Peterson presented what he called a first-ever comparative analysis of such a dollars-for-water trade to a conference that ended Tuesday at the Caesars Palace hotel-casino....
New Rawhide is movin' out to Wild Horse Pass Casino The Gila River Indian Community has lured Rawhide Western Town & Steakhouse, the faux-1880s cow town, which is closing its Scottsdale home of 33 years. Details are scheduled to be disclosed this morning at a news conference near the Wild Horse Pass Casino, said Gary Bohnee, spokesman for the community. The new Rawhide will be north of the casino and will include a new Native American village. "We'll almost rewrite history," said Letha Lamb, board member of the Wild Horse Pass Development Authority, about locating a cowboy town in an Indian community....
Bin Laden's horse survives at modest stables The horse Osama bin Laden used to ride now lives in the run-down stables of a colonial-era racetrack on the edge of Khartoum. Her name is Swift Like the Wind, but a more appropriate one might be Victim of Circumstance. At 12, she's too old to race. Last year she almost starved to death. Now she spends her days in a small caged area, next to a grimy pool of water turtles. There was a time when the spirited white mare, dusted with gray spots, was one of a dozen prized horses that galloped in glory along the dusty stretch of track. In bin Laden's heyday here, as a wealthy exile in the mid-1990s, Swift ran in Sudan's most prestigious races....
El Último Vaquero Habla Español (The Last Cowboy Speaks Spanish) When René Alberto Vera Reyes got on a bus to come to the United States, he was 21 years old. He left the village of Cochrane—in Chilean Patagonia, population 2,000—in April 1999, carrying only a duffel bag that contained two pairs of pants, a pair of riding boots, a couple of shirts, a wool poncho, an awl, and several yards of horsehide pita, thin strips used to weave bridles and bullwhips. What he wanted, though, was to be an American cowboy. He wanted to wear a big belt buckle and Wrangler jeans, and to make enough money to trade his horse for a pickup and to buy land someday back in Chile. To get these things, he'd signed a three-year contract with the Western Range Association, a 200-member Citrus Heights, California–based consortium of sheep ranchers that imports hundreds of South Americans a year to work on ranches all over the West....