NEWS ROUNDUP

Protection vs. recreation: the tortoise tussle As Congress considers whether to tinker with the venerable Endangered Species Act, a dust-up between environmentalists and off-road enthusiasts is spotlighting the power of judges to protect animals from the agencies assigned to defend them. At issue is the Mojave desert tortoise, a species whose numbers in Southern California have shrunk in recent decades. Federal wildlife officials, who believe they only have an obligation to keep the tortoise from dwindling further, are facing fire from environmental organizations, including the Sierra Club. A federal judge has been sympathetic to the tortoise's defenders, rejecting pleas from off-roaders who fear losing access to large swaths of the desert. The dispute is part of an enduring trend in which environmentalists are turning to the courts to fight any federal rollback of protections for rare plants and animals. In recent months, judges have been grappling with how far to go to protect animals such as Arizona's pygmy owl and the southwestern willow flycatcher....
Murray tries again for wilderness bill Sen. Patty Murray yesterday launched yet another bid to win congressional approval for Wild Sky, a popular but tormented effort to create Washington's first new wilderness area in a generation. "Wild Sky reflects the great tradition of preserving places that make Washington state unique," Murray, D-Wash., said of the proposal to protect 106,000 acres in the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest. But while Murray said the bill's prospects in the Senate are good, where it has already passed twice, its future in the House is far less certain. House Resources Committee Chairman Richard Pombo, R-Calif., said he would consider Wild Sky only if it is trimmed of roughly 13,000 acres that contain logging roads and other marks of modern intrusion....
Ranchers to sue state over prairie dogs Landowners in southwestern South Dakota are asking the state to compensate them for losses caused by black-tailed prairie dogs that moved from federal land onto the ranchers' private land. The approximately 60 landowners filing suit have lost about $5 million because the state failed to control the prairie dog population in the area around the Buffalo Gap National Grasslands, said rancher Charles Kruse of Interior. The lawsuit alleges that the state Agriculture Department and the state Game, Fish and Parks Department did not comply with state laws related to the reintroduction of the endangered black-footed ferret and the management of prairie dogs, the ferrets' main food. A 1992 state law allowed the two departments to participate in the programs to reintroduce the black-footed ferret, but it set several conditions. One of those conditions said private landowners had to be compensated if increases in the prairie dog population were needed. Prairie dog numbers skyrocketed in some parts of southwestern South Dakota in recent years because of drought and a halt in poisoning on federal land while federal officials studied whether to designate the prairie dog as an endangered species. The drought and prairie dogs destroyed grazing on parts of the Buffalo Gap National Grasslands. The critters also moved from the federal grasslands onto adjacent private lands....
LAND TRIAL JUDGE COULD RULE SOON Attorneys crammed a complicated two-year legal battle into less than two hours Tuesday when they made their closing arguments in a trial to determine the ownership of hundreds of acres of land and mineral deposits in Upshur County. State District Judge Paul Banner said he hopes to make a ruling by the end of next week, after he examines scores of maps, documents and other pieces of evidence. Plaintiffs W.L. Dixon and Barton McDonald filed a lawsuit against Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson claiming the 4,662-acre William King Survey actually lies about two miles west of where it appears on today's maps, leaving a vacancy in the eastern position. Historically, vacancies have been discovered in mostly small tracts of land, gaps between surveyed areas. Vacancies belong to the state, rendering invalid titles to land and minerals held by private entities in the vacancy. Because vacancies benefit the state's Permanent School Fund, lawmakers included an incentive to find them - a fraction of the mineral values in the vacant area....
Panel endorses wildlife trust fund CHEYENNE -- A bill that would preserve wildlife habitat for future generations through a $75 million state trust fund was unanimously endorsed by a Senate committee on Tuesday. Under the Wildlife and Natural Resource Funding Act, only the interest and earnings generated by the account could be spent. Allowable projects would include improving or acquiring habitat and accepting easements that could protect land from development. A board appointed by the governor and confirmed by the state Senate would evaluate, rank and prioritize proposed wildlife improvement projects and determine which ones to fund, with an emphasis on public-private partnerships....
Bison activists want disease targeted, not animals Bison-protection activists urged Gov. Brian Schweitzer on Tuesday to join them in attacking disease in Yellowstone National Park bison and end the hazing, capturing and killing of the animals as they leave the park. Schweitzer, who earlier this month halted a planned bison hunt this winter, said he agrees that ridding the herd of brucellosis should be a priority, but he also said that hunting must be a part of population control beyond Yellowstone's borders. He and representatives of the Buffalo Field Campaign agreed the bison need more room to roam outside the park on public land, but Schweitzer warned the group's leaders that allowing a more free-ranging herd must not jeopardize Montana's status as a brucellosis-free state....
Group making a point with 'endangered' snakehead A group of politicians from Western states has embarked on an unlikely cause: having the voracious, invasive northern snakehead declared as an endangered species. But the move isn't so much about the toothy fish - it's a stunt aimed at gaining attention to property owners' concerns about the federal government infringing on their rights to protect endangered species. Alan Gardner, a commissioner in rural Washington County, Utah, admitted the application is a ploy for publicity. "It may let other people in other areas realize what impact the Endangered Species Act has on them," Mr. Gardner said. The petition filed by Mr. Gardner and government officials from a dozen other Western states asks the federal government to protect the northern snakehead and its possible habitat - a massive stretch of land from upstate New York to parts of North Carolina....
Governors Want Clean Air Protections New York Gov. George Pataki and California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger are pressing Congress to protect key parts of the Clean Air Act as lawmakers and the Bush administration seek to change the law. The two moderate Republicans on Tuesday urged senators considering updating the act not to reduce the powers states have now to enforce environmental regulations or create tougher state regulations. The governors, who both place great emphasis on their environmental initiatives, wrote to members of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, which will hold a hearing Wednesday to consider changes to the Clean Air Act....
Bankruptcy Threat With an Edge Timber giant Pacific Lumber Co. has told the Schwarzenegger administration that unless it is allowed to cut more trees, the firm may file for bankruptcy, which it says would likely terminate environmental safeguards promised as part of a $480-million deal struck more than five years ago. The federal and state governments paid the company that money to protect several thousand of acres of ancient redwoods under a 1999 agreement preserving the Headwaters Forest in Humboldt County. But now Pacific Lumber, owned by Houston-based Maxxam Inc., says it faces financial ruin because it is starting to run out of marketable timber. Unless the state grants permission for logging on a dozen areas of flood-prone watersheds the company still owns near Eureka, it says, it will have to file for bankruptcy, closing mills and laying off workers....
New sawmill is a pleasant surprise In the Seattle metropolitan area, as in most Western cities, any talk of new jobs these days usually centers around the so-called new economy: computers, biotechnology, the service industry. So it came as a surprise when Sierra Pacific Industries, a privately held company in Redding, Calif., announced a proposal last week to build something that's become a rarity around here: a sawmill. "Well, that's a switch," regional economist Dick Conway said. Like many in the area, Conway has become more used to hearing about sawmills closing, not opening....
An End to the West's Drought? Early January surveys of snowpack show that the Colorado River Basin, which gathers runoff from Wyoming to Southern California, will receive 98 percent of "normal" precipitation this year. If the rest of the winter meets historic averages, Lake Mead and Lake Powell, the West's most massive reservoirs which have shrunk over the past five years to 56 percent and 36 percent of capacity, respectively, will rise. That's good news not only for the recreationists who love to boat in the desert, but also for the tens of millions of people who rely on the river for agricultural and drinking waters, including farmers in Arizona and urbanites in Las Vegas. But I wouldn't bet on the reservoirs filling up just yet. As reported in High Country News this month, scientists at the University of Arizona have discovered through analysis of the growth rings of trees that drought is a persistent visitor to the West. Over the past 500 years, a half-dozen major droughts, some lasting many decades, have struck the Colorado River Basin, according to research from the university's Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research. So the current drought could last a long while, whether it is interrupted by an occasional wet year or not....
Entertaining 'Across Cultures' As the National Cowboy Poetry Gathering gathered steam Monday, the featured evening performance at the Western Folklife Center's G Three Bar Theater was entitled "Across Cultures" - but it could well have been called "Across Oceans." A pair of poets from the Australian Bush shared the stage with Grupo Cimarron, a joropo band from the eastern plains of Colombia, and the unique mix of music, rhyme and culture from around the world delighted the near-capacity crowd....
It just suits them Russ Weaver preached the Gospel in a cowboy hat and a gold-and-silver belt buckle that bore a cross to more than 800 people that filled the Stock Show's livestock auction room for Sunday's Cowboy Church services. Cowboy church is an international movement that began reaching out to Christians from agricultural backgrounds more than three decades ago. When the movement's pioneers saw that Christians with farming, ranching and rodeo backgrounds were not regularly attending a church, they decided to take the church to them. Services were held in their workplaces, such as rodeo arena barns, where jeans and vests prevailed over the suit-and-tie attire of a traditional church, and bales of hay doubled as pews and prayer altars....
Cow Stuck In A Well An unusual rescue in Fresno County, came to a happy ending. A cow got stuck in a well near South and Peach Monday night. That's west of Fowler. An 80,000 lb. excavator was brought in to free the cow. Yet there she was, an 8-month old heifer, 20-feet down at the bottom of an abandoned well west of Selma. Rancher Steve Farris noticed she was missing from the herd late Monday and went searching for her, "I got about right over here by the fence and I heard this moo."....