Always bet on the cowgirl
Julie Carter
Donna and JoAnn were suffering with a little cash flow problem. It was suppertime and no cash meant no meal so when a challenge was offered, the challenge was accepted. The gleam in the girls' eyes came free of charge.
The cowgirls had been hauling pretty steady this particular year. Getting to every breakaway roping at every punkin' rollin' rodeo close enough to get to and both were picking up regular checks, but not always first place.
They tuned on their horses with a string of calves at the feedlot where Donna worked and spent their evenings practicing their roping. With a long schedule of rodeos ahead of them, they made some dedicated plans to do some serious winning.
Both gals knew that meant paying their dues in the practice pen. And they knew the skills that needed honed were getting out of the roping box quicker and cleaner and throwing the loop sooner.
A long rainy spell hit the Texas panhandle and was wreaking havoc on their practice sessions. Undaunted, they headed to the only covered arena in the area. It belonged to a guy in town that let the local feedlot and wheat cattle punchers practice on off nights if they brought their own cattle. Donna and JoAnn loaded their calves and their horses in the trailer and set off to take advantage of this deal.
This gathering spot for the area punchers drew in mostly the young guns that had come to practice their team roping. With only a little disdain showing , they would periodically agree to "rest a spell" and let the "little cowgirls" practice for a little bit. Their real intent was to get their kicks making fun of them.
These two cowgirls look like any ordinary person who might like to ride a little on the weekend but, in fact, they were both ranch raised, feedlot hardened and competitive down to their Victoria Secrets. Their seasoned skills didn't show that much and they weren't the type to flaunt it.
They loaded their calves in the chute, pulled their cinches, shook out their ropes and proceeded with their practice session. The cowpuncher audience stood by ready to cheer or jeer.
Their plan, no matter who was watching, was to concentrate on their timing with the barrier and getting rid of their loop at least one swing sooner. With all their attention on "the plan," their accuracy wasn't up to par, but they were getting accomplished what they'd come to do. Catching wasn't their problem when it counted.
The young guns that were lined up to watch didn't know this pair could catch a shadow in the dark if that was what needed done. So in their ignorance and arrogance, the offers for a bet or two began.
Big spenders that they were, on puncher's wages, they gave the girls a hard time and suggested that the winners of a match roping would buy the hamburgers. With stomachs growling and pockets empty, the girls agreed. The bet was on.
It wasn't a pretty sight but after a five-head average with each of the women catching all and the guys coming up a little short, the cowboys, appearing as slow learners, offered a double or nothing bet.
As the sun set on West Texas, the girls were downing burgers, fries, and Godzilla-size cokes, compliments of the jeering section.
Not that anyone would notice, the punchers got a good lesson.
If somebody looks like a cowgirl, smells like a cowgirl and acts like a cowgirl - don't bet against her. It'll cost you money.
© Julie Carter 2007
Saturday, February 03, 2007
OPINION/COMMENTARY
Property Rights
The January edition of "Imprimis" contains an important speech by former New Jersey Superior Court Judge Andrew P. Napolitano titled "Property Rights After the Kelo Decision." For those who haven't kept up, the Kelo decision is the 2005 U.S. Supreme Court 5-4 decision that upheld the city of New London, Connecticut's condemnation of the property of one private party so that another private party could use it to build an office facility. Such a decision was a flagrant violation of the letter and spirit of the Fifth Amendment, which reads in part, "nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation." Public use, according to the Constitution's framers, means uses such as roads, bridges, and forts. While most Americans appreciate the concept of yours and mine, Judge Napolitano's speech gives it greater focus. Formerly a law professor, Napolitano says, "When teaching law students the significance of private property, we tell them that each owner of such property has something called a 'bundle of rights.' The first of these is the right to use the property. The second is the right to alienate the property. The third and greatest is the right to exclude people from the property." Can the government force one to sell his property? James Madison said yes, so long as it was for a public use and the owner was paid a fair market value. Thomas Jefferson was opposed to a person being forced to sell his property for a public use, arguing that the essence of private property is the right to exclude anyone, including government, from the property. But Madison's view prevailed, hence the Fifth Amendment provision. Napolitano concluded his speech pointing out something that few Americans appreciate. Natural rights do not come from government; they spring from our humanity. Or, as our founders put it, we are endowed by our "Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness," the latter meaning property. We establish governments to secure these rights....
The other 'green' in global warming
The up-tick in global warming propaganda in recent days is to set the stage for the release of the Fourth Assessment Report from the International Panel on Climate Change. Surprise, surprise, the report will say the sky is falling – faster and faster. For people who have watched this process since the beginning, this report, at least the executive summary of the report, is mostly hogwash, wordsmithed by policy wonks and media specialists to scare the gas out of the economy. The First Assessment Report was developed by a fairly balanced group of scientists from around the world and released in 1990. The report was quite extensive and dealt primarily with capturing and storing carbon dioxide. The Second Assessment Report was adopted by a fairly balanced group of participating scientists in December 1995. Then, the lead author of the report, B. D. Santor, acting with the consent of the co-chairman of the Working Group, John Houghton, and with the consent of the executive secretary of the Framework Convention on Climate Change, Michael Cutajar, changed the report significantly, without the approval of the scientists. Dr. Freidrich Seitz, president emeritus of Rockefeller University and former president of the National Academy of Sciences, said: "I have never witnessed a more disturbing corruption of the peer-review process than the events that led to this IPCC report. Nearly all the changes worked to remove hints of the skepticism with which many scientists regard global warming claims." A hundred distinguished scientists, meeting in Leipzig, Germany, released a joint statement July 10, 1996, which said: "There is still no scientific consensus on the subject of climate change. On the contrary, most scientists now accept the fact that actual observations from earth satellites show no climate warming whatsoever." From that point forward, any scientist who dared to offer research results that did not affirm the conclusions of the IPCC has been denied invitations to participate in the IPCC studies, denied funding and/or denigrated publicly by politically motivated scientists and/or the media. Any scientist who dares express skepticism is at once denounced as a pawn for the oil and coal industry....
The Greatest Environmental Threat Ever
The environmental movement needs to be urgently informed concerning a new threat to the planet. This assault on nature does not come from without but from within the very people who are attempting to "save" the Earth. The grave danger is something more horrendous and subtle than global warming. The new contamination of Gaea could not only destroy hundreds of ecosystems but could possibly end all life permanently. This revolting scheme is carefully planned by a dark entity urging to destroy everything dear to tree lovers. The creature is far worse than human beings, more threatening than a meteor slamming into the Earth, and greedier than a strip-mining industrialist. If you haven’t guessed by now....it’s...the Giant Panda! The environmental movement for years has been deceived by this leech on the globe. The animal appears so cute and cuddly that we have fallen prey to its coercive manipulation. Behind those adorable jet black eyes, a monster dwells. Environmentalists constantly attempt to preserve "natural" ecology. Of course, this implies that human beings aren’t part of nature. Everything else is a part of nature to them. A coyote can kill its prey. A woodchuck can cut down a tree. But suddenly when a human does either, a great ecological "crime" occurs. The act is a supposed malicious unnatural abomination that must be stopped. The human species has once again trampled upon natural ecology. The Giant Panda only exists because of human involvement. It could not survive in a natural selection process...Now that you know the treacherous and deceptive essence of the beast, I can continue about the doomsday rolling ever closer. The most vile gluttonous creatures on Earth known as Americans consume at most about 6 pounds of food a day, about 2,200 pounds of food a year. The larger giant pandas waste up to 40 pounds of bamboo per day in a 10- to 16-hour shift of endless habitat destruction totaling almost 15,000 pounds of bamboo per year!....
If the Cap Fits
The Climate Action Partnership, a group of 10 major companies that made headlines this week with its call for a national limit on carbon dioxide emissions, would surely feign shock at such an accusation. After all, their plea was carefully timed to coincide with President Bush's State of the Union capitulation on global warming, and it had the desired PR effect. The media dutifully declared that "even" business now recognized the climate threat. Sen. Barbara Boxer, who begins marathon hearings on warming next week, lauded the corporate angels for thinking of the "common good." There was a time when the financial press understood that companies exist to make money. And it happens that the cap-and-trade climate program these 10 jolly green giants are now calling for is a regulatory device designed to financially reward companies that reduce CO2 emissions, and punish those that don't. Four of the affiliates--Duke, PG&E, FPL and PNM Resources--are utilities that have made big bets on wind, hydroelectric and nuclear power. So a Kyoto program would reward them for simply enacting their business plan, and simultaneously sock it to their competitors. Duke also owns Cinergy, which relies heavily on dirty, CO2-emitting coal plants. But Cinergy will soon have to replace those plants with cleaner equipment. Under a Kyoto, it'll get paid for its trouble. DuPont has been plunging into biofuels, the use of which would soar under a cap. Somebody has to cobble together all these complex trading deals, so say hello to Lehman Brothers. Caterpillar has invested heavily in new engines that generate "clean energy." British Petroleum is mostly doing public penance for its dirty oil habit, but also gets a plug for its own biofuels venture. Finally, there's General Electric, whose CEO Jeffrey Immelt these days spends as much time in Washington as Connecticut. GE makes all the solar equipment and wind turbines (at $2 million a pop) that utilities would have to buy under a climate regime. GE's revenue from environmental products long ago passed the $10 billion mark, and it doesn't take much "ecomagination" to see why Mr. Immelt is leading the pack of climate profiteers....
Wal-Mart Plan to Force Suppliers to Implement Green Agenda is Bad Business
The National Legal and Policy Center (NLPC) today criticized Wal-Mart CEO H. Lee Scott for his speech in London last night before Prince Charles and 400 business leaders, in which he said a key component of the company’s campaign to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, allegedly responsible for global warming, will be to push its business suppliers into reducing their emissions. Wal-Mart (WMT) had previously announced that it will pressure its 60,000 suppliers to adhere to environmental mandates. “It is the responsibility of every corporation to be more sustainable,” said Scott. Scott insists that Wal-Mart is not trying to coerce its suppliers but rather is “a cooperative effort of encouragement and support.” “This is simply not true,” says John Carlisle, Director of Policy at NLPC. “Scott and other Wal-Mart executives have said that companies that don’t meet the environmental mandates run a serious risk of losing their contracts.” Wal-Mart has devised a scorecard to grade the environmental progress of suppliers which Scott says the company will use to “pick the ones moving in the right direction.” Likewise, Tim Yatsko, Wal-Mart Senior Vice President for Transportation, is on record as saying, “We have made it clear that all things being equal, we’ll give business to operators who show they’re fully engaged” in fuel efficiency efforts....
Property Rights
The January edition of "Imprimis" contains an important speech by former New Jersey Superior Court Judge Andrew P. Napolitano titled "Property Rights After the Kelo Decision." For those who haven't kept up, the Kelo decision is the 2005 U.S. Supreme Court 5-4 decision that upheld the city of New London, Connecticut's condemnation of the property of one private party so that another private party could use it to build an office facility. Such a decision was a flagrant violation of the letter and spirit of the Fifth Amendment, which reads in part, "nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation." Public use, according to the Constitution's framers, means uses such as roads, bridges, and forts. While most Americans appreciate the concept of yours and mine, Judge Napolitano's speech gives it greater focus. Formerly a law professor, Napolitano says, "When teaching law students the significance of private property, we tell them that each owner of such property has something called a 'bundle of rights.' The first of these is the right to use the property. The second is the right to alienate the property. The third and greatest is the right to exclude people from the property." Can the government force one to sell his property? James Madison said yes, so long as it was for a public use and the owner was paid a fair market value. Thomas Jefferson was opposed to a person being forced to sell his property for a public use, arguing that the essence of private property is the right to exclude anyone, including government, from the property. But Madison's view prevailed, hence the Fifth Amendment provision. Napolitano concluded his speech pointing out something that few Americans appreciate. Natural rights do not come from government; they spring from our humanity. Or, as our founders put it, we are endowed by our "Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness," the latter meaning property. We establish governments to secure these rights....
The other 'green' in global warming
The up-tick in global warming propaganda in recent days is to set the stage for the release of the Fourth Assessment Report from the International Panel on Climate Change. Surprise, surprise, the report will say the sky is falling – faster and faster. For people who have watched this process since the beginning, this report, at least the executive summary of the report, is mostly hogwash, wordsmithed by policy wonks and media specialists to scare the gas out of the economy. The First Assessment Report was developed by a fairly balanced group of scientists from around the world and released in 1990. The report was quite extensive and dealt primarily with capturing and storing carbon dioxide. The Second Assessment Report was adopted by a fairly balanced group of participating scientists in December 1995. Then, the lead author of the report, B. D. Santor, acting with the consent of the co-chairman of the Working Group, John Houghton, and with the consent of the executive secretary of the Framework Convention on Climate Change, Michael Cutajar, changed the report significantly, without the approval of the scientists. Dr. Freidrich Seitz, president emeritus of Rockefeller University and former president of the National Academy of Sciences, said: "I have never witnessed a more disturbing corruption of the peer-review process than the events that led to this IPCC report. Nearly all the changes worked to remove hints of the skepticism with which many scientists regard global warming claims." A hundred distinguished scientists, meeting in Leipzig, Germany, released a joint statement July 10, 1996, which said: "There is still no scientific consensus on the subject of climate change. On the contrary, most scientists now accept the fact that actual observations from earth satellites show no climate warming whatsoever." From that point forward, any scientist who dared to offer research results that did not affirm the conclusions of the IPCC has been denied invitations to participate in the IPCC studies, denied funding and/or denigrated publicly by politically motivated scientists and/or the media. Any scientist who dares express skepticism is at once denounced as a pawn for the oil and coal industry....
The Greatest Environmental Threat Ever
The environmental movement needs to be urgently informed concerning a new threat to the planet. This assault on nature does not come from without but from within the very people who are attempting to "save" the Earth. The grave danger is something more horrendous and subtle than global warming. The new contamination of Gaea could not only destroy hundreds of ecosystems but could possibly end all life permanently. This revolting scheme is carefully planned by a dark entity urging to destroy everything dear to tree lovers. The creature is far worse than human beings, more threatening than a meteor slamming into the Earth, and greedier than a strip-mining industrialist. If you haven’t guessed by now....it’s...the Giant Panda! The environmental movement for years has been deceived by this leech on the globe. The animal appears so cute and cuddly that we have fallen prey to its coercive manipulation. Behind those adorable jet black eyes, a monster dwells. Environmentalists constantly attempt to preserve "natural" ecology. Of course, this implies that human beings aren’t part of nature. Everything else is a part of nature to them. A coyote can kill its prey. A woodchuck can cut down a tree. But suddenly when a human does either, a great ecological "crime" occurs. The act is a supposed malicious unnatural abomination that must be stopped. The human species has once again trampled upon natural ecology. The Giant Panda only exists because of human involvement. It could not survive in a natural selection process...Now that you know the treacherous and deceptive essence of the beast, I can continue about the doomsday rolling ever closer. The most vile gluttonous creatures on Earth known as Americans consume at most about 6 pounds of food a day, about 2,200 pounds of food a year. The larger giant pandas waste up to 40 pounds of bamboo per day in a 10- to 16-hour shift of endless habitat destruction totaling almost 15,000 pounds of bamboo per year!....
If the Cap Fits
The Climate Action Partnership, a group of 10 major companies that made headlines this week with its call for a national limit on carbon dioxide emissions, would surely feign shock at such an accusation. After all, their plea was carefully timed to coincide with President Bush's State of the Union capitulation on global warming, and it had the desired PR effect. The media dutifully declared that "even" business now recognized the climate threat. Sen. Barbara Boxer, who begins marathon hearings on warming next week, lauded the corporate angels for thinking of the "common good." There was a time when the financial press understood that companies exist to make money. And it happens that the cap-and-trade climate program these 10 jolly green giants are now calling for is a regulatory device designed to financially reward companies that reduce CO2 emissions, and punish those that don't. Four of the affiliates--Duke, PG&E, FPL and PNM Resources--are utilities that have made big bets on wind, hydroelectric and nuclear power. So a Kyoto program would reward them for simply enacting their business plan, and simultaneously sock it to their competitors. Duke also owns Cinergy, which relies heavily on dirty, CO2-emitting coal plants. But Cinergy will soon have to replace those plants with cleaner equipment. Under a Kyoto, it'll get paid for its trouble. DuPont has been plunging into biofuels, the use of which would soar under a cap. Somebody has to cobble together all these complex trading deals, so say hello to Lehman Brothers. Caterpillar has invested heavily in new engines that generate "clean energy." British Petroleum is mostly doing public penance for its dirty oil habit, but also gets a plug for its own biofuels venture. Finally, there's General Electric, whose CEO Jeffrey Immelt these days spends as much time in Washington as Connecticut. GE makes all the solar equipment and wind turbines (at $2 million a pop) that utilities would have to buy under a climate regime. GE's revenue from environmental products long ago passed the $10 billion mark, and it doesn't take much "ecomagination" to see why Mr. Immelt is leading the pack of climate profiteers....
Wal-Mart Plan to Force Suppliers to Implement Green Agenda is Bad Business
The National Legal and Policy Center (NLPC) today criticized Wal-Mart CEO H. Lee Scott for his speech in London last night before Prince Charles and 400 business leaders, in which he said a key component of the company’s campaign to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, allegedly responsible for global warming, will be to push its business suppliers into reducing their emissions. Wal-Mart (WMT) had previously announced that it will pressure its 60,000 suppliers to adhere to environmental mandates. “It is the responsibility of every corporation to be more sustainable,” said Scott. Scott insists that Wal-Mart is not trying to coerce its suppliers but rather is “a cooperative effort of encouragement and support.” “This is simply not true,” says John Carlisle, Director of Policy at NLPC. “Scott and other Wal-Mart executives have said that companies that don’t meet the environmental mandates run a serious risk of losing their contracts.” Wal-Mart has devised a scorecard to grade the environmental progress of suppliers which Scott says the company will use to “pick the ones moving in the right direction.” Likewise, Tim Yatsko, Wal-Mart Senior Vice President for Transportation, is on record as saying, “We have made it clear that all things being equal, we’ll give business to operators who show they’re fully engaged” in fuel efficiency efforts....
ROPIN' THE BLOGGIES
Jacob Sullum says the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit appears skeptical of the President's claimed authority to indefinitely detain enemy combatants...Jeff Taylor tells us NFL attorneys have shut down the Fall Creek Baptist Church's planned Super Bowl party....Brian Doherty links to an article in Rolling Stone that asserts Al Gore would be the best candidate for the Democrats....Justin Ptak reports the Super Bowl Champs caps and T-shirts for the team that loses will be locked away and then shipped to a developing nation in Africa....Gary Galles has reported the savings rate for the U.S. was a minus one percent as reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Galles says there are "serious measurement shortcomings" with this figure and what the politicians may do will make things worse...William L. Anderson posts that the Republican enery policy was "subsidies and rhetoric" and the new energy policy of the Democrats is "to lower fuel prices by forcing up fuel prices"....Manuel Lora links to an article about a man who won an $138,000 trip to space. But wait, along comes the IRS and says that is income and he owes $25,000 in taxes. The man had to cancel the trip....and finally, Amy Ridenour lays waste to a Washington Post Op-Ed on global warming.
Jacob Sullum says the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit appears skeptical of the President's claimed authority to indefinitely detain enemy combatants...Jeff Taylor tells us NFL attorneys have shut down the Fall Creek Baptist Church's planned Super Bowl party....Brian Doherty links to an article in Rolling Stone that asserts Al Gore would be the best candidate for the Democrats....Justin Ptak reports the Super Bowl Champs caps and T-shirts for the team that loses will be locked away and then shipped to a developing nation in Africa....Gary Galles has reported the savings rate for the U.S. was a minus one percent as reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Galles says there are "serious measurement shortcomings" with this figure and what the politicians may do will make things worse...William L. Anderson posts that the Republican enery policy was "subsidies and rhetoric" and the new energy policy of the Democrats is "to lower fuel prices by forcing up fuel prices"....Manuel Lora links to an article about a man who won an $138,000 trip to space. But wait, along comes the IRS and says that is income and he owes $25,000 in taxes. The man had to cancel the trip....and finally, Amy Ridenour lays waste to a Washington Post Op-Ed on global warming.
Friday, February 02, 2007
NYRI to Sue NY Over Eminent Domain Law
The company that wants to build a high-voltage transmission line from central New York to the New York City suburbs said Thursday it will ask a federal court to throw out a state law that would restrict its use of eminent domain to secure land for the project. Albany-based New York Regional Interconnect Inc. says the proposed 200-mile, $1.6 billion line from the Utica area to the lower Hudson Valley would deliver electricity to an area where power demand is expected to outstrip supply in a few years. In October, Gov. George Pataki created a major obstacle to the project by signing a law restricting NYRI's use of eminent domain. Without the ability to force property sales, the company would have little chance of securing all the necessary land to complete the line, project manager Bill May said. In a suit to be filed in federal court in Albany Thursday, NYRI contends the law discriminates against the company and violates its rights under the U.S. Constitution. NYRI also argues that the new law infringes its rights to equal protection and due process. "The law seeks to individually punish NYRI for a project intended for a public need," May said....
The company that wants to build a high-voltage transmission line from central New York to the New York City suburbs said Thursday it will ask a federal court to throw out a state law that would restrict its use of eminent domain to secure land for the project. Albany-based New York Regional Interconnect Inc. says the proposed 200-mile, $1.6 billion line from the Utica area to the lower Hudson Valley would deliver electricity to an area where power demand is expected to outstrip supply in a few years. In October, Gov. George Pataki created a major obstacle to the project by signing a law restricting NYRI's use of eminent domain. Without the ability to force property sales, the company would have little chance of securing all the necessary land to complete the line, project manager Bill May said. In a suit to be filed in federal court in Albany Thursday, NYRI contends the law discriminates against the company and violates its rights under the U.S. Constitution. NYRI also argues that the new law infringes its rights to equal protection and due process. "The law seeks to individually punish NYRI for a project intended for a public need," May said....
WOLVES ON A KILLING SPREE PROMPT COUNTY TO TAKE ACTION
Wolf incidents in Catron County are on the rise and Catron County’s Commissioners, who declared an emergency situation in February, 2006, are now determined to take firmer action to protect the citizens here. “These wolves are on a killing spree,” said Catron County Commission Chairman Ed Wehrheim recently. “They killed a horse on Whitewater Mesa just the other day, the second horse in just one month.” Wehrheim is gravely concerned because these are just more incidents in what appears to him and the other Commissioners to be a never-ending spiral of killings of animals that the Commissioners feel will ultimately end with the attack by a wolf on a human being. The County passed the emergency declaration last year primarily to put a halt to the economic devastation caused by the presence of Mexican wolves which not only hunt wild game, but also kill cattle, horses, dogs, cats and other domestic animals. Now it appears that the situation has become more than an economic emergency and has escalated to a high level of risk for human lives in Catron County. At base is the problem that many of these wolves are habituated to humans. This means that, unlike normal wild animals, habituated wolves are unafraid to be around humans and areas where humans spend time. It becomes more and more difficult to haze away habituated wolves when they have their sights set on an easy meal - which may be a family pet. This is just what happened with the Miller family on their Link Ranch in Catron County south of Wall Lake - not far from a dude ranch where families with children vacation. Last November, the Millers’ eight year old daughter went out to the corral near the house to let the horses in to feed them grain. Right in front of her, the alpha male of the Aspen wolf pack attacked the family dog which had accompanied her to the corral. The wolf was unfazed by the Millers’ attempts to chase it off the dog, which was only saved from death by the fact that it was wearing a large collar. This was the second attack on one of the Miller’s dogs in just weeks. Then, early in January, wolves trapped the Miller’s daughter’s horse, Six, in the same horse pen, where Six had run for safety. There was blood everywhere. If this was a typical wolf kill, Six would have been torn apart and eaten while still alive. Hopefully the Miller’s daughter is unaware of that fact. The wolves continue to stalk the rest of the Miller horses, sometimes chasing them for miles. “The horses are back at our house but so are the wolves,” Mark Miller reported last week. “As of this morning, the wolves are all around the house and the horses are huddled in a corner of our property.” Miller went on to express his concern for his daughter’s emotional health, since at eight years old, she cannot help but be aware that if her dogs can be attacked and her horse killed, she might be the next victim....
Wolf incidents in Catron County are on the rise and Catron County’s Commissioners, who declared an emergency situation in February, 2006, are now determined to take firmer action to protect the citizens here. “These wolves are on a killing spree,” said Catron County Commission Chairman Ed Wehrheim recently. “They killed a horse on Whitewater Mesa just the other day, the second horse in just one month.” Wehrheim is gravely concerned because these are just more incidents in what appears to him and the other Commissioners to be a never-ending spiral of killings of animals that the Commissioners feel will ultimately end with the attack by a wolf on a human being. The County passed the emergency declaration last year primarily to put a halt to the economic devastation caused by the presence of Mexican wolves which not only hunt wild game, but also kill cattle, horses, dogs, cats and other domestic animals. Now it appears that the situation has become more than an economic emergency and has escalated to a high level of risk for human lives in Catron County. At base is the problem that many of these wolves are habituated to humans. This means that, unlike normal wild animals, habituated wolves are unafraid to be around humans and areas where humans spend time. It becomes more and more difficult to haze away habituated wolves when they have their sights set on an easy meal - which may be a family pet. This is just what happened with the Miller family on their Link Ranch in Catron County south of Wall Lake - not far from a dude ranch where families with children vacation. Last November, the Millers’ eight year old daughter went out to the corral near the house to let the horses in to feed them grain. Right in front of her, the alpha male of the Aspen wolf pack attacked the family dog which had accompanied her to the corral. The wolf was unfazed by the Millers’ attempts to chase it off the dog, which was only saved from death by the fact that it was wearing a large collar. This was the second attack on one of the Miller’s dogs in just weeks. Then, early in January, wolves trapped the Miller’s daughter’s horse, Six, in the same horse pen, where Six had run for safety. There was blood everywhere. If this was a typical wolf kill, Six would have been torn apart and eaten while still alive. Hopefully the Miller’s daughter is unaware of that fact. The wolves continue to stalk the rest of the Miller horses, sometimes chasing them for miles. “The horses are back at our house but so are the wolves,” Mark Miller reported last week. “As of this morning, the wolves are all around the house and the horses are huddled in a corner of our property.” Miller went on to express his concern for his daughter’s emotional health, since at eight years old, she cannot help but be aware that if her dogs can be attacked and her horse killed, she might be the next victim....
Catron County considers wolf ordinance
Federal biologists responsible for reintroducing the endangered Mexican gray wolf in New Mexico and Arizona can decide when and how to trap or eliminate the animals if they become troublesome. But Catron County commissioners are considering an ordinance that would let them in on the decision making, according to a copyright story in Friday's Albuquerque Journal. Catron County Manager Bill Aymar said a growing number of incidents in which wolves have killed pets or livestock and menaced residents has led commissioners to think about taking action. "If you're flying an airplane and your helmet is on fire, you're going to deal with it," he said. "And we are having experiences day to day with wolves being close." County Attorney Ron Shortes said he has received six drafts of the ordinance from the county's consultant on natural resource management. In general, the measure would allow the commission to issue an order to remove from the county or kill a problem wolf. Shortes said he's trying to determine whether such a measure has solid legal footing. Aymar said the commission would hold a public hearing before taking action on the ordinance. Last February, the commission declared that an economic and agricultural state of emergency existed because of the presence and depredations of the wolves....
Federal biologists responsible for reintroducing the endangered Mexican gray wolf in New Mexico and Arizona can decide when and how to trap or eliminate the animals if they become troublesome. But Catron County commissioners are considering an ordinance that would let them in on the decision making, according to a copyright story in Friday's Albuquerque Journal. Catron County Manager Bill Aymar said a growing number of incidents in which wolves have killed pets or livestock and menaced residents has led commissioners to think about taking action. "If you're flying an airplane and your helmet is on fire, you're going to deal with it," he said. "And we are having experiences day to day with wolves being close." County Attorney Ron Shortes said he has received six drafts of the ordinance from the county's consultant on natural resource management. In general, the measure would allow the commission to issue an order to remove from the county or kill a problem wolf. Shortes said he's trying to determine whether such a measure has solid legal footing. Aymar said the commission would hold a public hearing before taking action on the ordinance. Last February, the commission declared that an economic and agricultural state of emergency existed because of the presence and depredations of the wolves....
Thursday, February 01, 2007
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Phone 505.773.4897
Email: lif.strand@gmail.com
CATRON COUNTY TO APPROVE LETHAL TAKING OF MEXICAN WOLF
Commissioners Will Approve Ordinance next Wednesday
Catron County, New Mexico. Citing the rising number of close encounters with wolves, particularly where children are involved, the Catron County Commissioners approved a resolution on Wednesday, January 17, which sets the stage for enacting a county-wide ordinance allowing the Commissioners to give the go-ahead to kill Mexican wolves which threaten human lives.
The Catron County Commission agenda for the next Commission meeting on Wednesday, January 24 in Reserve, New Mexico, includes approval of an ordinance which defines the circumstances under which the County may issue a “Dispatch Order”, which is direction issued by the Catron County Commission for physical removal of a wolf by lethal means from within the borders of Catron County. The Dispatch Order will instruct the County’s Wolf Incident Investigator, Jess Carey, to notify the US Wildlife Service to remove an identified wolf from the County within twenty four hours, or Carey is authorized to execute the removal himself. The Order is meant to make sure that the identified wolf is permanently removed, so that the threat is eliminated and the wolf will not have any opportunity to re-enter the boundaries of Catron County.
Carey says that an attack on a human, particularly a child or an elderly person, is inevitable at the rate the incidents of wolf attack are occurring on dogs, cats and other domestic animals which live close to or with humans. In November, for instance, a dog was attacked by a wolf within several feet of an eight year old girl. The Commissioners and Carey agree that existing rules and standard operating procedures for the Mexican Gray Wolf Reintroduction Project are not sufficient to ensure protection of humans and that the County has the right and the obligation to protect its citizens.
For more information contact Bill Aymar, Catron County Manager, 505.533.6462 ccmanager@gilanet.com
Phone 505.773.4897
Email: lif.strand@gmail.com
CATRON COUNTY TO APPROVE LETHAL TAKING OF MEXICAN WOLF
Commissioners Will Approve Ordinance next Wednesday
Catron County, New Mexico. Citing the rising number of close encounters with wolves, particularly where children are involved, the Catron County Commissioners approved a resolution on Wednesday, January 17, which sets the stage for enacting a county-wide ordinance allowing the Commissioners to give the go-ahead to kill Mexican wolves which threaten human lives.
The Catron County Commission agenda for the next Commission meeting on Wednesday, January 24 in Reserve, New Mexico, includes approval of an ordinance which defines the circumstances under which the County may issue a “Dispatch Order”, which is direction issued by the Catron County Commission for physical removal of a wolf by lethal means from within the borders of Catron County. The Dispatch Order will instruct the County’s Wolf Incident Investigator, Jess Carey, to notify the US Wildlife Service to remove an identified wolf from the County within twenty four hours, or Carey is authorized to execute the removal himself. The Order is meant to make sure that the identified wolf is permanently removed, so that the threat is eliminated and the wolf will not have any opportunity to re-enter the boundaries of Catron County.
Carey says that an attack on a human, particularly a child or an elderly person, is inevitable at the rate the incidents of wolf attack are occurring on dogs, cats and other domestic animals which live close to or with humans. In November, for instance, a dog was attacked by a wolf within several feet of an eight year old girl. The Commissioners and Carey agree that existing rules and standard operating procedures for the Mexican Gray Wolf Reintroduction Project are not sufficient to ensure protection of humans and that the County has the right and the obligation to protect its citizens.
For more information contact Bill Aymar, Catron County Manager, 505.533.6462 ccmanager@gilanet.com
NEWS ROUNDUP
Wyoming begins second year of test-and-slaughter program State wildlife managers captured and tested 79 adult elk for brucellosis this week, the second year of a pilot test-and-slaughter program that Wyoming hopes will reduce the prevalence of the disease. Thirteen of the elk tested positive for brucellosis and were shipped off to slaughter, according to a news release Wednesday from the state Game and Fish Department. Brucellosis is a disease that can cause pregnant elk, cattle and bison to abort their fetuses. Ranchers who worry about the elk spreading the disease to cattle support the test-and-slaughter program. But some environmentalists oppose the program, saying eliminating state elk feedgrounds would be a better way of controlling the disease....
Death of Horse Blamed on Endangered Wolf Pack A horse belonging to a Catron County, N.M., family has been killed by a pack of endangered Mexican gray wolves, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Mark Miller and his family returned to their homestead on the Diamond Creek in southwestern New Mexico about three weeks ago to find the remains of their horse. Tracks show the wolves apparently chased the horse from a pasture into a corral and killed it. Miller said his family has tried yelling at the wolves, throwing rocks and installing noisemakers, but the Aspen Pack--particularly the alpha male--continues to be problematic. Miller said personnel with the wolf reintroduction team responded quickly to the report of the horse kill, but he thinks they may be just giving the family "lip service." Elizabeth Slown, a Fish and Wildlife spokeswoman based in Albuquerque, said attempts by the team to scare the male wolf from Miller's property haven't been successful and that helicopters have searched for the wolf three times in an effort to dart it. "It hasn't worked," Slown said. "We would like to try trapping it, but we are waiting for the weather to clear up a bit. We know the wolf is a problem because hazing hasn't modified its behavior." Miller and his wife said they are concerned about their 8-year-old daughter's safety....
Column - The Wolf’s At the Door John B. Kendrick was a classic rags-to-riches western story. A penniless, half-educated, Texas orphan, he moved to Wyoming, rising in the livestock industry until by the beginning of the 20th century he was one of the region’s biggest cattleman, with nine separate ranches in two counties in Wyoming and four counties in Montana. In 1910, Kendrick was elected to the Wyoming state Senate. He became governor in 1914 and the first popularly elected U.S. Senator in 1916. He served in the Senate until 1933, when he died of a brain hemorrhage. Like other ranchers of that era, Kendrick was plagued by wolves. In 1912, Kendrick paid a trapper $10 for dead pups and $20 for killing grown wolves, according to Cynde Georgen’s biography, One Cowboy’s Dream. His records indicate he paid out about $1,000 a year—somewhere between 50 and 100 wolves annually removed from the gene pool. Yesterday, in a widely expected action, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has proposed removing the timber wolf in the Rockies from its list of threatened and endangered species. The outcry from the cattle and sheep producing states of Idaho, Montana and Wyoming when the wolf was originally reintroduced was shrill. The reaction to the “delisting” proposal is nearly as shrill, though spread a little more evenly among the population....
Group wants Prairie Dog Day to take groundhog's place It's time for Punxsutawney Phil to share his moment in the sun - or shadow. A nuisance to many ranchers, the prairie dog would be widely honored if one group has its way. At least that's the goal of a Denver-based conservation group that wants to make Feb. 2 a celebration of the groundhog's smaller, Western kin, the prairie dog. So far, the Forest Guardians group has persuaded four communities - including Boulder, Colo., and Sante Fe, N.M. - to designate Feb. 2 as Prairie Dog Day. An official with the group says it hopes to spread the idea across the West. "Not Nebraska this year, but maybe next year," said Lauren McCain, desert and grasslands coordinator for Forest Guardians, a group dedicated to conservation of forests and threatened and endangered species. But what the group calls a "new twist" on the Groundhog Day tradition is viewed as totally twisted by many ranchers and horse owners, who cuss prairie dogs like a cockleburr in a cowboy boot. "Most people you call around here will tell you they're a nuisance," said Mike Roumpf, a horse owner and city council member in Crawford, in far northwest Nebraska. "Guys come up here to shoot them," Roumpf said. "They don't shoot groundhogs." He predicted that Crawford wouldn't jump aboard the Prairie Dog Day bandwagon. That doesn't faze the Forest Guardians, which has offices in Sante Fe and Denver. McCain said the main goal of a Prairie Dog Day is to celebrate the critter's role as an icon of the West....
Busting five myths about our car-happy culture How much of the United States is developed? Twenty-five percent? Fifty? Seventy-five? How about 5.4 percent? That's the Census Bureau's figure. And even much of that is not exactly crowded: The bureau says that an area is "developed" when it has 30 or more people per square mile. But most people do live in developed areas, so it's easy to get the impression that humans have trampled nature. One need only take a cross-country flight and look down, however, to realize that our nation is mostly open space. And there are signs that Mother Nature is gaining ground. After furious tree chopping during America's early years, forests have made a comeback. The U.S. Forest Service notes the "total area of forests has been fairly stable since about 1920." Agricultural innovations have a lot to do with this. Farmers can raise more on less land. Yes, American houses are getting bigger. From 1970 to 2000, the average size ballooned from 1,500 square feet to 2,260. But this hardly means we're gobbling up ever more land. U.S. homeowners are using land more efficiently. Between 1970 and 2000, the average lot size shrank from 14,000 square feet to 10,000. In truth, housing in this country takes up less space than most people realize. If the nation were divided into four-person households and each household had an acre, everyone would fit in an area half the size of Texas. The United States is not coming anywhere close to becoming an "Asphalt Nation," to use the title of a book by Jane Holtz Kay....
Grijalva to head National Parks subcommittee U.S. Rep. Raúl Grijalva D-Ariz., was named chairman of the National Parks, Forests and Public Lands Subcommittee of the Natural Resources Committee on Wednesday. This is Grijalva's first chairmanship since his election to Congress in 2002. The subcommittee handles matters concerning the Bureau of Land Management, National Wilderness Preservation System, U.S. Forest Service and National Park Service. His first order of business was to introduce a bill to expand the boundaries of Saguaro National Park.... You will recall that Mr. Grijalva is the primary sponsor of the grazing buyout legislation. Do you reckon Jimmy Bason will be lobbying him?
Natural gas project set to move into moose habitat Drilling rigs soon will move into moose habitat on the Grand Mesa National Forest near Vega Reservoir, and the U.S. Forest Service wants to hear public opinion about the project. Beginning late this year, Laramie Energy plans to drill 32 natural gas wells on five well pads near Hightower Mountain on Grand Mesa and construct 3.5 miles of gas lines and a compressor station. The wells will be spaced 40 acres apart. The company plans to develop leases it purchased during a Bureau of Land Management lease sale last year, but its plans must be approved by forest officials before construction can begin. The Forest Service is not looking for public comment about whether the project should move forward; rather, it seeks comment about the placement of the wells and how the project will impact the land, said Niccole Mortenson....
Burst pipe causes oil spill near condor sanctuary About 200 to 300 gallons of oil were spilled in the Los Padres National Forest on Tuesday and ran into a nearby creek, the Bureau of Land Management said Wednesday. It happened in the Sespe Oil Field when a pipe containing a mixture of groundwater and oil burst, said BLM spokesman David Christy. The mixture was about 90 percent groundwater. The oil field is on private land within the forest's boundaries, north of Fillmore. The spill made its way about two miles down Tar Creek, Christy said. An oily sheen on the water due to natural seepage of oil and tar into the water made it difficult to determine if the oil made it farther downstream, he said. Tar Creek runs along the Sespe Condor Sanctuary, but the oil is not believed to have reached that far downstream....
Column - Declining park visits: Good news, or ominous? The number of visitors to many national parks in Utah and around the country is dropping. According to a recent article by The Los Angeles Times' Julie Cart, overnight stays in national parks fell 20 percent between 1995 and 2005, and tent and backcountry camping dropped 24 percent during the same period. The Federal Parks and Recreation newsletter reported visitation decreased 1.9 percent from 2005 to 2006. But the numbers were actually worse. An extra 2.1 million who attended the Cherry Blossom Festival in Washington, D.C. were counted in 2006, but not in 2005. In Utah, park visitation fell 1.8 percent in 2005. Bryce Canyon and Hovenweep both experienced a 17 percent decline. The decreases raise issues for those of us here in Utah who love national parks, as well as for gateway-community residents and gear manufacturers relying heavily on the money park visitors generate. From a purely selfish standpoint, I view the decline favorably. Increased visitation can detract from the experience. Many parks, trails and campgrounds have reached their "people capacity," and resources were becoming damaged. There are many reasons for the decline....
Rey says new forest worker business model planned A top Bush administration forestry official announced Wednesday the Forest Service will try a new business model for contract work in federal forests to help prevent worker abuse and encourage investment in rural communities. Mark Rey, Agriculture Department undersecretary for natural resources and the environment, said test programs are planned this year for three national forests — the Colville in Washington state, Shasta Trinity in Northern California, and the Allegheny in Pennsylvania. The goal is to make forest management projects into long-term projects stretching over 10 years to allow contractors to invest in equipment and training for workers, and to allow them to build stronger ties to the community, Rey and other federal officials said. "What we're trying to do with this new business model is see if we can respond to some of the problems that the current contracting system creates in terms of making it more difficult for local communities to participate," Rey said. Bids for work such as reforestation or forest thinning projects typically cover only one year and rely heavily on the lowest bidder — too often a "fly-by-night" or unscrupulous contractor who abuses immigrant workers mostly from Mexico, Rey and other officials said at a public hearing on forest worker conditions at the University of Oregon....
Geothermal Energy Controversy In Central Oregon The reason the hot water exists is because Newberry sits on top of millions of dollars worth of high-value pumice and geothermal energy. The popular recreational area where I sat that night is the focus of one of Oregon’s most controversial Measure 37 claims and the West’s future of sustainable energy resources. Several companies, most specifically the Portland-based LPP Resources, which owns some of the Newberry property, have plans to build a geothermal power plant on the west flank of the crater. These kinds of power plants use heat and steam from the earth’s core to crank turbines and generate electricity. The upside is the plants work without all the emissions associated with coal energy. The downside is they are often located in remote and scenic areas - such as the case with Newberry, one of only three national monuments in Oregon. In addition to the power plant, James Miller, a general partner with LPP Resources, and his company have drawn up plans to construct a large scale pumice mine and 100 homes inside the monument. All told, the partnership values the developments at $203 million. Basically the question we’re dealing with here is what’s more important, taking advantage of a natural, efficient power supply or conserving the beauty of a state treasure? It’s a question with passionate support on each side. Let’s take a look at some of the facts....
Government has a new plan for fire season With wildfires burning a hole in the U.S. Forest Service budget, the federal government has a new plan for the 2007 fire season. And already officials are anticipating cries of concern from Western governors and municipal leaders. "It's going to make them very nervous. It's a very sensitive political issue," Mark Rey, under-secretary of Agriculture for Natural Resources and Environment, told reporters after outlining the plan to Western senators at a Senate Energy Committee hearing led by Sen. Jeff Bingaman, a Silver City Democrat, on Tuesday. Instead of allocating resources among nine fire regions, the plan calls for a single commander over Forest Service smoke jumpers, Hotshot crews, planes and helicopters. Assets will be moved more often from state to state to meet predicted threats, Rey said. The new plan comes at a time of increasing alarm in Congress over the cost to the federal budget of fighting wildfires, which last year burned almost 9.9 million acres. The cost has tripled since 1999, up to a record $2 billion last year on fire suppression alone, said Bingaman. At the current trend, Congress could have to find an additional $900 million by this summer's end, he warned....
Coyote traps catch wolves In recent years as wolf populations have expanded, the number of incidents of wolves caught in coyote traps has increased. On many occasions, the wolves can be released without major injury. But there have been a few wolf deaths. For example, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service euthanized an old female wolf in the LaBarge area last week. Fish and Wildlife Service wolf recovery leader Mike Jimenez said he was notified by a coyote trapper on a private ranch west of LaBarge that a wolf had been caught in a coyote trap, but had broken away, taking the trap and its drag chain with it. The landowner had seen two wolves together in the area, Jimenez reported. He entered the area and tracked the two wolves, following the trail where the wolf would get the chain tangled and stuck, then break free and once again be on the move. Jimenez finally located the wolf with the trap, and because of damage to the animal’s leg, put the wolf down. The second wolf remains in the area....
Nez Perce Tribe welcomes delisting of Idaho wolves Officials with the Nez Perce Tribe in northern Idaho say they support the federal government's plans to remove wolves from the list of protected animals, and attribute much of the success of wolves in the state to the tribe's wolf management efforts. "Wolves are such a highly regarded species historically to our people," Rebecca Miles, chairwoman of the Nez Perce Tribal Executive Committee, told The Lewiston Tribune. "It's a huge accomplishment by all the parties. We know it is time for delisting. In spite of any debate elsewhere, the tribe is very supportive of that effort." The Interior Department on Monday said it would like to remove about 1,200 wolves in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming from the endangered and threatened list within a year, making state and tribal governments responsible for keeping their numbers at healthy levels. "The Nez Perce Tribe has been leading wolf management efforts from about the first time we put wolves back into north central Idaho, and they have been doing an outstanding job," said Ed Bangs, wolf recovery coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service at Billings, Mont....
Wild pigs march on California Using computer-aided mapping and records of hunting tags, a scientist supported by the University of California Exotic/Invasive Pests and Diseases Research Program has calculated how far wild pigs have expanded their range in California to encourage using alternative methods to control their spread. Wild pigs have long been considered a threat to native species and especially native plants in California. But what has been irritating is moving toward threatening as the wild pigs encroach on less-wild locations. “Unless we find better ways to manage wild pigs, California will risk losing many of its unique plants and animals,” says Rick Sweitzer, a wildlife ecologist at the University of North Dakota. “Equally important, agricultural losses might become enormously costly if wastes from wild pigs spread into croplands.” Mr. Sweitzer and his research team compiled a database of more than 70,000 wild pig harvest locations, which they used to determine the pace of range expansion by the species in California over the last 13 years. Preliminary results indicate they expanded their range by more than 7,000 square miles between 1992 and 2004....
Fish agency considers petition to remove or kill sea lions The federal government will consider a petition by three states to remove or kill troublesome sea lions in order to protect endangered salmon and steelhead headed upriver through Bonneville Dam to Columbia and Snake river spawning grounds. The action applies to fish protected by the federal Endangered Species Act, which includes about a dozen Columbia and Snake river fish populations, Brian Gorman, spokesman for the NOAA Fisheries Service, said Tuesday. A decision to remove or kill the sea lions, he said, likely will be a year or more away. The Marine Mammal Protection Act, established in 1972, protects California sea lions and many other species, although the sea lions are far from endangered. Accepting the application starts a process that will set up a task force and request public comment on the petition from Oregon, Washington and Idaho. Fishermen contend the sea lions, who gather at the base of the dam as salmon head upriver, eat too many of the fish and reduce the available catch....
Case pits bald eagle against sacred rites Winslow Friday needed a bald eagle. A sacred Northern Arapaho Indian religious ceremony was approaching, and Friday needed an eagle's wing, plume and feathers to perform his part of an ancient ritual Sun Dance so that his prayers would be carried up to God. So Friday went out with his rifle one day in March 2005 and shot one of the rare birds as it soared above the sprawling Wind River Indian Reservation in western Wyoming. In killing the eagle, Friday believed, he was answering a higher calling and fulfilling a solemn religious duty. But he also was breaking the law - a strict federal statute intended to safeguard the nation's symbolic bird that bars anyone from even touching a bald eagle feather without explicit government permission. Friday's own uncle, a wildlife officer on the reservation, reported the shooting to federal officials, and Friday soon was arrested and charged with violating the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act, a crime punishable by up to a year in prison and a $100,000 fine. Now, as Friday's case makes its way through the courts - possibly on its way to the U.S. Supreme Court - it has become a closely watched test of the federal government's ability to balance two sharply conflicting obligations: the congressional mandate to protect a fragile national symbol, and the constitutional requirement to protect a fragile Native American way of life....
Bald eagle flies out of peril The bald eagle, America's signature bird, is likely to be removed from the endangered species list within two weeks, after one of the most successful conservation efforts in history. But the delisting itself isn't the result of direct action by environmentalists. The eagle is about to leave the federal nest because of a lawsuit by the conservative, Sacramento-based Pacific Legal Foundation, a nonprofit law firm that has waged war against environmental regulation. Former President Clinton first promised to delist it in 1999, with a bald eagle at his side during a White House ceremony. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service never followed through, claiming the bird's wide-ranging nature and diverse habitats complicated planning for the status change. So the Pacific Legal Foundation agreed to represent Edmund Contoski, a Minnesota property owner who claims he was prevented from subdividing a lakefront parcel because bald eagles nested in the trees. The foundation sued in 2005, hoping to force delisting. In August 2006, a federal judge agreed with Schiff and Contoski, ordering the government to rule on the eagle's status by Feb. 16. Most observers expect the decision will be to delist the eagle. Environmental groups support that. The eagle's numbers for 2006, still estimates, indicate there are 9,350 breeding pairs in the lower 48 states, a dramatic improvement from about 417 in 1963....
Lawsuits threaten traditional outdoor activities Sportsmen and women, and the many activities they enjoy, continue to be targets of anti-hunting, anti-trapping and anti-fishing groups. The tactics used by many of these groups have changed in recent years, with less emphasis on public demonstrations and more on creating havoc through frivolous lawsuits. One such lawsuit was filed last fall against the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife concerning the status of the Canada Lynx. The U.S. Sportsmen’s Alliance Foundation, affiliated with the U.S Sportsmen’s Alliance, filed to represent sportsmen in Maine in this precedent-setting lawsuit brought by animal activists to derail hunting, fishing and trapping for abundant game wherever endangered or threatened species exist. In October 2006, the animal rights group sued to expand endangered and threatened species protections to healthy and abundant wildlife populations. "Our goal is to prevent the animal rights movement from manipulating the Endangered Species Act to ban hunting, fishing and trapping," said Rob Sexton, USSAF vice president for government affairs. "The case could set a precedent that affects the future of hunting, fishing and trapping and how they are used as wildlife management tools."....
Polar bears put Alaska oil development at risk Until now, the Alaskan oil industry and polar bears have coexisted peacefully, but proposals by the U.S. government to list polar bears as endangered by global warming have cast a shadow on oil development on Alaska's North Slope. Until now, the Alaskan oil industry and polar bears have coexisted peacefully, but proposals by the U.S. government to list polar bears as endangered by global warming have cast a shadow on oil development on Alaska's North Slope. A "threatened" listing for the struggling bears, proposed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, could bring new regulatory hurdles for future exploration and drilling, industry advocates say. Listing the bears as threatened "has the potential to damage Alaska's and the nation's economy without any benefit to polar bear numbers or their habitat," Gov. Sarah Palin wrote in a letter to U.S. Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne that argued against the listing and its protections....
Beefy Security Last week Charles Benbrook, chief scientist at the Organic Center in Oregon, told farmers gathered at Asilomar that the key to preventing another deadly E. coli outbreak is not more self-imposed regulation, but collaboration with livestock owners. “I don’t believe farmers and food processors in California can solve this alone,” Benbrook told the audience at the 27th annual Eco-Farm Conference. “Part of the solution is going to entail changing how cattle are managed when they exist in and around important fruit and vegetable growing areas.” It’s an idea that has taken hold in the Salinas Valley in the months since last fall’s outbreak, amid much confusion and with mixed popularity. Lou Calcagno, county supervisor and owner of Moonglow Dairy in Moss Landing, says in the last two or three months many Salinas Valley cattlemen have voluntarily removed animals from confined areas near productive ag land. “I’m getting very disappointed and angry with this situation and the way it’s being handled,” says Soledad rancher Clem Albertoni, who recently sold 15 roping steers and horses that had been corralled near the fields after hearing that regulations were on the way barring confined cattle operations near crops....
Calves, cows continue dying We're getting a clearer picture of what our winter weather's doing to ranchers and cattle east of the I-25 corridor. The farther southeast you go, the more disturbing the picture gets. In the very southeast corner of our state, cattle are big business in Baca County. It's calving season right now, but County Commissioners say they're getting reports from some ranchers that 50 percent of the calves that are born are dying. The arctic cold and snow is too much for them. Rancher Bill Brooks says he's lost about 25 calves in the past couple of weeks. "That's twice what we normally lose in the whole year for all the cows, so we're just getting started and we got 200 to go," he says. A lot of ranchers say they're spending five times more than usual on feed this year. Rancher Leroy Haddock said he usually has enough hay and feed for his cows, but this year he's frequently driving 200 miles to Pueblo to buy feed. "I went to Pueblo yesterday, got a load of feed, cost me $100 a day to feed my animals right now 'cause all of our pastures are under 2 feet of snow," he says....
Cattle dispute continues Canadian cattle at a Swift packing plant in Nebraska were delivered directly from Canada, not by a South Dakota livestock producer, a U.S. Department of Agriculture investigation has determined. Federal law requires Canadian cattle to be shipped only in sealed trucks to feedlots or slaughterhouses. However, the South Dakota cattleman involved believes some cattle he bought at livestock auctions in the state came from Canada. The USDA investigation started after the Swift plant informed Jan Vandyke of Wessington Springs that it was withholding payment for seven head of cattle he sold to the packer in November. Vandyke then contacted the USDA, state ag officials, livestock groups and politicians to see what had happened and how he could be paid for the cattle. A USDA official said Wednesday that the investigation revealed that the Canadian cattle were never at Vandyke's operation. Instead, the investigation showed the cattle in question were shipped directly to the plant from Manitoba, Canada, as is allowed by law. The USDA was able to use import documents to determine that the animals entered the United States legally, the ag department spokesman said. But Vandyke said he's sure the cattle were in his yard. He said he remembers seeing the distinct ear tags. Vandyke said his family members also remember the eartags. "I have unanswered questions galore," Vandyke said....
USDA Announces Farm Bill Plan The opening salvo of the Farm Bill battle was fired by USDA on Wednesday as it presented a wide ranging plan for the 2007 Farm Bill. While the recommendations are simply proposals for Congress to consider, Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns said these ideas were based on farmer input from listening sessions held across the nation. Most of the recommendations are restructuring of current programs and not totally new initiatives. The Secretary said that the message he heard over and over from farmers that they like the way the current Farm Bill was structured. Critics of the administration plan said USDA is simply rearranging the deck chairs to hide the fact they are cutting funding from farm programs. The more than 65 proposals correspond to the 2002 Farm Bill titles with additional special focus areas, including specialty crops, beginning farmers and ranchers, and socially disadvantaged producers.... Go here for the USDA info packet.
Plans under way for endurance ride on Santa Fe Trail For the past year, the 62-year-old retired real estate developer and his wife, Beverly, have been putting together The Great Santa Fe Trail Horse Race. It starts Sept. 3 in Santa Fe, N.M. and ends Sept. 15 in Missouri, broken down into 10 rides of about 50 miles a day over 515 miles. Phillips got the idea after hearing the story of Francis X. Aubry, a trader who in 1848 made a $1,000 bet that he could traverse the trail from Santa Fe to its start in Independence, Mo., in six days. He took five days and 16 hours to cover the 800-mile route that normally took a month and established a record that stands to this day. "When I heard that story, I thought we've got to do something about the Santa Fe Trail and get the world excited about it again," Phillips said. The riders will cover the sweeping landscape of open prairies and rolling plains that greeted travelers heading west with trade goods or in search of a better place to live. "It will always be near to what we consider the trail. We're in real close proximity and I doubt we'll spend a night on land that wasn't camped on by people in covered wagons," Phillips said. The trail opened in 1821 when Missouri trader William Becknell became the first to use it to haul goods by mule train to Santa Fe, then part of Mexico....
It’s The Pitts - Bumper To Bumper He promised her a life of travel and culture, of meeting interesting people and constant companionship. So here she was behind the wheel of an eighteen wheeler stuck in Denver traffic while her "sleeping bag" was sawing logs in the sleeper. She had a South Dakota address, her home on wheels was a Kenworth and her only constant companion was the trailer in her mirrors. The only people this gear-jamming-mama ever met were at the truck stop or on the C.B. The only culture she was exposed to was if they happened to stop at a TCBY for some yogurt. Her hobby was reading, not books, but billboards and bumper stickers. Stuck in the stop-and-go traffic she had read all the classics. The commuters wore their feelings on their car bumpers. She pulled on the air horn as a car passed with a sticker that read, Honk If You Love Jesus. Then she got embarrassed when another car passed with a bumper that crudely said, Honk If You Are Horny. A four-wheel drive pickup passed that was Insured by Smith and Wesson. A patriotic bumper simply stated The Marines Could Use A Few Good Men. The lady trucker muttered to herself, "Couldn't we all?"....
Wyoming begins second year of test-and-slaughter program State wildlife managers captured and tested 79 adult elk for brucellosis this week, the second year of a pilot test-and-slaughter program that Wyoming hopes will reduce the prevalence of the disease. Thirteen of the elk tested positive for brucellosis and were shipped off to slaughter, according to a news release Wednesday from the state Game and Fish Department. Brucellosis is a disease that can cause pregnant elk, cattle and bison to abort their fetuses. Ranchers who worry about the elk spreading the disease to cattle support the test-and-slaughter program. But some environmentalists oppose the program, saying eliminating state elk feedgrounds would be a better way of controlling the disease....
Death of Horse Blamed on Endangered Wolf Pack A horse belonging to a Catron County, N.M., family has been killed by a pack of endangered Mexican gray wolves, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Mark Miller and his family returned to their homestead on the Diamond Creek in southwestern New Mexico about three weeks ago to find the remains of their horse. Tracks show the wolves apparently chased the horse from a pasture into a corral and killed it. Miller said his family has tried yelling at the wolves, throwing rocks and installing noisemakers, but the Aspen Pack--particularly the alpha male--continues to be problematic. Miller said personnel with the wolf reintroduction team responded quickly to the report of the horse kill, but he thinks they may be just giving the family "lip service." Elizabeth Slown, a Fish and Wildlife spokeswoman based in Albuquerque, said attempts by the team to scare the male wolf from Miller's property haven't been successful and that helicopters have searched for the wolf three times in an effort to dart it. "It hasn't worked," Slown said. "We would like to try trapping it, but we are waiting for the weather to clear up a bit. We know the wolf is a problem because hazing hasn't modified its behavior." Miller and his wife said they are concerned about their 8-year-old daughter's safety....
Column - The Wolf’s At the Door John B. Kendrick was a classic rags-to-riches western story. A penniless, half-educated, Texas orphan, he moved to Wyoming, rising in the livestock industry until by the beginning of the 20th century he was one of the region’s biggest cattleman, with nine separate ranches in two counties in Wyoming and four counties in Montana. In 1910, Kendrick was elected to the Wyoming state Senate. He became governor in 1914 and the first popularly elected U.S. Senator in 1916. He served in the Senate until 1933, when he died of a brain hemorrhage. Like other ranchers of that era, Kendrick was plagued by wolves. In 1912, Kendrick paid a trapper $10 for dead pups and $20 for killing grown wolves, according to Cynde Georgen’s biography, One Cowboy’s Dream. His records indicate he paid out about $1,000 a year—somewhere between 50 and 100 wolves annually removed from the gene pool. Yesterday, in a widely expected action, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has proposed removing the timber wolf in the Rockies from its list of threatened and endangered species. The outcry from the cattle and sheep producing states of Idaho, Montana and Wyoming when the wolf was originally reintroduced was shrill. The reaction to the “delisting” proposal is nearly as shrill, though spread a little more evenly among the population....
Group wants Prairie Dog Day to take groundhog's place It's time for Punxsutawney Phil to share his moment in the sun - or shadow. A nuisance to many ranchers, the prairie dog would be widely honored if one group has its way. At least that's the goal of a Denver-based conservation group that wants to make Feb. 2 a celebration of the groundhog's smaller, Western kin, the prairie dog. So far, the Forest Guardians group has persuaded four communities - including Boulder, Colo., and Sante Fe, N.M. - to designate Feb. 2 as Prairie Dog Day. An official with the group says it hopes to spread the idea across the West. "Not Nebraska this year, but maybe next year," said Lauren McCain, desert and grasslands coordinator for Forest Guardians, a group dedicated to conservation of forests and threatened and endangered species. But what the group calls a "new twist" on the Groundhog Day tradition is viewed as totally twisted by many ranchers and horse owners, who cuss prairie dogs like a cockleburr in a cowboy boot. "Most people you call around here will tell you they're a nuisance," said Mike Roumpf, a horse owner and city council member in Crawford, in far northwest Nebraska. "Guys come up here to shoot them," Roumpf said. "They don't shoot groundhogs." He predicted that Crawford wouldn't jump aboard the Prairie Dog Day bandwagon. That doesn't faze the Forest Guardians, which has offices in Sante Fe and Denver. McCain said the main goal of a Prairie Dog Day is to celebrate the critter's role as an icon of the West....
Busting five myths about our car-happy culture How much of the United States is developed? Twenty-five percent? Fifty? Seventy-five? How about 5.4 percent? That's the Census Bureau's figure. And even much of that is not exactly crowded: The bureau says that an area is "developed" when it has 30 or more people per square mile. But most people do live in developed areas, so it's easy to get the impression that humans have trampled nature. One need only take a cross-country flight and look down, however, to realize that our nation is mostly open space. And there are signs that Mother Nature is gaining ground. After furious tree chopping during America's early years, forests have made a comeback. The U.S. Forest Service notes the "total area of forests has been fairly stable since about 1920." Agricultural innovations have a lot to do with this. Farmers can raise more on less land. Yes, American houses are getting bigger. From 1970 to 2000, the average size ballooned from 1,500 square feet to 2,260. But this hardly means we're gobbling up ever more land. U.S. homeowners are using land more efficiently. Between 1970 and 2000, the average lot size shrank from 14,000 square feet to 10,000. In truth, housing in this country takes up less space than most people realize. If the nation were divided into four-person households and each household had an acre, everyone would fit in an area half the size of Texas. The United States is not coming anywhere close to becoming an "Asphalt Nation," to use the title of a book by Jane Holtz Kay....
Grijalva to head National Parks subcommittee U.S. Rep. Raúl Grijalva D-Ariz., was named chairman of the National Parks, Forests and Public Lands Subcommittee of the Natural Resources Committee on Wednesday. This is Grijalva's first chairmanship since his election to Congress in 2002. The subcommittee handles matters concerning the Bureau of Land Management, National Wilderness Preservation System, U.S. Forest Service and National Park Service. His first order of business was to introduce a bill to expand the boundaries of Saguaro National Park.... You will recall that Mr. Grijalva is the primary sponsor of the grazing buyout legislation. Do you reckon Jimmy Bason will be lobbying him?
Natural gas project set to move into moose habitat Drilling rigs soon will move into moose habitat on the Grand Mesa National Forest near Vega Reservoir, and the U.S. Forest Service wants to hear public opinion about the project. Beginning late this year, Laramie Energy plans to drill 32 natural gas wells on five well pads near Hightower Mountain on Grand Mesa and construct 3.5 miles of gas lines and a compressor station. The wells will be spaced 40 acres apart. The company plans to develop leases it purchased during a Bureau of Land Management lease sale last year, but its plans must be approved by forest officials before construction can begin. The Forest Service is not looking for public comment about whether the project should move forward; rather, it seeks comment about the placement of the wells and how the project will impact the land, said Niccole Mortenson....
Burst pipe causes oil spill near condor sanctuary About 200 to 300 gallons of oil were spilled in the Los Padres National Forest on Tuesday and ran into a nearby creek, the Bureau of Land Management said Wednesday. It happened in the Sespe Oil Field when a pipe containing a mixture of groundwater and oil burst, said BLM spokesman David Christy. The mixture was about 90 percent groundwater. The oil field is on private land within the forest's boundaries, north of Fillmore. The spill made its way about two miles down Tar Creek, Christy said. An oily sheen on the water due to natural seepage of oil and tar into the water made it difficult to determine if the oil made it farther downstream, he said. Tar Creek runs along the Sespe Condor Sanctuary, but the oil is not believed to have reached that far downstream....
Column - Declining park visits: Good news, or ominous? The number of visitors to many national parks in Utah and around the country is dropping. According to a recent article by The Los Angeles Times' Julie Cart, overnight stays in national parks fell 20 percent between 1995 and 2005, and tent and backcountry camping dropped 24 percent during the same period. The Federal Parks and Recreation newsletter reported visitation decreased 1.9 percent from 2005 to 2006. But the numbers were actually worse. An extra 2.1 million who attended the Cherry Blossom Festival in Washington, D.C. were counted in 2006, but not in 2005. In Utah, park visitation fell 1.8 percent in 2005. Bryce Canyon and Hovenweep both experienced a 17 percent decline. The decreases raise issues for those of us here in Utah who love national parks, as well as for gateway-community residents and gear manufacturers relying heavily on the money park visitors generate. From a purely selfish standpoint, I view the decline favorably. Increased visitation can detract from the experience. Many parks, trails and campgrounds have reached their "people capacity," and resources were becoming damaged. There are many reasons for the decline....
Rey says new forest worker business model planned A top Bush administration forestry official announced Wednesday the Forest Service will try a new business model for contract work in federal forests to help prevent worker abuse and encourage investment in rural communities. Mark Rey, Agriculture Department undersecretary for natural resources and the environment, said test programs are planned this year for three national forests — the Colville in Washington state, Shasta Trinity in Northern California, and the Allegheny in Pennsylvania. The goal is to make forest management projects into long-term projects stretching over 10 years to allow contractors to invest in equipment and training for workers, and to allow them to build stronger ties to the community, Rey and other federal officials said. "What we're trying to do with this new business model is see if we can respond to some of the problems that the current contracting system creates in terms of making it more difficult for local communities to participate," Rey said. Bids for work such as reforestation or forest thinning projects typically cover only one year and rely heavily on the lowest bidder — too often a "fly-by-night" or unscrupulous contractor who abuses immigrant workers mostly from Mexico, Rey and other officials said at a public hearing on forest worker conditions at the University of Oregon....
Geothermal Energy Controversy In Central Oregon The reason the hot water exists is because Newberry sits on top of millions of dollars worth of high-value pumice and geothermal energy. The popular recreational area where I sat that night is the focus of one of Oregon’s most controversial Measure 37 claims and the West’s future of sustainable energy resources. Several companies, most specifically the Portland-based LPP Resources, which owns some of the Newberry property, have plans to build a geothermal power plant on the west flank of the crater. These kinds of power plants use heat and steam from the earth’s core to crank turbines and generate electricity. The upside is the plants work without all the emissions associated with coal energy. The downside is they are often located in remote and scenic areas - such as the case with Newberry, one of only three national monuments in Oregon. In addition to the power plant, James Miller, a general partner with LPP Resources, and his company have drawn up plans to construct a large scale pumice mine and 100 homes inside the monument. All told, the partnership values the developments at $203 million. Basically the question we’re dealing with here is what’s more important, taking advantage of a natural, efficient power supply or conserving the beauty of a state treasure? It’s a question with passionate support on each side. Let’s take a look at some of the facts....
Government has a new plan for fire season With wildfires burning a hole in the U.S. Forest Service budget, the federal government has a new plan for the 2007 fire season. And already officials are anticipating cries of concern from Western governors and municipal leaders. "It's going to make them very nervous. It's a very sensitive political issue," Mark Rey, under-secretary of Agriculture for Natural Resources and Environment, told reporters after outlining the plan to Western senators at a Senate Energy Committee hearing led by Sen. Jeff Bingaman, a Silver City Democrat, on Tuesday. Instead of allocating resources among nine fire regions, the plan calls for a single commander over Forest Service smoke jumpers, Hotshot crews, planes and helicopters. Assets will be moved more often from state to state to meet predicted threats, Rey said. The new plan comes at a time of increasing alarm in Congress over the cost to the federal budget of fighting wildfires, which last year burned almost 9.9 million acres. The cost has tripled since 1999, up to a record $2 billion last year on fire suppression alone, said Bingaman. At the current trend, Congress could have to find an additional $900 million by this summer's end, he warned....
Coyote traps catch wolves In recent years as wolf populations have expanded, the number of incidents of wolves caught in coyote traps has increased. On many occasions, the wolves can be released without major injury. But there have been a few wolf deaths. For example, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service euthanized an old female wolf in the LaBarge area last week. Fish and Wildlife Service wolf recovery leader Mike Jimenez said he was notified by a coyote trapper on a private ranch west of LaBarge that a wolf had been caught in a coyote trap, but had broken away, taking the trap and its drag chain with it. The landowner had seen two wolves together in the area, Jimenez reported. He entered the area and tracked the two wolves, following the trail where the wolf would get the chain tangled and stuck, then break free and once again be on the move. Jimenez finally located the wolf with the trap, and because of damage to the animal’s leg, put the wolf down. The second wolf remains in the area....
Nez Perce Tribe welcomes delisting of Idaho wolves Officials with the Nez Perce Tribe in northern Idaho say they support the federal government's plans to remove wolves from the list of protected animals, and attribute much of the success of wolves in the state to the tribe's wolf management efforts. "Wolves are such a highly regarded species historically to our people," Rebecca Miles, chairwoman of the Nez Perce Tribal Executive Committee, told The Lewiston Tribune. "It's a huge accomplishment by all the parties. We know it is time for delisting. In spite of any debate elsewhere, the tribe is very supportive of that effort." The Interior Department on Monday said it would like to remove about 1,200 wolves in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming from the endangered and threatened list within a year, making state and tribal governments responsible for keeping their numbers at healthy levels. "The Nez Perce Tribe has been leading wolf management efforts from about the first time we put wolves back into north central Idaho, and they have been doing an outstanding job," said Ed Bangs, wolf recovery coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service at Billings, Mont....
Wild pigs march on California Using computer-aided mapping and records of hunting tags, a scientist supported by the University of California Exotic/Invasive Pests and Diseases Research Program has calculated how far wild pigs have expanded their range in California to encourage using alternative methods to control their spread. Wild pigs have long been considered a threat to native species and especially native plants in California. But what has been irritating is moving toward threatening as the wild pigs encroach on less-wild locations. “Unless we find better ways to manage wild pigs, California will risk losing many of its unique plants and animals,” says Rick Sweitzer, a wildlife ecologist at the University of North Dakota. “Equally important, agricultural losses might become enormously costly if wastes from wild pigs spread into croplands.” Mr. Sweitzer and his research team compiled a database of more than 70,000 wild pig harvest locations, which they used to determine the pace of range expansion by the species in California over the last 13 years. Preliminary results indicate they expanded their range by more than 7,000 square miles between 1992 and 2004....
Fish agency considers petition to remove or kill sea lions The federal government will consider a petition by three states to remove or kill troublesome sea lions in order to protect endangered salmon and steelhead headed upriver through Bonneville Dam to Columbia and Snake river spawning grounds. The action applies to fish protected by the federal Endangered Species Act, which includes about a dozen Columbia and Snake river fish populations, Brian Gorman, spokesman for the NOAA Fisheries Service, said Tuesday. A decision to remove or kill the sea lions, he said, likely will be a year or more away. The Marine Mammal Protection Act, established in 1972, protects California sea lions and many other species, although the sea lions are far from endangered. Accepting the application starts a process that will set up a task force and request public comment on the petition from Oregon, Washington and Idaho. Fishermen contend the sea lions, who gather at the base of the dam as salmon head upriver, eat too many of the fish and reduce the available catch....
Case pits bald eagle against sacred rites Winslow Friday needed a bald eagle. A sacred Northern Arapaho Indian religious ceremony was approaching, and Friday needed an eagle's wing, plume and feathers to perform his part of an ancient ritual Sun Dance so that his prayers would be carried up to God. So Friday went out with his rifle one day in March 2005 and shot one of the rare birds as it soared above the sprawling Wind River Indian Reservation in western Wyoming. In killing the eagle, Friday believed, he was answering a higher calling and fulfilling a solemn religious duty. But he also was breaking the law - a strict federal statute intended to safeguard the nation's symbolic bird that bars anyone from even touching a bald eagle feather without explicit government permission. Friday's own uncle, a wildlife officer on the reservation, reported the shooting to federal officials, and Friday soon was arrested and charged with violating the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act, a crime punishable by up to a year in prison and a $100,000 fine. Now, as Friday's case makes its way through the courts - possibly on its way to the U.S. Supreme Court - it has become a closely watched test of the federal government's ability to balance two sharply conflicting obligations: the congressional mandate to protect a fragile national symbol, and the constitutional requirement to protect a fragile Native American way of life....
Bald eagle flies out of peril The bald eagle, America's signature bird, is likely to be removed from the endangered species list within two weeks, after one of the most successful conservation efforts in history. But the delisting itself isn't the result of direct action by environmentalists. The eagle is about to leave the federal nest because of a lawsuit by the conservative, Sacramento-based Pacific Legal Foundation, a nonprofit law firm that has waged war against environmental regulation. Former President Clinton first promised to delist it in 1999, with a bald eagle at his side during a White House ceremony. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service never followed through, claiming the bird's wide-ranging nature and diverse habitats complicated planning for the status change. So the Pacific Legal Foundation agreed to represent Edmund Contoski, a Minnesota property owner who claims he was prevented from subdividing a lakefront parcel because bald eagles nested in the trees. The foundation sued in 2005, hoping to force delisting. In August 2006, a federal judge agreed with Schiff and Contoski, ordering the government to rule on the eagle's status by Feb. 16. Most observers expect the decision will be to delist the eagle. Environmental groups support that. The eagle's numbers for 2006, still estimates, indicate there are 9,350 breeding pairs in the lower 48 states, a dramatic improvement from about 417 in 1963....
Lawsuits threaten traditional outdoor activities Sportsmen and women, and the many activities they enjoy, continue to be targets of anti-hunting, anti-trapping and anti-fishing groups. The tactics used by many of these groups have changed in recent years, with less emphasis on public demonstrations and more on creating havoc through frivolous lawsuits. One such lawsuit was filed last fall against the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife concerning the status of the Canada Lynx. The U.S. Sportsmen’s Alliance Foundation, affiliated with the U.S Sportsmen’s Alliance, filed to represent sportsmen in Maine in this precedent-setting lawsuit brought by animal activists to derail hunting, fishing and trapping for abundant game wherever endangered or threatened species exist. In October 2006, the animal rights group sued to expand endangered and threatened species protections to healthy and abundant wildlife populations. "Our goal is to prevent the animal rights movement from manipulating the Endangered Species Act to ban hunting, fishing and trapping," said Rob Sexton, USSAF vice president for government affairs. "The case could set a precedent that affects the future of hunting, fishing and trapping and how they are used as wildlife management tools."....
Polar bears put Alaska oil development at risk Until now, the Alaskan oil industry and polar bears have coexisted peacefully, but proposals by the U.S. government to list polar bears as endangered by global warming have cast a shadow on oil development on Alaska's North Slope. Until now, the Alaskan oil industry and polar bears have coexisted peacefully, but proposals by the U.S. government to list polar bears as endangered by global warming have cast a shadow on oil development on Alaska's North Slope. A "threatened" listing for the struggling bears, proposed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, could bring new regulatory hurdles for future exploration and drilling, industry advocates say. Listing the bears as threatened "has the potential to damage Alaska's and the nation's economy without any benefit to polar bear numbers or their habitat," Gov. Sarah Palin wrote in a letter to U.S. Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne that argued against the listing and its protections....
Beefy Security Last week Charles Benbrook, chief scientist at the Organic Center in Oregon, told farmers gathered at Asilomar that the key to preventing another deadly E. coli outbreak is not more self-imposed regulation, but collaboration with livestock owners. “I don’t believe farmers and food processors in California can solve this alone,” Benbrook told the audience at the 27th annual Eco-Farm Conference. “Part of the solution is going to entail changing how cattle are managed when they exist in and around important fruit and vegetable growing areas.” It’s an idea that has taken hold in the Salinas Valley in the months since last fall’s outbreak, amid much confusion and with mixed popularity. Lou Calcagno, county supervisor and owner of Moonglow Dairy in Moss Landing, says in the last two or three months many Salinas Valley cattlemen have voluntarily removed animals from confined areas near productive ag land. “I’m getting very disappointed and angry with this situation and the way it’s being handled,” says Soledad rancher Clem Albertoni, who recently sold 15 roping steers and horses that had been corralled near the fields after hearing that regulations were on the way barring confined cattle operations near crops....
Calves, cows continue dying We're getting a clearer picture of what our winter weather's doing to ranchers and cattle east of the I-25 corridor. The farther southeast you go, the more disturbing the picture gets. In the very southeast corner of our state, cattle are big business in Baca County. It's calving season right now, but County Commissioners say they're getting reports from some ranchers that 50 percent of the calves that are born are dying. The arctic cold and snow is too much for them. Rancher Bill Brooks says he's lost about 25 calves in the past couple of weeks. "That's twice what we normally lose in the whole year for all the cows, so we're just getting started and we got 200 to go," he says. A lot of ranchers say they're spending five times more than usual on feed this year. Rancher Leroy Haddock said he usually has enough hay and feed for his cows, but this year he's frequently driving 200 miles to Pueblo to buy feed. "I went to Pueblo yesterday, got a load of feed, cost me $100 a day to feed my animals right now 'cause all of our pastures are under 2 feet of snow," he says....
Cattle dispute continues Canadian cattle at a Swift packing plant in Nebraska were delivered directly from Canada, not by a South Dakota livestock producer, a U.S. Department of Agriculture investigation has determined. Federal law requires Canadian cattle to be shipped only in sealed trucks to feedlots or slaughterhouses. However, the South Dakota cattleman involved believes some cattle he bought at livestock auctions in the state came from Canada. The USDA investigation started after the Swift plant informed Jan Vandyke of Wessington Springs that it was withholding payment for seven head of cattle he sold to the packer in November. Vandyke then contacted the USDA, state ag officials, livestock groups and politicians to see what had happened and how he could be paid for the cattle. A USDA official said Wednesday that the investigation revealed that the Canadian cattle were never at Vandyke's operation. Instead, the investigation showed the cattle in question were shipped directly to the plant from Manitoba, Canada, as is allowed by law. The USDA was able to use import documents to determine that the animals entered the United States legally, the ag department spokesman said. But Vandyke said he's sure the cattle were in his yard. He said he remembers seeing the distinct ear tags. Vandyke said his family members also remember the eartags. "I have unanswered questions galore," Vandyke said....
USDA Announces Farm Bill Plan The opening salvo of the Farm Bill battle was fired by USDA on Wednesday as it presented a wide ranging plan for the 2007 Farm Bill. While the recommendations are simply proposals for Congress to consider, Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns said these ideas were based on farmer input from listening sessions held across the nation. Most of the recommendations are restructuring of current programs and not totally new initiatives. The Secretary said that the message he heard over and over from farmers that they like the way the current Farm Bill was structured. Critics of the administration plan said USDA is simply rearranging the deck chairs to hide the fact they are cutting funding from farm programs. The more than 65 proposals correspond to the 2002 Farm Bill titles with additional special focus areas, including specialty crops, beginning farmers and ranchers, and socially disadvantaged producers.... Go here for the USDA info packet.
Plans under way for endurance ride on Santa Fe Trail For the past year, the 62-year-old retired real estate developer and his wife, Beverly, have been putting together The Great Santa Fe Trail Horse Race. It starts Sept. 3 in Santa Fe, N.M. and ends Sept. 15 in Missouri, broken down into 10 rides of about 50 miles a day over 515 miles. Phillips got the idea after hearing the story of Francis X. Aubry, a trader who in 1848 made a $1,000 bet that he could traverse the trail from Santa Fe to its start in Independence, Mo., in six days. He took five days and 16 hours to cover the 800-mile route that normally took a month and established a record that stands to this day. "When I heard that story, I thought we've got to do something about the Santa Fe Trail and get the world excited about it again," Phillips said. The riders will cover the sweeping landscape of open prairies and rolling plains that greeted travelers heading west with trade goods or in search of a better place to live. "It will always be near to what we consider the trail. We're in real close proximity and I doubt we'll spend a night on land that wasn't camped on by people in covered wagons," Phillips said. The trail opened in 1821 when Missouri trader William Becknell became the first to use it to haul goods by mule train to Santa Fe, then part of Mexico....
It’s The Pitts - Bumper To Bumper He promised her a life of travel and culture, of meeting interesting people and constant companionship. So here she was behind the wheel of an eighteen wheeler stuck in Denver traffic while her "sleeping bag" was sawing logs in the sleeper. She had a South Dakota address, her home on wheels was a Kenworth and her only constant companion was the trailer in her mirrors. The only people this gear-jamming-mama ever met were at the truck stop or on the C.B. The only culture she was exposed to was if they happened to stop at a TCBY for some yogurt. Her hobby was reading, not books, but billboards and bumper stickers. Stuck in the stop-and-go traffic she had read all the classics. The commuters wore their feelings on their car bumpers. She pulled on the air horn as a car passed with a sticker that read, Honk If You Love Jesus. Then she got embarrassed when another car passed with a bumper that crudely said, Honk If You Are Horny. A four-wheel drive pickup passed that was Insured by Smith and Wesson. A patriotic bumper simply stated The Marines Could Use A Few Good Men. The lady trucker muttered to herself, "Couldn't we all?"....
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
NEWS ROUNDUP
10 years to save the planet A NEW worldwide movement backed by celebrities, musicians, politicians and business leaders is aiming to reverse the effects of global warming over the next decade. Global Cool launched in London and LA today and is calling on one billion people to reduce their carbon emissions by just one tonne a year, for the next 10 years. Boffins have found the climatic tipping point - when the climate becomes irreversibly damaged - can be turned back if global CO2 emissions are reduced by one billion tonnes a year. Campaigners then hope cleaner, renewable energy sources such as solar, wind, water and hydrogen would have been developed. Big names including Leonardo Di Caprio, Orlando Bloom, KT Tunstall, Pink, The Killers, Razorlight and Josh Hartnett have thrown their weight behind the worldwide effort to beat climate change....
Waxman Seeks Climate Inquiry Evidence The Democratic chairman of a House panel examining the government's response to climate change said Tuesday there is evidence that senior Bush administration officials sought repeatedly "to mislead the public by injecting doubt into the science of global warming." Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., said he and the top Republican on his oversight committee, Rep. Tom Davis of Virginia, have sought documents from the administration on climate policy, but repeatedly been rebuffed. "The committee isn't trying to obtain state secrets or documents that could affect our immediate national security," said Waxman, opening the hearing. "We are simply seeking answers to whether the White House's political staff is inappropriately censoring impartial government scientists." "We know that the White House possesses documents that contain evidence of an attempt by senior administration officials to mislead the public by injecting doubt into the science of global warming and minimize the potential danger," Waxman said....
U.N. agency pressures Ban on climate crisis summit The U.N. environment agency pressured Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Tuesday to call an emergency climate summit amid dire reports about the risks from global warming. A summit, tentatively planned for September, would focus on the hunt for a successor to the Kyoto Protocol on cutting greenhouse gases widely blamed for forecasts of more heatwaves, floods, droughts and rising sea levels. U.N. environment agencies are lobbying Ban to play a leading role in helping governments battle climate change after Kyoto expires in 2012. But he stopped short on Tuesday of endorsing his officials' proposal for a summit of some 20 key leaders. On Friday, the broadest scientific study of the human effect on the climate is set to conclude there is at least a 90 percent chance that human activities, mainly burning fossil fuels, are to blame for most of the warming in the last 50 years....
Survey shows 13 pct of Americans never heard of global warming Thirteen percent of Americans have never heard of global warming even though their country is the world's top source of greenhouse gases, a 46-country survey showed on Monday. The report, by ACNielsen of more than 25,000 Internet users, showed that 57 percent of people around the world considered global warming a "very serious problem" and a further 34 percent rated it a "serious problem." "It has taken extreme and life-threatening weather patterns to finally drive the message home that global warming is happening and is here to stay unless a concerted, global effort is made to reverse it," said Patrick Dodd, the President of ACNielsen Europe. People in Latin America were most worried while U.S. citizens were least concerned with just 42 percent rating global warming "very serious." The United States emits about a quarter of all greenhouse gases, the biggest emitter ahead of China, Russia and India. Thirteen percent of U.S. citizens said they had never heard or read anything about global warming, the survey said....
Two New Books Confirm Global Warming Is Natural, Moderate Two powerful new books say today's global warming is due not to human activity but primarily to a long, moderate solar-linked cycle. "Unstoppable Global Warming Every 1500 Years," by physicist Fred Singer and economist Dennis Avery was released just before Christmas. "The Chilling Stars: A New Theory of Climate Change," by Danish physicist Henrik Svensmark and former BBC science writer Nigel Calder (Icon Books), is due out in March. Singer and Avery note that most of the earth's recent warming occurred before 1940, and thus before much human-emitted CO2. Moreover, physical evidence shows 600 moderate warmings in the earth's last million years. The evidence ranges from ancient Nile flood records, Chinese court documents and Roman wine grapes to modern spectral analysis of polar ice cores, deep seabed sediments and layered cave stalagmites. "Unstoppable Global Warming" shows the earth's temperatures following variations in solar intensity through centuries of sunspot records, and finds cycles of sun-linked isotopes in ice and tree rings. The book cites the work of Svensmark, who says cosmic rays vary the earth's temperatures by creating more or fewer of the low, wet clouds that cool the earth. It notes that global climate models can't accurately register cloud effects....
California may ban conventional lightbulbs by 2012 A California lawmaker wants to make his state the first to ban incandescent lightbulbs as part of California's groundbreaking initiatives to reduce energy use and greenhouse gases blamed for global warming. The "How Many Legislators Does it Take to Change a Lightbulb Act" would ban incandescent lightbulbs by 2012 in favor of energy-saving compact fluorescent lightbulbs. "Incandescent lightbulbs were first developed almost 125 years ago, and since that time they have undergone no major modifications," California Assemblyman Lloyd Levine said on Tuesday. "Meanwhile, they remain incredibly inefficient, converting only about 5 percent of the energy they receive into light." Levine is expected to introduce the legislation this week, his office said....
Eiffel Tower to switch off lights as scientists finish major report on global warming Even the Eiffel Tower is out to save the planet. On Thursday evening, as scientists and officials put finishing touches on a long-awaited report about global warming, the Paris landmark will switch off its 20,000 flashing light bulbs that run up and down the tower and illuminate the French capital's skyline. The Eiffel Tower's lights account for about 9 percent of the monument's total energy consumption of 7,000 megawatt-hours per year. The five-minute blackout comes at the urging of environmental activists seeking to call attention to energy waste _ and just hours before world scientists on Friday unveil a major report Friday warning that the planet will keep getting warmer and presenting new evidence of humans' role in climate change. Environmental groups are seeking to take advantage of the worldwide attention on the meetings in Paris this week of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The panel will release a report laying out policy proposals for governments based on the latest research on global warming....
The Humane Society Becomes a Political Animal Many people may consider the Humane Society of the United States a pussycat. But with 10 million donors and a $120 million budget, it is becoming a tiger among Washington's interest groups. Just ask Maryland Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. (R) and Rep. Richard W. Pombo (R-Calif.). Actually, make that former governor and then-representative. The Humane Society targeted both in last year's elections after Ehrlich supported bear hunting and Pombo supported commercial whaling and trapping in wildlife refuges. The society also spent lavishly to help pass an initiative in Arizona, fought by agribusiness, that bans inhumane factory farming. And it bested the National Rifle Association on a measure that prohibits the shooting of mourning doves for sport in Michigan. "They are a worthy opponent," said Andrew Arulanandam of the NRA. "They certainly have a lot of backers with deep pockets." "They keep us on our toes," agreed Kelli Ludlum of the American Farm Bureau Federation. "We need all of our members to counter their growing effectiveness."....
Huntsman tables roadless forest petition Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. on Monday told a group of outdoor recreation executives that he was at least temporarily shelving the state's roadless forest petition because of legal uncertainties regarding the issue. Since last year, the governor's office has been crafting a petition that would establish new management guidelines for Utah's nearly 4 million acres of inventoried roadless forest. The petition process was created by the Bush administration in 2005 to replace the Clinton-era roadless rule, which called for the protection of the nation's 50 million acres of roadless forest. Huntsman's petition was controversial, because, unlike California or New Mexico - which requested that all of their roadless areas remain protected - his petition called for the abolition of the roadless designations in Utah and more input into forest management decisions by the state. However, with a recent federal court ruling in California that rejected the Bush administration rule for failing to follow national environmental law - restoring the Clinton rule in the process - the Utah governor has opted to sit the battle out. For now, the Clinton rule remains in effect. "If a [petition] submission is made, we look forward to engaging all appropriate stakeholders, including the outdoor industry," Huntsman said in a statement....
Army wouldn't make good neighbors, rancher says Critics of the Army's plan to expand the Pinon Canyon Maneuver Site are not reassured by suggestions the Pentagon could lease land or make other cooperative agreements with ranchers rather than purchase or condemn land. "There's no way you could let the Army conduct live fire maneuvers on one area of land while you're trying to keep cattle on another section," rancher Lon Robertson said Tuesday. "It just doesn't sound feasible. It also avoids the fundamental question of why the Army thinks they need this land in the first place." Robertson, who lives near Kim and is a founder of the Pinon Canyon Expansion Opposition Coalition, said the Army's claim that it needs to expand the 238,000-acre training area by an additional 418,000 acres doesn't make sense to ranchers and rural communities around the maneuver site, which is southwest of La Junta. "What is it about the Pinon Canyon area that the Army can't find on the 2.5 million acres the Pentagon already owns?" Robertson asked....
Court rejects water rights fees after 4-year fight Family farmers who were wrongfully required to pay a state water rights fee could get some of their money back. After a four-year legal battle, the 3rd District Court of Appeal in Sacramento decided in favor of farmers and ranchers who protested imposition of a new and unconstitutional state fee that resulted in a total collection of more than $20 million. Water rights fees were levied on about 7,000 water rights holders beginning in 2004. The court agreed with the California Farm Bureau Federation that those fees were invalid and unconstitutional. Refund checks, however, aren't in the mail to those wrongfully charged, said Carl Borden, CFBF associate counsel. It's likely the state will appeal the opinion to the California Supreme Court. Legal experts are advising patience as this issue is played out in court....
S.D. House Panel Nixes Game Warden Restrictions A bill that would have restricted game wardens' ability to enter private lands to check for hunting violations was rejected Tuesday by a South Dakota House committee. The Agriculture Committee voted 7-6 to kill the bill after some lawmakers said the state Game, Fish and Parks Department has made a good effort to improve relations with landowners in the two years since a similar bill was rejected by the Legislature. The bill's main sponsor, Rep. Betty Olson, R-Prairie City, said western South Dakota ranchers want to protect their property rights. Game wardens should have to ask permission to enter private land or have a specific reason for doing so, she said. "We'd just like a little appreciation and a little protection from Game, Fish and Parks," Olson said. Olson said about 4 million acres of land in northwestern South Dakota have been closed to hunting because of the issue. Until game wardens' ability to enter private land is restricted, ranchers will not open their land to hunting, except for people who pay for the privilege, she said....
Trial date set for charges in deadly WA wildfire A March 26 trial date has been set for a former U.S. Forest Service crew boss charged with involuntary manslaughter and lying to federal investigators in the 2001 deaths of four firefighters. Ellreese Daniels welcomes the trial to clear his name, Tina Hunt, a federal public defender, said after not guilty pleas were entered Tuesday on behalf of her client. A federal grand jury indicted Daniels, 46, of Leavenworth, on four counts of involuntary manslaughter and seven counts of making material false statements stemming from his role as a fire crew boss in the Thirtymile Fire in Okanogan County in July 2001. Four firefighters died when flames trapped the crew and two civilians in the Chewuch River Canyon....
Four states involved in project to deal with drilling permit backlog Driven by accelerating oil and gas development on federal lands, in 2005 Congress passed the Energy Policy Act of 2005. That legislation mandated formation of interagency offices in four western states to deal with a backlog of applications for permits to drill (APD). "The bureau was ... unable to keep up with applications and demand for APDs," said Alan Kesterke, pilot project manager who oversees the seven offices from a BLM office in Cheyenne, Wyo. "Concern on all sides was that we didn't have the capability (to meet those demands)." The move to bring BLM together with the Forest Service and other federal and state agencies was unique. The Energy Policy Act, in addition to mandating the offices, also approved funding and required the agencies to sign an agreement within 90 days of passage of the act that would set the stage for the offices. "That's phenomenal" in the workings of federal bureaucracies, Kesterke said. In all, 125 new jobs were approved for the seven offices in Rawlins and Buffalo, Wyo.; Glenwood Springs; Carlsbad and Farmington, N.M.; and Miles City, Mont....
Glenwood's pilot energy office is still working out the kinks In Glenwood Springs last year, a pilot office was created to deal with the explosive growth of natural gas development in western Colorado. That office is still trying to find its feet. Opened on May 17, the Glenwood Energy Office combines specialists from the Bureau of Land Management Field Office and the White River National Forest (WRNF) that focus exclusively in permitting natural gas well drilling. Also included in the office is a specialist from the Fish and Wildlife Service. Staff from the Army Corps of Engineers and the Environmental Protection Agency are on call to assist the office. For the Glenwood Springs office, the challenge has been to combine two agencies, BLM and Forest Service, which have their own sets of procedures and issues. "We've always had a good working relationship with BLM," said WRNF Rifle District Ranger Mike Herth. "Now we're trying to meld the specialists into an interagency team." Each agency brings its own perspective to the office. "The challenge is to work together effectively and to work across agency boundaries seamlessly," he said. "It takes time."....
Agencies' fire performance gets criticized The skyrocketing federal cost of preventing and fighting wildfires won't drop until state and local governments and the insurance industry work to stem the number of new homes built near wild lands, lawmakers and officials said Tuesday at a Senate hearing. Federal agencies responsible for fire suppression also came under criticism at the Energy and Natural Resources Committee hearing for failing to make needed changes over the past seven years to improve management of wildfires. In response, the agencies outlined new cost-containment steps they will take this fire season, including putting fire crews and helicopters under more federal control. The federal government spent $1.9 billion on fire suppression in 2006, the worst wildfire year on record, officials said. Nearly 10 million acres burned. Another factor in the increasing wildfire threat is the over-accumulation of dead vegetation that can fuel fires. The increase in such hazardous fuels stems from extended drought, widespread disease and insect infestations and the past aversion to the natural use of wildland fire, Fong said. Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., asked whether the Healthy Forests Initiative had worked to reduce such fuels. The number of acres needing treatment is actually growing three times faster than the acres treated, responded Robin Nazzaro of the Government Accountability Office....
Oregon senator threatens filibuster An Oregon senator is threatening to filibuster a must-pass spending bill if Congress does not extend payments to rural counties hurt by cutbacks in federal logging. "The federal government has an obligation to rural Oregon, and it's time to meet that obligation," said Sen. Gordon Smith, R-Ore. "We are talking about people's jobs, children's schools and general public safety in 700 timber counties in 39 states." Congress is considering a $463.5 billion spending bill that would pay for 13 Cabinet agencies this year. Democratic leaders hope to move the bill through the House as early as Wednesday, with the Senate likely taking it up after that. Smith said he would try to block the bill if it does not include funding for the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act, a seven-year-old law that has pumped more than $2 billion into Oregon and other states hurt by federal policies that restricted logging in the 1990s. The policies were aimed at protecting the spotted owl and other threatened species....
Editorial - Gear head: check-off Registration box should be more evenhanded Under House Bill 97, a check-off box on vehicle registration forms would help off-highway vehicle enthusiasts fund lawsuits for more access to public land. A good deal for OHV users, to be sure, but hardly fair to hikers and others who share the land and want to protect it. Hundreds of miles of roads and trails and millions of acres are already open to OHVs. Scofflaws now can go wherever their OHVs can take them almost with impunity. To be fair, the Legislature should provide another check-off box for the public to contribute to the costs of keeping OHV users on designated trails. The state should also collect OHV user fees to pay for enforcing rules. In establishing a fund only to expand the wide access OHV users already enjoy, the state would be weighing in far too heavily on one side of a controversial issue. HB 97 is sponsored by Republican Rep. Mike Noel of Kanab in Kane County, where the battle against OHV restrictions is particularly heated. It would create a fund to be disbursed by the state Board of Parks and Recreation. To be eligible, organizations must act to "protect access to public lands by motor vehicle and off-highway vehicle operators and educate the public about appropriate off-highway vehicle use."But who would decide what is appropriate?....
Historian to discuss the nature of wilderness Dr. Jay Turner, an environmental historian from Wellesley College in Massachusetts, will discuss his perspectives on wilderness and environmentalism at Evergreen Fire Rescue's administration building on Feb. 9 from 6 to 9 p.m. Turner will be in Evergreen to participate in the U.S. Forest Service's Wilderness Manager's Winter Meeting, which begins Feb. 6 and ends on the 9th. The managers, as well as district rangers, resource specialists, volunteers and non-profit partners, are using Evergreen Fire Rescue's facilities for their meetings and largely staying at the local Quality Suites on Highway 40. As an environmental historian, Turner studies human interactions with their non-human surroundings through time. Because economics, culture, religion and politics all weigh into those relationships, environmental history has become popular in recent years as students search for more holistic interpretations of the past and present. Turner's lecture, "Wilderness and the Myths of Environmentalism," will consider the role of wilderness in modern American environmental politics. Turner's presentation is sponsored by Friends of Mount Evans & Lost Creek Wilderness and the Mount Evans Group of the Sierra Club....I'd bet this would cause protests and national headlines if the talk was sponsored by Chevron or some national OHV group.
Opponents lose lawsuit against wild horse round-up near Las Vegas A federal judge gave after-the-fact approval Tuesday for the government to gather wild horses and burros around Las Vegas. U.S. District Judge Kent Dawson in Las Vegas rejected efforts by Nevada-based America's Wild Horse Advocates and Wild Horses 4 Ever to stop the process and have the animals returned to the range. The same judge earlier this month refused to stop the Bureau of Land Management from conducting the round-up. Advocate Billie Young says she's disappointed that the horses were already rounded up and offered for adoption before opponents had their day in court. BLM field office chief Juan Palma in Las Vegas says the round-up was the best way to balance the number of animals on the range with the food and water resources available to support them. A BLM official says wranglers left 127 horses and up to 198 burros on the range.
Fish ladders required for Klamath dams PacifiCorp must build new fish ladders and make other modifications so salmon can swim freely past four hydroelectric dams on the Klamath River if it wants a new license to produce electricity, federal fisheries agencies said Tuesday. The ladders, turbine screens and fish bypasses are estimated to cost about $300 million and will be requirements of any new operating license issued by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, boosting pressure on the utility to remove the dams as a cheaper alternative. Removing the dams would open access to 350 miles of spawning habitat blocked for nearly a century in what was once the West Coast’s third most productive salmon river basin, but whose mounting struggles triggered a near shutdown last summer of commercial salmon fishing off Oregon and California. Bolstered by an administrative law judge’s findings that the science was sound behind a proposal last spring to require ladders and screens, fisheries agencies of the U.S. Departments of Commerce and Interior filed documents with the commission that flatly rejected PacifiCorp’s cheaper proposal to truck fish around the dams. The final mandates make minor changes to last year’s proposal....
Seoul Leaves Open FTA Package Deal South Korea on Wednesday hinted at a package deal to complete a free trade agreement (FTA) with the United States currently under extended talks. During a radio interview, Lee Hye-min, the No. 2 in the Korean negotiating team said, ``The two sides should make a give-and-take deal after the seventh and final round is completed.’’ The seventh round of talks is scheduled for Washington, D.C. from Feb. 11-14. Lee quickly added that the upcoming talks will be focused on narrowing their differences in individual sectors. The package deal Lee talked about is likely to address the issue of U.S. beef. Korea has refused to allow in U.S. beef shipments because they were found to have bone fragments. Chief U.S. FTA negotiator Wendy Cutler and U.S. lawmakers demanded Korea soften its import standards, saying that there would be no FTA with Korea, unless the beef issue is resolved to the satisfaction of U.S. ranchers and meat processors....
U.S. Congress eyes trade agreement U.S. lawmakers say they want a new global trade agreement, but it's unlikely they will support any deal they believe sells farmers short, especially as a new U.S. farm bill hangs in the balance, trade analysts said on Monday. Free-trade advocates this weekend hailed a decision by trade ministers to press ahead with the Doha round of trade talks, which ground to an acrimonious halt in July. Pascal Lamy, director-general of the World Trade Organization, has yet to formally relaunch the round, but Europe's top negotiator, Peter Mandelson, said he's "more confident" that a stubborn impasse over agricultural subsidies and tariffs may soon be broken. Dave Salmonsen, who follows trade for the American Farm Bureau Federation lobbying group, said a Doha deal would be judged on whether it provided U.S. farmers with meaningful access to new markets. "We know there's going to be lower spending limits on the domestic support programs ... but we need to have the balance as far as looking for how producers will be affected," he said. Other farm groups were less confident a deal could help their members. "The free trade agenda has not been beneficial to U.S. farmers and ranchers," said Tom Buis, president of the National Farmers Union....
Students revive century-old Cowboy tradition The Old Central bell is ringing again — 113 years after its first installation. “I think the Oklahoma A&M students would really be happy,” said Linda Smith, director of the Oklahoma Museum of Higher Education/Historic Old Central. “I think they’d be really proud that OSU students are bringing back the bell tradition and the heritage of Old Central.” A tradition that lay dormant for decades has returned in full force, thanks to efforts from the athletic department, the alumni association, alumni and one dedicated student. It really started in 1894 when the College Building at Oklahoma A&M College first opened, Smith said. Students would ring the bell after every football victory — home and away — to let farmers and ranchers around Stillwater know the team had won....
10 years to save the planet A NEW worldwide movement backed by celebrities, musicians, politicians and business leaders is aiming to reverse the effects of global warming over the next decade. Global Cool launched in London and LA today and is calling on one billion people to reduce their carbon emissions by just one tonne a year, for the next 10 years. Boffins have found the climatic tipping point - when the climate becomes irreversibly damaged - can be turned back if global CO2 emissions are reduced by one billion tonnes a year. Campaigners then hope cleaner, renewable energy sources such as solar, wind, water and hydrogen would have been developed. Big names including Leonardo Di Caprio, Orlando Bloom, KT Tunstall, Pink, The Killers, Razorlight and Josh Hartnett have thrown their weight behind the worldwide effort to beat climate change....
Waxman Seeks Climate Inquiry Evidence The Democratic chairman of a House panel examining the government's response to climate change said Tuesday there is evidence that senior Bush administration officials sought repeatedly "to mislead the public by injecting doubt into the science of global warming." Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., said he and the top Republican on his oversight committee, Rep. Tom Davis of Virginia, have sought documents from the administration on climate policy, but repeatedly been rebuffed. "The committee isn't trying to obtain state secrets or documents that could affect our immediate national security," said Waxman, opening the hearing. "We are simply seeking answers to whether the White House's political staff is inappropriately censoring impartial government scientists." "We know that the White House possesses documents that contain evidence of an attempt by senior administration officials to mislead the public by injecting doubt into the science of global warming and minimize the potential danger," Waxman said....
U.N. agency pressures Ban on climate crisis summit The U.N. environment agency pressured Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Tuesday to call an emergency climate summit amid dire reports about the risks from global warming. A summit, tentatively planned for September, would focus on the hunt for a successor to the Kyoto Protocol on cutting greenhouse gases widely blamed for forecasts of more heatwaves, floods, droughts and rising sea levels. U.N. environment agencies are lobbying Ban to play a leading role in helping governments battle climate change after Kyoto expires in 2012. But he stopped short on Tuesday of endorsing his officials' proposal for a summit of some 20 key leaders. On Friday, the broadest scientific study of the human effect on the climate is set to conclude there is at least a 90 percent chance that human activities, mainly burning fossil fuels, are to blame for most of the warming in the last 50 years....
Survey shows 13 pct of Americans never heard of global warming Thirteen percent of Americans have never heard of global warming even though their country is the world's top source of greenhouse gases, a 46-country survey showed on Monday. The report, by ACNielsen of more than 25,000 Internet users, showed that 57 percent of people around the world considered global warming a "very serious problem" and a further 34 percent rated it a "serious problem." "It has taken extreme and life-threatening weather patterns to finally drive the message home that global warming is happening and is here to stay unless a concerted, global effort is made to reverse it," said Patrick Dodd, the President of ACNielsen Europe. People in Latin America were most worried while U.S. citizens were least concerned with just 42 percent rating global warming "very serious." The United States emits about a quarter of all greenhouse gases, the biggest emitter ahead of China, Russia and India. Thirteen percent of U.S. citizens said they had never heard or read anything about global warming, the survey said....
Two New Books Confirm Global Warming Is Natural, Moderate Two powerful new books say today's global warming is due not to human activity but primarily to a long, moderate solar-linked cycle. "Unstoppable Global Warming Every 1500 Years," by physicist Fred Singer and economist Dennis Avery was released just before Christmas. "The Chilling Stars: A New Theory of Climate Change," by Danish physicist Henrik Svensmark and former BBC science writer Nigel Calder (Icon Books), is due out in March. Singer and Avery note that most of the earth's recent warming occurred before 1940, and thus before much human-emitted CO2. Moreover, physical evidence shows 600 moderate warmings in the earth's last million years. The evidence ranges from ancient Nile flood records, Chinese court documents and Roman wine grapes to modern spectral analysis of polar ice cores, deep seabed sediments and layered cave stalagmites. "Unstoppable Global Warming" shows the earth's temperatures following variations in solar intensity through centuries of sunspot records, and finds cycles of sun-linked isotopes in ice and tree rings. The book cites the work of Svensmark, who says cosmic rays vary the earth's temperatures by creating more or fewer of the low, wet clouds that cool the earth. It notes that global climate models can't accurately register cloud effects....
California may ban conventional lightbulbs by 2012 A California lawmaker wants to make his state the first to ban incandescent lightbulbs as part of California's groundbreaking initiatives to reduce energy use and greenhouse gases blamed for global warming. The "How Many Legislators Does it Take to Change a Lightbulb Act" would ban incandescent lightbulbs by 2012 in favor of energy-saving compact fluorescent lightbulbs. "Incandescent lightbulbs were first developed almost 125 years ago, and since that time they have undergone no major modifications," California Assemblyman Lloyd Levine said on Tuesday. "Meanwhile, they remain incredibly inefficient, converting only about 5 percent of the energy they receive into light." Levine is expected to introduce the legislation this week, his office said....
Eiffel Tower to switch off lights as scientists finish major report on global warming Even the Eiffel Tower is out to save the planet. On Thursday evening, as scientists and officials put finishing touches on a long-awaited report about global warming, the Paris landmark will switch off its 20,000 flashing light bulbs that run up and down the tower and illuminate the French capital's skyline. The Eiffel Tower's lights account for about 9 percent of the monument's total energy consumption of 7,000 megawatt-hours per year. The five-minute blackout comes at the urging of environmental activists seeking to call attention to energy waste _ and just hours before world scientists on Friday unveil a major report Friday warning that the planet will keep getting warmer and presenting new evidence of humans' role in climate change. Environmental groups are seeking to take advantage of the worldwide attention on the meetings in Paris this week of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The panel will release a report laying out policy proposals for governments based on the latest research on global warming....
The Humane Society Becomes a Political Animal Many people may consider the Humane Society of the United States a pussycat. But with 10 million donors and a $120 million budget, it is becoming a tiger among Washington's interest groups. Just ask Maryland Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. (R) and Rep. Richard W. Pombo (R-Calif.). Actually, make that former governor and then-representative. The Humane Society targeted both in last year's elections after Ehrlich supported bear hunting and Pombo supported commercial whaling and trapping in wildlife refuges. The society also spent lavishly to help pass an initiative in Arizona, fought by agribusiness, that bans inhumane factory farming. And it bested the National Rifle Association on a measure that prohibits the shooting of mourning doves for sport in Michigan. "They are a worthy opponent," said Andrew Arulanandam of the NRA. "They certainly have a lot of backers with deep pockets." "They keep us on our toes," agreed Kelli Ludlum of the American Farm Bureau Federation. "We need all of our members to counter their growing effectiveness."....
Huntsman tables roadless forest petition Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. on Monday told a group of outdoor recreation executives that he was at least temporarily shelving the state's roadless forest petition because of legal uncertainties regarding the issue. Since last year, the governor's office has been crafting a petition that would establish new management guidelines for Utah's nearly 4 million acres of inventoried roadless forest. The petition process was created by the Bush administration in 2005 to replace the Clinton-era roadless rule, which called for the protection of the nation's 50 million acres of roadless forest. Huntsman's petition was controversial, because, unlike California or New Mexico - which requested that all of their roadless areas remain protected - his petition called for the abolition of the roadless designations in Utah and more input into forest management decisions by the state. However, with a recent federal court ruling in California that rejected the Bush administration rule for failing to follow national environmental law - restoring the Clinton rule in the process - the Utah governor has opted to sit the battle out. For now, the Clinton rule remains in effect. "If a [petition] submission is made, we look forward to engaging all appropriate stakeholders, including the outdoor industry," Huntsman said in a statement....
Army wouldn't make good neighbors, rancher says Critics of the Army's plan to expand the Pinon Canyon Maneuver Site are not reassured by suggestions the Pentagon could lease land or make other cooperative agreements with ranchers rather than purchase or condemn land. "There's no way you could let the Army conduct live fire maneuvers on one area of land while you're trying to keep cattle on another section," rancher Lon Robertson said Tuesday. "It just doesn't sound feasible. It also avoids the fundamental question of why the Army thinks they need this land in the first place." Robertson, who lives near Kim and is a founder of the Pinon Canyon Expansion Opposition Coalition, said the Army's claim that it needs to expand the 238,000-acre training area by an additional 418,000 acres doesn't make sense to ranchers and rural communities around the maneuver site, which is southwest of La Junta. "What is it about the Pinon Canyon area that the Army can't find on the 2.5 million acres the Pentagon already owns?" Robertson asked....
Court rejects water rights fees after 4-year fight Family farmers who were wrongfully required to pay a state water rights fee could get some of their money back. After a four-year legal battle, the 3rd District Court of Appeal in Sacramento decided in favor of farmers and ranchers who protested imposition of a new and unconstitutional state fee that resulted in a total collection of more than $20 million. Water rights fees were levied on about 7,000 water rights holders beginning in 2004. The court agreed with the California Farm Bureau Federation that those fees were invalid and unconstitutional. Refund checks, however, aren't in the mail to those wrongfully charged, said Carl Borden, CFBF associate counsel. It's likely the state will appeal the opinion to the California Supreme Court. Legal experts are advising patience as this issue is played out in court....
S.D. House Panel Nixes Game Warden Restrictions A bill that would have restricted game wardens' ability to enter private lands to check for hunting violations was rejected Tuesday by a South Dakota House committee. The Agriculture Committee voted 7-6 to kill the bill after some lawmakers said the state Game, Fish and Parks Department has made a good effort to improve relations with landowners in the two years since a similar bill was rejected by the Legislature. The bill's main sponsor, Rep. Betty Olson, R-Prairie City, said western South Dakota ranchers want to protect their property rights. Game wardens should have to ask permission to enter private land or have a specific reason for doing so, she said. "We'd just like a little appreciation and a little protection from Game, Fish and Parks," Olson said. Olson said about 4 million acres of land in northwestern South Dakota have been closed to hunting because of the issue. Until game wardens' ability to enter private land is restricted, ranchers will not open their land to hunting, except for people who pay for the privilege, she said....
Trial date set for charges in deadly WA wildfire A March 26 trial date has been set for a former U.S. Forest Service crew boss charged with involuntary manslaughter and lying to federal investigators in the 2001 deaths of four firefighters. Ellreese Daniels welcomes the trial to clear his name, Tina Hunt, a federal public defender, said after not guilty pleas were entered Tuesday on behalf of her client. A federal grand jury indicted Daniels, 46, of Leavenworth, on four counts of involuntary manslaughter and seven counts of making material false statements stemming from his role as a fire crew boss in the Thirtymile Fire in Okanogan County in July 2001. Four firefighters died when flames trapped the crew and two civilians in the Chewuch River Canyon....
Four states involved in project to deal with drilling permit backlog Driven by accelerating oil and gas development on federal lands, in 2005 Congress passed the Energy Policy Act of 2005. That legislation mandated formation of interagency offices in four western states to deal with a backlog of applications for permits to drill (APD). "The bureau was ... unable to keep up with applications and demand for APDs," said Alan Kesterke, pilot project manager who oversees the seven offices from a BLM office in Cheyenne, Wyo. "Concern on all sides was that we didn't have the capability (to meet those demands)." The move to bring BLM together with the Forest Service and other federal and state agencies was unique. The Energy Policy Act, in addition to mandating the offices, also approved funding and required the agencies to sign an agreement within 90 days of passage of the act that would set the stage for the offices. "That's phenomenal" in the workings of federal bureaucracies, Kesterke said. In all, 125 new jobs were approved for the seven offices in Rawlins and Buffalo, Wyo.; Glenwood Springs; Carlsbad and Farmington, N.M.; and Miles City, Mont....
Glenwood's pilot energy office is still working out the kinks In Glenwood Springs last year, a pilot office was created to deal with the explosive growth of natural gas development in western Colorado. That office is still trying to find its feet. Opened on May 17, the Glenwood Energy Office combines specialists from the Bureau of Land Management Field Office and the White River National Forest (WRNF) that focus exclusively in permitting natural gas well drilling. Also included in the office is a specialist from the Fish and Wildlife Service. Staff from the Army Corps of Engineers and the Environmental Protection Agency are on call to assist the office. For the Glenwood Springs office, the challenge has been to combine two agencies, BLM and Forest Service, which have their own sets of procedures and issues. "We've always had a good working relationship with BLM," said WRNF Rifle District Ranger Mike Herth. "Now we're trying to meld the specialists into an interagency team." Each agency brings its own perspective to the office. "The challenge is to work together effectively and to work across agency boundaries seamlessly," he said. "It takes time."....
Agencies' fire performance gets criticized The skyrocketing federal cost of preventing and fighting wildfires won't drop until state and local governments and the insurance industry work to stem the number of new homes built near wild lands, lawmakers and officials said Tuesday at a Senate hearing. Federal agencies responsible for fire suppression also came under criticism at the Energy and Natural Resources Committee hearing for failing to make needed changes over the past seven years to improve management of wildfires. In response, the agencies outlined new cost-containment steps they will take this fire season, including putting fire crews and helicopters under more federal control. The federal government spent $1.9 billion on fire suppression in 2006, the worst wildfire year on record, officials said. Nearly 10 million acres burned. Another factor in the increasing wildfire threat is the over-accumulation of dead vegetation that can fuel fires. The increase in such hazardous fuels stems from extended drought, widespread disease and insect infestations and the past aversion to the natural use of wildland fire, Fong said. Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., asked whether the Healthy Forests Initiative had worked to reduce such fuels. The number of acres needing treatment is actually growing three times faster than the acres treated, responded Robin Nazzaro of the Government Accountability Office....
Oregon senator threatens filibuster An Oregon senator is threatening to filibuster a must-pass spending bill if Congress does not extend payments to rural counties hurt by cutbacks in federal logging. "The federal government has an obligation to rural Oregon, and it's time to meet that obligation," said Sen. Gordon Smith, R-Ore. "We are talking about people's jobs, children's schools and general public safety in 700 timber counties in 39 states." Congress is considering a $463.5 billion spending bill that would pay for 13 Cabinet agencies this year. Democratic leaders hope to move the bill through the House as early as Wednesday, with the Senate likely taking it up after that. Smith said he would try to block the bill if it does not include funding for the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act, a seven-year-old law that has pumped more than $2 billion into Oregon and other states hurt by federal policies that restricted logging in the 1990s. The policies were aimed at protecting the spotted owl and other threatened species....
Editorial - Gear head: check-off Registration box should be more evenhanded Under House Bill 97, a check-off box on vehicle registration forms would help off-highway vehicle enthusiasts fund lawsuits for more access to public land. A good deal for OHV users, to be sure, but hardly fair to hikers and others who share the land and want to protect it. Hundreds of miles of roads and trails and millions of acres are already open to OHVs. Scofflaws now can go wherever their OHVs can take them almost with impunity. To be fair, the Legislature should provide another check-off box for the public to contribute to the costs of keeping OHV users on designated trails. The state should also collect OHV user fees to pay for enforcing rules. In establishing a fund only to expand the wide access OHV users already enjoy, the state would be weighing in far too heavily on one side of a controversial issue. HB 97 is sponsored by Republican Rep. Mike Noel of Kanab in Kane County, where the battle against OHV restrictions is particularly heated. It would create a fund to be disbursed by the state Board of Parks and Recreation. To be eligible, organizations must act to "protect access to public lands by motor vehicle and off-highway vehicle operators and educate the public about appropriate off-highway vehicle use."But who would decide what is appropriate?....
Historian to discuss the nature of wilderness Dr. Jay Turner, an environmental historian from Wellesley College in Massachusetts, will discuss his perspectives on wilderness and environmentalism at Evergreen Fire Rescue's administration building on Feb. 9 from 6 to 9 p.m. Turner will be in Evergreen to participate in the U.S. Forest Service's Wilderness Manager's Winter Meeting, which begins Feb. 6 and ends on the 9th. The managers, as well as district rangers, resource specialists, volunteers and non-profit partners, are using Evergreen Fire Rescue's facilities for their meetings and largely staying at the local Quality Suites on Highway 40. As an environmental historian, Turner studies human interactions with their non-human surroundings through time. Because economics, culture, religion and politics all weigh into those relationships, environmental history has become popular in recent years as students search for more holistic interpretations of the past and present. Turner's lecture, "Wilderness and the Myths of Environmentalism," will consider the role of wilderness in modern American environmental politics. Turner's presentation is sponsored by Friends of Mount Evans & Lost Creek Wilderness and the Mount Evans Group of the Sierra Club....I'd bet this would cause protests and national headlines if the talk was sponsored by Chevron or some national OHV group.
Opponents lose lawsuit against wild horse round-up near Las Vegas A federal judge gave after-the-fact approval Tuesday for the government to gather wild horses and burros around Las Vegas. U.S. District Judge Kent Dawson in Las Vegas rejected efforts by Nevada-based America's Wild Horse Advocates and Wild Horses 4 Ever to stop the process and have the animals returned to the range. The same judge earlier this month refused to stop the Bureau of Land Management from conducting the round-up. Advocate Billie Young says she's disappointed that the horses were already rounded up and offered for adoption before opponents had their day in court. BLM field office chief Juan Palma in Las Vegas says the round-up was the best way to balance the number of animals on the range with the food and water resources available to support them. A BLM official says wranglers left 127 horses and up to 198 burros on the range.
Fish ladders required for Klamath dams PacifiCorp must build new fish ladders and make other modifications so salmon can swim freely past four hydroelectric dams on the Klamath River if it wants a new license to produce electricity, federal fisheries agencies said Tuesday. The ladders, turbine screens and fish bypasses are estimated to cost about $300 million and will be requirements of any new operating license issued by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, boosting pressure on the utility to remove the dams as a cheaper alternative. Removing the dams would open access to 350 miles of spawning habitat blocked for nearly a century in what was once the West Coast’s third most productive salmon river basin, but whose mounting struggles triggered a near shutdown last summer of commercial salmon fishing off Oregon and California. Bolstered by an administrative law judge’s findings that the science was sound behind a proposal last spring to require ladders and screens, fisheries agencies of the U.S. Departments of Commerce and Interior filed documents with the commission that flatly rejected PacifiCorp’s cheaper proposal to truck fish around the dams. The final mandates make minor changes to last year’s proposal....
Seoul Leaves Open FTA Package Deal South Korea on Wednesday hinted at a package deal to complete a free trade agreement (FTA) with the United States currently under extended talks. During a radio interview, Lee Hye-min, the No. 2 in the Korean negotiating team said, ``The two sides should make a give-and-take deal after the seventh and final round is completed.’’ The seventh round of talks is scheduled for Washington, D.C. from Feb. 11-14. Lee quickly added that the upcoming talks will be focused on narrowing their differences in individual sectors. The package deal Lee talked about is likely to address the issue of U.S. beef. Korea has refused to allow in U.S. beef shipments because they were found to have bone fragments. Chief U.S. FTA negotiator Wendy Cutler and U.S. lawmakers demanded Korea soften its import standards, saying that there would be no FTA with Korea, unless the beef issue is resolved to the satisfaction of U.S. ranchers and meat processors....
U.S. Congress eyes trade agreement U.S. lawmakers say they want a new global trade agreement, but it's unlikely they will support any deal they believe sells farmers short, especially as a new U.S. farm bill hangs in the balance, trade analysts said on Monday. Free-trade advocates this weekend hailed a decision by trade ministers to press ahead with the Doha round of trade talks, which ground to an acrimonious halt in July. Pascal Lamy, director-general of the World Trade Organization, has yet to formally relaunch the round, but Europe's top negotiator, Peter Mandelson, said he's "more confident" that a stubborn impasse over agricultural subsidies and tariffs may soon be broken. Dave Salmonsen, who follows trade for the American Farm Bureau Federation lobbying group, said a Doha deal would be judged on whether it provided U.S. farmers with meaningful access to new markets. "We know there's going to be lower spending limits on the domestic support programs ... but we need to have the balance as far as looking for how producers will be affected," he said. Other farm groups were less confident a deal could help their members. "The free trade agenda has not been beneficial to U.S. farmers and ranchers," said Tom Buis, president of the National Farmers Union....
Students revive century-old Cowboy tradition The Old Central bell is ringing again — 113 years after its first installation. “I think the Oklahoma A&M students would really be happy,” said Linda Smith, director of the Oklahoma Museum of Higher Education/Historic Old Central. “I think they’d be really proud that OSU students are bringing back the bell tradition and the heritage of Old Central.” A tradition that lay dormant for decades has returned in full force, thanks to efforts from the athletic department, the alumni association, alumni and one dedicated student. It really started in 1894 when the College Building at Oklahoma A&M College first opened, Smith said. Students would ring the bell after every football victory — home and away — to let farmers and ranchers around Stillwater know the team had won....
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
GAO
Wildland Fire Management: Lack of a Cohesive Strategy Hinders Agencies' Cost-Containment Efforts, by Robin M. Nazzaro, director, natural resources and environment, before the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. GAO-07-427T, January 30. http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-07-427T
Highlights - http://www.gao.gov/highlights/d07427thigh.pdf
Wildland Fire Management: Lack of a Cohesive Strategy Hinders Agencies' Cost-Containment Efforts, by Robin M. Nazzaro, director, natural resources and environment, before the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. GAO-07-427T, January 30. http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-07-427T
Highlights - http://www.gao.gov/highlights/d07427thigh.pdf
NEWS ROUNDUP
Gray wolves to lose some protection Federal protection for about 4,000 gray wolves in three western Great Lakes states — northern parts of Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan — will end in about a month, the Fish and Wildlife Service announced. Plans to do the same in Montana, Idaho and Wyoming probably will take the rest of this year, service director H. Dale Hall said. A formal proposal, with public hearings and a two-month comment period, will be published this week. Two wildlife advocacy groups — the Defenders of Wildlife and Sinapu, a Colorado-based wolf advocacy group — warned they might sue to prevent taking wolves in the Rockies off the endangered list. Another group, the Center for Biological Diversity, claims the proposal will "end in the mass killing of wolves." Ed Bangs, the Fish and Wildlife recovery coordinator in the Rockies, says Wyoming wants all its wolves outside of Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks classified as "predators" that can be shot on sight without restriction. He hopes that talks with the state will produce an acceptable plan. If not, Fish and Wildlife will keep federal restrictions in Wyoming, Hall said. Wyoming Gov. Dave Freudenthal said Monday that the agency's threat "raises the interesting question of whether any (wolf) packs outside Yellowstone in Wyoming are even necessary."....
Wyo wolves could stay under federal control Whether Wyoming's gray wolf population will be part of the animal's broader removal from federal protection in the Rocky Mountains is yet to be seen, but federal officials said a proposal for delisting will move forward with or without Wyoming. Lynn Scarlett, deputy secretary of the Interior, told reporters in a news conference Monday that if Wyoming does not move forward with a federally approved management plan, a "significant portion of the range would remain protected under the Endangered Species Act." Population levels necessary to meet federal requirements in those areas outside the national parks would continue to be overseen by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, she said. That means management would be largely unchanged. Idaho and Montana would be able to move forward with their state plans, which call for maintaining a minimum number of wolves in each state, and would not shoulder any additional burden because of Wyoming, she said....
Criminal charges dropped against rancher who closed road Box Elder County's new attorney dropped criminal charges against a Box Elder County rancher who kept a gate over a disputed mountain road. Stephen Hadfield, who replaced former County Attorney Amy Hugie, told rancher Bret Selman that he didn't see the case as a criminal matter, Selman said. Hugie, frustrated with the county's inability to resolve a dispute over the road, had charged Selman last winter with five class B misdemeanors. The county - backed by recreationists who want access to public lands and a loop road for motorcyclists and ATV riders - claims the road belongs to the public. Selman and his parents, Fred and Laura Selman of Tremonton, claim the stretch of dirt road through their ranch southeast of Mantua belongs to them. Motorcyclists, ATV riders and snowmobilers are damaging their land and threatening wildlife, the Selmans say....
Environmental concerns hit ski plans Beneath a steely sky and icy snow flurries, cross-country skiers glide over a 130-acre alpine meadow that Kirkwood Mountain Resort has preserved for wildlife and recreation. In nearby restaurants, diners use plates and utensils that are reusable or made with recycled materials. And employees receive financial rewards for carpooling to work. Kirkwood, a 35-year-old vacation community nestled in a box canyon south of Lake Tahoe, is a proud signer of a national environmental charter for ski areas. Yet Kirkwood is the only California resort to receive an F in the current report card by an environmental coalition that rates Western ski areas for development practices, water and energy consumption and natural resource protection. And Kirkwood Mountain Resort and Development Co.'s plans for hundreds of dwellings and a ridgeline restaurant visible from wilderness trails have provoked the ire of community activists....
State sues to delist mouse It has been almost two years since the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service began reviewing a proposal to remove the Preble's meadow jumping mouse from the list of threatened and endangered species. But the agency still has not issued a final decision, and now the state of Wyoming wants a federal judge to compel the agency make up its mind. A lawsuit filed last week asks U.S. District Court to force a final action within one month. It also asks the court to direct the Fish and Wildlife Service to strip the 3-inch mouse of its federal protection. “We've asked the court to put them on a deadline,” state Attorney General Pat Crank said. The Fish and Wildlife Service acknowledged Monday that the agency response is late. After missing a 12-month deadline in February 2006, it announced a six-month extension, which it also failed to honor....
Bill would authorize suing feds Several powerful Wyoming legislators are sponsoring a bill that would ask the state attorney general to watch for opportunities to sue the federal government over any failure to follow the federal Endangered Species Act or the National Environmental Policy Act. The bill comes as Gov. Dave Freudenthal's administration continues to negotiate with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service over the federal agency's proposed wolf-management plan for the state. Rep. Pat Childers, R-Cody, chairman of the Travel, Recreation, Wildlife and Cultural Resources Committee, is a main sponsor of the legislation. It would give the Wyoming attorney general's office as much as $250,000 to hire three more lawyers to take legal action in Wyoming, but possibly also to intervene in litigation anywhere in the country....
Hayman fire arsonist re-sentencing in question A judge Monday agreed to reconsider his decision that a former Forest Service employee invalidated her guilty plea by filing an appeal in the worst wildfire in Colorado history. Judge Thomas Kennedy's decision could mean the difference between a re-sentencing hearing for Terry Barton or a new trial that could include additional charges from up to four counties ravaged by the Hayman fire in 2002. Barton, who admitted setting the fire by burning a letter in a drought-stricken area, is serving a 6-year federal sentence, but her 12-year state sentence was thrown out by the state Appeals Court. She pleaded guilty to a state felony arson charge. Prosecutors argue that Barton broke her word when she appealed. With Barton listening by telephone Monday, her lawyer Mark Walta told Kennedy that prosecutors should have raised that issue when Barton filed her appeal in 2003 and it's too late to do so now....
In the Rockies, Pines Die and Bears Feel It Jesse Logan retired in July as head of the beetle research unit for the United States Forest Service at the Rocky Mountain Laboratory in Utah. He is an authority on the effects of temperature on insect life cycles. That expertise has landed him smack in the middle of a debate over protecting grizzly bears. You just never know where the study of beetles will take you. Dr. Logan seems, in fact, to be on a collision course with the federal government, in the debate over whether to lift Endangered Species Act protections from the grizzly bears in and around Yellowstone National Park. The grizzly population in the greater Yellowstone area is estimated to be at least 600. The population is centered in the park proper, federal scientists say, where it has reached its likely natural maximum and has leveled off. But in adjoining stretches of national forest, the number of grizzlies is continuing to go up by 4 percent to 7 percent a year. Their resurgence in the past 50 years is why the federal government announced in 2005 the start of proceedings to take them off the endangered or threatened species list. Dr. Logan enters the fray on the question of what grizzly bears eat, how much of it will be available in the future, and where. All that, he says, hinges on the mountain pine beetle and the whitebark pine....
Following the Tracks of a Killer Mountain Beetle In early September, Jesse Logan, a 62-year-old insect specialist with a knack for mathematics and a deep love for the Western landscape, gazed across a rolling meadow 10,400 feet high in the rugged Wind River Range in Wyoming. Moving carefully with the aid of two trekking poles, Dr. Logan favored a left knee injured three years ago by a Colorado avalanche that killed a close friend. He had not been sure he would ever get into back country like this again. Yet here he was, nearing the end of an arduous expedition, organized and led by Louisa Willcox, director of the wild bears project for the National Resources Defense Council, carrying a 40-pound pack over 12,000-foot passes in a roadless wilderness. Dr. Logan is an authority on the effects of temperature on insect life cycles. Across the way he could see likely signs of a particularly aggressive organism he was seeking but hoping not to find here, the mountain pine beetle. The beetle is the most destructive timber pest in the Western United States. The rising warmth across the Rockies is expanding its range north and, equally important, uphill. Dr. Logan had hoped to find no incipient, major outbreaks here. But many of the pine trees across the way were an unhealthy red. This did not look good....
Senate Panel Examining Firefighting Costs The U.S. Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee will hear testimony tomorrow, January 30 on questions related to cost-sharing among local, state, and federal jurisdictions and comparisons of firefighting and prevention methods. There is a growing debate in Washington about the increased federal costs of firefighting and the best fire prevention methods. Since 2000, the federal government has carried more than $1 billion of the costs of suppressing the fires according to the Government Accounting Office (GAO). Several studies have suggested the Forest Service is carrying too much of the burden. It its most recent report, the GAO said some federal officials are concerned the current framework insulates states and local governments from having to carry the financial burden of protecting the wildland-urban interface (WUI). The GAO said that might reduce incentives for nonfederal entities to help mitigate fire risks, “such as requiring homeowners to use fire-resistant materials and landscaping.” The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Inspector General (IG) issued a report entitled “Forest Service Large Fire Suppression Costs.” This report bluntly said states and local governments should pick up more of the tab....
New Forest Plan Could Impact Ice Climbing Access The newly proposed Gallatin National Forest Travel Plan has caused quite a stir in the ice climbing community. Ice climbers comprise one of the largest user groups during the winter in Hyalite Canyon, one of the many areas of focus, and a proposed plan to change winter accessibility has taken the group by storm. The Travel Plan has had a varied history. In 2002, the Gallatin National Forest originally began working on a new travel plan to manage multiple uses of the public lands. Climbers were ecstatic about a possible victory for winter access in October 2004 when Forest Service officials released a “preferred alternative” that called for plowing to the Chisholm Campground and ungated access beyond that point. Ice climbers banded together to advance this original alternative to the travel plan. Recently, however, Forest Service officials, in an effort believed to be beneficial to family-oriented cross-country skiing activities, have decided to plow the road to the Blackmore Campground and then gate access past the Hyalite Reservoir on January 1, beginning in the 2007-2008 season. This will effectively shorten the season for those ice climbers who do not own or have access to snowmobiles, since access to Hyalite is generally limited later in the season by vehicle clearance due to snow-packed roads....
Colorado's Storm Peak Lab: Science in the snow Up the mountain from the Steamboat Springs Ski Resort, atmospheric scientists have studied everything from snow crystals and pollution to the impact of ultraviolet radiation on vegetation. Scientists at the Storm Peak Laboratory have conducted research here since 1981. Currently, climate change tops their priorities. The findings made at Storm Peak could be important to how the ski industry adjusts to warming temperatures. "With a warmer climate, you will have a shorter ski season," said lab director Dr. Gannet Hallar. "You'll have an earlier melt and a later onset of snow. This makes a lot of difference for the skiing community,"she said. But less snow has an impact far beyond vacationing skiers and snowboarders, Hallar and the other researchers stressed. "Water is a major issue in Colorado," said Hallar. "Our water serves Las Vegas and Los Angeles. So less snow in Colorado influences water across the nation." The lab has determined that an increase in sulfate pollution from power plants reduces snowfall by about 15 percent....
Trouble in paradise In a federal courtroom, Greg Adair looks like someone who might be more comfortable dangling from a 3,000-foot granite wall than sitting at the plaintiff's table. The long hair, the rock-climber physique and the suit and tie just don't seem to mix. He is an uneasy legal warrior for a place where people from around the globe stop to gawk — Yosemite Valley. Adair is the blue-collar activist who has led two local groups in a legal battle for Yosemite's ecological soul. They have won impressive court decisions over the last six years, stopping vast construction projects in the glacial valley. The man behind these court victories is a 45-year-old Bay-Area resident with eclectic pursuits — construction worker, rock climber, philosopher and ardent friend of nature....
National Parks Case May Affect Access The plunging waterfalls and soaring crags chiseled by the Merced River draw millions of visitors each year, but the crowds are precisely what threatens the waterway and the park. Efforts to safeguard the Merced have spawned a court battle over the future of development in Yosemite National Park's most popular stretch. The case may come down to the challenge facing all of America's parks: Should they remain open to everyone, or should access be limited in the interest of protecting them? In November, a federal judge barred crews from finishing $60 million in construction projects in Yosemite Valley, siding with a small group of environmentalists who sued the federal government, saying further commercial development would bring greater numbers of visitors, thus threatening the Merced's fragile ecosystem. "The park's plans for commercialization could damage Yosemite for future generations," said Bridget Kerr, a member of Friends of Yosemite Valley, one of two local environmental groups that filed the suit....
5 dozen killer whales believed to be hunting salmon off S.F. coast A large group of endangered killer whales has been spotted off the coast of San Francisco, a long way from their usual feeding grounds along the Washington coast. The magnificent black and white predators were first seen off Half Moon Bay, where they were apparently searching for salmon, which are declining in numbers in the Pacific Northwest. Photos were taken Jan. 24 of from nine to 15 orcas swimming in the open water between the Farallon Islands and San Francisco. Although killer whales have been seen off the coast before, researchers believe some five dozen or more individuals are now regularly leaving their historic habitat in the Puget Sound area for the abundant waters near the Golden Gate....
Calif. Town's Economy 'Hostage' to Fly This city lives in the shadow of a 1-inch fly that that slurps nectar and zooms around like a hummingbird. The Delhi Sands flower-loving fly is the only fly on the federal endangered species list. Recent counts have yielded no more than two dozen of the flies at any time, and their best hope of survival is pinned on prime breeding habitat in Colton, about 60 miles east of Los Angeles. But that prime habitat is considered prime real estate by Colton officials. They say restrictions on building on the habitat have limited commercial growth and cost tens of millions of dollars in economic development. So city leaders have fought to get the fly off the endangered list since it was placed there in 1993. "It's absurd that an economy and a community should be held hostage by a fly," said Daryl Parrish, the city manager....
Cruise line agrees to $750,000 fine in collision with whale Princess Cruise Lines will pay $750,000 to settle federal charges that a cruise ship hit and killed a humpback whale near Glacier Bay in 2001, according to an agreement approved in U.S. District Court Monday. As part of the agreement, the cruise line said the ship Dawn Princess had a "close encounter" with two humpback whales in July 200l, but did not admit that the ship actually collided with a whale. The cruise line said it was guilty of failing to operate its vessel in at a "slow, safe speed" while near the humpback, but had implemented new safety procedures. The company will pay a $200,000 fine to the government and $550,000 to the National Park Service Foundation. The Park Service money will go to an account for Glacier Bay National Park, to be used for whale research and conservation efforts. Tomie Lee, superintendent of Glacier Bay National Park, said in a statement she was satisfied with the agreement....I see the Bush Justice Dept. is continuing to divert court fines to private non-profits. In this case 70 percent or so of the court fine is diverted. Who picks the non-profits and how, and where is the hue and cry over public input into this decision? Where is the Congressional oversight? If all citizens must obey these laws, then all citizens should benefit from noncompliance. The fines should go to the general treasury.
NAFTA Environmental Commission Rules Against Liquefied Natural Gas Facility On U.S.- Mexico Border The Secretariat of the Commission for Environmental Cooperation, a tri-national commission set up under the North American Free Trade Agreement, announced January 25th that it was rejecting a request by Mexico to suspend an investigation into whether the country violated its own laws in approving a proposed liquefied natural gas (LNG) facility next to a biodiversity hotspot on the U.S. border. In 2005, U.S. and Mexican conservation organizations filed a formal petition with the NAFTA Commission to challenge the Mexican government's granting of permits to Chevron to build the LNG terminal just 600 yards from the Coronado Islands. The islands, located 11 miles south of the U.S. border, provide critical nesting habitat for six threatened or endangered seabird species and 10 other species of plants and animals found nowhere else in the world. The Commission was expressly created to prevent "maquiladora"-style projects, as it was feared by many that the lifting of trade barriers under NAFTA would result in the increased flight of polluting industries and dangerous projects to areas where environmental and health and safety laws were not enforced. Accordingly, the environmental side agreement to NAFTA provides a process for citizens of any NAFTA country to challenge the nation's failure to enforce its environmental laws....
Coordinator works to improve management of the Rio Grande for all users Abeyta, the daughter of a Sandia National Laboratories chemist and granddaughter of ranchers near Mora, has spent her career studying water quality along the Rio Grande. She's a trained scientist living in the state's largest city, but her roots are firmly planted in her family's rural, agricultural heritage. Abeyta, 49, worked for the USGS for 22 years, focusing on water-quality studies. In 2000, in the midst of a legal battle over the endangered Rio Grande silvery minnow, she was asked to join the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as coordinator for the Middle Rio Grande. Her job as head of the Rio Grande Bosque Initiative is part scientist, part diplomat and part project coordinator. She works with pueblos, farmers, ranchers, city officials, environmental groups, scientists and state and federal agencies along the 180-mile stretch of the Rio Grande from Cochiti Dam to the head of Elephant Butte Reservoir to implement the 21 recommendations in a decade-old Rio Grande Bosque management plan....
'Big House' harmed by influx of animals The "Big House" at Casa Grande Ruins National Monument has withstood centuries of desert punishment, but encroachment by unnaturally high populations of animal species is causing permanent damage to the Ruins. Pigeons, round-tail ground squirrels and other rodents have overpopulated the 480 acres of pristine Sonoran Desert encompassed by the monument. The lasting effects of their waste byproducts and living habits have spurred the Ruins staff to take preventative action. Enter WildEdge Conservation Science. For more than a year, Dawson and his team have visited the Ruins with an arsenal of trained raptors, which take controlled flights intended to abate the overpopulation of pigeons and rodents. "Our mission is to address human-wildlife interaction problems," Dawson explained. "For example, pigeon problems are huge in Phoenix and outlying areas. Our approach is to find solutions that do not involve poison, but are more natural and environmentally sound." A common current-day bird abatement program involves baiting pigeons with poisoned grains. However, Dawson said, this method also puts protected birds at risk....
$155 million home planned at club For Sale: Ten bedroom, 53,000-squre-foot stone-and-wood mansion at The Yellowstone Club. Amenities include heated driveway, wine cellar, indoor/outdoor pool and a ski lift that can be boarded inside the house. Spectacular views. Price: If you have to ask, you can't afford it. But if you're curious, it's going on the market at $155 million. Billionaire developer Tim Blixseth calls the house "The Pinnacle." He said it should be complete in 12 to 14 months. Forbes Magazine said the sales price makes it the most expensive "publicized" mega-home of its kind. "You can't believe the number of people interested in this thing," Blixseth said of possible buyers. "And the guys who are calling aren't going to have to borrow any money." Locati Architects of Bozeman designed the house, which is between Pioneer Mountain and Lone Peak, a short distance from the Lee Metcalf Wilderness Area....
Climate change means hunger and thirst for billions: report Billions of people will suffer water shortages and the number of hungry will grow by hundreds of millions by 2080 as global temperatures rise, scientists warn in a new report. The report estimates that between 1.1 billion and 3.2 billion people will be suffering from water scarcity problems by 2080 and between 200 million and 600 million more people will be going hungry. The assessment is contained in a draft of a major international report by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to be released later this year, Australia's The Age newspaper said. Rising sea levels could flood seven million more homes, while Australia's famed Great Barrier Reef, treasured as the world's largest living organism, could be dead within decades, the scientists warn, the newspaper said....
Climate change may crush wine industry By any measure, California wines rank among the best in the world. But a 2-degree rise in temperature could make Napa Valley chardonnay a thing of the past. Warmer grape-growing regions such as the Livermore Valley could be knocked out of the premium wine game entirely. "It's clear that there's the potential for really substantial problems, and almost certainly going to be some change," said John Williams, owner and winemaker at Frog's Leap Winery in Napa Valley. Although grapes may feel the heat first, they won't be alone. Many of the state's signature crops — avocados, oranges, almonds — will face serious declines in yield by midcentury, according to computer models that project climate changes....
The race that Barbaro could not win The eight-month survival saga of Barbaro, a story that captured the emotions and imaginations of millions around the world and raised questions about the extent and expense of his treatment, ended early Monday morning. Barbaro, the Kentucky Derby winner last May with a 6 1/2 -length victory margin that was the largest in 60 years, was euthanized at the hospital where he had been since the day he suffered multiple fractures in his right hind leg. The widespread fascination with Barbaro's ordeal was born out of the competitive nature of horse racing and an unusually long and complicated medical treatment. People who didn't care about horse racing suddenly did. "It was a difficult night," said Dean Richardson, the surgeon at the New Bolton Center of the George D. Widener Hospital for Large Animals at Kennett Square, Pa. Richardson had repaired Barbaro's three broken bones, one of which broke into 20 pieces. "He didn't lie down all night, for the first time since he has been here," Richardson said at a news conference. "It was the first night that he was clearly distressed by his own condition. "We meant what we said all along. If we couldn't control his discomfort, we wouldn't go on."...
Sheriff's Department investigating Redington Pass cattle shooting The Pima County Sheriff's Department is looking for those responsible for the shooting deaths of several cattle in the Redington Pass area northeast of Tucson. A local rancher notified authorities Friday after finding six of his cattle shot to death near a watering hole, according to a press release from the Animal Cruelty Taskforce. Deputies found three freshly killed cows and three that had been killed earlier in the week, judging by the state of decomposition and evidence that scavengers had eaten parts of the carcasses, according to the release. Authorities believe the three most recent killings occurred Thursday or Friday of last week....
Too many cows for Wash cattle producers High corn prices and not enough processing plants have produced an oversupply of cows, causing feedlot headaches for Pacific Northwest cattle producers. When animals are fed corn in feedlots for even a few extra days, it can cost ranchers thousands of dollars. Then beef processors dock producers if their animals are even a few pounds too fat. Cattle can gain three to five pounds a day in a feedlot and only bring about $20 a head in total profit, so they have to be sold quickly when they are ready. "The losses are just huge," said Rod Van de Graaf, co-owner of a large feedlot in Sunnyside. "We are just trying to hold on." Van de Graaf said he feeds about 240 tons of corn a day, and he's got hundreds of cattle milling around that should already have been shipped to market. The closure of a Tyson Foods Co. processing plant near Boise, Idaho, is forcing ranchers in Idaho and Oregon to ship their cows to a Pasco plant, ranchers said. "They (Tyson) are putting you off for three to four weeks when you have cattle ready," Beus said....
2 senators take aim at meatpackers A pair of Iowa senators has revived legislation to challenge the dominance that the nation's largest meatpacking companies hold over that market, offering a bill that would ban those companies from buying livestock in an effort to eliminate what the lawmakers contend are practices that gouge small farmers and ranchers. The new "packer ban" bill resembles a similar, hard-fought initiative that was defeated as part of the 2002 farm bill. Like the old bill, the new one asks Congress to prohibit large meat producers from using their market heft to buy and raise their own livestock. It also would restrict the sort of contracts that the large companies may strike with those who raise cattle just before the cattle are shipped to packing plants for slaughter. Republican Sen. Charles Grassley and Sen. Tom Harkin, a Democrat and the new chairman of the agriculture committee, contend that the large meatpacking companies use their overwhelming buying power to obtain livestock long before they are sent to packing plants for slaughter. That practice, they say, enables those companies to keep livestock prices low and undercut farmers and ranchers who also are trying to sell cattle on the open market....
An ol’ time cowboy Even at 81 years old, I.C. “Tiny” Earp still gets out to visit the ranch once or twice a week. Earp, who had a birthday Jan. 15, turned over the last 1,000 acres to his children at the start of 2006, but it doesn’t keep him away. Earp’s ranching career began when he received a Hereford heifer when he was 4. He said the cow produced 14 calves. “I can remember the first bull calf I ever sold,” he said. “It brought $12 and weighed 500 pounds.” After spending some time working at a gasoline plant and ranching on the side, Earp took over George Cowden II’s ranch between Crane and Imperial. Along with the land he already had, Earp said that gave him nearly 20,000 acres, which he said he watched over largely by himself. On a ranch, Earp noted, three types of figures can be found: rodeo cowboys, cowboys by trade and cowmen. Because he was able to figure out the business side of the ranch, he considers himself among the latter, although he also made a go of it in rodeo....
It's All Trew: Higgins was stage station At most settlements in the Llano Estacado, buffalo hide hunters were the first Anglos to camp or pause for a spell at the site. From 1873 to 1878, hunters hunted illegally in the eastern Texas/Oklahoma panhandles, which was supposedly Indian Territory. In 1874, one of the area's first settlements was established as a resting place for hunters and travelers going south from Fort Supply. The stop was called The Commission Creek Stage Station and known locally as Polly's Hotel. After Fort Elliott was established in 1875, creating a new military road to Fort Supply, the future of the Stage Station seemed assured. Further promises for the future arrived as a mail route began passing through the settlement, which was sold and renamed The Latham House....
Gray wolves to lose some protection Federal protection for about 4,000 gray wolves in three western Great Lakes states — northern parts of Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan — will end in about a month, the Fish and Wildlife Service announced. Plans to do the same in Montana, Idaho and Wyoming probably will take the rest of this year, service director H. Dale Hall said. A formal proposal, with public hearings and a two-month comment period, will be published this week. Two wildlife advocacy groups — the Defenders of Wildlife and Sinapu, a Colorado-based wolf advocacy group — warned they might sue to prevent taking wolves in the Rockies off the endangered list. Another group, the Center for Biological Diversity, claims the proposal will "end in the mass killing of wolves." Ed Bangs, the Fish and Wildlife recovery coordinator in the Rockies, says Wyoming wants all its wolves outside of Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks classified as "predators" that can be shot on sight without restriction. He hopes that talks with the state will produce an acceptable plan. If not, Fish and Wildlife will keep federal restrictions in Wyoming, Hall said. Wyoming Gov. Dave Freudenthal said Monday that the agency's threat "raises the interesting question of whether any (wolf) packs outside Yellowstone in Wyoming are even necessary."....
Wyo wolves could stay under federal control Whether Wyoming's gray wolf population will be part of the animal's broader removal from federal protection in the Rocky Mountains is yet to be seen, but federal officials said a proposal for delisting will move forward with or without Wyoming. Lynn Scarlett, deputy secretary of the Interior, told reporters in a news conference Monday that if Wyoming does not move forward with a federally approved management plan, a "significant portion of the range would remain protected under the Endangered Species Act." Population levels necessary to meet federal requirements in those areas outside the national parks would continue to be overseen by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, she said. That means management would be largely unchanged. Idaho and Montana would be able to move forward with their state plans, which call for maintaining a minimum number of wolves in each state, and would not shoulder any additional burden because of Wyoming, she said....
Criminal charges dropped against rancher who closed road Box Elder County's new attorney dropped criminal charges against a Box Elder County rancher who kept a gate over a disputed mountain road. Stephen Hadfield, who replaced former County Attorney Amy Hugie, told rancher Bret Selman that he didn't see the case as a criminal matter, Selman said. Hugie, frustrated with the county's inability to resolve a dispute over the road, had charged Selman last winter with five class B misdemeanors. The county - backed by recreationists who want access to public lands and a loop road for motorcyclists and ATV riders - claims the road belongs to the public. Selman and his parents, Fred and Laura Selman of Tremonton, claim the stretch of dirt road through their ranch southeast of Mantua belongs to them. Motorcyclists, ATV riders and snowmobilers are damaging their land and threatening wildlife, the Selmans say....
Environmental concerns hit ski plans Beneath a steely sky and icy snow flurries, cross-country skiers glide over a 130-acre alpine meadow that Kirkwood Mountain Resort has preserved for wildlife and recreation. In nearby restaurants, diners use plates and utensils that are reusable or made with recycled materials. And employees receive financial rewards for carpooling to work. Kirkwood, a 35-year-old vacation community nestled in a box canyon south of Lake Tahoe, is a proud signer of a national environmental charter for ski areas. Yet Kirkwood is the only California resort to receive an F in the current report card by an environmental coalition that rates Western ski areas for development practices, water and energy consumption and natural resource protection. And Kirkwood Mountain Resort and Development Co.'s plans for hundreds of dwellings and a ridgeline restaurant visible from wilderness trails have provoked the ire of community activists....
State sues to delist mouse It has been almost two years since the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service began reviewing a proposal to remove the Preble's meadow jumping mouse from the list of threatened and endangered species. But the agency still has not issued a final decision, and now the state of Wyoming wants a federal judge to compel the agency make up its mind. A lawsuit filed last week asks U.S. District Court to force a final action within one month. It also asks the court to direct the Fish and Wildlife Service to strip the 3-inch mouse of its federal protection. “We've asked the court to put them on a deadline,” state Attorney General Pat Crank said. The Fish and Wildlife Service acknowledged Monday that the agency response is late. After missing a 12-month deadline in February 2006, it announced a six-month extension, which it also failed to honor....
Bill would authorize suing feds Several powerful Wyoming legislators are sponsoring a bill that would ask the state attorney general to watch for opportunities to sue the federal government over any failure to follow the federal Endangered Species Act or the National Environmental Policy Act. The bill comes as Gov. Dave Freudenthal's administration continues to negotiate with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service over the federal agency's proposed wolf-management plan for the state. Rep. Pat Childers, R-Cody, chairman of the Travel, Recreation, Wildlife and Cultural Resources Committee, is a main sponsor of the legislation. It would give the Wyoming attorney general's office as much as $250,000 to hire three more lawyers to take legal action in Wyoming, but possibly also to intervene in litigation anywhere in the country....
Hayman fire arsonist re-sentencing in question A judge Monday agreed to reconsider his decision that a former Forest Service employee invalidated her guilty plea by filing an appeal in the worst wildfire in Colorado history. Judge Thomas Kennedy's decision could mean the difference between a re-sentencing hearing for Terry Barton or a new trial that could include additional charges from up to four counties ravaged by the Hayman fire in 2002. Barton, who admitted setting the fire by burning a letter in a drought-stricken area, is serving a 6-year federal sentence, but her 12-year state sentence was thrown out by the state Appeals Court. She pleaded guilty to a state felony arson charge. Prosecutors argue that Barton broke her word when she appealed. With Barton listening by telephone Monday, her lawyer Mark Walta told Kennedy that prosecutors should have raised that issue when Barton filed her appeal in 2003 and it's too late to do so now....
In the Rockies, Pines Die and Bears Feel It Jesse Logan retired in July as head of the beetle research unit for the United States Forest Service at the Rocky Mountain Laboratory in Utah. He is an authority on the effects of temperature on insect life cycles. That expertise has landed him smack in the middle of a debate over protecting grizzly bears. You just never know where the study of beetles will take you. Dr. Logan seems, in fact, to be on a collision course with the federal government, in the debate over whether to lift Endangered Species Act protections from the grizzly bears in and around Yellowstone National Park. The grizzly population in the greater Yellowstone area is estimated to be at least 600. The population is centered in the park proper, federal scientists say, where it has reached its likely natural maximum and has leveled off. But in adjoining stretches of national forest, the number of grizzlies is continuing to go up by 4 percent to 7 percent a year. Their resurgence in the past 50 years is why the federal government announced in 2005 the start of proceedings to take them off the endangered or threatened species list. Dr. Logan enters the fray on the question of what grizzly bears eat, how much of it will be available in the future, and where. All that, he says, hinges on the mountain pine beetle and the whitebark pine....
Following the Tracks of a Killer Mountain Beetle In early September, Jesse Logan, a 62-year-old insect specialist with a knack for mathematics and a deep love for the Western landscape, gazed across a rolling meadow 10,400 feet high in the rugged Wind River Range in Wyoming. Moving carefully with the aid of two trekking poles, Dr. Logan favored a left knee injured three years ago by a Colorado avalanche that killed a close friend. He had not been sure he would ever get into back country like this again. Yet here he was, nearing the end of an arduous expedition, organized and led by Louisa Willcox, director of the wild bears project for the National Resources Defense Council, carrying a 40-pound pack over 12,000-foot passes in a roadless wilderness. Dr. Logan is an authority on the effects of temperature on insect life cycles. Across the way he could see likely signs of a particularly aggressive organism he was seeking but hoping not to find here, the mountain pine beetle. The beetle is the most destructive timber pest in the Western United States. The rising warmth across the Rockies is expanding its range north and, equally important, uphill. Dr. Logan had hoped to find no incipient, major outbreaks here. But many of the pine trees across the way were an unhealthy red. This did not look good....
Senate Panel Examining Firefighting Costs The U.S. Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee will hear testimony tomorrow, January 30 on questions related to cost-sharing among local, state, and federal jurisdictions and comparisons of firefighting and prevention methods. There is a growing debate in Washington about the increased federal costs of firefighting and the best fire prevention methods. Since 2000, the federal government has carried more than $1 billion of the costs of suppressing the fires according to the Government Accounting Office (GAO). Several studies have suggested the Forest Service is carrying too much of the burden. It its most recent report, the GAO said some federal officials are concerned the current framework insulates states and local governments from having to carry the financial burden of protecting the wildland-urban interface (WUI). The GAO said that might reduce incentives for nonfederal entities to help mitigate fire risks, “such as requiring homeowners to use fire-resistant materials and landscaping.” The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Inspector General (IG) issued a report entitled “Forest Service Large Fire Suppression Costs.” This report bluntly said states and local governments should pick up more of the tab....
New Forest Plan Could Impact Ice Climbing Access The newly proposed Gallatin National Forest Travel Plan has caused quite a stir in the ice climbing community. Ice climbers comprise one of the largest user groups during the winter in Hyalite Canyon, one of the many areas of focus, and a proposed plan to change winter accessibility has taken the group by storm. The Travel Plan has had a varied history. In 2002, the Gallatin National Forest originally began working on a new travel plan to manage multiple uses of the public lands. Climbers were ecstatic about a possible victory for winter access in October 2004 when Forest Service officials released a “preferred alternative” that called for plowing to the Chisholm Campground and ungated access beyond that point. Ice climbers banded together to advance this original alternative to the travel plan. Recently, however, Forest Service officials, in an effort believed to be beneficial to family-oriented cross-country skiing activities, have decided to plow the road to the Blackmore Campground and then gate access past the Hyalite Reservoir on January 1, beginning in the 2007-2008 season. This will effectively shorten the season for those ice climbers who do not own or have access to snowmobiles, since access to Hyalite is generally limited later in the season by vehicle clearance due to snow-packed roads....
Colorado's Storm Peak Lab: Science in the snow Up the mountain from the Steamboat Springs Ski Resort, atmospheric scientists have studied everything from snow crystals and pollution to the impact of ultraviolet radiation on vegetation. Scientists at the Storm Peak Laboratory have conducted research here since 1981. Currently, climate change tops their priorities. The findings made at Storm Peak could be important to how the ski industry adjusts to warming temperatures. "With a warmer climate, you will have a shorter ski season," said lab director Dr. Gannet Hallar. "You'll have an earlier melt and a later onset of snow. This makes a lot of difference for the skiing community,"she said. But less snow has an impact far beyond vacationing skiers and snowboarders, Hallar and the other researchers stressed. "Water is a major issue in Colorado," said Hallar. "Our water serves Las Vegas and Los Angeles. So less snow in Colorado influences water across the nation." The lab has determined that an increase in sulfate pollution from power plants reduces snowfall by about 15 percent....
Trouble in paradise In a federal courtroom, Greg Adair looks like someone who might be more comfortable dangling from a 3,000-foot granite wall than sitting at the plaintiff's table. The long hair, the rock-climber physique and the suit and tie just don't seem to mix. He is an uneasy legal warrior for a place where people from around the globe stop to gawk — Yosemite Valley. Adair is the blue-collar activist who has led two local groups in a legal battle for Yosemite's ecological soul. They have won impressive court decisions over the last six years, stopping vast construction projects in the glacial valley. The man behind these court victories is a 45-year-old Bay-Area resident with eclectic pursuits — construction worker, rock climber, philosopher and ardent friend of nature....
National Parks Case May Affect Access The plunging waterfalls and soaring crags chiseled by the Merced River draw millions of visitors each year, but the crowds are precisely what threatens the waterway and the park. Efforts to safeguard the Merced have spawned a court battle over the future of development in Yosemite National Park's most popular stretch. The case may come down to the challenge facing all of America's parks: Should they remain open to everyone, or should access be limited in the interest of protecting them? In November, a federal judge barred crews from finishing $60 million in construction projects in Yosemite Valley, siding with a small group of environmentalists who sued the federal government, saying further commercial development would bring greater numbers of visitors, thus threatening the Merced's fragile ecosystem. "The park's plans for commercialization could damage Yosemite for future generations," said Bridget Kerr, a member of Friends of Yosemite Valley, one of two local environmental groups that filed the suit....
5 dozen killer whales believed to be hunting salmon off S.F. coast A large group of endangered killer whales has been spotted off the coast of San Francisco, a long way from their usual feeding grounds along the Washington coast. The magnificent black and white predators were first seen off Half Moon Bay, where they were apparently searching for salmon, which are declining in numbers in the Pacific Northwest. Photos were taken Jan. 24 of from nine to 15 orcas swimming in the open water between the Farallon Islands and San Francisco. Although killer whales have been seen off the coast before, researchers believe some five dozen or more individuals are now regularly leaving their historic habitat in the Puget Sound area for the abundant waters near the Golden Gate....
Calif. Town's Economy 'Hostage' to Fly This city lives in the shadow of a 1-inch fly that that slurps nectar and zooms around like a hummingbird. The Delhi Sands flower-loving fly is the only fly on the federal endangered species list. Recent counts have yielded no more than two dozen of the flies at any time, and their best hope of survival is pinned on prime breeding habitat in Colton, about 60 miles east of Los Angeles. But that prime habitat is considered prime real estate by Colton officials. They say restrictions on building on the habitat have limited commercial growth and cost tens of millions of dollars in economic development. So city leaders have fought to get the fly off the endangered list since it was placed there in 1993. "It's absurd that an economy and a community should be held hostage by a fly," said Daryl Parrish, the city manager....
Cruise line agrees to $750,000 fine in collision with whale Princess Cruise Lines will pay $750,000 to settle federal charges that a cruise ship hit and killed a humpback whale near Glacier Bay in 2001, according to an agreement approved in U.S. District Court Monday. As part of the agreement, the cruise line said the ship Dawn Princess had a "close encounter" with two humpback whales in July 200l, but did not admit that the ship actually collided with a whale. The cruise line said it was guilty of failing to operate its vessel in at a "slow, safe speed" while near the humpback, but had implemented new safety procedures. The company will pay a $200,000 fine to the government and $550,000 to the National Park Service Foundation. The Park Service money will go to an account for Glacier Bay National Park, to be used for whale research and conservation efforts. Tomie Lee, superintendent of Glacier Bay National Park, said in a statement she was satisfied with the agreement....I see the Bush Justice Dept. is continuing to divert court fines to private non-profits. In this case 70 percent or so of the court fine is diverted. Who picks the non-profits and how, and where is the hue and cry over public input into this decision? Where is the Congressional oversight? If all citizens must obey these laws, then all citizens should benefit from noncompliance. The fines should go to the general treasury.
NAFTA Environmental Commission Rules Against Liquefied Natural Gas Facility On U.S.- Mexico Border The Secretariat of the Commission for Environmental Cooperation, a tri-national commission set up under the North American Free Trade Agreement, announced January 25th that it was rejecting a request by Mexico to suspend an investigation into whether the country violated its own laws in approving a proposed liquefied natural gas (LNG) facility next to a biodiversity hotspot on the U.S. border. In 2005, U.S. and Mexican conservation organizations filed a formal petition with the NAFTA Commission to challenge the Mexican government's granting of permits to Chevron to build the LNG terminal just 600 yards from the Coronado Islands. The islands, located 11 miles south of the U.S. border, provide critical nesting habitat for six threatened or endangered seabird species and 10 other species of plants and animals found nowhere else in the world. The Commission was expressly created to prevent "maquiladora"-style projects, as it was feared by many that the lifting of trade barriers under NAFTA would result in the increased flight of polluting industries and dangerous projects to areas where environmental and health and safety laws were not enforced. Accordingly, the environmental side agreement to NAFTA provides a process for citizens of any NAFTA country to challenge the nation's failure to enforce its environmental laws....
Coordinator works to improve management of the Rio Grande for all users Abeyta, the daughter of a Sandia National Laboratories chemist and granddaughter of ranchers near Mora, has spent her career studying water quality along the Rio Grande. She's a trained scientist living in the state's largest city, but her roots are firmly planted in her family's rural, agricultural heritage. Abeyta, 49, worked for the USGS for 22 years, focusing on water-quality studies. In 2000, in the midst of a legal battle over the endangered Rio Grande silvery minnow, she was asked to join the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as coordinator for the Middle Rio Grande. Her job as head of the Rio Grande Bosque Initiative is part scientist, part diplomat and part project coordinator. She works with pueblos, farmers, ranchers, city officials, environmental groups, scientists and state and federal agencies along the 180-mile stretch of the Rio Grande from Cochiti Dam to the head of Elephant Butte Reservoir to implement the 21 recommendations in a decade-old Rio Grande Bosque management plan....
'Big House' harmed by influx of animals The "Big House" at Casa Grande Ruins National Monument has withstood centuries of desert punishment, but encroachment by unnaturally high populations of animal species is causing permanent damage to the Ruins. Pigeons, round-tail ground squirrels and other rodents have overpopulated the 480 acres of pristine Sonoran Desert encompassed by the monument. The lasting effects of their waste byproducts and living habits have spurred the Ruins staff to take preventative action. Enter WildEdge Conservation Science. For more than a year, Dawson and his team have visited the Ruins with an arsenal of trained raptors, which take controlled flights intended to abate the overpopulation of pigeons and rodents. "Our mission is to address human-wildlife interaction problems," Dawson explained. "For example, pigeon problems are huge in Phoenix and outlying areas. Our approach is to find solutions that do not involve poison, but are more natural and environmentally sound." A common current-day bird abatement program involves baiting pigeons with poisoned grains. However, Dawson said, this method also puts protected birds at risk....
$155 million home planned at club For Sale: Ten bedroom, 53,000-squre-foot stone-and-wood mansion at The Yellowstone Club. Amenities include heated driveway, wine cellar, indoor/outdoor pool and a ski lift that can be boarded inside the house. Spectacular views. Price: If you have to ask, you can't afford it. But if you're curious, it's going on the market at $155 million. Billionaire developer Tim Blixseth calls the house "The Pinnacle." He said it should be complete in 12 to 14 months. Forbes Magazine said the sales price makes it the most expensive "publicized" mega-home of its kind. "You can't believe the number of people interested in this thing," Blixseth said of possible buyers. "And the guys who are calling aren't going to have to borrow any money." Locati Architects of Bozeman designed the house, which is between Pioneer Mountain and Lone Peak, a short distance from the Lee Metcalf Wilderness Area....
Climate change means hunger and thirst for billions: report Billions of people will suffer water shortages and the number of hungry will grow by hundreds of millions by 2080 as global temperatures rise, scientists warn in a new report. The report estimates that between 1.1 billion and 3.2 billion people will be suffering from water scarcity problems by 2080 and between 200 million and 600 million more people will be going hungry. The assessment is contained in a draft of a major international report by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to be released later this year, Australia's The Age newspaper said. Rising sea levels could flood seven million more homes, while Australia's famed Great Barrier Reef, treasured as the world's largest living organism, could be dead within decades, the scientists warn, the newspaper said....
Climate change may crush wine industry By any measure, California wines rank among the best in the world. But a 2-degree rise in temperature could make Napa Valley chardonnay a thing of the past. Warmer grape-growing regions such as the Livermore Valley could be knocked out of the premium wine game entirely. "It's clear that there's the potential for really substantial problems, and almost certainly going to be some change," said John Williams, owner and winemaker at Frog's Leap Winery in Napa Valley. Although grapes may feel the heat first, they won't be alone. Many of the state's signature crops — avocados, oranges, almonds — will face serious declines in yield by midcentury, according to computer models that project climate changes....
The race that Barbaro could not win The eight-month survival saga of Barbaro, a story that captured the emotions and imaginations of millions around the world and raised questions about the extent and expense of his treatment, ended early Monday morning. Barbaro, the Kentucky Derby winner last May with a 6 1/2 -length victory margin that was the largest in 60 years, was euthanized at the hospital where he had been since the day he suffered multiple fractures in his right hind leg. The widespread fascination with Barbaro's ordeal was born out of the competitive nature of horse racing and an unusually long and complicated medical treatment. People who didn't care about horse racing suddenly did. "It was a difficult night," said Dean Richardson, the surgeon at the New Bolton Center of the George D. Widener Hospital for Large Animals at Kennett Square, Pa. Richardson had repaired Barbaro's three broken bones, one of which broke into 20 pieces. "He didn't lie down all night, for the first time since he has been here," Richardson said at a news conference. "It was the first night that he was clearly distressed by his own condition. "We meant what we said all along. If we couldn't control his discomfort, we wouldn't go on."...
Sheriff's Department investigating Redington Pass cattle shooting The Pima County Sheriff's Department is looking for those responsible for the shooting deaths of several cattle in the Redington Pass area northeast of Tucson. A local rancher notified authorities Friday after finding six of his cattle shot to death near a watering hole, according to a press release from the Animal Cruelty Taskforce. Deputies found three freshly killed cows and three that had been killed earlier in the week, judging by the state of decomposition and evidence that scavengers had eaten parts of the carcasses, according to the release. Authorities believe the three most recent killings occurred Thursday or Friday of last week....
Too many cows for Wash cattle producers High corn prices and not enough processing plants have produced an oversupply of cows, causing feedlot headaches for Pacific Northwest cattle producers. When animals are fed corn in feedlots for even a few extra days, it can cost ranchers thousands of dollars. Then beef processors dock producers if their animals are even a few pounds too fat. Cattle can gain three to five pounds a day in a feedlot and only bring about $20 a head in total profit, so they have to be sold quickly when they are ready. "The losses are just huge," said Rod Van de Graaf, co-owner of a large feedlot in Sunnyside. "We are just trying to hold on." Van de Graaf said he feeds about 240 tons of corn a day, and he's got hundreds of cattle milling around that should already have been shipped to market. The closure of a Tyson Foods Co. processing plant near Boise, Idaho, is forcing ranchers in Idaho and Oregon to ship their cows to a Pasco plant, ranchers said. "They (Tyson) are putting you off for three to four weeks when you have cattle ready," Beus said....
2 senators take aim at meatpackers A pair of Iowa senators has revived legislation to challenge the dominance that the nation's largest meatpacking companies hold over that market, offering a bill that would ban those companies from buying livestock in an effort to eliminate what the lawmakers contend are practices that gouge small farmers and ranchers. The new "packer ban" bill resembles a similar, hard-fought initiative that was defeated as part of the 2002 farm bill. Like the old bill, the new one asks Congress to prohibit large meat producers from using their market heft to buy and raise their own livestock. It also would restrict the sort of contracts that the large companies may strike with those who raise cattle just before the cattle are shipped to packing plants for slaughter. Republican Sen. Charles Grassley and Sen. Tom Harkin, a Democrat and the new chairman of the agriculture committee, contend that the large meatpacking companies use their overwhelming buying power to obtain livestock long before they are sent to packing plants for slaughter. That practice, they say, enables those companies to keep livestock prices low and undercut farmers and ranchers who also are trying to sell cattle on the open market....
An ol’ time cowboy Even at 81 years old, I.C. “Tiny” Earp still gets out to visit the ranch once or twice a week. Earp, who had a birthday Jan. 15, turned over the last 1,000 acres to his children at the start of 2006, but it doesn’t keep him away. Earp’s ranching career began when he received a Hereford heifer when he was 4. He said the cow produced 14 calves. “I can remember the first bull calf I ever sold,” he said. “It brought $12 and weighed 500 pounds.” After spending some time working at a gasoline plant and ranching on the side, Earp took over George Cowden II’s ranch between Crane and Imperial. Along with the land he already had, Earp said that gave him nearly 20,000 acres, which he said he watched over largely by himself. On a ranch, Earp noted, three types of figures can be found: rodeo cowboys, cowboys by trade and cowmen. Because he was able to figure out the business side of the ranch, he considers himself among the latter, although he also made a go of it in rodeo....
It's All Trew: Higgins was stage station At most settlements in the Llano Estacado, buffalo hide hunters were the first Anglos to camp or pause for a spell at the site. From 1873 to 1878, hunters hunted illegally in the eastern Texas/Oklahoma panhandles, which was supposedly Indian Territory. In 1874, one of the area's first settlements was established as a resting place for hunters and travelers going south from Fort Supply. The stop was called The Commission Creek Stage Station and known locally as Polly's Hotel. After Fort Elliott was established in 1875, creating a new military road to Fort Supply, the future of the Stage Station seemed assured. Further promises for the future arrived as a mail route began passing through the settlement, which was sold and renamed The Latham House....
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