NEWS ROUNDUP

Taming the Wild West in the Supreme Court t came as a surprise a few weeks ago when the Supreme Court agreed to hear the government's appeal in the case of Wilkie v. Robbins. After all, the case involves neither big money nor high principle nor unsettled law. But it brings a whiff of the wild, wild West to the high court, and it offers a pleasant change from writing about more citified stuff. Westerners used to have a phrase for a violent and prolonged storm. It's when "black gum and thunder meet." The tree won't break and the lightning won't let up. The federal Bureau of Land Management (BLM) provides the thunder. A novice cattleman named Harvey Frank Robbins is as stubborn as a black gum tree. Robbins owns the High Island Ranch near Thermopolis, Wyo. To boil down a feud now in its 12th year, Robbins does not like the bureaucrats, and the bureaucrats do not like Robbins. So far, Robbins is winning, but "so far" is not very far, and the case has yet a long way to go. The brouhaha began in the spring of 1994 when Robbins bought the ranch from George Nelson. It appears that Robbins was not born to the ways of the West. He had been in the lumber business in Alabama, selling custom flooring, but his heart hungered for a new career where the buffalo roam and the skies are not cloudy all day. Perhaps the greenhorn did not fully understand the rules of western land management. The 80,000 acres involved in this case are partly public and partly private. The federal BLM regularly swaps some of its federal land for easements over private land, and vice versa. In this case, the government negligently failed to record a critical easement before Robbins bought the ranch from Nelson and moved in. Under Wyoming law, he took unencumbered ownership....
Conservation Group, Unions Joining Forces In a first-of-its-kind alliance that could fundamentally reshape the environmental movement, 20 labor unions with nearly 5 million members are joining forces with a Republican-leaning umbrella group of conservationists -- the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership -- to put pressure on Congress and the Bush administration. The Union Sportsman's Alliance, to be rolled out in Washington on Tuesday after nearly three years of quiet negotiations, is to be a dues-based organization ($25 a year). Its primary goal is to increase federal funding for protecting wildlife habitat while guaranteeing access for hunters and anglers. The unlikely marriage of union and conservation interests comes at a time when the Bush administration, with its push for oil and gas drilling in the Rocky Mountain West, has limited public access to prime hunting and fishing areas on federal land. This has triggered a bipartisan backlash from sportsmen and conservation groups, as well as from Western politicians in both parties. The strength of that backlash is making bedfellows of blue-collar workers and old-guard conservationists, who historically have shared little but suspicion and disdain....
Our Opinion: Conservation - ranch buys still best bet Vast swaths of open land in Pima County are being protected from development, thanks to the wisdom of voters and of county leaders overseeing the Sonoran Desert Conservation Plan. Some environmentalists are concerned that cattle grazing continues to pose problems as the county buys ranches for preservation but lets the ranchers keep operating another 10 years or longer. Other activists are miffed that more money from the conservation plan, approved by voters in May 2004, isn't being spent to purchase open space on the county's booming Northwest Side. While both concerns are legitimate - given the damage wrought by grazing and the need for open space in heavily developed areas - the land purchases to date eventually will prove to have been wise. In spending $51.6 million on seven ranches and a farm, the county is conserving 23,479 acres at an average cost of $2,200 per acre. Indeed, those lands and all others acquired so far under the 2004 county bond plan - 25,471 acres total - were bought for an average cost of $2,800 per acre. By contrast, 33 acres comprising four sites that environmentalists want purchased on the Northwest Side would cost $2.47 million, or $74,991 per acre....
Column - America Goes Insane Over the Weather It's official. America is now totally insane over the weather. Even the Weather Channel that used to simply provide reasonably accurate, short-term information about the weather is now telling everyone we’re doomed because global warming is going to destroy the Earth. Why not just rename it the AlGore Channel? The weather used to be the concern primarily of farmers and ranchers. It determines how well or not crops would grow and herds will thrive. As America became more urbanized, the rest of the population wanted to know whether to bring an umbrella or what to wear. Now it is a source of daily anxiety over the fate of the Earth. To make matters worse, people are being told and actually believing that what they do or not can affect the weather in ways to keep the seas and temperatures from rising. It is no longer the domain of the sun, the oceans, volcanoes and clouds. These puny things are nothing compared to what kind of car you drive or what you use to heat your home....
Rare double discovery fuels debate over fossil sales A team of fossil hunters has pulled a world-class dinosaur find from the badlands of western Garfield County. Frozen in the sandstone are the death poses of two beasts — a meat-eater and a plant-eater — with their tails crossed like swords. The pair's sudden, sandy burial, near the coast of Montana's prehistoric sea 75 million years ago, preserved them with remarkable detail, right down to tendons and teeth. The discovery is believed to be one of only three worldwide capturing ameat-eater and plant-eater together, and the first in North America.And it raises a titillating question: Did they die in battle? The bone-digger team, taking a page from the realm of murder mysteries and TV dramas, has dubbed their excavation "The Paleo-Incident Project." But their find has stirred up the feud between paleontologists, who want fossils donated to universities or museums, and commercial fossil hunters, who aim to cash in on their efforts....
The Warming of Greenland Mr. Schmitt, a 60-year-old explorer from Berkeley, Calif., had just landed on a newly revealed island 400 miles north of the Arctic Circle in eastern Greenland. It was a moment of triumph: he had discovered the island on an ocean voyage in September 2005. Now, a year later, he and a small expedition team had returned to spend a week climbing peaks, crossing treacherous glaciers and documenting animal and plant life. Despite its remote location, the island would almost certainly have been discovered, named and mapped almost a century ago when explorers like Jean-Baptiste Charcot and Philippe, Duke of Orléans, charted these coastlines. Would have been discovered had it not been bound to the coast by glacial ice. Maps of the region show a mountainous peninsula covered with glaciers. The island’s distinct shape — like a hand with three bony fingers pointing north — looks like the end of the peninsula. Now, where the maps showed only ice, a band of fast-flowing seawater ran between a newly exposed shoreline and the aquamarine-blue walls of a retreating ice shelf. The water was littered with dozens of icebergs, some as large as half an acre; every hour or so, several more tons of ice fractured off the shelf with a thunderous crack and an earth-shaking rumble. All over Greenland and the Arctic, rising temperatures are not simply melting ice; they are changing the very geography of coastlines....
Masked marauders Ron Klataske remembers when there were a dozen coveys of quail within a mile of his family's Washington County home, and a few raccoons along the creek. Now there are more raccoons than Klataske ever imagined and maybe one small covey of quail. He thinks there's a correlation between the rise of one and fall of the other. "I don't think there's any doubt raccoons could be having a negative impact on quail," said Klataske, Audubon of Kansas executive director. R.J. Robel, a retired Kansas State professor and acclaimed upland bird biologist, agrees. "We're seeing some significant losses of all kinds of ground-nesting birds... like quail, mourning doves and meadow larks," Robel said. "All sorts of eggs are being eaten."....
Editorial - RAC involvement in setting fees is a good idea Regional citizen committees set up to help the federal Bureau of Land Management do its job are biting off a new responsibility that has the potential of biting back. For years, resource advisory councils have helped BLM in its decision-making processes, in theory at least providing the public's imprimatur or objections to proposed land management actions. The far-flung Central Montana RAC, for example, played a role in development of a management plan for the Upper Missouri River Breaks National Monument, and it regularly works on grazing and oil- and gas-leasing issues. The latest addition to RAC members' job descriptions will be reviewing proposed recreation fees, not only for BLM properties but also those operated by the Forest Service, which is part of a different federal agency — BLM is in the Department of the Interior, while the Forest Service is part of the Department of Agriculture....
Snowmobile collides with boarder on Aspen Mountain An accident Sunday on Richmond Ridge shattered the leg and face of a pro snowboarder from Missouri Heights and nearly broke his father's heart. Doran Laybourn, 26, was snowboarding on a gentle grade on a groomed, public route a few miles south of the upper terminal of the Silver Queen Gondola when a snowmobile rounded a blind curve and collided with him, according to his father, Royal Laybourn. Friends took Doran Laybourn by snowmobile to the gondola terminal where he was cared for by the ski patrol, transported to the bottom of the mountain and taken by ambulance to Aspen Valley Hospital. He was in intensive care and faced multiple surgeries Sunday night, according to his dad, and he was in stable condition Monday. Royal Laybourn said he can accept that accidents happen. What angered him was the reaction by the snowmobile driver and his colleagues. "They didn't render assistance. They just split," he said....
Forest Service called biased Cross country ski and snowshoe groups largely panned last month's decision by the U.S. Forest Service to divvy up what had been a 10,000-acre area in Logan Canyon set aside for skiers to also include snowmobiles. Their argument: The Forest Service too often sides with motorized users at the expense of nonmotorized enthusiasts when making winter recreation decisions. The verdict reached by the Wasatch-Cache National Forest regarding winter uses in the Franklin Basin-Tony Grove area of Logan Canyon, they maintain, is just the latest and most high-profile example. "This is what we've been saying for a long time," says Tim Wagner, board chairman for the Bear River Watershed Council. "The tremendous increase in [winter] motorized use in just the last 10 years has vastly trampled areas that were pretty much quiet and used by nonmotorized users traditionally. But just because there has been a tremendous increase in snowmobile use in Utah, it doesn't mean less people are recreating in a nonmotorized way." Do the skiers and snowshoers have a point? A recently released report by the Winter Wildlands Alliance, a Boise-based skiing and snowshoeing advocacy group, asserts that the Forest Service has, in fact, tilted decisively on behalf of motorized users when planning and determining winter recreation land uses on forest lands - even though in many cases skiers and snowshoers outnumber their snowmobiling brethren....
Lookout posted for ATVs in forests Officer Teddy Mullins, who patrols the George Washington and Jefferson national forests, saw lights on Pearis Mountain that he knew shouldn't be there. The surveillance in late December resulted in 50 federal charges against 12 persons caught riding all-terrain vehicles, which are illegal in much of the national forest. Seven of the machines were impounded. "We had had it under surveillance off and on for 18 months," Capt. Woody Lipps said. "We just never were able to catch anybody there." The riders were mostly 18 to 22 years old, and many had just received their ATVs for Christmas. Although there is no federal law that specifically authorizes officers to seize ATVs, Capt. Lipps said they have the right to seize evidence. "We're just going to start taking them," Capt. Lipps told the Roanoke Times. "When your $3,000 or $4,000 or $6,000 machine turns up missing and you come to the National Forest Service looking for it, we'll be happy to see that you get it back. But not until you've gotten your ticket."....
Wild being worn out of wilderness? Imagine a crisp, cool summer morning near Cathedral Lake in the Maroon Bells-Snowmass Wilderness. You emerge from your tent, tiptoe through the dew-soaked grass, inhale the fresh pine scent, then glance around and see a sight that sends you scurrying inside. Four other backpackers pitched camp after you turned in, some alarmingly close to "your" space; others too close to the water's edge. Hordes of day hikers have already converged on the lake during their wildflower outings. Some let their friendly dogs wander over to say hello. The U.S. Forest Service's Rocky Mountain regional office in Denver has convened a special committee over the past year to debate what's wrong with that picture. More to the point, the agency wants to know if it should do anything about it. Colorado's growing population, coupled with soaring visits to public lands, has the Forest Service concerned about the fate of some of most scenic spots in wilderness lands. Public lands managers call those cream-of-the-crop sites "popular magnets."....
Mad cow 'minimum risk' from Canadian beef, U.S. says Coming to the aid of an American meat industry suffering from lost foreign markets, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has proposed lifting its ban on the import of cheaper cattle from Canada, despite Canada's discovery of eight cases of mad cow disease since 2003, including five in 2006 alone. USDA officials say that a recently completed risk assessment of Canada's beef raising and feeding practices shows that U.S. consumers face "minimum risk" from the renewed import of Canadian cattle to the U.S. The USDA is accepting comments on its proposed removal of the ban until March 12, after which the department will make a final decision on whether to adopt the proposed rule. Consumer advocates and some cattle ranchers oppose the new Canadian import proposal, arguing that the new rule is driven by the needs of large meat packing corporations, and that its food safety logic is deeply flawed....
The GM hens whose eggs are designed to save lives Scientists have created a breed of designer chickens with eggs that can produce life-saving drugs. The breakthrough could help the fight against diseases such as cancer and dramatically cut the cost of treatments. But it will worry opponents of the genetic modification techniques the scientists used. The 500-strong flock was bred at Edinburgh's Roslin Institute, the birthplace of Dolly the cloned sheep. The chickens' DNA was altered so that their eggs contained complex medicinal proteins. The proteins can be extracted to make drugs for humans. It is the first time scientists have successfully manipulated the birds' DNA so that their characteristics are passed down the generations. Previously the ability to make the valuable proteins had vanished in a generation or two....
Amenity Ranch Boom Spreads East he term “amenity ranch” is a part of the modern vocabulary of the West, and the mind’s eye is replete with a thousand slick ads in a hundred different magazines: a huge log mansion, picture windows warmly alight, a trout river flowing majestically with towering snow-covered peaks beyond. The fields are lush and green. The scenes of western agriculture as we have come to know it are absent from the vision. But as land prices in the most scenic and still accessible parts of the west reach astronomical levels, a new breed of amenity ranch buyers is emerging, casting about for land far from the luxury hotspots like Jackson Hole or Big Sky. This new breed has been priced out of those places, and many of them don’t seem to care about that. They don’t need ski-town ambiance, wealthy neighbors, or even rushing streams full of native trout. They just want the commodity that is perhaps the fastest disappearing one on earth -- big private spaces, clean air, a place to hunt big game and upland birds and waterfowl. Once-forgotten farm and ranch land in the plains of the West is teeming with these amenities and often sells for a price that -- for now -- pales in comparison to what's being sold in the Jackson Holes and Big Skies of the region. Over the past decade, many of these properties have been made even more desirable by enrollment in the federal Conservation Reserve Program or the Wetlands Reserve Program or the availability of Conservation Easements, or a combination of all three -- all of which encourage more wildlife habitat while providing either per-acre payments or tax breaks for buyers. This new market is driving up land prices from eastern Oregon to Kansas and Nebraska, transforming some of the most marginal operations on the prairies into valuable real estate....
Learning the ropes There are thousands of horse owners in Texas, and most don't have a clue as to how to get the best performance from their animals. That's why somewhere between 400 to 500 people endured the cold drizzle Sunday morning to watch Chris Cox put on his horsemanship demonstration in the damp coolness of Will Rogers Coliseum. "Horses are an unregulated business," Cox said after his hour-and-a-half clinic. "You have to get a driver's license to drive a car; you need training and a license to fly an airplane. Yet anyone can go out and buy a horse and start riding." Chris, please don't give this idea to the politicians. I'm sure they would love to regulate and tax all horse owners. Find another way to make your point and market your service.
It's All Trew: Artifacts aren't always what they seem The museum exhibits a large display of post mauls because they were used in building early day barbed-wire fences, especially along railroad rights of way. Some treated posts used by the railroad had lathe-turned, pointed ends to facilitate driving into the soil. A post maul goes way back in history as most were made by local blacksmiths heating cast iron over their forges and pouring the molten metal into molds. The cast iron hammer-heads will chip and flake off if used against iron stakes or posts. Mauls were used not only to drive posts but wooden stakes and stobs used in setting concrete forms and raising circus tents. Some mauls have wooden inserts to absorb the impact without damage and all have the weight of the head imprinted into the metal. Some weighed up to 40 pounds. An item often mistaken as some sort of barbed wire is a seed-corn rack. Long before seed companies originated, each farmer had to select, dry and shell out his own seed corn for the next year's planting....