America's water war "Resource wars" are things that happen elsewhere. We don't usually think of our country as water poor or imagine that "resource wars" might be applied as a description to various state and local governments in the Southwest, Southeast or upper Midwest now fighting tooth and nail for previously shared water. And yet, "war" may not be a bad metaphor for what's on the horizon. According to the National Climate Data Center, federal officials have declared 43 percent of the contiguous U.S. to be in "moderate to extreme drought." Already, Sonny Perdue of Georgia is embroiled in an ever more bitter conflict with the governors of Florida and Alabama, as well as the Army Corps of Engineers, over the flow of water into and out of the Atlanta area. He's hardly alone. After all, the Southwest is in the grips of what, according to Davis, some climatologists are terming a "'mega-drought,' even the 'worst in 500 years.'" More shockingly, he writes, such conditions may actually represent the region's new "normal weather." The upper Midwest is also in rainfall-shortage mode, with water levels at all the Great Lakes dropping unnervingly. The water level of Lake Superior, for instance, has fallen to the "lowest point on record for this time of year." (Notice, by the way, how many "records" are being set nationally and globally in these drought years; how many places are already beginning to push beyond history, which means beyond any reference point we have.) And then there's the Southeast, 26 percent of which, according to the National Weather Service, is in a state of "exceptional" drought, its most extreme category, and 78 percent of which is "drought-affected." We're talking here about a region normally considered rich in water resources setting a bevy of records for dryness....
Predator poisons up in air Federal regulators are asking for public comment on a petition to ban two forms of poisoning used to kill livestock predators. The Environmental Protection agency is responding to concerns of environmental groups that say the poisoning devices intended for species such as coyotes threaten birds, wolves and dogs as well. The devices have been used for decades as a means to help ranchers prevent losses. But on Friday, the EPA gave notice it will take public comment on canceling the program. The move comes nearly a year after a coalition of conservation and health groups led by Boulder-based Sinapu submitted a 53-page petition highlighting a litany of concerns with the poisons that ranged from danger to California condors to terrorism risks. The federal government distributes baited, spring-loaded traps made to spray a mist in the face of coyote that bites down on it. The traps, known as M-44, are placed in the ground. Another poison distributed by the government is used in livestock collars that release the poison when a predator tries to bite the animal's neck....
Who Owns Montana? - ATV and equestrian use in the Pryor Mountains The Pryor Mountains are often overlooked by the Beartooths towering over from the West, but they are now taking center stage as the Forest Service looks to finalize a draft travel management plan for the range. The proposal is pitting ATV users versus backcountry horsemen and other wilderness advocates hoping to limit the use of off road vehicles in the Pryors. Dick Walton is heading up the Pryors Coalition, a group composed of the Audobon Society, the Montana Wilderness Association, and the Beartooth Backcountry Horsemen. Walton is working to limit the presence of off road vehicle trails, trails he says have doubled since the current plan was first written. "We are not against motorized use in the Pryors, but we want to preserve it so the motorized use doesn't dominate the landscape," says Walton. Randy Thom, meanwhile, started the Park City Recreation Association- in part to educate ATV users about how best to protect the land....
Tons of sand cleared More than 13,200 tons of river-clogging traction sand was cleaned-up along Interstate 70 this year on Vail Pass, between East Vail and Shrine Pass. That’s around double the amount of traction sand actually put down by the Colorado Department of Transportation last winter in that area, said Ken Wissel, a deputy maintenance superintendent for the region. The sand, which is used to keep icy and snow-packed roads safe during cold weather, has a profound environmental impact. It eventually seeps into Black Gore Creek below the highway, smothers insects, harms fish and eventually settles in Gore Creek, the trout stream that flows through Vail. Much of the sand is caught in sediment basins along I-70 and Black Gore Creek. The basins though require regular cleaning, or else more sand will end up in the water where it does its damage. “There’s 30 years of sand out there, so there’s plenty to clean up,” Wissel said....
Forest Service finds it easier to be green You might think that an agency dedicated to conservation would be ahead of the curve when it comes to having eco-friendly operations. But the U.S. Forest Service, just as many of us ordinary folks, has only recently come to a realization of how much it can do to change its habits and conserve resources. This past week, at a national conference held in Denver, the agency launched its nationwide effort to integrate sustainability into its day-to-day operations. The changes, big and small, came out of a "green" movement started here in the Forest Service's Rocky Mountain region. It's going to take a while to turn around a bureaucracy as large and entrenched as the Forest Service, but the energy and enthusiasm of those involved is laudable and shows an introspective quality that you don't often see in government. "I think somehow, as part of society, we got complacent," said Rick Cables, Rocky Mountain regional forester. "We didn't notice. We didn't think about it." Now, they are looking at a spectrum of ways to reduce what they call the service's environmental footprint....
Conservation Groups Ask Forest Service to Protect Key Southwest Rivers A coalition of conservationists led by the Center for Biological Diversity petitioned the U.S. Forest Service to immediately protect two ecologically critical river corridors in Arizona and New Mexico from continued damage by off-road vehicles. The San Francisco and Blue Rivers are two crown jewels of the Southwest that are rich in cultural resources, wildlife habitat, and opportunities for quiet recreation; yet portions of these rivers that flow through the Apache-Sitgreaves and Gila National Forests are threatened by ongoing and increasing abuse by off-road vehicles. The petition cites the need for immediate action based on the Forest Service’s duty to protect the area’s outstanding ecological and quiet recreational values from potentially irreparable harm. Closing the Frisco-Blue area would also help to ensure the agency’s compliance with the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Water Act, and the National Forest Management Act. “If there were only one place on the forest where off-road vehicles should not be allowed, it would be in riparian areas, especially along the perennial flow of water down the San Francisco River Canyon,” said Dutch Salmon, chairman of the Gila Conservation Coalition. The Forest Service is in the midst of a travel-planning process, set to be completed by 2009, whereby each forest is charged with designating routes, trails, and areas as open to off-road vehicle use and prohibiting such use in more sensitive areas....
Air operations report is dearth of details Cal Fire's analysis of air operations during last month's firestorms lacks the critical details it was supposed to provide, leaving officials with an incomplete look at what went wrong as they try to prepare for the next disaster. Among the missing details: a reason for grounding all available military aircraft in San Diego County on the first day of last month's wildfires. Cal Fire Director Ruben Grijalva referred to the report at the 2007 Wildfire Response Roundtable, a closed-door meeting Saturday at Cuyamaca College in El Cajon. Grijalva, members of the military and the San Diego County congressional delegation began to establish new aerial firefighting policies at the meeting. The consensus from the meeting was that much of the problem stemmed from a lack of military helicopter managers, better known as “spotters.” Cal Fire has trained and certified 39 spotters, who are required to be on board military helicopters to help pilots position water drops and communicate with firefighters in the air and on the ground....
New US-Canada Cattle Trade Upsets Some Canadian cattle over 30 months of age will be allowed into the U.S. market starting Monday, despite criticism from some domestic ranchers worried about mad cow disease. No one knows for sure how the decision will affect U.S. ranchers or foreign markets, which have yet to fully recover from the discovery of an infected cow in 2003. One cattlemen's group didn't wait to find out, filing an emergency request Friday for a temporary restraining order to block the rule from taking effect. In May 2003, the United States closed the border to cattle imports from Canada after an Alberta cow was confirmed with mad cow disease, known scientifically as bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE. The border between the world's largest trade partners reopened for Canadian beef from younger cattle within months of the original ban, and live cattle under the age of 30 months have been allowed to move across the border since July 2005. But the border has remained closed to older cattle until now. Agriculture officials have said the change is firmly based in science and ensures that U.S. regulators will protect the country against the disease. Critics counter that the federal government has failed to fully investigate the potential impact to U.S. ranchers and their export markets....
Older Canadian cattle start to come across border Older cattle from Canada began moving across the border into the United States on Monday, despite last-minute court appeals by some U.S. cattle groups and ranchers concerned about mad cow disease in Canada. Ten plaintiffs, including R-CALF USA, the South Dakota Stockgrowers Association and other groups and individual ranchers, on Friday asked U.S. District Judge Charles Kornmann of Aberdeen for an emergency restraining order to keep the border closed. They were still waiting for word from Kornmann on Monday afternoon, according to Shae Dodson, communications director for R-CALF USA (Ranchers-Cattlemen Action Legal Fund United Stockgrowers of America). Meanwhile, at least one shipment of Canadian cattle came across the border Monday, according to Ed Curlett, a spokesman for the U.S. Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service. Curlett said Monday that he didn't know how many cattle were in the shipment or where they crossed....
Here comes the cavalry As a kid, I spent several summers on a big grain farm in eastern Alberta. Sometimes I would see older kids riding their horses by the side of the road with a blaring portable radio strapped to a saddle pommel. Maybe they still do that in Alberta, or maybe the country kids all have iPods now. Either way, they're not hearing a lot of songs about rural life when they listen to country radio. Cowboy songs have pretty much disappeared from mainstream country music, and the horses are gone too. It's a long way, culturally speaking, from Wilf Carter's The Fate of the Old Strawberry Roan to Carrie Underwood's Jesus, Take the Wheel. It took someone with real cowboy blood in his veins to round up the ponies and get them running again, through some brand new western songs. Horse Soldier! Horse Soldier!, the latest album by Corb Lund and the Hurtin' Albertans on Stony Plain Records, takes a sophisticated look at our ancient relationship with horses, in fields of peace and of war. Lund has a couple of generations of ranchers and cowboys in his family. His face is lightly scarred from his own adventures as a ranch kid and junior rodeo rider in southern Alberta....
It's All Trew: Military editions are book rarities I consider myself an avid reader, book-nut or reading addict. I have to be to keep writing columns each week. Recently, I discovered a type of book I had never heard of before. They are called the "Armed Services Editions." ASEs were published by a firm called Editions For The Armed Services, Incorporated, a nonprofit group established in 1942 by The Council On Books In Wartime. Made up of publishers, librarians and booksellers, they chose and oversaw the printing of 120,000,000 volumes to be distributed exclusively to members of the American Armed Forces in wartime. Classed as U.S. Government property, these books were not to be sold off-base or made available to civilians. To prevent mistaken identity, ASEs took on a different form from the common paperback books of the day. The covers were not adorned in color but left plain. The books were regular size paperbacks but the text and covers were printed horizontal form instead of the regular vertical format. Containing 200 to 300 pages, each had two columns of text instead of one like the regular books. A total of 1324 titles were produced and distributed from 1943 to 1947. The government paid six cents each, splitting a one-cent royalty with authors and the regular publisher when the work was not in the public domain....