NEWS ROUNDUP

Ranchers fight Army over land Herman Moltrer returned from Vietnam to be a cattle rancher on the broad shortgrass prairie that stretches as far as the eye can see in southern Colorado. The rugged work earned him a living and a little something extra for his soul, but now he fears he may have to sell his land, at someone else's price. The U.S. Army wants 418,000 acres of private ranch land, tripling the size of its Pinon Canyon Maneuver Site, a training site considered suitable — some would say essential — for preparing American warriors to do battle in the Middle East and Afghanistan. The 1,000-square-mile facility would be 15 times the size of Washington. Several dozen ranchers and members of 15 county commissions that voted to oppose the project find themselves pitted against the Pentagon and Colorado business interests in a struggle over property rights, personal heritage and the contested priorities of national security. Bob Hill, a rancher forced to sell his land to the Army 25 years ago, said caustically, "I find the city people are really patriotic with our property."....
Plague blamed for biologist's death An Arizona-based wildlife biologist likely died of the plague, officials from Grand Canyon National Park announced on Friday. Autopsy reports for Eric York, a 37-year-old wildlife biologist for the National Park Service, showed that he had plague in his body. Officials said that 49 of York's coworkers and others who came within a 6-foot diameter of him were placed on antibiotics. As of Wednesday, they were still on medication, but none had become ill or displayed symptoms, officials said. Officials said York was most likely exposed to the plague when he performed an autopsy on a mountain lion that had been infected and most likely killed by it. York was the only person to come in contact with the dead mountain lion, according to officials....
Tracing the root of a fire takes time It's hard to comprehend how a small spark can set in motion a firestorm that destroys vast amounts of property and takes human lives. When it happens, people like Gary Eidsmoe are the ones charged with finding out where that spark originated – and why. Normally, when just one fire is involved, investigators systematically search for answers from the beginning. On days like Oct. 21 and 22, when fires were breaking out all over San Diego County, thorough examinations have to wait. Eidsmoe, 54, retired from Cal Fire at the end of last year. He had been a fire investigator for 17 years. But he's still on call and was sent to Potrero on Oct. 21 to find the cause of the Harris fire. Eidsmoe also helped with investigations of the Poomacha blaze near Palomar Mountain and a number of fires on Camp Pendleton. Cal Fire has not officially announced the causes of any of last month's fires. Eidsmoe said it is his understanding that most were caused by power lines arcing or falling down in high winds, or transformers exploding....
Ranch easements culled The conservation easements ranchers use to cut taxes and protect land are being scrutinized by the Colorado Division of Real Estate, Colorado Department of Revenue and the Internal Revenue Service because of allegedly inflated appraisals. Of the more than 400 tax returns involving conservation easements that the IRS is investigating nationwide, 290 are in Colorado. About 60 of those were initiated at the request of the Colorado Department of Revenue. A conservation easement is a permanent restriction on some land uses, typically development and subdivision of a property. Ranchers and farmers establish conservation easements on their properties through land trusts - nonprofit organizations that work to conserve land. In exchange for putting land into an easement, owners get tax deductions. When there are abuses, as with inflated appraisals, the government gets shorted on taxes. "There can't be abuse if the appraisal isn't overvalued," said Division of Real Estate director Erin Toll. "We're in danger of losing the whole (conservation easement) program if we don't step up enforcements."....
Criminal Probe Opened in Bay Oil Spill Coast Guard investigators on Sunday were trying to determine whether a cargo ship's speed and possible communication problems led to a collision that resulted in the San Francisco Bay's worst oil spill in nearly two decades. A preliminary Coast Guard investigation found that human error, not mechanical failure, caused the ship to sideswipe a support on the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge as federal prosecutors opened a criminal investigation into the incident. "One of the things we are looking at, as with any investigation with the weather conditions we saw—specifically heavy fog—would be what speed was the ship traveling and was that appropriate given the visibility at the time," Coast Guard Cmdr. Brendan McPherson said Sunday. The Cosco Busan's collision with the bridge Wednesday left a gash nearly 100 feet long on the side of the 926-foot vessel and ruptured two of the vessel's fuel tanks, causing about 58,000 gallons of heavy bunker fuel to leak into the bay....
Feds: Fire retardant use is better than burning Federal and state agencies dropped 31.3 million gallons of fire retardant on U.S. wildfires last year, coating 26,600 acres of burning forest with bright red substance that is mostly water laced with a somewhat toxic chemical brew. Just how toxic has been the subject of a federal review of the environmental impact of fire retardants dropped from the air. Despite retardant’s fertilizer-based chemicals, the U.S. Forest Service disclosed last month that it will continue to drop the substance to slow down imminent flames and assist on-the-ground wildfire defense. The U.S. Forest Service released an environmental assessment in October that analyzed the impacts of fire retardant on soils, air quality, aquatic environments, alpine ecosystems, cultural artifacts and public health. After a year’s worth of general analysis on 193 million acres of land, the Forest Service declared that fire retardant poses no significant impact to natural and human environments — except for bodies of water. In most cases, eliminating the use of retardant would likely increase the severity of a fire, which would in turn worsen the fire’s environmental impact, the study concluded....
Environmentalists oppose ruling on endangered hawk species A bird of prey found along North America's northern West Coast warrants protection as an endangered species in Canada but not in Alaska, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service decided Thursday. Environmental groups that sued the agency for protections for the Queen Charlotte goshawk called the decision bad science and a bad interpretation of federal law and vowed to return to court to have Alaska birds protected. "We think it's illegal, and organizationally, when we think things are illegal, we go to court and try to get a judge to agree with us," said Brendan Cummings of the Center for Biological Diversity. The quest to list the birds under the Endangered Species Act has been going on since 1994. The Fish and Wildlife Service's latest response came after its previous determination denying protections was rejected in court. Queen Charlotte goshawks are one of three subspecies that inhabit the Northern hemisphere, according to the listing petition. They're found from Washington's Olympic Peninsula to southeast Alaska south of Juneau....
Scientists strive to get wildfires' number After a day wrestling with the mysteries of fire, Francis Fujioka turned on the TV and watched Southern California burn into the night. A news feed showed a line of fire climbing a hillside. It was small, moving slowly, not a threat for the moment. But Fujioka saw what viewers missed: The flames were bent in a way that suggested a tiny weather pattern had formed within the fire, and that would influence what happened next. "I'm watching this and I'm thinking to myself, 'There's no way in my career -- what's left of it -- that I'm ever going to be able to model that on a computer,' " said Fujioka, 61, a research meteorologist at the U.S. Forest Service's Fire Laboratory in Riverside. "Predicting a fire's growth is really a difficult business." For nearly three decades, Fujioka has fought fire not with water but with mathematics in an attempt to predict what is inherently unpredictable. Weather, fuel and topography are the ingredients of wildfires like the ones that savaged Southern California recently. The study of the myriad ways they influence each other is an inexact science. A fire's predicted path of destruction using today's forecasting tools often has little in common with what actually burns....
Interior’s rules tread close to trampling free press Those of us in the news media are more than a bit concerned over proposed rules that could restrict photography — both still and video — on public lands. The Society of Professional Journalists and 18 other journalism organizations signed a letter this month opposing the new rules being drafted by the U.S. Department of Interior. The federal agency says it is simply codifying agency rules that are already in place. These rules include a fee schedule for commercial crews that want to film in our national parks and guidelines for what can be filmed by others and where. What prompted the letter of protest from journalists was the possibility that the newly codified agency rules would — in effect — make the government the judge of what can be seen. If that happens, park rangers could assume the role of editor. We get all nervous when government becomes the arbiter of what can and cannot be covered or documented, especially on vast tracts of public lands....Welcome to the regulated community. The media has promoted the regulation of others, or stood silently by while others were regulated out of business. I hope you like the taste of what others have choked on.
Colo. gas lease fetches record price The state government made $2.6 million in a couple of minutes Thursday at an auction of natural-gas drilling rights. Someone paid $26,000 an acre for the right to drill 200 acres north of Interstate 70, near Parachute, more than triple the previous record for a federal gas lease in Colorado. The record-breaking bid comes during a heated debate about how to divide the state's oil and gas revenues, and whether some places should be off limits to drilling. The 200 acres is close to the Naval Oil Shale Reserve, better known as the Roan Plateau. Although the area was first set aside for oil shale, it has a large deposit of natural gas, and it has become the main battleground between gas companies and their opponents in the environmental and wildlife communities....
Horse center to reopen after testing finds no salmonella The U.S. Bureau of Land Management's wild horse center in Palomino Valley plans to reopen Tuesday, nearly seven weeks after salmonella sickened horses at the facility. "The public will be able to come in and again use the facility," BLM official JoLynn Worley said Thursday. "We will be back in business for bringing in horses and shipping them out." Since early September, when 983 horses from the Jackson Mountains were brought to the center, 178 animals have died or were euthanized, the BLM said. Nineteen were euthanized for other conditions, including old injuries. On Sept. 26, the center voluntarily closed after officials learned salmonella was found in some horses....
Groups: Protect prairie dog The environmental group Forest Guardians cites escalating threats to the black-tailed prairie dog in a new petition asking the federal government to protect the animal under the Endangered Species Act. Laramie-based Biodiversity Conservation Alliance is a partner in the petition filed in August with the Department of the Interior. “The black-tailed prairie dog population has vanished in 98 percent of its native range,” said Erik Molvar of Biodiversity. “In its remaining areas, it’s threatened not only by this nonnative plague, but also by these recurring prairie dog poisoning efforts that are pushing the animal closer to the brink of extinction.” The new petition claims the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service erred in its 2004 decision that the animal did not warrant federal protection. Petitioners also state that the black-tailed prairie dog warrants a fresh look due to increased threats from poisoning by humans and habitat destruction, as well as the ongoing threats of shooting and plague....
Wolf plan divides ranchers Ranchers in some areas of the state have differing views of whether Wyoming's proposed new wolf plan is good or bad news for their business. Some ranchers in the Upper Green River Valley area -- where wolves would receive no protection under the current draft plan -- would rather see their lands incorporated into a proposed trophy game zone for wolves. That's because with trophy game status, the ranchers would have help with wolf control and would be reimbursed for livestock losses, actions that would not happen outside the trophy game zone. But around Cody, some ranchers within the proposed trophy game area would rather see so-called predator status for wolves there, so they could have greater flexibility in controlling problem wolves. The Wyoming Game and Fish Department, for its part, says the draft plan is a balance between the two interests. The state Game and Fish Commission is expected to vote on the state's wolf plan when it meets in Thermopolis Thursday and Friday. The plan would take effect once wolves are removed from federal protection....
Hunting group intervenes in grizzly suit A federal judge has allowed a hunting group to intervene in a lawsuit in which conservation organizations are challenging a federal move to strip grizzly bears in the greater Yellowstone area of Endangered Species Act protections. U.S. District Judge Edward Lodge in Idaho on Wednesday granted a request from Safari Club International and Safari Club International Foundation to participate in the lawsuit as friends of the court. Grizzly bears were removed from Endangered Species Act protection last spring. Seven conservation groups sued over the grizzly delisting in June. They say grizzly bears still face threats from limited habitat, poor genetic diversity, and declining food sources. Safari Club officials said they want to prevent the grizzly bear from regaining protection under the Endangered Species Act. They said federal protection for the bear "deprives the states of their management authority," blocks states from preventing declines in deer, elk and moose populations and would prevent sustainable bear hunting in the future....
Plague outbreak delays ferret transplant Plans to reintroduce the endangered black-footed ferret to the Thunder Basin National Grassland are on hold following a severe plague outbreak in prairie dogs this summer. Prairie dogs are the primary food source for the black-footed ferret. Only about 3,000 acres of active colonies of the rodent remain of the area marked for ferret reintroduction, said Misty Hays, deputy district ranger for the Douglas U.S. Forest Service office. The delay could be as little as two years, depending on the animals’ rebound, Hays said. Plans had called for ferret transplants this fall. Wyoming Game and Fish Department nongame mammal biologist Martin Grenier is participating in the multi-agency ferret reintroduction with the Forest Service and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. He said two years may be optimistic, and reintroduction could be more than several years down the road. “It may be longer than that,” Grenier said. “We really don’t know how long it’s going to take for populations to bounce back to the point they’ll support ferrets.”....
Polar bears in danger? Is this some kind of joke? First there came the computer-generated polar bear in Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth; then that heartrending photo, syndicated everywhere, of the bears apparently stranded on a melting ice floe; then the story of those four polar bears drowned by global warming (actually, they’d perished in a storm). Now, in a new cinema release called Earth – a magnificent, feature-length nature documentary from the makers of the BBC’s Planet Earth series – comes the most sob-inducing “evidence” of all: a poor male polar bear filmed starving to death as a result, the quaveringly emotional Patrick Stewart voiceover suggests, of global warming. Never mind that what actually happens is that the bear stupidly has a go at a colony of walruses and ends up being gored to death. Having been up to the bears’ habitat in Svalbard, I do have a certain amount of sympathy with these concerns. To claim, however, that they are facing imminent doom is stretching the truth. In 1950, let us not forget, there were about 5,000 polar bears. Now there are 25,000. No wonder Greenpeace had trouble getting polar bears placed on the endangered species list. A fivefold population increase isn’t exactly a catastrophic decline....
When 'voluntary' means 'mandatory' When the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced its new National Animal Identification System in 2005, it was scheduled to become mandatory in three phases: property registration by 2007; animal identification and registration by 2008; and reporting – within 24 hours – of animal movement off the registered property by 2009. Even under the best of circumstances, it was an impossible goal. The idea of assigning a seven-digit number to every property in the nation that houses even a single chicken, horse, cow, goat, sheep, or any one of 29 species of animals is simply unrealistic, especially if the owners of the property don't want their property registered in a government database. Even more ridiculous is the idea of tagging each of these hundreds of millions of animals with a radio frequency identification device containing a unique 15-digit number. And perhaps the height of unrealistic expectations was that the owners of these registered and tagged animals would report to the government every time a registered animal was moved from the registered property – within 24 hours. The USDA anticipated big fines for non-compliance as a way to enforce the "mandatory."....
Texas may be home to new foot-and-mouth disease research lab For a half-century, the nation's only experiments on the world's most devastating livestock virus have occurred on this clandestine government-run island, separated from the mainland by more than a mile of choppy water. Now foot-and-mouth disease may be about to come ashore. Texas and five other states are competing to win a mammoth biodefense facility – a new $500 million federal research center that would house foot-and-mouth and other highly infectious animal diseases. The National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility is intended to replace the Plum Island labs, which homeland security officials say are outdated, inadequate and difficult to secure. The location will be chosen next fall. But bringing foot-and-mouth research onto the mainland – a move that requires an act of Congress – has posed a quandary for ranchers and farmers, who want the best possible research but fear a U.S. epidemic....
E. coli loophole cited in recalls One federal inspector calls it the "E. coli loophole." Another says, "Nobody would buy it if they knew." The officials are referring to the little-discussed fact that the U.S. Department of Agriculture has deemed it acceptable for meat companies to cook and sell meat on which E. coli, a bacterium that can sicken and even kill humans, is found during processing. The "E. coli loophole" affects millions of pounds of beef each year that tests positive for the presence of E. coli O157:H7, a particularly virulent strain of the bacterium. The agency allows companies to put this E. coli-positive meat in a special category -- "cook only." Cooking the meat, the USDA and producers say, destroys the bacteria and makes it safe to eat as precooked hamburgers, meat loaf, crumbled taco meat and other products. But some USDA inspectors say the "cook only" practice means that higher-than-appropriate levels of E. coli are tolerated in packing plants, raising the chance that clean meat will become contaminated. They say the "cook only" practice is part of the reason for this year's sudden rise in incidents of E. coli contamination....
Rancher auctions off his unique collection Each of Hank Vaskey's 40 antique saddles on the auction block Saturday carried not only cowboys and ranchers but stories generated from years of riding on the high plains of Montana over the past 120 years. "It was terrible, really hard to see them go," Vaskey, 76, said after the auction Saturday. "But I kept my favorite, an old Cogshall that was made in Miles City. I also kept my dad's saddle." Vaskey, a retired rancher from the Raynesford area, watched as some of the hundreds of live bidders and 30 online bidders purchased the saddles during a farm and ranch equipment auction Saturday on the Greg Larson property outside of Vaughn. Bidders from Pennsylvania, Minnesota, North Dakota and Colorado came specifically for the saddle auction, said officials from Burow's Auction Service. A well-worn E.G. Burrows saddle possibly made in the 1920s or 30s brought back memories of life on the ranch for East Helena resident Harley Ziesman. Burrows, one of the country's premier saddle makers from Basin, Wyo., who's now deceased, made two for Ziesman's father and grandfather in the 1930s....