CAFE Rule Will Add $900 to $10,000 to Cost of Car The new Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards - set by Congress and signed into law by President Bush in the new energy bill - will require vehicles to get 35 miles per gallon by the year 2020 and will add somewhere between $900 and $10,000 to the cost of buying a car, dependent upon which expert is consulted. That cost, high or low, will boost the average price of a new car, which will be passed onto consumers, according to carmakers and independent analysts. The Comerica Automotive Affordability Index says that the average cost of a passenger car today is $27, 958. If CAFE standards add $900 to the price of a car, it will raise the average car price to $28,858; but if the CAFE regulations cost closer to $10,000 to implement, the average price could go up to $37,958. Bob Lutz, vice chairman at General Motors, predicts the highest increase per vehicle -between $4,000 and $10,000 - with the average about $6,000....
Antarctic volcanoes identified as a possible culprit in glacier melting Another factor might be contributing to the thinning of some of the Antarctica's glaciers: volcanoes. In an article published Sunday on the Web site of the journal Nature Geoscience, Hugh Corr and David Vaughan of the British Antarctic Survey report the identification of a layer of volcanic ash and glass shards frozen within an ice sheet in western Antarctica. "This is the first time we have seen a volcano beneath the ice sheet punch a hole through the ice sheet" in Antarctica, Vaughan said. Volcanic heat could still be melting ice to water and contributing to thinning and speeding up of the Pine Island glacier, which passes nearby, but Vaughan said he doubted that it could be affecting other glaciers in western Antarctica, which have also thinned in recent years. Most glaciologists, including Vaughan, say that warmer ocean water is the primary cause of thinning....
Wolves in delisting cross hairs Now, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is preparing to remove the species from federal protection in the Northern Rockies, marking a watershed moment for one of history's most studied and controversial predators. Although the so-called delisting is expected to start in late March, the future of the northern Rocky Mountain gray wolf remains uncertain. Conservation groups plan to file lawsuits against the delisting, while Montana, Idaho and Wyoming prepare to assume full management of wolves within their borders, including possible wolf hunts this fall. Rather than settling the wolf debate, the delisting promises to renew it. “Wolves and wolf management have nothing to do with reality,” said Ed Bangs, the wolf recovery coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “The whole thing is about symbolism and rhetoric and the BS flying around from all sides instead of focusing on the science.”....
Massive ranch will be protected San Felipe Ranch, the largest privately owned property in Santa Clara County and a rustic, personal retreat for Silicon Valley pioneers Bill Hewlett and David Packard for more than four decades, will forever be protected from development under a landmark deal to be announced Monday. The nine adult children of Hewlett and Packard will still own the property but have donated the development rights - worth about $40 million - to the sprawling 10-mile-long ranch in the foothills east of San Jose to the Nature Conservancy, a non-profit land trust in San Francisco. The gift ranks as one of the largest private environmental gifts in California history. "This property is an amazing place. It meant a whole lot to our parents," said Julie Packard, executive director of the Monterey Bay Aquarium. "We just felt it was a great opportunity for our generation to ensure the place stays in a natural state for the future."....
Energy policy carves up Wyoming I knew it was not a terribly smart idea to drive straight into the face of a blizzard, but I had a mission. I wanted to see the scars on Buck Brannaman's land -- the ones that made the famous horse whisperer vote for a Democrat for the first time in 20 years. The next morning, I finally reached Buck's ranch 11 miles out of Sheridan to see Jack's point illustrated. Over a ridge beyond Buck's house and horse barn, a pristine meadow rolls out toward the Bighorn Mountains -- only now, with 11 abandoned well sites and a road scraped into the land, it's not so pristine. The joke, of course, was that all that snow I drove through had covered the damage, so I couldn't actually see it. But Mary Brannaman, Buck's wife, had plenty of pictures she shot as evidence during the five angry years she and Buck fought with the methane company while being treated like annoying squatters on their own property. As in much of the West, title to the land doesn't necessarily give a landowner rights to the minerals underground. In Wyoming and elsewhere, ranchers must often share their wide-open spaces with extracting operators who aren't always polite company. Most ranchers put up with it because they can't afford to oppose powerful corporations who have buddies in the state capital. Buck is an exception. His horse-training technique helped inspire the novel "The Horse Whisperer," and he was Robert Redford's adviser and stunt double for the movie version of the tale. As a young cowboy, he eked out a living doing rope tricks and riding rough stock at rodeos. Now, he conducts horsemanship clinics on more than one continent. His success gave him the means to fight Paxton Resources LLC all the way to the Wyoming Supreme Court, where, in 2004, the court let stand a local jury's award of $810,887 in damages to the Brannamans....
Carnivores released into wild 'fail and die' Most carnivores bred in captivity and released back into the wild fail to cope and die, according to a study published on Monday. Researchers are calling for a complete rethink of such reintroductions before others are carried out, including the suggested release of animals such as the lynx, wildcat and wolf into Scotland. The study looked at reintroductions involving such carnivores as lynx, Amur tiger, cheetah, brown bear and otter, and found only one in three captive-bred animals released into their natural habitat survived. Most of the deaths were caused by human activities, suggested the captive-bred animals were too trusting of humans, and some starved to death because they did not know how to hunt. Kirsten Jule, lead author of the paper, said: "Animals in captivity do not usually have the natural behaviours needed for success in the wild. Their lack of hunting skills and their lack of fear towards humans are major disadvantages." The scientists from Exeter University looked at 45 reintroductions, involving 17 carnivore species. It found that over half the animals were killed by humans, generally in shootings and car accidents. The study, published online in the journal Biological Conservation, also found captive animals were more susceptible to starvation and disease than their wild counterparts and less able to form successful social groups....
Wolf tracks found in RMNP Dr. Dave Augeri crouched close to the snow Thursday, his eyes trained on a track left in the powder less than 24 hours earlier. A smile broke his concentration, and he said, “Looks like we got lucky.” The wildlife biologist from the Denver Zoo had found his first evidence of a possible wild wolf in the national park — about six weeks after park volunteers reported spotting a wolf and park staffers found similar tracks. At first glance, the researcher said the print was too large to be that of a coyote and had the telltale signs of a large canine: toes, pad and claws. After discussing his observations and sharing photos with another expert, Dr. Richard Reading, Augeri said both men confirmed the print belongs to a wolf or a wolf-dog hybrid. Augeri and his research assistant, Stephanie Graham, battled wind gusts up to 32 mph and temperatures as cold as 23 below zero Thursday to check cameras placed to capture predator activity and to look for tracks off the paths. Augeri’s cameras have been in the park for more than a year to study the patterns and connections of predators to their prey. But it wasn’t until after the possible wolf sighting Dec. 4 that his team placed five cameras in areas strategically chosen to capture images of the possible wolf....
The New American Gentry The word "gentrification" conjures up images of once-poor urban neighborhoods invaded by cappuccino bars and million-dollar condos. Now, broad swaths of rural America -- from New England to the Rocky Mountain West -- are being gussied up, too. Affluent retirees and other high-income types have descended on these remote areas, creating new demand for amenities like interior-design stores, spas and organic markets. For many communities, it's the biggest change since the interstate highway system came barreling through in the 1960s and 1970s. With the Internet allowing people to work from almost anywhere, the distinction between first and second homes has become blurred. Many people are buying retirement property while they're still employed. Millions of soon-to-retire baby boomers, say demographers, will propel this trend for years to come. Such change can create social tensions, as longtime residents are either driven away because they can no longer afford housing or are forced to adapt to new careers. The impact of rural gentrification is playing out in this lakeside town, situated roughly 100 miles from Boise in Valley County. For decades it's been home to ranchers, farmers and timber workers. It has also served as a weekend retreat for residents throughout the state who flocked to Payette Lake for summer fishing and boating. Today, Valley County is attracting newcomers from as far away as New York and Sydney....
In the past 30 years, bovines get beefier Anyone struggling to stuff postholiday thighs into preholiday pants can take comfort in one thing: Humans aren't the only species weighing more these days. Cattle are getting bigger too. Between 1970 and 2006, the average weight of the cattle walking around our nation's plains and our city's National Western Stock Show has ballooned 23 percent, from 1,035 pounds to 1,275 pounds, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. During the same time, the average dressed weight — the carcass product — from each animal has gone up 25 percent, from 624 pounds to 781 pounds. Bigger cattle, of course, mean bigger steaks. The average rib-eye steak, for example, was about 11 square inches in 1970. It's more like 16 square inches today, said Keith E. Belk, Colorado State University professor of animal sciences....
Corn prices wallop cattlemen in wallet Corn is hot these days and that means big problems for Colorado's ranchers. Strides made in ethanol production and a global demand for corn have pushed prices to record highs of nearly $5 a bushel. That's been great news for corn growers, but Colorado Livestock Association chief executive Bill Hammerick said it is the biggest factor hurting ranchers' profits. "Ranchers have always known when corn prices rise, cattle prices fall," said Jeff Olson, a cattle rancher from Haigler, Neb., attending the National Western Stock Show. "But ranchers are just losing now. Why would a corn farmer risk selling some of his crop for feed when it's guaranteed much more money as a cash crop?" Corn is the most common feed used for livestock, and increased demand has about doubled the price of corn-gluten feed, from $70 a ton in 2002 to $134.17 in 2007, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Hammerick said ethanol production is the chief industry siphoning corn from ranchers....
Boy, 6, meets cowboy bent on living his faith Six-year-old Reese Lory found his hero during Sunday's worship service at the National Western Stock Show. A few days before, Reese was just another kid eating with his family in a Country Buffet. Then he looked up and saw Grant Adkisson, big, broad-shouldered, wearing his cowboy hat. Hailing from more than a century of Colorado ranchers, Adkisson had that long, steady look that seems to be burned into a cowboy's DNA. Reese, a city kid from Aurora, had never seen anything like it. "Mom," he asked, "Can I go up and talk to him?" Maria Lory, who is divorced and glad when her boy can meet honorable men as mentors, said yes. Shyly, Reese walked up and said hello. Immediately, Maria Lory marveled, the cowboy- stranger crouched down to Reese's level and started to chat. And that's how, on Sunday, Reese Lory and his family ended up in the last place they ever expected - in a crowd of several hundred worshipers led by Adkisson, who is director of the national Fellowship of Christian Cowboys....
19th century hothead worked both sides of the law One of the most feared men in 19th century Los Angeles wore a badge. Both his temper and his trigger finger were notoriously quick, and, after a business partner he had defrauded shot him to death, hundreds attended his funeral but few mourned him. Joseph Franklin Dye was a lawman, oilman and rancher who dispensed his own form of justice in 1870 by killing his boss, City Marshal William Warren. But that was hardly Dye's only brush with the wrong side of the law, according to newspaper accounts and a recently published book. Born in Kentucky in 1831 as one of 16 children in a family that later settled in Texas, Dye began his life of violence in his 20s. According to William B. Secrest's 2007 book, "California Badmen," Dye left the family farm at age 22 and worked throughout the Southwest for several years as a miner and mule-team driver. He shot a man, wounding him in the neck during a fight over a card game. Secrest's research put Dye in California during the Civil War, when the state was a hotbed of Confederate sympathizers. "Everything points to him joining a gang of killers and robbers called the Mason-Henry gang," Secrest said in a recent interview. After the war, Dye was hired as a special deputy in El Monte, tracking down thieves as far away as Salt Lake City. In 1867, impressed with Dye's tracking and shooting skills, Los Angeles City Marshal Warren, a former Union soldier serving in a job equivalent to today's chief of police, hired Dye to patrol Chinatown, where gambling halls, saloons and bordellos flourished....