Sales of natural gas vehicles evaporate

Last summer, with gasoline prices in the ionosphere, interest in cars that ran on compressed natural gas (instead of the liquid stuff) surged. When oil prices collapsed ... not so much. Honda Civic GX Among the victims of the short-lived natural gas hype are car sales professionals like Alex Tissot, who, as general manager of Colonial Honda in Glendale, ordered up a mess of natural gas-powered Honda Civic GX sedans last summer, only to find them impossible to sell as the price of fuel dropped below the $2.50 mark. He and others are victims of a sales problem described in today's paper: Crashing demand for alternative powertrain vehicles as gas prices decline...LA Times

Green Jobs: Myth or Reality?

The debate over the impact of "green" jobs on the economy continues. The latest salvo came Monday from a group of university researchers seeking to shoot down studies showing that spending billions of dollars on stimulus for renewable energy, energy efficiency and "smart grid" will help employ millions of people. Not so fast, the researchers said – many of those jobs will simply be shifted from existing "fossil fuel-based sectors," and others shouldn't be classified as "green" at all. Instead of spending government money on backing those industries, the authors of the "Seven Myths about Green Jobs" report want the free market to guide where job growth happens...greentechmedia

This is from the abstract of the research paper:

A rapidly growing literature promises that a massive program of government mandates, subsidies, and forced technological interventions will reward the nation with an economy brimming with green jobs. Not only will these jobs improve the environment, but they will be high paying, interesting, and provide collective rights. This literature is built on mythologies about economics, forecasting, and technology.

Myth: Everyone understands what a green job is.

Reality: No standard definition of a green job exists.

Myth: Creating green jobs will boost productive employment.

Reality: Green jobs estimates include huge numbers of clerical, bureaucratic, and administrative positions that do not produce goods and services for consumption.

Myth: Green jobs forecasts are reliable.

Reality: The green jobs studies made estimates using poor economic models based on dubious assumptions.

Myth: Green jobs promote employment growth.

Reality: By promoting more jobs instead of more productivity, the green jobs described in the literature encourage low-paying jobs in less desirable conditions. Economic growth cannot be ordered by Congress or by the United Nations. Government interference - such as restricting successful technologies in favor of speculative technologies favored by special interests - will generate stagnation...

Myth: Imposing technological progress by regulation is desirable.

Reality: Some technologies preferred by the green jobs studies are not capable of efficiently reaching the scale necessary to meet today's demands and could be counterproductive to environmental quality.

In this Article, we survey the green jobs literature, analyze its assumptions, and show how the special interest groups promoting the idea of green jobs have embedded dubious assumptions and techniques within their analyses. Before undertaking efforts to restructure and possibly impoverish our society, careful analysis and informed public debate about these assumptions and prescriptions are necessary.

Drunk On Subsidies - Green Beer

You have probably heard of green buildings, green cars and, perhaps, even green phones. But were you aware that green beer is flowing from the taps of some U.S. breweries, and not the kind for St. Patrick's Day tomorrow? Among the leaders of the movement is Lucky Labrador Brewing Company in Portland, Ore., which for the past year has been saving big bucks by using solar energy to heat water used in the brewing process. Lucky Labrador's first green beer, "Solar Flare Ale," was an instant sensation when it was introduced in February 2008, according to brewery co-owner Gary Geist. Sales spiked in the month following the beer's debut, Geist says. But, he notes that going solar is more about long-term benefits than about temporary sales spurts. He says the entire system, which includes 16 solar panels on the brewery roof, cost about $70,000 up front but that it ended up costing only about $6,000, thanks to a $21,000 (30 percent) federal tax credit, a $35,000 (50 percent) state tax credit, and an $8,000 incentive from the Energy Trust of Oregon (a nonprofit that assists businesses taking steps to reduce their gas and electrical energy consumption)...Scientific American

Why can't green products compete on a level playing field? I mean, if beer can't compete, what the hell can?

Numbers of wolves increase again

Federal officials say a record 1,645 gray wolves counted in the Northern Rockies this winter shows the predators' population remains strong but is no longer expanding as rapidly as in past years. Since their reintroduction to the region in the mid-1990s, wolf numbers had previously grown on average by 24 percent annually in Wyoming, Idaho and Montana. This year's figure is up only 8 percent, said U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist Ed Bangs. Bangs said the slowdown - combined with increasing numbers of livestock killed by the animals - signals that wolves have filled most prime habitat in the three states. "The population is getting to about as many as you're going to have," he said. "There's a big, healthy population in the Northern Rocky Mountains," he said. "At some point, the suitable habitat will be filled with wolves and the population just won't grow any more." The government's annual winter wolf count found 497 of the predators in Montana, 302 in Wyoming and 846 in Idaho. Livestock kills by wolves spiked more than 40 percent, with 601 cattle, sheep, llamas, dogs and other domestic animals killed. In response government wildlife agents and ranchers killed 264 wolves last year, or about one of every six wolves in the entire population. That included 21 entire packs...Billings Gazette

EPA Sued for Letting Air Pollution Cross State Lines

An environmental group is accusing the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency of not safeguarding public health in the West by failing to limit the transmission of air pollution across state lines. The federal agency requires states to have plans aimed at addressing the interstate transport of ozone pollution and fine particles, but WildEarth Guardians said New Mexico and several other states do not have plans. Jeremy Nichols, WildEarth Guardians' climate and energy program director, said his group will sue the agency if it fails to enforce the interstate transport requirements of the Clean Air Act. WildEarth Guardians' concerns stem from a 2005 EPA finding that all 50 states had to adopt clean air plans to protect downwind states from ozone pollution and particles such as those found in smoke and haze. EPA gave states a deadline of 2007, but Nichols said California, Colorado, Idaho, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma and Oregon are still without plans...Fox News

EPA re-evaluates 'green club' for companies

The Environmental Protection Agency is closing a program that drew complaints from environmentalists for cutting back on company inspections and regulations as a reward for voluntary controls on pollution. The National Environmental Performance Track Program, established in 2000 but administered mainly during the Bush presidency, enrolled hundreds of corporations in its "green club" if they agreed to undertake initiatives to save energy and reduce pollution. However, investigations of the program questioned its effectiveness. The agency said in a statement Monday that it would evaluate and refine the program's concepts "in order to develop a stronger system to protect human health and the environment." In a report issued in 2007, the EPA's inspector general found that underperforming facilities in Performance Track reduced its integrity and value. The program itself lacked clear plans that connected activities with goals and did not show whether it achieved anticipated results, the report said...AP

Sage grouse concern halts well permits

Permits for some 82 coalbed methane wells are being sent back to the Bureau of Land Management's Buffalo Field Office because of alleged inadequate and inconsistent regard for sage grouse. The Interior Board of Land Appeals decision could have broader implications for the industry in the Powder River Ba-sin, given that ranchers and various environmental groups have filed similar appeals to the board. "It said the BLM was not consistent in analyzing sage grouse impacts," said Jill Morrison, organizer for the Powder River Basin Resource Council. Bruce Hinchey, president of the Petroleum Association of Wyoming, said he couldn't comment on the ruling but said the data that Wyoming has generated would suggest that the sage grouse is not endangered in the state. "I think the main thing to do is wait for the (U.S.) Fish and Wildlife (Service) to make a decision," Hinchey said, refer-ring to the agency's ongoing review of whether to list the sage grouse as a threatened or endangered species...Billings Gazette

Conservationists launch effort to restore prairies

Four conservation groups are teaming up to try to restore some of the country's original grasslands and preserve the wildlife that depends on it. The groups announced the partnership Tuesday. Members say only 10 percent of North America's 585 million acres of original native grasslands remain, putting wildlife that live there at peril. The goal is to improve 60 million acres of habitat. Terry Riley, of the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, said the project's focus will be on grouse because those birds are a bellwether of the prairie's condition. "We have found that prairie grouse are one of the most sensitive (species) to change," said Riley of Albuquerque, N.M., formerly a wildlife biologist with the U.S. Forest Service and the Iowa Department of Natural Resources. Other groups in the new Prairie Grouse Partners are the Mule Deer Foundation, Pheasants Forever and the North American Grouse Partnership. With help from U.S. Department of Agriculture data, the groups identified all the counties with prairie and assessed the condition of the grasslands. The area stretches from the plains in Montana, Wyoming and Colorado, east as far as Ohio and south to the Gulf of Mexico...AP

Ranching enters the satellite era

The Wandering Shepherd ear tag, developed by Edmonton's iFind Systems, will provide the traceability demanded by Alberta beef customers around the world since the BSE crisis, founder Neil Helfrich says. The tag automatically delivers GPS co-ordinates and other information to the satellite, which forwards it to rancher and government databases. It also allows agencies to trace the origin of disease-infected livestock within minutes, and even animals they have been in contact with. The Wandering Shepherd, the first ear tag to use satellite technology, will be paired with the world's first fourth-generation (4G) satellite network provided by Virginia-based partner TerreStar Networks. The satellite is set to launch later this year, and if all goes well the Wandering Shepherd should be up and running by early 2010, Helfrich says. "We believe our system is more effective than any tracking system out there. Other products currently available are bulky and require the battery be replaced after a period of time. While current Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) ear tags depend on the livestock owner reporting the information, the Wandering Shepherd is completely automatic once it's activated, Helfrich says...Edmonton Journal

How long before this or something similar becomes a condition of your grazing permit?

Anti-logger school book replaced in Grants Pass

Parents objected to a spread in the book that showed loggers chopping down trees and various bits of litter on the ground. The text on page 6 read: "These people do not take care of the forest. They cut down huge trees. They drop trash on the ground." That was followed by a tearjerker page 7: "The trees are gone. The birds cannot find homes. The animals cannot find food." After news broke that the book had been pulled from classrooms, the publisher sent the district 108 new copies with a different take on loggers: "These people take care of huge forests. They put out fires. They cut down sick trees. Then new trees can be planted. Animals will still have homes. They will still find food." The illustrations, too, have changed. Rather than a trash-littered forest floor, the new edition shows a firefighter and a tree planter, and in a tree there's a bear. A top official for Pearson-Scott Foresman, the publishing house, sent a letter along with the books. "The publication of this edition was an egregious error on our part, and I will not attempt to offer an explanation," wrote Paul McFall, senior vice president...AP

Mexico & New Mexico: Wildlife Exchange

An international wildlife exchange program taking place between New Mexico and Mexico had the first leg completed recently, when 125 pronghorn antelope were moved to the state of Coahuila in Mexico. New Mexico Department of Game and Fish employees used a helicopter to herd the antelope into a fenced trapping area, where they were examined by veterinarians and had ear tags attached before being shipped. An additional 27 animals were relocated to Santa Ana Pueblo lands near Bernalillo, N.M., to help repopulate the species there. The antelope were taken from cooperating private ranches in northeastern New Mexico, reducing the existing population by about 10%. Four animals are known to have died during the process. This is the third transplant of pronghorn to captive breeding facilities in Mexico, with the hope that the animals will reproduce enough so that they can be released to multiple locations in the country...LA Times

Bill would let landowners lease rights to chopper assaults on feral hogs

Lawmakers seemed open Tuesday to launching an aerial assault against the feral hog menace in Texas, but it's just not as easy as shooting a pig in a poke. Rep. Sid Miller, R-Stephenville, has written the pork-chopper bill, which would allow landowners to lease their property to hunters using helicopters to thin the estimated 2 million feral hogs causing havoc in virtually every county. Currently, landowners can only rent helicopters and do their own shooting, but this would let them sell the rights and recoup some of their losses, said Miller, speaking before the House Culture, Recreation and Tourism Committee. But lawmakers had concerns that this could turn into a slippery sty and left the bill pending. Would feral pigs become a game animal, where hunters would have to dispose of the carcasses, abide by a season and other hunting rules, lawmakers wondered? And let's just say chasing a pig at 100 mph doesn't make it easy to stop at a property boundary...Dallas Morning News

NM legislature passes feral hog bill

The Legislature Tuesday morning passed a bill prohibiting “importing, transporting, breeding, or selling a live feral hog or operating a commercial feral hog hunting enterprise.” A feral hog is defined, basically, as one that is wild. Captive-bred hogs very quickly go feral. They can grow quite large and become dangerous. The bill imposes misdemeanor sanctions for violations, including a fine of $1,000, imprisonment for less than a year or both. How many feral hogs are in New Mexico? The general consensus was that not too many are here now, but that it could become a serious problem. Some outfitters lead hunts for feral hogs...NM Independent

Source: More feds to combat border violence

The Obama administration plans to send reinforcements to the Southwest border to help contain the rampant violence of the Mexican drug cartel wars. Thirty-seven agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms are being deployed to the region. An official familiar with the plan said the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency is considering reassignment of at least 90 officers to the border. The official requested anonymity because the plan has not yet been announced. The deployments are part of President Barack Obama's first moves to boost federal security sources on the U.S. side of the border. The additional immigration agents would double the size of an ongoing ICE task force that has been working with other federal agencies to fight the criminal organizations contributing to the border violence. The ATF agents will be added to anti-gunrunning teams in McAllen, Texas, El Centro, Calif., and Las Cruces, N.M., as well as to U.S. consulates in Juarez and Tijuana. Some of the reinforcement costs will be covered with economic recovery money recently approved by Congress...AP

PETA's action creates havoc at elementary school

The first call came shortly after 11 a.m. one day last week. Protesters were on their way to the Fulton Elementary School in Hempstead. That call, and a second one a short time later, came from reporters who had received news releases from the animal rights advocacy group PETA - People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. The news sent the school district scrambling to the Internet for information. And later, after seeing the news release, they found out more. "There was my school's name, my school's address and my school's exact dismissal time," Regina Armstrong-Robinson, the school's principal, said yesterday, "and I'm asking myself who are these people and why are they coming here?" PETA's intention was to let children know that circuses are cruel to animals. No doubt, the protest was timed to coincide with the coming of the Ringling Bros. Circus, which is slated to open this week at Nassau Coliseum in the neighboring community of Uniondale. Some parents and children stopped to take buttons or an activity book protesters handed out, which, on one page, asks kids to color an elephant wearing "circus chains." "The material is disturbing and inappropriate for small children, who are visual learners," said Rodney Gilmore, the district's interim assistant superintendent. "Kids love the idea of a circus. This would be upsetting to them."...Newsday

Man finds 41 bull snakes under Colo. home

Jeff Stafford's buddy owes him a few beers — and 41 brews would still be a bargain for the colony of bull snakes Stafford found slithering in the crawl space of friend's townhome in Westminster Sunday. The 25-year-old banker had stopped by his friend's place near Federal Boulevard and West 112th Avenue to say "hi." He was wearing flip flops. His friend, who asked to remain anonymous, was tending to a leaky pipe beneath the home, while Stafford chatted with his friend's wife. "Thirty seconds later I heard what sounded like the yelp of a small, frightened child," Stafford said Monday. His friend had spotted a snake in the muddy crawl space. "Dude, you've got to go get it," Stafford recalled him saying Monday. With a flashlight and a stick of firewood, Stafford climbed into the crawl space and onto the blue tarp that covered the muddy surface. The tarp moved beneath him; the floor writhed in bull snakes — 41 of them by the time Stafford got through stuffing them into a trash bag...Denver Post

European Farmers Protest Proposals to Tax Cow Flatulence

Proposals to tax the flatulence of cows and other livestock have been denounced by farming groups in the Irish Republic and Denmark. A cow tax of $18 per animal has been mooted in Ireland, while Denmark is discussing a levy as high as $110 per cow to offset the potential penalties each country faces from European Union legislation aimed at combating global warming. The proposed levies are opposed vigorously by farming groups. The Irish Farmers' Association said that the cattle industry would move to South America to avoid EU taxes. The cow tax proposals would raise funds to buy allowances from other member states or to invest in technology that might reduce emissions. Denmark is believed to be further advanced with housing for pigs that captures and stores methane emitted from the animals. The gas can be used as a fuel for power generation. A spokesman for the European Commission said that a cow tax was not its preferred option. “We would rather have solutions that reduce emissions by capturing methane from manure and new animal feeds that reduce methane.”...London Times

EU offers US bigger beef quota in hormone row

The European Commission is offering to double the preferential quota for beef imports from the United States as part of a deal to end a long-standing dispute over beef trade, EU sources familiar with the plan said. Last week, Washington said it would hold off on applying new retaliatory duties to EU products while it negotiates with Brussels on a solution to the trans-Atlantic row, sparked by an EU ban on U.S. imports of hormone-treated meat in 1988. But the sources told Reuters the plan by the EU executive -- which oversees trade and food safety policy for the 27-nation bloc -- did not include lifting the embargo which Brussels says is based on scientific advice and is not protectionist. "The proposal is aimed at giving a bigger incentive to U.S. beef farmers to export normal-treated beef in return for the U.S. ending its sanctions," one EU source with knowledge of the proposal said. "The ban on hormone-treated beef stays. The Commission was quite clear on that," another EU source said, adding the proposal was discussed at a regular closed-door meeting of EU trade officials on Friday...Reuters

8 Dems oppose quick debate on global warming bill

Eight Senate Democrats are opposing speedy action on President Barack Obama's bill to combat global warming, complicating prospects for the legislation and creating problems for their party's leaders. The eight Democrats disapprove of using the annual budget debate to pass Obama's "cap and trade" bill to fight greenhouse gas emissions, a measure that divides lawmakers, environmentalists and businesses. The lawmakers' opposition makes it more difficult for Democratic leaders to move the bill without a threat of a Republican filibuster. The budget debate is the only way to circumvent Senate rules that allow a unified GOP to stop a bill through filibusters. "Enactment of a cap-and-trade regime is likely to influence nearly every feature of the U.S. economy," wrote the Democratic senators, mostly moderates. They were joined by 25 Republicans. "Legislation so far-reaching should be fully vetted and given appropriate time for debate."...AP

Scientists Claim Earth Is Undergoing Natural Climate Shift

The bitter cold and record snowfalls from two wicked winters are causing people to ask if the global climate is truly changing. The climate is known to be variable and, in recent years, more scientific thought and research has been focused on the global temperature and how humanity might be influencing it. However, a new study by the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee could turn the climate change world upside down. Scientists at the university used a math application known as synchronized chaos and applied it to climate data taken over the past 100 years. "Imagine that you have four synchronized swimmers and they are not holding hands and they do their program and everything is fine; now, if they begin to hold hands and hold hands tightly, most likely a slight error will destroy the synchronization. Well, we applied the same analogy to climate," researcher Dr. Anastasios Tsonis said. Scientists said that the air and ocean systems of the earth are now showing signs of synchronizing with each other. Eventually, the systems begin to couple and the synchronous state is destroyed, leading to a climate shift. "In climate, when this happens, the climate state changes. You go from a cooling regime to a warming regime or a warming regime to a cooling regime. This way we were able to explain all the fluctuations in the global temperature trend in the past century," Tsonis said. "The research team has found the warming trend of the past 30 years has stopped and in fact global temperatures have leveled off since 2001." The most recent climate shift probably occurred at about the year 2000...ABC

Endangered Wolves Decision Symbolizes Green Costs of Democrats' Western Support

In Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar's decision to stick with a controversial Bush administration policy, and take wolves off the endangered species list in Montana and Idaho and other Rocky Mountain states, some of Audacity's supporters won, and others lost. The overarching theme of this particular tale is the Democratic Party's avowed intent and considerable efforts to be competitive in the West. It earned the Democrats a passel of Electoral College votes last fall, cheering liberals across the land. But it comes with some costs, as environmentalists discovered with the wolf decision. Though pretty green by regional standards, Western Democrats like Salazar are not extremists. They know how to weigh the competing interests of energy firms, ski resorts, environmental groups, animal lovers, ranchers and the outdoors industry. You can't cheer, as a lefty blogger, when Democrats are competitive in the northern Rockies, without acknowledging there will be trade-offs in environmental policy. And so the enviro groups and wildlife folks got stiffed by Salazar's decision to stick with the recommendations of the Interior Department scientists, and consign the fate of the (choose one: a) cute, b) livestock killing) wolves to state officials...US News & World Report

The Fall and Rise of the Right Whale

Actually, it’s one of so many good signs that researchers are beginning to hope that for the first time in centuries things are looking up for the right whale. They say the species offers proof that simple conservation steps can have a big impact, even for species driven to the edge of oblivion. North Atlantic right whales, which can grow up to 55 feet long and weigh up to 70 tons, were the “right” whales for 18th- and 19th-century whalers because they are rich in oil and baleen, move slowly, keep close to shore and float when they die. They were long ago hunted to extinction in European waters, and by 1900 perhaps only 100 or so remained in their North American range, from feeding grounds off Maritime Canada and New England to winter calving grounds off the Southeastern coast. Since then, the species’ numbers have crept up, but very slowly. NOAA estimates that there are about 325, though scientists in and out of the agency suspect there may be more, perhaps as many as 400. It has been illegal to hunt the right whale since 1935, when the League of Nations put them under protection. Even so, researchers despaired of ever seeing a healthy right whale population here as long as ship strikes still maimed and killed them and fishing gear strangled them...NY Times

As Oil and Gas Prices Plunge, Drilling Frenzy Ends

The great American drilling boom is over. The number of oil and gas rigs deployed to tap new energy supplies across the country has plunged to less than 1,200 from 2,400 last summer, and energy executives say the drop is accelerating further. Lower prices are bringing to an end an ambitious effort to squeeze more oil from aging fields and to tap new sources of natural gas. For the last four years, companies here drilled below airports, golf courses, churches and playgrounds in a frantic search for energy. They scoured the Rocky Mountains, the Great Plains, the Gulf of Mexico and Appalachia. But the economic downturn has cut into demand. Global oil prices and American natural gas prices have plummeted two-thirds since last summer. Not even an unseasonably cold winter drove down unusually high inventories of natural gas. The drop has been good news for American consumers, with gasoline now selling for $1.92 a gallon, on average, down from a high of $4.11 in July. But the result for companies is that it is becoming unprofitable to drill...NY Times

One of Those Earmarks That Bug People

Big bugs with bulging goggle eyes swarmed the remote Utah ranching outpost of Grouse Creek like a biblical plague. Each of the past four summers, the hungry critters known as Mormon crickets have marched by the tens of thousands over grassy hillsides, past juniper trees, across dirt roads and through ranch houses. The noisy insects have devoured crops, frightened children and threatened families' livelihoods in the tranquil high desert. "It's almost like an Alfred Hitchcock movie," said Brent Tanner, who helps run a large cattle ranch in Grouse Creek that has been in his family since the 1870s. "You just see swarms of these large crickets that move in and can be devastating to crops, and certainly are very irritating. They'll just crawl right into your house, get up on your walls. It's enough to drive a person totally insane." And this summer, scientists say, it's a sure bet Mormon crickets will be back. So to the 80-odd folks who live in Grouse Creek, the $1 million congressional earmark secured by their state's junior senator to kill the insects is hardly wasteful pork, as it has been demonized. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and television comedian Jon Stewart may lampoon it as an egregious example of government spending, but to Grouse Creek, the earmark is salvation. "Everything that's green is just gone," said Tanner's older brother, Jay, who described what happens after Mormon crickets hatch on federal land, migrate onto his family's Della Ranches and eat up acres of grass, alfalfa and cattle feed. "When the crickets come and devastate the area, then I'm done. There's really nothing I can do. It's just like coming in and stealing money out of my wallet."...Washington Post

Check out the video:

Economy could hurt U.S. forests, United Nations says

A prolonged economic downturn could prompt more private woodland owners in their United States to sell their lots, threatening forests with development, the United Nations said today in its latest "State of the World's Forests" report. From 1994 to 2007, U.S. forest ownership by integrated forest companies -- involved in both production and processing -- declined from about 48 million acres to 10 million acres, the report says. Much of the ownership has been picked up by real estate investment trusts and other institutional investors. The change in ownership could undermine long-term investments in forest management and research, the report said, and accelerate commercial development of private forest lands. A prolonged down economy would further lower the value of wood, the report said, increasing the incentive to convert forests to other uses. But the supply of available forest land for purchase is also shrinking, the report said, providing a potential brake on the trend...The Oregonian

So a "prolonged down economy" lowers the value of a natural resource. I'm sure glad we have UN to teach us such things.

Senate agrees to lift ban on Indian development

The U.S. Senate has voted to lift a decades-old ban on development on about 700,000 acres in Arizona's Black Mesa region that both the Navajo and Hopi tribes claimed as their own. The Senate unanimously approved a bill by Arizona senators John McCain and Jon Kyl on Thursday night to lift a ban on development in the "Bennett Freeze" area. The ban had prevented about 8,000 Navajos who live there from putting in electric lines, repairing leaky roofs and running water lines to their homes unless the improvements were approved by the neighboring Hopi Tribe. Action by the House is still required, but no opposition is expected. The ban was imposed in 1966 by former U.S. Commissioner of Indian Affairs Robert Bennett as a way to settle the land dispute between the tribes. It was lifted in late 2006 after the tribes reached an agreement and a federal judge signed off on it. But tribal members remained fearful that the freeze could be reinstated if the law that authorized it wasn't repealed...Santa Fe New Mexican

Plum Creek sawmill begins shutdown

Plum Creek Timber Co. has begun shutting down the last major sawmill in the Tobacco Valley, a swath of northwestern Montana that was dotted with mills during much of the 20th century. The Seattle-based company said the sawmill at Fortine, about 20 miles from the Montana-British Columbia border, was cutting its final log on Thursday, planing will end later this month and the mill will be disassembled in April, ending 72 jobs and 53 years of operation. Fortine is in Lincoln County, where the January unemployment rate - the latest available - was 15.6 percent, compared to a state rate of 6.7 percent. Plum Creek said earlier this winter that the poor housing market and the related decline in demand for wood products required trimming operations at several plants in Montana...Billings Gazette

Arizona dairies in peril

A global fall in the demand for milk has dropped wholesale prices so low that Arizona dairy farmers have begun slaughtering cows to stay in business. The lower demand, last year's high grain prices, increased production from other countries and last year's scandal in China involving milk tainted with the industrial chemical melamine are all causing Arizona dairymen to lose about $100 per cow per month, experts say. Arizona's dairy slump has rippled to other areas of agriculture, such as beef and hay producers. "We have a lot of dairies in the 2,000- to 3,000-cow range. So, they are losing $200,000 to $300,000 a month. The big question is how long will prices stay down like that," said Gary Dyer, president and chief executive officer of Farm Credit Services Southwest, a Tempe agricultural-cooperative lender that does half its business with dairy farms and hay producers. Farmers estimate it costs about $180 each month to feed a dairy cow. They are recouping less than half that amount in dairy-product sales. The combination of high costs and low prices has forced farmers to thin their herds to survive. The damage to the dairy industry, in turn, hurts farmers like Rogers who grow corn, alfalfa hay and cotton seed as cattle feed. Hay is Arizona's largest crop and hay prices have dropped from about $225 a ton a year ago to about $130, Dyer said. The dairy-cow reduction also hurts beef ranchers, who fear their selling prices will drop because of all the extra dairy cows on the market...Arizona Republic

Country of Origin Labeling Goes Into Effect Today

Looking for beef from Brazil? Fruit from France? Veggies from the Virgin Islands? Beginning today, March 16, 2009, the labeling on those and other foods must make it easier for you to find out where what you are putting in your mouth came from. The new U.S. Department of Agriculture rules for County of Origin Labels (COOL) now require a listing of where most meats and some fruits, vegetables, and other foods was raised or grown. The idea is to give consumers more information to decide what they are buying and identify food that is imported from outside the United States. Such labeling has long been sought by consumer rights activists and U.S. ranchers, who compete with cattle producers in Canada and other countries. The more detailed labeling was approved last year, but did not become mandatory until this week. Most fresh meats, including steaks, ground beef, lamb, and pork chops, and fresh chicken products that are sold in retail stores, and some perishable fruits and vegetables must begin using the more detailed labeling. Farm-raised fish and shellfish, perishable agricultural commodities such as fresh and frozen fruits and vegetables, macadamia nuts, pecans, ginseng, and unroasted peanuts also are covered by the new labeling regulations...attorneyatlaw

New "mad cow" regulations make disposal difficult for cattle ranchers

The company that collected cattle and horse corpses for disposal now is dead itself, the victim of a new federal regulation on cattle renderers that is designed to prevent mad cow disease. The federal regulation, which takes effect in April, has led to uncertainty in the cattle industry about how to dispose of dead animals. Consequently, the Halfway Packing Co. has shut down, leaving ranchers in one of the nation's largest beef cattle states without any company willing to travel from farm to farm picking up dead livestock. "It's a hardship, and from a potential disease and public health standpoint, it's a critical issue," said Jeff Windett, executive vice president for the Missouri Cattlemen's Association. "If dead animals are not disposed of properly, they could present a health problem and a disease problem." There are typically four options for disposing of dead livestock: burning, composting, burying and rendering. Rendering companies turn animal waste such as eyes, hooves and intestines into a variety of products including biofuels, gelatin, animal feed and various industrial chemicals. The new U.S. Food and Drug Administration regulations require renderers and animal feed manufacturers to remove the brain and spinal cord from cows 30 months and older. The rule is intended to prevent central nervous system tissue of dead cattle from getting into animal feed, because it can cause bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or mad cow disease. But the health safeguards carry a cost for rendering companies and farmers because of the additional cost incurred by adding a new step to the process. Until this year, the trucks at Halfway Packing Co. traveled more than 1,000 miles a day picking up carcasses in 20 counties through the heart of Missouri's cattle country. Richard Spinning, the company's owner, charged about $20 per cow; he used the meat to make canned pet food and sold the hides. So unlike renderers that can use waste from the animals, Spinning could only use the well-preserved carcasses that were picked up. He estimated that to stay in business under the federal rule, he would have had to charge more than $100 per animal...Missourian

Cows Really Do Have a Magnetic Sixth Sense

Satellite images of cattle and deer herds suggest that low-frequency magnetic fields disrupt the tendency of four-legged animals to align their bodies with geomagnetic fields. When herds stand next to power lines, which emit a mild electromagnetic field, they point in different directions. In the absence of power lines, they point along a north-south axis. The findings, published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, come from the same biologists who used Google Earth images to identify a bovine north-south tendency. Some commentators dismissed those results, or said they didn't necessarily indicate a magnetic sixth sense. "These findings constitute evidence for magnetic sensation in large mammals as well as evidence of an overt behavioral reaction to weak [extreme low-frequency magnetic fields] in vertebrates," write the researchers...Wired Science

Inspectors Scan Auctions for Thieves

On a cold January morning, Pat McGuigan stood on a catwalk overlooking hundreds of head of cattle. The cows mooed while bulls snorted -- their noses running from the cold air whipping through the Longview Livestock Commission Co.'s sale barn. On the flank of each head of cattle was a yellow sticker placed there by auction workers as sellers drove up to the barn with the cattle they hoped would fetch a good price during the day's auction. On this morning like most mornings, McGuigan, a market inspector for the Texas Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association, is taking information, indicating any brands on the cattle and he is looking for anything that does not seem right. "On a busy day here at this particular sale barn we would normally see about 500 to 600 head of cattle come through here on sale day," he said. Armed with a pen, pad and inspection forms, he is looking for cattle that could be stolen. If McGuigan sees something that doesn't fit, he begins asking the person who brought the cow into the auction questions. "We don't accuse anyone of stealing. We give them a chance to explain how they came to have that cow," he said. "But we will get to the bottom of it." McGuigan and other market inspectors like him are one line of defense to help stop cattle rustling, a crime that costs producers across the state millions each year collectively. According to the TSCRA, Special Rangers, the association's team of law enforcement commissioned by the Texas Department of Public Safety, and market inspectors like McGuigan, recovered 44,892 head of stolen cattle from 1997 to 2007. The data also indicates the association has recovered 1,066 horses, 999 saddles and 253 trailers. The total value of livestock and property recovered during the 10-year period exceeds $48 million...Tyler Morning Telegraph

Circuit-riding preacher uses horse to carry the gospel

Pelted by a cold, steady rain, Ken Downey and his quarter horse Pilgrim seemed unbothered, if a bit out of place. His Bible tucked safely in his saddlebag, Downey and his companion trotted across the Freedom Memorial Bridge, followed only by an old bus with a trailer on the back and four sets of blue lights to warn passersby. Downey had a lane essentially all to himself, and Pilgrim had a good rhythm, so he just let him go. It would take him 45 minutes to cross the Trent River on Monday. But a little rain isn't much of a bother to those who are used to the climes of Minnesota this time of year. And besides, Downey was on the lookout for divine appointments. "They are always there if your antenna's up," he said. "Out here, I've learned to keep my antenna up." Downey, for the next six months, is a circuit-riding preacher. He will travel through Bayboro, New Bern, Cove City and Kinston this week on a 3,370-mile journey that will end - eventually - in Everett, Wash., a town just north of Seattle. He plans to spread the word of God to as many churches, characters and lost souls as he can along the way...Sun Journal

Interior secretary's decision on gray wolves triggers discord

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar's decision to stick with a Bush administration move that took gray wolves off the endangered-species list in most of the northern Rockies reflects the independent streak that has defined his career. But it has alienated key Obama administration allies, including environmentalists and some lawmakers on Capitol Hill. Salazar's surprise March 6 decision provoked a protest letter from 10 senior House Democrats and a literal howl of delight from Idaho Republican Gov. C.L. "Butch" Otter. While White House officials declined to comment on Salazar's move, it has clearly caused a headache for the administration. Lawmakers called senior Obama aides to question the decision, environmental groups filed a Freedom of Information Act request to investigate the decision, and experts inside and outside the administration predicted the issue will end up in court. Interior spokeswoman Kendra Barkoff said Salazar had followed the unanimous recommendation of Fish and Wildlife Service scientists in setting the new policy. "This was a decision based on science," she said...Seattle Times

Federal fire policy leaves private timber in ruins

Thousands of acres of private timberland are adjacent to and within National Forest boundaries, where fire protection responsibility comes under the U.S. Forest Service. It is the Forest Service's legal duty to protect these private parcels just as Cal Fire protects lands outside of National Forest influence. It is apparent from last summer's fires that fire protection no longer exists for thousands of acres of private timberland, as many private parcels were purposely set fire by the Forest Service and burned. In fact, more acreage was burned, and more smoke and carbon were put into the air by the U.S. Forest Service than by natural wildfire. Most of the private timberland burned is not being reforested as owners are fearful of similar events happening in the future. Following the death of several firefighters in Idaho a few years ago, the Forest Service adopted a new "safety policy" using indirect methods to fight fire. This policy change has resulted in the huge devastating fires and smoke plumes the western states are experiencing. The federal policy of indirect firefighting leads to larger fires that require many more bodies, equipment and aircraft be put in harm's way. This action will always increase the number of accidents, not decrease them. The U.S. Forest Service must come to the realization that its policies are destructive and not meeting the agency's safety goals...Record Searchlight

After Coyote Attacks, a Denver Suburb Turns to a Gun-Wielding Trapper

Jay Stewart lumbered down the driveway, past the Mercedes and away from the home overlooking Westlands Park near the southern edge of Denver. “We get any coyotes today?” a woman shouted from across the street. Mr. Stewart shook his head no, tugged at his camouflage cap and headed for the old trailer cluttered with the varmint traps he hauls with him everywhere he goes. Since a recent rash of coyote attacks on pets in Greenwood Village, an affluent suburb of Denver, Mr. Stewart, the owner and primary employee of Animal Damage Control Wildlife Management Services, has been on the hunt. When he comes across a coyote after being dispatched by the city, he closely observes its behavior until he has judged whether it is aggressive. Those he deems a threat to humans or pets he shoots with one of his .22-caliber guns. Many coyotes now feel safer in cities than on the open range, said Stanley D. Gehrt, an assistant professor of wildlife ecology at Ohio State University. The sightings have become so frequent in and around Denver over the last few months that the city and several suburbs have held meetings to address the issue. No community in the area has been affected more than Greenwood Village, population 14,000, which recorded 110 coyote sightings in the first two months of this year, compared with 186 in all of 2008. Coyotes have killed and maimed pets, and late last year one attacked a 14-year-old boy out for a walk. “We’ve heard from a lot of our residents,” said the city manager, Jim Sanderson. “They’re just living in fear. They’re afraid to let their children walk to school or play in the yard.”...NY Times

Many rural residents have the same concerns with wolves. Difference is, should they defend their children or families, they are off to the federal pen.

Infection forces spaying of mexican gray wolf at El Paso Zoo

A Mexican gray wolf named Ivy, one of the rarest creatures on the planet, was spayed Friday at the El Paso Zoo's medical center. She underwent surgery after being diagnosed with a uterine infection. Zoo Director Steve Marshall described Ivy's operation as routine, and said the staff will be watching her to make sure her recovery is successful. That is why the El Paso Zoo is sending Ivy's ovaries to the St. Louis Zoo Endangered Species Research Center & Veterinary Hospital. Scientists there will attempt to collect the eggs. "There is a chance that Ivy's genes can be passed on in the future if they are able to successfully harvest eggs from the ovaries," said El Paso Zoo Coordinator John Kiseda...El Paso Times

Environmental enemy combatant, no guantanamo: First salmon-eating sea lion killed at Bonneville Dam

Wildlife officials put down a salmon-eating sea lion at Bonneville Dam for the first time Thursday, killing it with a lethal injection after a health examination determined it couldn't be relocated to a zoo or aquarium. The California sea lion -- branded C265 -- is thought to be the first deliberately killed by a Northwest government agency. Marine mammals received legal protection under the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972. The animal, captured in a cage trap Tuesday at Bonneville, was on a list of 73 male sea lions that habitually prey on endangered fish gathered at ladders below the dam, the first fish encounter when migrating up the Columbia. Veterinarians estimated the sea lion's age at 15 and its weight at 800 to 900 pounds. The sea lion was well-known to agency biologists. Wildlife officials from Oregon, Washington and Idaho said earlier that 30 sea lions at Bonneville could be relocated or killed this year. So far, officials only have enough homes lined up to relocate eight...The Oregonian

A dangerous mix in the forecast

The American pika is a small furry mammal resembling a mouse that lives in the mountains throughout the West, including the Rockies, the Sierra Nevada, and the Cascades. It has been voted one of the three "cutest animals" in North America. The Sierra's pika population has now become (as of the last week of February) the first mammal in the Lower 48 states considered for federal protection under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) due to global warming. Another charismatic species, the polar bear in Alaska, was first to be listed (2008) because of global warming. The pika and the polar bear listings status resulted from ESA-based lawsuits filed against the federal government by proliferate eco-litigating organizations including the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD), Earthjustice (the legal arm of the Sierra Club), the Natural Resources Defense Council and Greenpeace. To these well-heeled litigating organizations, the ESA is the most important environmental law in history. That is because, when enacted in 1973 with their active participation and influence, the ESA changed the age-old scientific definition of "species" to an amorphous, politicized definition that makes the listing of species - especially popular, photogenic ones - much less disciplined. Under the more accommodating definition, lawsuits to list eco-litigators' favored species are nearly always successful. Hand-in-hand with these successes goes "help-us-save-the species" fund-raising appeals. Another reason these "species champions" embrace the ESA is that their lawsuits conclude with an award of attorney fees and costs against the government. Although there are no official records of the taxpayer dollars paid in attorney fees to environmental litigators, the Sacramento Bee's Tom Knudson reported in 2001 (the last extensive research) that "*uring the 1990s, the government paid out $31.6 million in attorney fees for 434 environmental cases brought against federal agencies. The average award per case was more than $70,000...Washington Times

Edward Abbey, Conservative Anarchist

Edward Paul Abbey was born on January 29, 1927, in Indiana, Pennsylvania, the son of a farmer and logger. After a 1944 hitchhiking trip west at 17, he served in the U.S. Army late in World War II and afterwards, then enrolled at the University of New Mexico in 1948 on the G.I. Bill, eventually earning a Master's Degree in philosophy. During this time Abbey started to write as he began concurrently to explore the backcountry of the Southwest in his spare time, specifically the Four Corners area (where Utah, Colorado, Arizona, and New Mexico meet), otherwise known as the Colorado Plateau because it's drained by that great river. It was among the last of Western regions to be surveyed and mapped. In 1869, John Wesley Powell was its primary explorer when he led a party in dories down the rapids-ravaged canyons of the Green and Colorado Rivers from Green River, Wyoming, all the way through the Grand Canyon. It's an unforgiving region of deserts and mountains, much of it federal land, and home to a half dozen national parks. Here Abbey found the subject that was the focus of his four decades as a writer. Money was tight, though, and Abbey also worked odd jobs through the 1950s and '60s. His most noteworthy employment was as a seasonal ranger at Arches National Monument (now Arches National Park) near Moab, Utah, in 1959. This experience (along with others) culminated in the 1968 publication of Desert Solitaire, the book that made his reputation. After that, Cactus Ed became the Thoreau of the West. Abbey's most controversial role was only obliquely related to his work. In 1975 he published his novel The Monkey Wrench Gang, a book that alongside Desert Solitaire enhanced his reputation as an environmentalist, but unlike the latter tome it has prose as purple as an Arizona sunset. The plot involves four anarchic enviros who conspire to blow up Glen Canyon Dam. In a case of life imitates art, the book inspired the establishment of a notorious radical green group in 1980 known as Earth First!, with Abbey as a charter member. Other noteworthy members were activist/writer Doug Peacock, and Dave Foreman, an ex-Goldwater Republican...American Spectator

Border fences grow, as does debate that rages over them

Three men prop a ladder on top of a tree branch and lean it against a 15-foot border fence made of steel tubes so close together a man can't fit his head through. One by one, they climb over and shimmy down the other side, landing in the United States at the bottom of the Mariposa Wash, about two miles west of Nogales. They jog north across a concrete road, fading into the brush. On a nearby ridge, a U.S. Border Patrol agent watches, then jumps in his SUV and speeds down the new access road that, like the fence, is part of the biggest, fastest and most expensive buildup of border infrastructure in U.S. history. The three illegal border crossers run, but it isn't long before several agents converge and eventually find their hiding spot. The scene illustrates the debate over the effectiveness of border fences that now cover one-third of Arizona's 378 miles of U.S.-Mexico border, up from 7 percent three years ago. "These fences present between a 30-second to two-minute speed bump for most healthy individuals," said Matt Clark, Southwest representative of Defenders of Wildlife, a group that works to protect endangered species. "We are paying how many millions of dollars for this?" Walls, particularly unguarded, have historically been shown to be ineffective, he said. "It's just a piece of scrap metal that will be jumped over, tunneled under, gone around," Clark said. "At the end of the day, it's just a big waste of money." The Border Patrol sees the same scene as an example of how the fences help the patrol. "When you are crossing a fence 15 feet in the air, it's a lot easier for me to see," said Alan White, Border Patrol Nogales station chief. "With a barrier that they have to negotiate, it gives us a little more time to react and catch these people." Border Patrol officials acknowledge that the barriers are not a panacea but say they deter, slow and funnel traffic, providing them with a tool that gives them the upper hand in the eternal cat-and-mouse game with smugglers...Arizona Daily Star

California Water Users Sue Federal Agencies

The Coalition for a Sustainable Delta and the Kern County Water Agency (KCWA) today joined other water users in California by filing suit against federal agencies challenging regulatory restrictions placed on the state's water operations. The severe water supply restrictions have resulted from federal agency actions designed to protect the Delta smelt, a federally protected endangered species that lives in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. The restrictions have greatly reduced water supplies for 25 million Californians and millions of acres of productive San Joaquin Valley farmland. "The actions by federal agencies are greatly exacerbating California's ongoing water supply crisis and doing significant damage to farmers, farm workers, residents and the overall economy of our state," said Michael Boccadoro, a spokesperson for the Coalition. "Farmers are facing the loss of crops and fallowed fields. Additionally, tens of thousands of farm workers have lost their jobs because federal agencies have not done what they are required to do. People are suffering because federal agencies are not doing their job and addressing the real issues." The lawsuit focuses on the failure of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) to use the best available scientific data when determining the effects of water operations and other activities on the threatened Delta smelt. The federal agencies continue to ignore scientific data that point to a growing list of other factors or "stressors" that are impacting the Bay-Delta and the native fish that live there. Federal regulators have done nothing to address predation by non-native bass, habitat destruction, expanding wastewater and storm water discharges or the growing level of pesticides and other contaminants released into the estuary...Press Release

Double hit leaves Klamath dry

The 2009 irrigation season is proving troublesome for Klamath Basin farmers even before it's begun. The amount of water stored in Upper Klamath Lake is insufficient to meet federal fish habitat standards, prompting the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation to delay water deliveries to irrigators. "Basically, what we're up against is a tough water year," said Luther Horsley, president of the Klamath Water Users Association. "We're going to have to be as conservative as possible to make it through the year." Stream flow into the Upper Klamath Lake is projected to be roughly 30 percent below average this season, and the lake is roughly one foot below the minimum level set by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to protect endangered fish...Capital Press

Drought a $1 billion disaster in Texas

Agriculture officials said Friday that ranchers in the nation's largest cattle-producing state have already lost nearly $1 billion because of Texas' ongoing drought. Officials said cattle raisers have lost $829 million since last summer, $569 million of that since November. Recent rains across much of the state, though welcome, came too late. Ranchers have spent substantial money on hay and supplemental feed, the cost of trucking in additional hay. The drought losses also include failed wheat crops usually used for grazing. All of Texas is in some stage of drought for the second straight week, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor map released Thursday. Texas just had its driest December-February stretch on record. More than 60% of the state's beef cows are in counties with severe to exceptional drought — the three worst stages. Losses will likely grow past $1 billion in the next two months as livestock producers continue to make supplemental feed purchases or sell cattle and calves in a declining market, said David Anderson, an agriculture marketing economist with Texas AgriLife Extension Service...USA Today

Droughts double dying trees in 10 years

Tree experts are sounding the alarm: Because of severe drought across the west, the number of trees dying in forests has doubled over the last ten years, creating dangerous fire conditions. Experts say the drought conditions weaken trees, making them susceptible to bark beetles, which destroy the trees. The low rainfall over the last few years has left trees vulnerable to a surge in bark beetles. Experts say when there's sufficient moisture, trees are healthy and they're able to fight off beetles. But when they're stressed by drought, they're less able to defend themselves so beetles thrive...ABC

Climate change accelerates water hunt in U.S. West

It's hard to visualize a water crisis while driving the lush boulevards of Los Angeles, golfing Arizona's green fairways or watching dancing Las Vegas fountains leap more than 20 stories high. So look Down Under. A decade into its worst drought in a hundred years Australia is a lesson of what the American West could become. Bush fires are killing people and obliterating towns. Rice exports collapsed last year and the wheat crop was halved two years running. Water rationing is part of daily life. "Think of that as California's future," said Heather Cooley of California water think tank the Pacific Institute. There is very little water left untapped and global warming, the gradual increase of temperature as carbon dioxide and other gases retain more of the sun's heat, has created new uncertainties. Global warming pushes extremes. It prolongs drought while sometimes bringing deluges the parched earth cannot absorb. California Department of Water Resources Director Lester Snow says two things keep him up at night: drought and flood. Take Los Angeles, which had its driest year in 2006-2007, with 3 inches (7.6 cms) of rain. Only two years earlier, more than 37 inches (94 cms) fell, barely missing the record. California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger declared a drought emergency last month, and Los Angeles plans to ration water for the first time in 15 years...Reuters

Water scarcity clouds California farming's future

California almond farmer Marvin Meyers has moved into banking -- water banking that is. In the heart of the San Joaquin Valley, the world's most productive agricultural region, Meyers bought land to collect water in wet years and recharge a shallow aquifer. The water authority takes his supply for nearby farmers and gives him credit to irrigate from a canal at his orchard 15 miles away. It cost Meyers $7 million and lots of headaches, but now he is the envy of farmers facing a third year of drought, drastic water cutbacks and billions of dollars in losses. Worse may lie ahead, as climate change leads to longer droughts and depletes the mountain snowpack that now provides a steady stream of water until late in the farming year. Yet, for all his vision, Meyers's "bank of last resort" will run dry if the drought persists for three more years...Reuters

FACTBOX: Water scarcity and agriculture in California

Here are some facts about California farming and water:

-- California leads all states as top farm producer measured by cash receipts of $36.6 billion in 2007, 13 percent of the U.S. total and nearly twice the output of No. 2 Texas and No. 3 Iowa.

-- The state has 75,000 farms and ranches and is home to nine of the nation's top 10 producing counties.

-- It supplies over half of U.S. fruits, nuts and vegetables and over 90 percent of U.S. almonds, artichokes, avocados, broccoli and processing tomatoes. Grapes, lettuce and almonds are the biggest crops in cash value.

-- California produces 80 percent of the world almond crop and one-third of the world's canned tomatoes.

-- California is not technically a "breadbasket." It is not a top five U.S. producer of any grain product, but it is, surprisingly, the nation's largest dairy producer.

-- Overseas exports have risen in recent years to 25 percent of total production today from 16 percent 10 years ago. The top three destinations - the European Union, Canada and Japan - accounted for nearly 60 percent of the 48-commodity total.

-- Farming accounts for 2 percent of the state's $1.6 trillion economy, but its demand for equipment, transport, labor and other services make it a key economic sector for the world's eighth-largest economy.

-- The San Joaquin Valley accounts for 60 percent of the state's prime farmland and is the world's most productive agricultural region. It depends mostly on snowpack melt from hundreds of miles away for irrigation.

-- Farming accounts for 80 percent of the state's water usage, according to the Pacific Institute, but the farm industry and government put the number much lower at 40 percent to 60 percent.

-- California is expected to suffer its third straight year of drought in 2009. Economic losses could rise to $3 billion and 95,000 agricultural jobs will be lost. Federal water deliveries will be zero and state water allocations could be 15 percent of the amount requested...Reuters

Obama Announces Under Secretaries for USDA

President Barack Obama today announced his intention to nominate James W. (Jim) Miller to be Under Secretary of Agriculture for Farm and Foreign Agricultural Services and Dallas P. Tonsager to be Under Secretary of Agriculture for Rural Development. Miller currently is Chief of Staff for the National Farmers Union, a position he accepted in 1999 after serving four years as Senior Analyst for Agriculture and Trade on the majority staff of the Senate Budget Committee. Miller also has served as Chief Economist for the National Farmers Union and as Vice President for Government Relations for the National Association of Wheat Growers...USDA

This Little Piggy Goes Home

"Here, piggy piggy," calls the man peering through the early-morning fog into a livestock trailer, a .22-caliber rifle in his hands. It is 7 a.m. in farm country outside Santa Rosa, California. A rooster crows. "Here we go. Right here." He raises the rifle to his shoulder and takes aim. BAM! There's a thud, and a few excited squeals from the remaining pigs behind the bars. Carefully, the man sets down the gun and steps into the trailer. He emerges dragging a small, dead—but still twitching—reddish pig with a bullet hole the diameter of a pencil eraser just about perfectly centered in its forehead. Meet John Taylor, or "One Shot Johnny," as his customers call him. His business card offers just "JT's Custom Slaughtering" and his cell phone number, along with clip art of a cow, pig, sheep, and lamb. But then, he doesn't really need a card. Just about everyone in California north of San Francisco who raises animals for meat knows the tall "ranch butcher" with the bristly mustache and straight-arrow demeanor of a frontier sheriff. Now 43, he began sweeping floors in his family's butcher shop (since sold) in third grade, and started helping his uncle in the pasture not long after. "I was doomed—I knew this was what I was meant to do," he says. Taylor ties on a black rubber apron that hangs past the tops of his rubber boots and chains a knife holder around his waist. He sticks a hook through the animal's lower jaw and attaches it to a winch mounted on his truck. Twenty minutes of expert scraping, shaving, and eviscerating later, the pig has become pork...Marksmanship is important, but so is legal savvy, since a single misstep could land Taylor in hot water. By California law, he can slaughter livestock only for a farmer's personal use or for a farmer's customer who buys the animal alive and whole; in the latter case, he has to do so off farm premises. And under federal law, every carcass Taylor delivers to a butcher shop for cutting—and every piece from it—must be stamped "Not for Sale." Only meat from usda-inspected slaughterhouses can be sold across state lines or on a retail basis (including at farmers markets and restaurants) in the 25 states without their own inspection systems, like California and New York. Such rules are partly why federally inspected slaughterhouses kill 98 percent of all cattle and 99 percent of hogs in this country. But as giants like Tyson and Smithfield Foods—which have their own abattoirs—have increasingly dominated the meat industry, the number of usda-approved slaughterhouses nationwide has fallen, from 1,405 in 1992 to just 808 in 2008. (Wyoming doesn't have a single one.) In 2007, just 14 plants killed 18.5 million cattle, more than half the country's total; that's a per-slaughterhouse average of 2.5 head per minute, 24-7. These big operations "are not talking to the little guy, the farmer who says, 'I have 500 head of beef'"—let alone 50 or 5, says Bruce Dunlop, who raises lamb and pork on Lopez Island in Washington state. "They laugh at him."...Mother Jones

Old Cattle Crime Rears Its Head Again

There are no thundering hoofs, clouds of dust or bandits disguised in bandanas and sporting six shooters, but the Old West crime of cattle theft is still very much alive in Texas and other areas of the nation. It remains a profitable business for criminals and devastating for a small operation. Law enforcement says East Texas is the hottest spot for cattle thieves with more thefts annually than other parts of the state. When many citizens think of cattle rustling, they think of a good-old John Wayne western, where the good guy not only gets the bad guy and recovers the cattle, but also lands the girl and heroically rides into the sunset. They do not think of prolific crime occurring today resulting in losses of millions of dollars each year or of the special group of lawmen who investigate cattle theft and track thieves using high tech computers and forensic science. In a two-story office building in downtown Fort Worth, Larry Gray, director of the Texas Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association's Law Enforcement and Livestock Identification programs, heads special investigators who seek thieves and recover cattle across Texas and Oklahoma. Gray said the TSCRA has 28 livestock special rangers and theft investigators, stationed throughout Texas and Oklahoma. Trained in all areas of law enforcement, they combine knowledge of the cattle industry with modern methods to locate missing cattle. Gray added his agency recovered more than $3 million in livestock and equipment stolen from Texas farms and ranches in 2007. Figures for 2008 are not available. Gray said he did not know how much remains missing. He explained that many thefts are not reported to his agency. These thefts are investigated by other law enforcement or not reported...Tyler Morning Telegraph

Keeping it in the family

The extended Magby family has called Dog Canyon, located between the Guadalupe and Broke-Off mountains, home since the early 1900s. Wesley Magby came to the area from Texas in 1904. His son, Lee and wife, Pearl Magby homesteaded in West Dog Canyon in 1912, later trading that land for acreage in Dog Canyon. Today, Lee's son, Edgar and wife, Joy Magby and their five adult children, Justin, Laverne, Roland, Brad and Larea, own the Magby Ranch. Edgar, 80, was one of nine children born to Lee and Pearl Magby. Magby's grandfather Wesley and five children traveled by wagon to the Guadalupe Mountains area following his wife's death. They first settled in Dark Canyon. He later moved west to the Silver City area. Lee Magby traded his 320-acre homestead in West Dog Canyon to George Chandler for 320 acres in Dog Canyon. He bought 320 additional acres, which brought his holdings to 640 acres, or one section. Edgar Magby's brother Leroy acquired the ranch from their father Lee. Pearl Magby, Edgar's mother, became postmaster in 1929. A storeroom added to the original home housed the El Paso Gap post office. She remained postmaster until May 1935. On the ranch there was around 400 head of Angora goats. Twice a year, a man and his crew from Carlsbad traveled to Dog Canyon to do the shearing for area goat ranchers. Children in Dog Canyon attended the El Paso Gap School, which was a one-room schoolhouse, some 2 miles from the Magby ranch. On the way to school, Edgar and brother Leroy Magby would check on their traps each morning. After school, they would walk up the mountain and bring the goats home out of the way of predators...Carlsbad Current Argus

Cowgirl Sass & Savvy

Rodeo Fever - dangerous and expensive

Julie Carter

The approach of spring marks many changes in the world: blooming trees, the hint of green grass, romance for man and beast, high pollen counts and along those same lines, rodeo fever.

Unless you have competed in a sport or done any kind of activity that involved the spirit of competition, or in most cowboy's case, a good reason to get out of town and party, an understanding rodeo fever will come only by example.

Team ropers Robby and Darrel had a bad case of rodeo fever.

It was way late in the rodeo season, but the intensity of the need to rodeo was just as heavy as the late summer humidity.

A Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (PRCA) rodeo was coming to Comanche in two weeks and these two hometown heroes decided they needed to enter up and make their friends proud.

Having not spent much, well actually, no time in the practice pen, the duo headed over to a friend's place to tune up their roping skills.

They consumed a remarkable quantity of beer and roped a half dozen steers. Robby hadn't been on his horse in at least a couple of months and Darrel was riding a horse that had served him well in the arena for at least 24 years.

Neither horse had ever been behind a barrier, so the cowboys rigged up a practice one out of some hay twine and a jump rope they found in one of the pickups.

By now, darkness was falling and by the time the ropers called it a night, the horses were still jumping over the barrier instead of going through it.

As ready as they would be, they headed off to the rodeo that weekend. Both ropers could head and heel, although any success on either end of the steer was merely a coincidence.

The local rodeo drove that point home as they quickly earned no-time and rode out of the arena with only the crowd's applause for a reward. That in itself was fuel for the fire and the rodeo fever thermometer jumped up seriously.

They disappeared off the practice circuit for a few weeks, perhaps licking their no-time wounds.

Resurfacing in a flurry of phone calls to find a roping arena and cattle they could use, the duo admitted to entering four PRCA rodeos and even they thought they should maybe practice a little.

With the roping chute broke at their usual practice arena and a continued story of "don't have any steers" everywhere else they called, they went to plan B.

The local roping steer contractor told them he had some cattle they could lease. He warned them that the steers were still in shock, having just crossed the border and heard their first words of English since birth.

In their desperation for practice cattle, they heard none of the warning, loaded up and headed down the road to pick up the steers.

On the way back, they ran out of beer and had to stop to get another case, arriving at the roping arena about 11 p.m.

Still needing to practice, they unloaded the steers, herded them into the lead-up alley and just for a dry run, let one out of the chute.

That led to spending the next hour trying to get this wild Corriente through the stripping chute at the other end of arena.

This went on the better part of the night, as long as the beer held out anyway.

The next report from Robby was, "We never caught a one of those little jackrabbit s.o.b.'s."

Nevertheless, they had to get up and leave early that morning to get to Gatesville, the first rodeo of their four-rodeo run.

Friends were taking bets whether they'd even get a time or not.

The final consensus was that there was no telling how many rodeos this pair would enter and how much money they'd spend if they actually accidentally, in a miracle moment, won something.

The big-name ropers entering those PRCA rodeos wouldn't have a clue who Robby and Darrel were when they showed up, but their buddies were certain they'd leave with some recognition of the comedy kind.

"Here comes Mo and Larry. Where'd they leave Curly?"

"Curly" was back at home making a living at his honest job.

Having suffered from several bouts of rodeo fever, Curly was taking notes and naming names.

Stay tuned for the continuing saga of the expensive, dangerous disease called "rodeo fever."

Julie, who completed a 12-step rodeo fever program, can be reached for comment at www.julie-carter.com

It’s The Pitts

Who Died?

Lee Pitts

There are words in the English language that excite the reader or listener like no other. I am referring to phrases such as ‘estate sale’, ‘complete dispersal’ and ‘clearance sale’. But it has come to my attention that people are misusing these phrases. Take the words ‘going out of business sale’, for example. There seem to be quite a few these now days, but many of these sales do not offer the bargains they imply. I am getting sick of driving into town to go shopping, expecting to get bargains, only to find that the store the night before jacked up their prices by 10% and is now offering a going out of business sale price of 10% off. Do they think we’re idiots? We must be, because by the time the retailers get ready to close their doors the only things half-off are extra large sizes, store fixtures and the employees.

In the livestock business no term is more misused than the phrase ‘complete dispersal’. The words are supposed to mean that the stockmen is selling everything he owns related to his livestock operation and because we all love a bargain, such events attract buyers like ants to honey. People come to buy the good stuff that otherwise wouldn’t normally be for sale. So I was surprised at one ‘complete dispersal’ I went to in Texas where hardly anyone bothered to attend. I asked a buddy of mine why there wasn’t a crowd and he said it was because it was the owner’s 15th annual complete dispersal!

There is something in our DNA that makes us salivate at the possibility of getting a bargain, especially if that something is an old piece of junk that belonged to someone you never knew. I don’t know about you, but I get a euphoric feeling after I buy a big bucket of rusty bolts and washers for only fifty cents! I think we enjoy sorting through the refuse of other people’s lives because it’s like a big treasure hunt.

I wish I lived in Colorado or Nebraska because it seems like they have the most farm and estate sales. And they do it the right way: at auction. When my junk collecting days are over I have specified in my will that I want my valuable collection of motel stationery sold at auction. And you’re all invited. It will be a complete dispersal.

We don’t have estate auctions where I live. Instead, we have estate sales that drag on for three days. The real serious collectors among us always get there a couple hours early on the first day so that we have a better chance of getting the good stuff. On the third day everything is half-price but the pickings are usually pretty slim by then. Some unscrupulous cheaters noticed that these estate sales attract huge buying crowds so they got in the habit of advertising their small garage sales as ‘estate sales’. This irritates the heck out of professional junk collectors like me.

Woody is the acknowledged King of Junk in our neck of the woods and I idolize the man. He has an encyclopedic memory for the value of all things antique. Woody attends all the estate sales but he was especially excited about one that sounded promising because the advertisement said it was an ‘80 year accumulation’. Because it sounded so enticing Woody showed up at five in the morning for a sale that would open at nine. He was the first one through the door, only to discover that we’d all been scammed. He screamed at the host, “I got up at four this morning for this ‘estate sale’ and all you have for sale is a set of tire chains, an assortment of mismatched Tupperware containers and used Christmas wrapping paper. I want to know who died?”

The frightened lady the the cash box replied, “Wha-wha-wha-what do you mean?”

“For it to be an estate sale, someone had to die,” said Woody with a wild and menacing look on his face. “If no one died then you have to!”

You’d be surprised how Woody’s temper tantrum has reduced the number of ‘estate sales’ in our area.