How $5 million and Wendy Van Asselt helped create the NLCS

Environmental activist Wendy Van Asselt was at the World Resources Institute in 2003 when officials from the Wilderness Society made her an offer she couldn’t refuse. They wanted her to lead a huge project to remove 26 million acres of federal land in the National Landscape Conservation System (NLCS) from oil and gas production, grazing, timber harvesting, mining for strategic minerals, off-road recreation, and providing rural jobs. The Wyss Foundation would fund the new project, thanks to a Wilderness Society board member, Hansjorg Wyss, a Swiss entrepreneur whose net worth was estimated at $6 billion. The Hewlett Foundation would also give $1 million to the project. So, Van Asselt’s new job would be to get Congress to authorize Babbitt’s NCLS and give it a real budget. The graduate of Smith College (economics) and Harvard (master’s in public policy) would soon prove very much up to the challenge...more

No monument plan for state - yet

BLM Director Bob Abbey's pitch at the Sept. 16 Malta monument meeting fell on skeptical ears when he emphatically stated that "there is no plan for a national monument in Montana." So why the doubts and why did the unscientific telephone survey by the Great Falls Tribune confirm that 79 percent of those calling in don't trust Abbey's statement about designation? First, we've been misled before. Back in 1999, the Montana state BLM director sent a letter to Montana legislators, saying: "The secretary of the Interior will support designation in the Missouri Breaks if there is widespread local/regional favor." Of course there was mostly widespread opposition. Then Sen. Baucus wrote letters to a number of his constituents who opposed designation telling them he contacted the White House and Secretary Babbitt and told them not to create a new national park or establish some other designation in the Breaks. Sen. Baucus further stated in his letter that Secretary Babbitt was withdrawing the proposal for designation. Two years later the Breaks Monument was declared...more

BLM buys last piece of Devil's Canyon Ranch in Wyoming

The Bureau of Land Management has bought 3,000 acres of the former Devil’s Canyon Ranch to complete the public acquisition of the scenic property in Wyoming’s Bighorn Mountains. The ranch was subject to a bitter dispute more than a decade ago when its former owners closed a road through the property. That cut off access for several years to 20,000 acres of BLM and U.S. Forest Service land. The BLM on Thursday paid $2 million for the final piece of the ranch along the Montana border. It was sold by the Trust for Public Land, which bought the 11,000-acre property in 2003 to put into public ownership. In 2003, after the Trust for Public Lands had taken hold of the property, the late U.S. Sen. Craig Thomas helped arrange $4 million in federal funds to buy the initial 8,000 acres. The Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation also contributed to that deal. Money for last week’s purchase came from the federal government’s Land and Water Conservation Fund. The BLM says the land will be managed as part of the Craig Thomas Little Mountain Special Management Area...more

Interior won’t fight ruling on nuclear site

The federal government has decided not to fight a court ruling that might allow the Skull Valley Goshute Indians to revive their plans to store reactor waste on their Tooele County reservation. Two months ago, U.S. District Judge David M. Ebel threw out a pair of U.S. Interior Department decisions that, in effect, led many Utahns to believe that the storage site plans were dead four years ago. Interior officials’ decision to pass up on an appeal by Friday’s deadline has angered Utah leaders, who had urged the agency to vigorously contest the ruling. With the feds’ inaction, the issues in dispute now return to the agency “for further consideration” in light of the judge’s ruling. A spokeswoman for Gov. Gary Herbert said he believes it is inappropriate to have high-level nuclear waste stored 50 miles from downtown Salt Lake City. Tim Vollmann, an attorney for the Goshutes, noted Ebel’s ruling repeatedly called Interior’s decisions “arbitrary and capricious” — that is “unlawful.” The decision not to fight the court’s determination, he said, signaled the Interior Department’s attorneys must have agreed an appeal was doomed...more

Feds Find Gunnison Sage Grouse Imperiled, But Deny Endangered Species Act Protection

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced today that the Gunnison sage grouse warrants Endangered Species Act protection, but that listing is precluded by higher priority actions and lack of resources to finalize a listing rule. The grouse will now become a candidate species under the Act, offering it no formal protection. The decision continues an unfortunate trend by the Obama administration of failing to list species its own biologists have determined to be imperiled. “Here we go again,” said Mark Salvo, director of the Sagebrush Sea Campaign for WildEarth Guardians. “The government has now determined that greater sage grouse, Mono Basin sage grouse, the Columbia Basin population and now Gunnison sage grouse all warrant protection under the ESA, but hasn’t listed any of them.” The Fish and Wildlife Service previously decided that Gunnison sage grouse were not warranted for listing under the Endangered Species Act in April 2006. However, upon further review, the agency agreed to promulgate a new listing decision today. Historic and current population trends and threats support listing the bird under the Act...Press Release

What Are Species Worth? Putting a Price on Biodiversity

We live in what is paradoxically a great age of discovery and also of mass extinction. Astonishing new species turn up daily, as new roads and new technologies penetrate formerly remote habitats. And species also vanish forever, at what scientists estimate to be 100 to 1,000 times the normal rate of extinction. Over the past few years, as I was working on a book about the history of species discovery, I often found myself coming back to a fundamental question: Why do species matter? That is, why should ordinary people care if scientists discover one species or pronounce the demise of another? It may seem too obvious to need asking. In certain limited contexts, people clearly do care. We will go to great lengths to protect a boutique species like the giant panda, for instance. We also thrill to the possibility of finding the slightest microbial hint of life in outer space, hardly blinking when the U.S. government spends $7 billion a year largely for that purpose. Meanwhile, we spend pennies exploring the alien life forms that are all around us here on Earth. Maybe it’s just human nature not to value — or even see — the thing that’s right in front of our faces. And maybe it’s also a failure of communication. We need to understand that our lives depend on species we have never heard of. That is, scientists may need to explain their work on a far more basic level — not “Why do species matter?” but “Is food important to you?” or “Do you want your children to have effective medicines when they get sick?” or even “Do you like to breathe?” None of these questions overstates the importance of species...more

Monarch Butterfly Migration to Mexico Begins

The monarch butterfly migration started this week, and thousands of the black and orange insects have started the journey to Mexico. The monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus) is the only species to migrate, as they find winters in the north too cold to survive. Other butterflies spend the winter as larvae or in hibernation. According to the Lincoln Courier on Monday, numerous monarchs were spotted throughout Illinois as they migrated. The butterflies have been spotted in other states including Kansas, reports say. “There must have been thousands,” Vern LaGesse, who works in Menard County, Illinous, told the Courier on Monday. “They were covering the stiff goldenrod flowers.” Some monarchs travel nearly 3,000 miles to their destination in central Mexico, resting on oyamel fir trees in mountainous forests, about two miles above sea level. The Forest Service says that the insects can migrate between 50 and 100 miles per day...more

Alert issued after 3 bitten by foxes

After three people were bitten by foxes suspected of being rabid this month, the Allegheny County Health Department issued an alert to all county residents to avoid the animals as well as raccoons. Two of the incidents were described as surprise attacks. A man from Plum was bitten by a fox as he was cutting brush in a wooded area near his home. A man from Monroeville was bitten while washing his car in the driveway. A man was scratched while breaking up a fight in his Forest Hills front yard between his dog and a fox. Because the foxes escaped, they couldn't be tested for rabies, so the victims are being treated with vaccines. A fourth fox was found dead on a Monroeville road and tested positive for rabies...more

Stimulus Waste? $3.4 million Turtle Tunnel and $554,763 for Forest Service Windows

Lynn R. Mitchell at the Washington Examiner picks just 8 projects to prove her point:

- The sidewalk to nowhere - $89,298: A small town in Oklahoma received stimulus money to replace a quarter-mile stretch of sidewalk that was replaced only five years ago. The sidewalk reportedly "led to a ditch."

- Studying and photographing ants - $1.9 million: Yes, that's right ... $1.9 million was given by the federal government to the California Academy of Sciences so they could send researchers to the Southwest Indian Ocean Islands and east Africa to "capture, photograph and analyze thousands of exotic ants." The information is to be used to catalog the thousands of ant species throughout the world. Helpful? For some people, yes, but should it qualify for tax money?

- Forest Service to replace windows in closed visitor center - $554,763: The visitor center at Mount St. Helens in Washington state was closed in 2007 and has no plans to reopen. However, the government designated half-a-million dollars of stimulus money to replace the windows, a prime example of misdirected funds. I know ... it's mind-boggling.

- Snowmaking and chairlifts for Mt. Snow, VT - $25 million: How does a ski resort qualify for federal help? Mt. Snow, the "gateway to Vermont," will use stimulus money to replace chairlifts, construct a 120-million-gallon storage pond for snowmaking, and install additional snowmaking guns. I have nothing against Vermont but we have ski resorts in Virginia that would probably like to have $25 million handed over for improvements.

- "Greening" of Poff Federal Building in Roanoke, Va - $50.9 million: This is a building that cost several million dollars to build in the 1970s. The stimulus money will be used to replace windows and the heating/cooling system. No money, however, will be used on needs of individual tenants, and the building's largest tenant is not planning to return to the building after the green renovation.

- Scientist attempts to create joke machine - $712,883: Northwestern University researchers want to develop "machine-generated humor" with almost three-quarter of a million dollars of your tax money. That certainly is not funny to fiscally conservative taxpayers.

- Turtle tunnel - $3.4 million: Florida plans to build a 13-foot long tunnel under U.S. Highway 27 to provide safe passage for turtles and other animals to avoid squashed creatures in the roadway. By my estimate that's a cost of approximately $262,000 per foot of tunnel. Want to make bets on how many turtles miss the tunnel and still end up becoming speed bumps on the road?

- Smokers and smartphones - $497,893: Smokers in DC who want to quit may receive a smartphone so they can contact their “stop smoking” support group to prevent relapses, thanks to stimulus funds going to the American Legacy Foundation. That's half-a-million dollars from taxpayers to provide smartphones. I don't know about you but my old cell phone is just that ... old, battered, and still being used. It is a bit like a kick to head to know that my hard-earned tax dollars are being used for others to own smartphones.

Chainsaw Art

THE chainsaw seems an unlikely tool for making art. But along Route 1 in the upper-reaches of coastal Maine, Ray Murphy uses nothing else, taming the saw to create a host of sylvan inspired pieces—black bears, squirrels and eagles—and a scruffy fisherman with a pipe, a bestseller. So unlikely is the association between carving and the chainsaw that Murphy adamantly refers to himself as a sawyer. His tool of choice prevented him from entering a woodcarving exhibition a few decades ago. The grudge persists. Yet the chainsaw does well for Murphy; he’s sold thousands of pieces and puts on a live chainsaw art and entertainment show. The programme advertises numerous unrivalled feats, including sawing numbers one to 17 on a toothpick and the alphabet on a pencil. A few of these are recognised by "Ripley’s Believe it or Not", which granted Ray’s roadside trade some national notoriety. It seemed only natural that More Intelligent Life caught up with him over a can of Pepsi in his sawdust-encrusted shop...more

Song Of The Day #416

Ranch Radio will step out of it's normal venue this week. Put these in the category of "Just Cuz I Like'em".

Today's selection is What Did You Expect Me To Do? performed by Retta and The Smart Fellas.

You'll find the tune on her 9 track CD They Took the Stars Out of Heaven.

Group Protests Border Patrol Substation Site Opposition Wants Area Farther South

A group of Hidalgo County ranchers and other residents is protesting the proposed location of a Border Patrol substation near Animas, about 20 miles from the border, saying it would offer better protection if it was farther south. Residents submitted a 110-signature petition to the agency last week. The stations are aimed at stemming the flow of undocumented immigrants, human traffickers and drug smugglers. Agents starting their day at the Lordsburg headquarters must drive 75 miles to reach the border, a 90-minute drive at best, said Border Patrol agent in charge Chris Mangusing. So, he said, three hours of an eight- to 12-hour workday are eaten up simply traveling. Mangusing said the proposed substations, called forward operating bases, will serve as mini-headquarters, with living quarters for 16 agents, horse corrals, a fueling facility and a helipad. Agents will be stationed for short intervals, starting the workday closer to the border. Ranchers Levi Klump and Judy Keeler, who live nearby, are protesting. Both said they might get a personal advantage from having the substation nearby, possibly deterring traffic from their homes, but said they prefer a rejected BLM parcel seven miles north of the border. Klump said the BLM site is on a plain and would give agents a better view of surroundings. The BLM site also is near existing phone and utility lines. "Maybe, maybe, maybe the smugglers would stay away from my headquarters," he said. "But the real issue is the smuggling of humans and drugs from Mexico and into the United States. The more presence you have, the more the drug trafficking will be discouraged." Mangusing said there were environmental concerns about the BLM site, including its importance to wildlife...more

This just shows how the mere presence of federal land on the border is a hindrance to the Border Patrol and other law enforcement agencies. Why do the drug cartels prefer Arizona over Texas? Because Arizona has millions of acres of federal lands along the border, including wilderness areas.

Napolitano to McCain: Yes, Mexican Cartels Pose Terror Threat to U.S.

Under questioning by Sen. John McCain (R.-Ariz.) in the Senate Homeland Security Committee on Wednesday, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano conceded that Mexican drug cartels pose a terrorist threat to the United States.In 2009, the U.S. Justice Department declared in its annual National Drug Threat Assessment that the Mexican drug cartels were “the greatest organized crime threat to the United States,” but the U.S. State Department has not listed those cartels as foreign terrorist organizations.Napolitano’s concession that Mexican drug cartels pose a terrorist threat to the United States came while she was testifying beside FBI Director Robert Mueller who told McCain that violence on the Mexican side of the border increased the “national security threat” to the United States, an assessment Napolitano shared.“Would you agree that the violence in Mexico has dramatically escalated in, say, the last three or four years?” McCain asked.“Yes,” said Mueller.“And would you say that, then, increases the national security threat on the other side of our border?” asked McCain.“Yes,” said Mueller. When McCain asked Napolitano if she agree with that, Napolitano said, “I think that’s right...more 

Obama Tries to Make It Easier to Wiretap the Internet

Federal law enforcement and national security officials are preparing to seek sweeping new regulations for the Internet, arguing that their ability to wiretap criminal and terrorism suspects is “going dark” as people increasingly communicate online instead of by telephone. Essentially, officials want Congress to require all services that enable communications — including encrypted e-mail transmitters like BlackBerry, social networking Web sites like Facebook and software that allows direct “peer to peer” messaging like Skype — to be technically capable of complying if served with a wiretap order. The mandate would include being able to intercept and unscramble encrypted messages. The bill, which the Obama administration plans to submit to lawmakers next year, raises fresh questions about how to balance security needs with protecting privacy and fostering innovation. And because security services around the world face the same problem, it could set an example that is copied globally...more

Rope Afghanistan?

In a place where life can end abruptly or change forever in an instant, Arnold Norman is offering a belt buckle to the best soldier. Correction: the best roper soldier. Of all of Norman's missions as an agricultural adviser at a remote outpost in Afghanistan, organizing a roping competition would not have appeared anywhere. But Norman, 59, an avid team roper on weekends in Texas, discovered dozens of young American soldiers, and a few Afghans, who found swinging a rope at a dummy steer to be an unexpected salve for the stresses of combat and loneliness. "I thought it'd be kind of cool to have a little dummy-roping contest," said Norman, who lives outside Burleson. "It just kept getting bigger. I've probably got 50 guys signed up for it now." The contest is scheduled for Oct. 1 in the town of Baraki Barak, a couple of weeks after Norman returns from his leave. The best roper will get to take custom-made belt buckles home from deployment. Norman hears that the Stars & Stripes newspaper and Armed Forces Network might cover it...more

The Westerner

Due to some health issues I will be spending a limited amount of time in my wheelchair.

Which means, until I get my laptop working, a limited amount of time on The Westerner.

To top it all off, the email server for my isp is down, so no email for 3 days.

Stay tuned...no telling what will happen next.

Landowners oppose Oberstar, Clean Water Act

Oberstar, DFL-8th District and chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, last April authored amendments to the 1972 Clean Water Act. The bill, America’s Commitment to Clean Water Act, attempts to correct two U.S. Supreme Court cases over jurisdiction over waters. The original bill gave federal jurisdiction over all “navigable” waters, while the Oberstar bill removes that word and defines federal jurisdiction “to all waters that are currently used, were used in the past, may be susceptible to use in interstate or foreign commerce, including all waters that are subject to the ebb and flow of the tide,” says Don Parmeter, who is leading an effort to draft alternative legislation. “It’s a radical bill, we’ve been fighting it since 2007,” said Parmeter of the National Water and Conservation Alliance, of an earlier version of the Oberstar bill. “What this bill does, simply, is remove the term navigable from the federal water pollution control act of 1972 and replaces it with waters of the United States,” Parmeter said. “All interstate and international waters, including interstate and international wetlands, and all other waters, including intrastate which is all waters within the boundaries of the state” are included. That’s every wet spot,” he said. Parmeter said covered waters include lakes, rivers, streams (including intermittent streams), mudflats, sandflats, sloughs, prairie potholes, wet meadows, playa lakes and natural ponds. “This is a very expansive federal authority bill,” he said. “This is not only a controlled waters bill but also a controlled land bill — everything within a watershed.”...more

Idaho lawmakers considering next step on wolves

A panel of Idaho state lawmakers met Thursday to review the legal and on-the-ground status of wolves in Idaho and discuss potential actions lawmakers could take next year. Gov. Butch Otter, Idaho state agency leaders, and all of Idaho’s members of Congress have panned a court decision putting wolves back on the endangered species list, and taken steps to urge federal official to resolve the situation.  Many of the state lawmakers at the meeting in Boise were unhappy with the current legal status of wolves, but uncertain of how they could respond. Representatives from the governor’s office and the Idaho Department of Fish and Game (IDFG) said they’re doing all they can to bring back state management of wolves. The governor’s attorney, David Hensley, said the state would send the draft of a new memorandum of agreement to the U.S. Department of the Interior to outline how the state would handle wolves until they are delisted. “One of the most frustrating aspects with this is that the problems really lie in federal law,” Hensley said. Sen. Jeff Siddoway, R-Terreton, said the state should look into adopting one of the tactics of the environmental groups challenging federal decisions. “Our legislative approach to try to address the wolf delisting again in there may be an opportunity for us to file federal suit against the government,” he said. Siddoway, a sheep rancher, said Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming all have more wolves than the 10 packs that were set as the threshold for being on the endangered list. “Now we’ve got packs up the ying-yang,” he said...more

California cougars: a conflict between man and beast

More than half of California is considered mountain lion territory, with some 5,000 of the big cats, also known as cougars, roaming free. Fast and powerful, they can leap 18 feet into a tree and take down a bull elk six times their weight. Of 53 mountain lions that have been trapped, tranquilized and collared, 19 have been killed by vehicles or shot, far more than have died from natural causes.

"The closer lions are to people, the more likely they're going to die," Vickers said. "Any interaction with humans, broadly speaking, will likely end up badly for the lion."

 The extent of cougar attacks on domestic animals is difficult to determine. But one measure is the number of lions legally killed under depredation permits issued by state wildlife managers. In the year ending Sept. 30, 2009, 103 lions were killed by permit. Relocation is considered too risky. Mountain lions have been killed for preying on livestock in California since the Spanish friars brought cattle to the missions. In 1907, the state Legislature approved a bounty for cougars.
But the bounty was abolished in 1963, and in 1990 voters approved Proposition 117, which outlawed sport hunting of mountain lions and designated them a "specially protected species."

 But they're far from endangered. It's estimated that the mountain lion population has doubled in California since the 1970s...more

Update: Slain Rancher's Wife Hit By Car

Sue Krentz, wife of slain rancher Robert Krentz, was hit by a vehicle driven by a suspected drunken driver in Douglas Saturday night, Douglas Police said. It happened at approximately 6 p.m. Saturday on the street in front of St. Luke's Catholic Church, an official said. Krentz was airlifted to University Medical Center in Tucson, police said. Family friends told CBS 5 News Krentz had emergency pelvis surgery last night. They said Krentz is awake and alert, but in a lot of pain...more

Slain rancher’s family faces a new tragedy: Widow hit by vehicleThe widow of slain Douglas-area rancher Robert Krentz has been injured by a suspected drunken driver in Douglas, authorities said. Sue Krentz was walking an 80-year-old friend across the street after church Saturday evening when the two were struck by a vehicle, Cochise County Sheriff Larry Dever said. The driver, Ramon Parra Saucedo, 66, of Douglas, was charged with driving under the influence, two counts of aggravated assault and two counts of endangerment, Dever said. Saucedo was held in the Cochise County Jail on a $5,000 bond, Dever said. The sheriff said Douglas police are handling the case. How much more can this family take?” Dever asked as he spoke of the recent suffering the Krentz family has endured. “It’s a bad time, and not just for the family, but the community, as well.”...

This message was on Facebook:

From the Krentz Family: "Susan is in critical but stable condition at UMC
(Tucson). She had lots of internal bleeding, broken pelvis and leg. We will
try to keep you posted. The family thanks you for your thoughts and
prayers." We will update this thread on her condition. Bless this woman and
give her strength.