CATTLE CLONING
Cloned Cows' Milk, Beef Up to Standard
Milk and meat from cloned cattle are almost identical in composition to the milk and meat from conventionally bred cattle, according to the first comprehensive assessment of the nutritional value of food from clones. The new findings, by researchers in Connecticut and Japan, bolster industry assertions that food products from clones should be allowed on the market. But other experts criticized the report as incomplete and said that, in any case, social and economic factors argue against the sale of clonal food. The National Academy of Sciences in 2002 concluded that meat and milk from cloned cattle were unlikely to pose human health concerns, but it warned that there were few studies on which to base its conclusion. A year later, a Food and Drug Administration advisory committee leaned the same way, but several members expressed reservations and even more voiced concerns about the clones' health and welfare. The new study, described in this week's issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, compared the chemical composition of milk from clones of a 13-year-old, high-producing Holstein cow with milk from conventional Holsteins raised identically. Tests on more than 1,000 samples found no significant differences in levels of protein, fat, lactose, antibodies and other parameters routinely monitored by the dairy industry. The team also studied clones of the offspring of a prizewinning Japanese bull famed for his superior marbling -- the blend of fat and muscle that contributes so much to a steak's quality. Of more than 100 measures, more than 90 percent were virtually identical for the clones and conventional animals. Of the dozen tests on which clones scored differently, most showed they had higher levels of fats or fatty acids in various cuts -- traits valued by many consumers, the researchers reported. That reflects the high fat levels in the bull that sired the cloned animal -- one of the reasons that semen from that bull has been used to produce more than 165,000 offspring by standard in vitro fertilization methods....
Cloned Cows Yummy and Safe
Companies like ViaGen, a subsidiary of Exeter Life Sciences in Austin, Texas, and Cyagra, which offer livestock-cloning services to ranchers for replicating their most elite sires and dams, have also been waiting for several years for a final say from the FDA. Cloning cattle can eliminate the genetic gamble that comes with more traditional methods of reproduction, proponents say. Ranchers will choose the animals that produce the best meat and the most milk, as well as those that resist disease and reproduce more efficiently. "For the United States agricultural industry, (cloning) can reduce the number of cows necessary for milking," said Jerry Yang, an animal science professor at the University of Connecticut and a co-author of the study, which appears in the April 11 online issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. "They can have a pleasant environment and produce even more milk." Yang's research found that cloned cattle produced better-quality meat and more milk than those conceived through selective breeding. He also said that cloning could be a boon for developing countries where cows produce four to six times less meat and milk than those in the United States, where genetic breeding is more advanced. "If you use cloning technologies to copy the cows in developing countries, you can save them 50 years of breeding," Yang said....
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Monday, April 11, 2005
NEWS ROUNDUP
Westerners see poetic justice in saving snakehead For years, Alan Gardner has watched Easterners tie up land and scuttle development in the West by asking federal bureaucrats to put various rodents, predators and pests on the nation's endangered-species list. Now it's time for a little payback. Mr. Gardner is leading a band of 13 commissioners from Western counties who have filed to seek protection for a rare new species: the northern snakehead fish, also known as the "Frankenfish." In their application on behalf of the snakehead, the commissioners identify its habitat as a stretch of freshwater and land covering 68 million acres and cutting across 11 Eastern states and Washington, D.C. In the unlikely event that their petition is approved, the snakehead's hangouts would come under strict restrictions on building, transportation and recreation in the name of protecting the famous fish....
Engineers Redesign Roads to Save Moose At night on a dark country road, all that the headlights catch are the shadowy legs the size of tree trunks rising out of the pavement. Standing six feet at the shoulder, weighing up to 1,000 pounds, with massive antlers more than five feet across, moose tower over automobiles and have no fear of them. Increasingly the undisputed giants of the northern forest are tangling with traffic as they expand south. Massachusetts motorists hit 52 moose last year, a more than sixfold increase in four years. But now some traffic engineers around the country are experimenting with redesigning roads to accommodate wandering wildlife and using high tech laser and infrared devices, developed for space exploration and anti-missile systems, to warn motorists when a moose wanders into the road....
Professor protects critters If God's eye is on the sparrow, who's keeping tabs on the weasels? Kerry Foresman and Cory Clausen, that's who. Foresman, a University of Montana biology professor, and Clausen, who works for Roscoe Steel and Culvert Co. in Missoula, have patented a handy-dandy anti-roadkill device called the "critter crawl," a metal, mesh shelf that nestles inside a culvert, suspended above any flowing water. It allows furry little fauna such as fishers, martens, weasels, raccoons, skunks, porcupines, marmots — everything from the endangered lynx to the everyday puddy tat — to tiptoe under a highway, safe from the wrath of B.F. Goodrich....
Prairie chickens draw crowds More than 100 people flocked from as far as Massachusetts and as close as Clovis this weekend to attend the fourth annual High Plains Prairie Chicken Festival. The highlight of the weekend is the lesser prairie chicken’s mating ritual. Right before the springtime sunrise, male prairie chickens congregate on raised semi-clearings called “leks.” Here they puff their feathers, their pinnate and their bright red cheeks, as they spar, stomp and scratch to woo the female. The male’s mating “booming” cry can be heard up to a mile away....
All in the name of buffalo Justine Sanchez' maternal instinct fueled her desire to volunteer for the Buffalo Field Campaign. "As a mother, I felt like I have to raise my child to be a conscious human," she said this past week. "That's the only way we're going to be successful, to raise our children to look out for the buffalo." Sanchez, who lives in the mountains near Ward, Colo., started volunteering for the campaign four years ago after she grew frustrated reading about the capture and killing of Yellowstone National Park buffalo. These women, along with hundreds of other volunteers, are the reason the Buffalo Field Campaign is going strong. Now in its eighth year, the group wants to end what it sees as the unjustified slaughter of wildlife, all in the name of protecting cattle....
Devils Tower to keep name If God's eye is on the sparrow, who's keeping tabs on the weasels? Kerry Foresman and Cory Clausen, that's who. Foresman, a University of Montana biology professor, and Clausen, who works for Roscoe Steel and Culvert Co. in Missoula, have patented a handy-dandy anti-roadkill device called the "critter crawl," a metal, mesh shelf that nestles inside a culvert, suspended above any flowing water. It allows furry little fauna such as fishers, martens, weasels, raccoons, skunks, porcupines, marmots — everything from the endangered lynx to the everyday puddy tat — to tiptoe under a highway, safe from the wrath of B.F. Goodrich....
Lawsuit Pits Tribe Against U.S. and Endangered Bighorn Sheep Peninsular bighorn sheep have lived in this sun-drenched oasis and the parched mountains looming above as long as Native Americans have been here. It is an ancient relationship enshrined in the bighorn statue chained securely in front of the Agua Caliente band of Cahuilla Indians' downtown administrative offices. But now, the tribe is suing the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service seeking to withdraw special protection of 844,000 acres for the endangered sheep. Tribal officials contend that the "critical habitat" designation could cost them "hundreds of millions of dollars" in future development revenues — even though only 17,000 of the protected acres are on reservation land. An attorney for the tribe said that to challenge the habitat designation on the reservation land, the lawsuit had to target all 844,000 acres. The tribe, which owns half of downtown Palm Springs, says it has no immediate plans to develop the lands, but wants to preserve its right to do so....
Freedom beckons 6 lynx Finally, he went for it. Seconds later, the lynx had vanished, becoming Saturday the newest transplant to a state his species once called home. The $2.5 million lynx reintroduction program the Colorado Division of Wildlife began six years ago is reaching its apex and drawing to an end. Not only is this the last year wildlife officials intend to release large groups of the cats into the San Juan Mountains, but it’s also the first year they will have a real chance of telling whether the reintroduction effort is working. Kittens born in Colorado are old enough to breed, and if they do, it could mean the species is once again taking hold....
Dispute brewing over expansion plans at Little Bighorn Battlefield The current superintendent of the Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument near here is at odds with a former superintendent and a National Park Service historian over a proposal to expand the battlefield's museum and visitor center. Current Superintendent Darrell Cook said he is taking a ‘‘very preliminary'' look at adding an indoor interpretive space to the visitor center and expanding the onsite museum. But Robert M. Utley, the former chief historian of the National Park Service, which operates the national monument, said expanding the visitor center at its existing location ‘‘would likely inhibit, perhaps fatally,'' long-term plans to move the center off the site of the 1876 battle. In a letter to the Custer Battlefield Historical and Museum Association, Utley said it ‘‘is widely acknowledged'' that the National Park Service chose the wrong site in 1950 by building the museum at the battlefield site. ‘‘It is a major intrusion on the historic landscape and ought to be removed as soon as possible,'' he wrote....
Man rushes to preserve dino tracks Grand Junction resident Andre Delgalvis launched a race against time and the spring runoff to save what may be a significant find of dinosaur footprints at Lake Powell. Several years in a row of drought has drained Lake Powell to roughly one-third its capacity, the lowest it has been since it was filled in the 1960s. Historically low water levels at the lake have revealed hundreds — possibly thousands — of dinosaur tracks embedded in sandstone rocks that now rest on the shoreline, said Delgalvis. When the reservoir is full, the rock and footprints will be submerged. Delgalvis wants to save the dinosaur footprints before they’re inundated with water, covered again perhaps for decades....
Senate panel OKs bill for Mississippi drilling in Gulf Islands Seashore A U.S. Senate committee has approved a bill that would allow the state of Mississippi to explore, develop and produce oil and gas from beneath the Gulf Islands National Seashore. The bill, approved Wednesday by the Senate Appropriations Committee, also could prevent litigation between the National Park Service and the state of Mississippi over the rights to oil and gas under the Gulf Islands National Seashore. The committee is headed by Sen. Thad Cochran, R-Miss. The bill must pass the Senate and House before it could become law. More than 80 percent of Gulf Islands National Seashore is under water, except for the barrier islands. The seashore stretches 160 miles from Cat Island in Mississippi to the eastern tip of Santa Rosa Island in Florida....
"Fair balance" urged on Roan The federal government has seriously underestimated the impacts of its plan to drill for gas on western Colorado's Roan Plateau and should adopt more environmental protections to avoid a court fight, a coalition of local governments, businesses and environmentalists says. In comments submitted Friday to the Bureau of Land Management, the group urged the federal agency to adopt a competing proposal that would prohibit drilling from the plateau but allow directional wells to access gas beneath it. The coalition, which includes two counties, conservation groups and businesses, claims the BLM study is flawed because it looks at environmental impacts during only the first 20 years of a development cycle that will last much longer....
Gas bonanza shakes dust from Western towns Landscape painter Alfred Jacob Miller set up his easel on the shore of Fremont Lake 168 years ago and rendered one of the most famous romantic portraits ever made of the wild American West. Today, in the small ranching and tourist community that grew up around the venerated lake, motel rooms in Pinedale are sold out, but not from traditional tourists exploring the haunting Wind River range. The influx stems from an unprecedented invasion of oil-patch "roughnecks" creating a round-the-clock beehive of drilling rig crews, pipe layers, roadbuilders, and truck fleets. Indeed, tiny Pinedale represents ground zero in one of the biggest natural-gas booms in the postwar era. Driven by high energy prices and looser government regulations, it is transforming many of the small towns here along the rumpled spine of the Rockies — creating thousands of lucrative jobs, pouring money into local treasuries, and, as always happens with sudden growth, producing new problems ranging from traffic to drug use....
Column: ANWR is a start Sometimes we have to hand it to our greener friends, especially those in the Green Party. To express their horror about the recent Senate vote to open a teeny section of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for oil drilling, they raise the global warming specter. Specifically, the March 22 press release says, "Green Party members noted that new drilling not only threatened local lands and wildlife in Alaska, but also risked accelerating the advance of catastrophic global warming." Even if we grant all the globe's average annual warming of 0.017 degree Centigrade in the last 10 years was due to increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide -- and that's quite a concession -- the numbers on ANWR are a drop in the barrel. According to the Energy Information Administration, in that decade petroleum accounted for about 42 percent of the total human contribution of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. That would mean a total petroleum-related warming of about 0.007 degree yearly....
Sand and gravel plant in tight spot Sandia Aggregates may be about to lose it all in an unusual conflict that pits sand and gravel production against the protection of sensitive lands. The company, owned by Pabco Building Products LLC, will begin shutting down this month and will have to lay off at least half of its 20 employees. At the heart of the issue are location and time. Sandia's operations in northeast Clark County abut the Rainbow Gardens Area of Critical Environmental Concern. That site is a 37,620-acre parcel east of Frenchman's Mountain that received federal protected status in 1998, partly because it is a habitat for sensitive plants, such as the bearpaw poppy, and threatened animals, including the desert tortoise....
Column: Tree Huggers Finally Branch Out Some environmentalists are ready to pronounce their movement dead. As evidence they point to the relentless confidence with which President Bush and Republican majorities in Congress attack long-standing environmental goals, such as protecting the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from oil drillers. In truth, though, the environmental movement's vitality depends on how we define the movement. This is more than a linguistic exercise. Take global warming. The "environmentalism is dead" crowd contends that the big environmental groups have failed to get new federal laws passed limiting global-warming gases. The reason, they say, is the green groups' inability to link with labor and social movements and develop a broad coalition to take on such multifaceted issues as global warming. The environmentalists counter they have partners in their quest for energy efficiency. Both sides overlook a new dynamic that is revitalizing and redefining environmentalism: the development of locally and regionally based quality-of-life movements....
A testy case on access Asher's house sits on a low bluff above the John Day. For him, "steelheaders" has become an epithet, synonymous with the Association of Northwest Steelheaders, a group on the opposite side in a long-running dispute over who owns the banks along the Central Oregon river. On Tuesday, the State Land Board is expected to side with the steelhead group and assert the public's ownership over a 174-mile stretch of the John Day as it flows from near Spray into the Columbia River east of The Dalles. In the next several years, the state is set to do the same with at least six more rivers, starting next with the upper Rogue River. And if the experience around Spray is any indication, the other decisions will prove just as fraught with politics, lawsuits and enmity. "They way I see it, we're sort of a test case," Asher said. "Whatever is decided here will apply to the rest of the rivers in Oregon."....
Drought means less water for Klamath farmers Spring rain and snow have been too little, too late to avert irrigation cutbacks on the Klamath Reclamation Project, where farmers will have to tighten their belts to sustain threatened and endangered fish in a drought. The operations plan for the 2005 irrigation season released Friday by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation cuts back water for farmers by 15 percent on the bulk of the 180,000-acre project straddling the Oregon-California border on the east side of the Cascade Range. ``Since this is shaping up to be the third driest year on record, I am asking all Klamath Basin farmers, both on and off the reclamation project, to really tighten up on their water usage,'' said Dave Sabo, Reclamation's manager for the Klamath Project. Because of the drought, the amount mandated for fish is less than in wet years. A water bank set up to increase flows for fish has ramped up to 100,000 acre feet this year - about a third of what goes to irrigation. Farmers are being paid $7.6 million to leave 25,000 acres dry and divert wells. Nearby wildlife refuges are contributing 15,000 acre feet....
State prepares for water 'call' response Wyoming needs a plan to respond to a "compact call" on the Colorado River, should such a call ever happen, state officials say. Deputy State Engineer Harry LaBonde spoke with members of the Green River Basin Advisory Group here this week about the state's work on such a plan. The planning process focuses on the need for the upper basin states to provide water to the lower basin states under the Colorado River Compact, which was signed in 1922. With five years of drought, major storage accounts are low and could get lower. Wyoming's Green River is a tributary of the Colorado River....
Could Bull Riding Become the Next NASCAR? The wild sport of bull riding has always had its fans, but a group of cowboys wants more. They are trying to do for bull riding what NASCAR did for stock-car racing -- propel it into the big leagues. With high-tech shows and big-money promotions, bull-riding competitions have been filling arenas from California to the Carolinas and building a loyal TV audience of millions of fans. Bull riding advocates say the sport appeals to more than just cowboys. "You don't have to have a cowboy hat, you don't have to be from Wyoming, you don't have to have an agriculture background, it's just the sports fan," said Tuff Hedeman of the Professional Bull Riders Association....
Saddler's craft fits him well Saddler Doug Zinsitz is just about the last of his breed in this part of Texas. But once there was Don Atkinson in Ingram, Leonard Galvan on West Avenue in San Antonio and Don Atcheson in Kerrville. Before that, a rider could get a custom-made saddle in the now-defunct downtown Joske's department store. Even routine saddle-making jobs, once plentiful in Yoakum, are gradually being shifted to Mexico. Now, Doug's Saddlery on Main in Boerne is about the nearest place for locals to get a saddle featuring the leather and designs — called tooling — that they want. "It's a tough business to get into because it's hard to get schooled in this kind of work since you can't get the tools you need," said Zinsitz, 50....
Wild West Expo begins this week From 33 states and four foreign countries, western arena arts experts and fans will gather in Claremore April Wednesday through Sunday for the Will Rogers Wild West International Expo (public events start Thursday morning). If you have ever watched rope twirling, gun spinning or the latest Halle Berry movie, when she cracks a whip in each hand as “Catwoman,” and wondered “how’d they do that,” come to the Claremore Expo Center for the answer. Like explaining how a magic act really works, experts in western arena arts will conduct exhibitions, seminars and lessons and compete during the Will Rogers Wild West International Expo at the Claremore Expo Thursday through Sunday. The Wild West Expo, moving to Claremore after 16 years in Las Vegas, is co-sponsored by the Will Rogers Heritage Trust and Wild West Arts Club....
Trick roper will spin butterflies Charro-style trick riding will be one of the features at the 84th Red Bluff Round-up Rodeo April 15-17 at the Tehama District Fairground. One of the brightest young talents performing the classic charro-style trick roping; Tomas Garcilazo will present La Charreria. Garcilazo was born and raised in his family heritage in the most traditional and pure sport of Mexico La Charreria. He has been champion all around in this sport which is composed of seven different events called Charro Complete. Garcilazo has been traveling all around the world developing horsemanship and roping skills bringing to the United States a Mexican flavor of his tradition and culture....
On The Edge Of Common Sense: Black gets nod, not the wave at rodeo parade It's not easy being Queen for a Day. The Tucson Rodeo Parade Committee, numbering in the thousands as far as I could see, chose me to be their grand marshal. I was humbled and excited! It was like being nominated Secretary of Commerce or having Reggie Jackson ask for my autograph. In the interest of public disclosure they informed me that I was not the first choice, which explained the wadded up checklist I found in the rodeo museum trash can. My name was at the bottom. The following names had been crossed out: Sam Elliott, Condie Rice, Martha Stewart, Fred Whitfield, Theodore Roosevelt, Howard Hughes, Lassie, an Elvis impersonator and Garfield. The committee explained I would have responsibilities other than simply riding in the parade. I imagined interviews with National Public Radio, Dan Rather, Rush Limbaugh, a TV spot with Larry King, ribbon cuttings at Hoover Dam, the Pro-Rodeo Hall of Fame, Chernobyl. Instead, it turned out I was required to bus tables after the volunteers' luncheon, detail the parade chairman's car, and hawk nachos and beer during the slack performances....
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Westerners see poetic justice in saving snakehead For years, Alan Gardner has watched Easterners tie up land and scuttle development in the West by asking federal bureaucrats to put various rodents, predators and pests on the nation's endangered-species list. Now it's time for a little payback. Mr. Gardner is leading a band of 13 commissioners from Western counties who have filed to seek protection for a rare new species: the northern snakehead fish, also known as the "Frankenfish." In their application on behalf of the snakehead, the commissioners identify its habitat as a stretch of freshwater and land covering 68 million acres and cutting across 11 Eastern states and Washington, D.C. In the unlikely event that their petition is approved, the snakehead's hangouts would come under strict restrictions on building, transportation and recreation in the name of protecting the famous fish....
Engineers Redesign Roads to Save Moose At night on a dark country road, all that the headlights catch are the shadowy legs the size of tree trunks rising out of the pavement. Standing six feet at the shoulder, weighing up to 1,000 pounds, with massive antlers more than five feet across, moose tower over automobiles and have no fear of them. Increasingly the undisputed giants of the northern forest are tangling with traffic as they expand south. Massachusetts motorists hit 52 moose last year, a more than sixfold increase in four years. But now some traffic engineers around the country are experimenting with redesigning roads to accommodate wandering wildlife and using high tech laser and infrared devices, developed for space exploration and anti-missile systems, to warn motorists when a moose wanders into the road....
Professor protects critters If God's eye is on the sparrow, who's keeping tabs on the weasels? Kerry Foresman and Cory Clausen, that's who. Foresman, a University of Montana biology professor, and Clausen, who works for Roscoe Steel and Culvert Co. in Missoula, have patented a handy-dandy anti-roadkill device called the "critter crawl," a metal, mesh shelf that nestles inside a culvert, suspended above any flowing water. It allows furry little fauna such as fishers, martens, weasels, raccoons, skunks, porcupines, marmots — everything from the endangered lynx to the everyday puddy tat — to tiptoe under a highway, safe from the wrath of B.F. Goodrich....
Prairie chickens draw crowds More than 100 people flocked from as far as Massachusetts and as close as Clovis this weekend to attend the fourth annual High Plains Prairie Chicken Festival. The highlight of the weekend is the lesser prairie chicken’s mating ritual. Right before the springtime sunrise, male prairie chickens congregate on raised semi-clearings called “leks.” Here they puff their feathers, their pinnate and their bright red cheeks, as they spar, stomp and scratch to woo the female. The male’s mating “booming” cry can be heard up to a mile away....
All in the name of buffalo Justine Sanchez' maternal instinct fueled her desire to volunteer for the Buffalo Field Campaign. "As a mother, I felt like I have to raise my child to be a conscious human," she said this past week. "That's the only way we're going to be successful, to raise our children to look out for the buffalo." Sanchez, who lives in the mountains near Ward, Colo., started volunteering for the campaign four years ago after she grew frustrated reading about the capture and killing of Yellowstone National Park buffalo. These women, along with hundreds of other volunteers, are the reason the Buffalo Field Campaign is going strong. Now in its eighth year, the group wants to end what it sees as the unjustified slaughter of wildlife, all in the name of protecting cattle....
Devils Tower to keep name If God's eye is on the sparrow, who's keeping tabs on the weasels? Kerry Foresman and Cory Clausen, that's who. Foresman, a University of Montana biology professor, and Clausen, who works for Roscoe Steel and Culvert Co. in Missoula, have patented a handy-dandy anti-roadkill device called the "critter crawl," a metal, mesh shelf that nestles inside a culvert, suspended above any flowing water. It allows furry little fauna such as fishers, martens, weasels, raccoons, skunks, porcupines, marmots — everything from the endangered lynx to the everyday puddy tat — to tiptoe under a highway, safe from the wrath of B.F. Goodrich....
Lawsuit Pits Tribe Against U.S. and Endangered Bighorn Sheep Peninsular bighorn sheep have lived in this sun-drenched oasis and the parched mountains looming above as long as Native Americans have been here. It is an ancient relationship enshrined in the bighorn statue chained securely in front of the Agua Caliente band of Cahuilla Indians' downtown administrative offices. But now, the tribe is suing the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service seeking to withdraw special protection of 844,000 acres for the endangered sheep. Tribal officials contend that the "critical habitat" designation could cost them "hundreds of millions of dollars" in future development revenues — even though only 17,000 of the protected acres are on reservation land. An attorney for the tribe said that to challenge the habitat designation on the reservation land, the lawsuit had to target all 844,000 acres. The tribe, which owns half of downtown Palm Springs, says it has no immediate plans to develop the lands, but wants to preserve its right to do so....
Freedom beckons 6 lynx Finally, he went for it. Seconds later, the lynx had vanished, becoming Saturday the newest transplant to a state his species once called home. The $2.5 million lynx reintroduction program the Colorado Division of Wildlife began six years ago is reaching its apex and drawing to an end. Not only is this the last year wildlife officials intend to release large groups of the cats into the San Juan Mountains, but it’s also the first year they will have a real chance of telling whether the reintroduction effort is working. Kittens born in Colorado are old enough to breed, and if they do, it could mean the species is once again taking hold....
Dispute brewing over expansion plans at Little Bighorn Battlefield The current superintendent of the Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument near here is at odds with a former superintendent and a National Park Service historian over a proposal to expand the battlefield's museum and visitor center. Current Superintendent Darrell Cook said he is taking a ‘‘very preliminary'' look at adding an indoor interpretive space to the visitor center and expanding the onsite museum. But Robert M. Utley, the former chief historian of the National Park Service, which operates the national monument, said expanding the visitor center at its existing location ‘‘would likely inhibit, perhaps fatally,'' long-term plans to move the center off the site of the 1876 battle. In a letter to the Custer Battlefield Historical and Museum Association, Utley said it ‘‘is widely acknowledged'' that the National Park Service chose the wrong site in 1950 by building the museum at the battlefield site. ‘‘It is a major intrusion on the historic landscape and ought to be removed as soon as possible,'' he wrote....
Man rushes to preserve dino tracks Grand Junction resident Andre Delgalvis launched a race against time and the spring runoff to save what may be a significant find of dinosaur footprints at Lake Powell. Several years in a row of drought has drained Lake Powell to roughly one-third its capacity, the lowest it has been since it was filled in the 1960s. Historically low water levels at the lake have revealed hundreds — possibly thousands — of dinosaur tracks embedded in sandstone rocks that now rest on the shoreline, said Delgalvis. When the reservoir is full, the rock and footprints will be submerged. Delgalvis wants to save the dinosaur footprints before they’re inundated with water, covered again perhaps for decades....
Senate panel OKs bill for Mississippi drilling in Gulf Islands Seashore A U.S. Senate committee has approved a bill that would allow the state of Mississippi to explore, develop and produce oil and gas from beneath the Gulf Islands National Seashore. The bill, approved Wednesday by the Senate Appropriations Committee, also could prevent litigation between the National Park Service and the state of Mississippi over the rights to oil and gas under the Gulf Islands National Seashore. The committee is headed by Sen. Thad Cochran, R-Miss. The bill must pass the Senate and House before it could become law. More than 80 percent of Gulf Islands National Seashore is under water, except for the barrier islands. The seashore stretches 160 miles from Cat Island in Mississippi to the eastern tip of Santa Rosa Island in Florida....
"Fair balance" urged on Roan The federal government has seriously underestimated the impacts of its plan to drill for gas on western Colorado's Roan Plateau and should adopt more environmental protections to avoid a court fight, a coalition of local governments, businesses and environmentalists says. In comments submitted Friday to the Bureau of Land Management, the group urged the federal agency to adopt a competing proposal that would prohibit drilling from the plateau but allow directional wells to access gas beneath it. The coalition, which includes two counties, conservation groups and businesses, claims the BLM study is flawed because it looks at environmental impacts during only the first 20 years of a development cycle that will last much longer....
Gas bonanza shakes dust from Western towns Landscape painter Alfred Jacob Miller set up his easel on the shore of Fremont Lake 168 years ago and rendered one of the most famous romantic portraits ever made of the wild American West. Today, in the small ranching and tourist community that grew up around the venerated lake, motel rooms in Pinedale are sold out, but not from traditional tourists exploring the haunting Wind River range. The influx stems from an unprecedented invasion of oil-patch "roughnecks" creating a round-the-clock beehive of drilling rig crews, pipe layers, roadbuilders, and truck fleets. Indeed, tiny Pinedale represents ground zero in one of the biggest natural-gas booms in the postwar era. Driven by high energy prices and looser government regulations, it is transforming many of the small towns here along the rumpled spine of the Rockies — creating thousands of lucrative jobs, pouring money into local treasuries, and, as always happens with sudden growth, producing new problems ranging from traffic to drug use....
Column: ANWR is a start Sometimes we have to hand it to our greener friends, especially those in the Green Party. To express their horror about the recent Senate vote to open a teeny section of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for oil drilling, they raise the global warming specter. Specifically, the March 22 press release says, "Green Party members noted that new drilling not only threatened local lands and wildlife in Alaska, but also risked accelerating the advance of catastrophic global warming." Even if we grant all the globe's average annual warming of 0.017 degree Centigrade in the last 10 years was due to increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide -- and that's quite a concession -- the numbers on ANWR are a drop in the barrel. According to the Energy Information Administration, in that decade petroleum accounted for about 42 percent of the total human contribution of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. That would mean a total petroleum-related warming of about 0.007 degree yearly....
Sand and gravel plant in tight spot Sandia Aggregates may be about to lose it all in an unusual conflict that pits sand and gravel production against the protection of sensitive lands. The company, owned by Pabco Building Products LLC, will begin shutting down this month and will have to lay off at least half of its 20 employees. At the heart of the issue are location and time. Sandia's operations in northeast Clark County abut the Rainbow Gardens Area of Critical Environmental Concern. That site is a 37,620-acre parcel east of Frenchman's Mountain that received federal protected status in 1998, partly because it is a habitat for sensitive plants, such as the bearpaw poppy, and threatened animals, including the desert tortoise....
Column: Tree Huggers Finally Branch Out Some environmentalists are ready to pronounce their movement dead. As evidence they point to the relentless confidence with which President Bush and Republican majorities in Congress attack long-standing environmental goals, such as protecting the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from oil drillers. In truth, though, the environmental movement's vitality depends on how we define the movement. This is more than a linguistic exercise. Take global warming. The "environmentalism is dead" crowd contends that the big environmental groups have failed to get new federal laws passed limiting global-warming gases. The reason, they say, is the green groups' inability to link with labor and social movements and develop a broad coalition to take on such multifaceted issues as global warming. The environmentalists counter they have partners in their quest for energy efficiency. Both sides overlook a new dynamic that is revitalizing and redefining environmentalism: the development of locally and regionally based quality-of-life movements....
A testy case on access Asher's house sits on a low bluff above the John Day. For him, "steelheaders" has become an epithet, synonymous with the Association of Northwest Steelheaders, a group on the opposite side in a long-running dispute over who owns the banks along the Central Oregon river. On Tuesday, the State Land Board is expected to side with the steelhead group and assert the public's ownership over a 174-mile stretch of the John Day as it flows from near Spray into the Columbia River east of The Dalles. In the next several years, the state is set to do the same with at least six more rivers, starting next with the upper Rogue River. And if the experience around Spray is any indication, the other decisions will prove just as fraught with politics, lawsuits and enmity. "They way I see it, we're sort of a test case," Asher said. "Whatever is decided here will apply to the rest of the rivers in Oregon."....
Drought means less water for Klamath farmers Spring rain and snow have been too little, too late to avert irrigation cutbacks on the Klamath Reclamation Project, where farmers will have to tighten their belts to sustain threatened and endangered fish in a drought. The operations plan for the 2005 irrigation season released Friday by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation cuts back water for farmers by 15 percent on the bulk of the 180,000-acre project straddling the Oregon-California border on the east side of the Cascade Range. ``Since this is shaping up to be the third driest year on record, I am asking all Klamath Basin farmers, both on and off the reclamation project, to really tighten up on their water usage,'' said Dave Sabo, Reclamation's manager for the Klamath Project. Because of the drought, the amount mandated for fish is less than in wet years. A water bank set up to increase flows for fish has ramped up to 100,000 acre feet this year - about a third of what goes to irrigation. Farmers are being paid $7.6 million to leave 25,000 acres dry and divert wells. Nearby wildlife refuges are contributing 15,000 acre feet....
State prepares for water 'call' response Wyoming needs a plan to respond to a "compact call" on the Colorado River, should such a call ever happen, state officials say. Deputy State Engineer Harry LaBonde spoke with members of the Green River Basin Advisory Group here this week about the state's work on such a plan. The planning process focuses on the need for the upper basin states to provide water to the lower basin states under the Colorado River Compact, which was signed in 1922. With five years of drought, major storage accounts are low and could get lower. Wyoming's Green River is a tributary of the Colorado River....
Could Bull Riding Become the Next NASCAR? The wild sport of bull riding has always had its fans, but a group of cowboys wants more. They are trying to do for bull riding what NASCAR did for stock-car racing -- propel it into the big leagues. With high-tech shows and big-money promotions, bull-riding competitions have been filling arenas from California to the Carolinas and building a loyal TV audience of millions of fans. Bull riding advocates say the sport appeals to more than just cowboys. "You don't have to have a cowboy hat, you don't have to be from Wyoming, you don't have to have an agriculture background, it's just the sports fan," said Tuff Hedeman of the Professional Bull Riders Association....
Saddler's craft fits him well Saddler Doug Zinsitz is just about the last of his breed in this part of Texas. But once there was Don Atkinson in Ingram, Leonard Galvan on West Avenue in San Antonio and Don Atcheson in Kerrville. Before that, a rider could get a custom-made saddle in the now-defunct downtown Joske's department store. Even routine saddle-making jobs, once plentiful in Yoakum, are gradually being shifted to Mexico. Now, Doug's Saddlery on Main in Boerne is about the nearest place for locals to get a saddle featuring the leather and designs — called tooling — that they want. "It's a tough business to get into because it's hard to get schooled in this kind of work since you can't get the tools you need," said Zinsitz, 50....
Wild West Expo begins this week From 33 states and four foreign countries, western arena arts experts and fans will gather in Claremore April Wednesday through Sunday for the Will Rogers Wild West International Expo (public events start Thursday morning). If you have ever watched rope twirling, gun spinning or the latest Halle Berry movie, when she cracks a whip in each hand as “Catwoman,” and wondered “how’d they do that,” come to the Claremore Expo Center for the answer. Like explaining how a magic act really works, experts in western arena arts will conduct exhibitions, seminars and lessons and compete during the Will Rogers Wild West International Expo at the Claremore Expo Thursday through Sunday. The Wild West Expo, moving to Claremore after 16 years in Las Vegas, is co-sponsored by the Will Rogers Heritage Trust and Wild West Arts Club....
Trick roper will spin butterflies Charro-style trick riding will be one of the features at the 84th Red Bluff Round-up Rodeo April 15-17 at the Tehama District Fairground. One of the brightest young talents performing the classic charro-style trick roping; Tomas Garcilazo will present La Charreria. Garcilazo was born and raised in his family heritage in the most traditional and pure sport of Mexico La Charreria. He has been champion all around in this sport which is composed of seven different events called Charro Complete. Garcilazo has been traveling all around the world developing horsemanship and roping skills bringing to the United States a Mexican flavor of his tradition and culture....
On The Edge Of Common Sense: Black gets nod, not the wave at rodeo parade It's not easy being Queen for a Day. The Tucson Rodeo Parade Committee, numbering in the thousands as far as I could see, chose me to be their grand marshal. I was humbled and excited! It was like being nominated Secretary of Commerce or having Reggie Jackson ask for my autograph. In the interest of public disclosure they informed me that I was not the first choice, which explained the wadded up checklist I found in the rodeo museum trash can. My name was at the bottom. The following names had been crossed out: Sam Elliott, Condie Rice, Martha Stewart, Fred Whitfield, Theodore Roosevelt, Howard Hughes, Lassie, an Elvis impersonator and Garfield. The committee explained I would have responsibilities other than simply riding in the parade. I imagined interviews with National Public Radio, Dan Rather, Rush Limbaugh, a TV spot with Larry King, ribbon cuttings at Hoover Dam, the Pro-Rodeo Hall of Fame, Chernobyl. Instead, it turned out I was required to bus tables after the volunteers' luncheon, detail the parade chairman's car, and hawk nachos and beer during the slack performances....
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Sunday, April 10, 2005
Will property-rights revolt reverberate beyond Oregon?
In November Oregon voters overwhelmingly approved Measure 37, the nation's most sweeping property-rights law. Since then, hundreds of eager landowners such as Kempema have flooded city halls and county courthouses with claims demanding that government drop restrictions and let them develop their property, or pay them not to. "I never in my life thought I'd see something like this," Kempema marvels. Before Measure 37, their development plans would have been fantasies. They violate Oregon's pioneering land-use laws, often hailed as a national model for curbing sprawl and protecting farms and forests. Measure 37 trumps those laws. No statute in the country more drastically limits government's power to regulate what people can do with their property. Property-rights advocates in Washington, bristling at rules adopted under the state's Growth Management Act, hope to put a similar proposal on the ballot in 2006. Dave Hunnicutt of Oregonians in Action, Measure 37's sponsor, says he's also working with activists in Florida, Wisconsin and South Carolina. "If it can happen in Oregon... it can happen anywhere," writes Portland attorney Edward Sullivan, a leading opponent of Measure 37....
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In November Oregon voters overwhelmingly approved Measure 37, the nation's most sweeping property-rights law. Since then, hundreds of eager landowners such as Kempema have flooded city halls and county courthouses with claims demanding that government drop restrictions and let them develop their property, or pay them not to. "I never in my life thought I'd see something like this," Kempema marvels. Before Measure 37, their development plans would have been fantasies. They violate Oregon's pioneering land-use laws, often hailed as a national model for curbing sprawl and protecting farms and forests. Measure 37 trumps those laws. No statute in the country more drastically limits government's power to regulate what people can do with their property. Property-rights advocates in Washington, bristling at rules adopted under the state's Growth Management Act, hope to put a similar proposal on the ballot in 2006. Dave Hunnicutt of Oregonians in Action, Measure 37's sponsor, says he's also working with activists in Florida, Wisconsin and South Carolina. "If it can happen in Oregon... it can happen anywhere," writes Portland attorney Edward Sullivan, a leading opponent of Measure 37....
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SATURDAY NIGHT AT THE WESTERNER
Pop a top again, time for one more round of beef
By Julie Carter
Not long ago I heard that a newly opened local upscale resort - with a high class restaurant housed within- was going to offer Kobe beef on the menu.
Living in the heart of beef country most of my life with a good portion of that life directly affected by the price of beef on the hoof, I was pleased to hear beef would be a choice item even if it was on a pricey menu.
My next project was to figure out just what is Kobe beef? Someone said something about it being Japanese beef that is fed beer and massaged with sake to make them tender. Several parts of that statement piqued my interest beside the vision of drunken cattle.
I wasn’t happy that it was possibly foreign beef when ranchers all around the mountain where this resort resides raise prime beef and are working their third and fourth generation butts off getting it done.
So I did what I usually do when I don’t know what I’m talking about; I look it up in a book, on the internet or ask an old timer about it.
Kobe beef is a special grade of beef from Wagyu cattle raised in Kobe, Japan. They are indeed fed large amounts of beer to stimulate their appetite during the hot summer months when the heat would depress their food intake. I bet I know a few cowboys that will jump on that line of thinking for themselves.
Japanese producers believe that the hair coat and softness of skin are related to meat quality. It is believed that massaging the coat with sake improves the appearance and softness and is therefore of economic importance.
The result of this practice is said to produce meat that is extraordinarily tender, finely marbled, and full-flavored, unlike any produced anywhere any other way. It is also extremely expensive, often costing more than $100 per pound. It’s not your average Big Mac material.
Kobe beef became a home grown product when Wagyu cattle were first introduced to the United States in l976. Kobe Beef America was born in Redmond, Oregon to a fourth generation beef producer, R.L. Freeborn. Others followed with the idea and Kobe beef is available in the U.S. from U.S. producers.
So knowing there is a market for Kobe beef so close by, I began mentally trying to put the local ranchers to work raising it. The more I thought about it the funnier the vision became.
I don’t think they sell sake down at the convenience store on the corner but they do offer plenty of beer there. Most the local cowboys have already established routine pathways to the part of the cooler that houses their brand of choice.
Thinking the locals would want to start small to try the program, a thirty-pack and steer could be the whole program.
Getting the average cowboy to share his cool can of “spring water” with a beef will be the first program hurdle. I’m absolutely positive massaging it with a six pack isn’t going to be a popular idea.
I foresee a problem in the counting while working. One for me and one for the steer. One for me, one for me and one more for me.
I’d say Kobe beef exporters from Nebraska, Oregon or wherever should not feel threatened any time soon by an upstart local producer.
Julie can be contacted for comment at jcarter@tularosa.net. She prefers her beef sober.
© Julie Carter 2005
I welcome submissions for this feature.
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Pop a top again, time for one more round of beef
By Julie Carter
Not long ago I heard that a newly opened local upscale resort - with a high class restaurant housed within- was going to offer Kobe beef on the menu.
Living in the heart of beef country most of my life with a good portion of that life directly affected by the price of beef on the hoof, I was pleased to hear beef would be a choice item even if it was on a pricey menu.
My next project was to figure out just what is Kobe beef? Someone said something about it being Japanese beef that is fed beer and massaged with sake to make them tender. Several parts of that statement piqued my interest beside the vision of drunken cattle.
I wasn’t happy that it was possibly foreign beef when ranchers all around the mountain where this resort resides raise prime beef and are working their third and fourth generation butts off getting it done.
So I did what I usually do when I don’t know what I’m talking about; I look it up in a book, on the internet or ask an old timer about it.
Kobe beef is a special grade of beef from Wagyu cattle raised in Kobe, Japan. They are indeed fed large amounts of beer to stimulate their appetite during the hot summer months when the heat would depress their food intake. I bet I know a few cowboys that will jump on that line of thinking for themselves.
Japanese producers believe that the hair coat and softness of skin are related to meat quality. It is believed that massaging the coat with sake improves the appearance and softness and is therefore of economic importance.
The result of this practice is said to produce meat that is extraordinarily tender, finely marbled, and full-flavored, unlike any produced anywhere any other way. It is also extremely expensive, often costing more than $100 per pound. It’s not your average Big Mac material.
Kobe beef became a home grown product when Wagyu cattle were first introduced to the United States in l976. Kobe Beef America was born in Redmond, Oregon to a fourth generation beef producer, R.L. Freeborn. Others followed with the idea and Kobe beef is available in the U.S. from U.S. producers.
So knowing there is a market for Kobe beef so close by, I began mentally trying to put the local ranchers to work raising it. The more I thought about it the funnier the vision became.
I don’t think they sell sake down at the convenience store on the corner but they do offer plenty of beer there. Most the local cowboys have already established routine pathways to the part of the cooler that houses their brand of choice.
Thinking the locals would want to start small to try the program, a thirty-pack and steer could be the whole program.
Getting the average cowboy to share his cool can of “spring water” with a beef will be the first program hurdle. I’m absolutely positive massaging it with a six pack isn’t going to be a popular idea.
I foresee a problem in the counting while working. One for me and one for the steer. One for me, one for me and one more for me.
I’d say Kobe beef exporters from Nebraska, Oregon or wherever should not feel threatened any time soon by an upstart local producer.
Julie can be contacted for comment at jcarter@tularosa.net. She prefers her beef sober.
© Julie Carter 2005
I welcome submissions for this feature.
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OPINION/COMMENTARY
NTU Supports H.R. 1370, the Federal Land Asset Inventory Reform Act
On behalf of the 350,000 members of the National Taxpayers Union (NTU), I write in strong support of your bill, H.R. 1370, the Federal Land Asset Inventory Reform (FLAIR) Act. This bill would require the federal government to undertake an inventory of all of its federal land holdings and more importantly, the bill stipulates that once the inventory is completed, the data will be used to improve federal land management and sell off federal lands where appropriate. Amazingly, since the federal government is unable to tell exactly how much land it owns, the federal government can only estimate its land holdings (approximately 670 million acres). Worse, the government is often unable to tell exactly what land it owns, how it is being used, and whether it is being used effectively. The sheer size of the federal government's land holdings makes the issue of land ownership incredibly important for taxpayers. Because it owns 86 percent of Nevada, nearly two-thirds of all land in Utah, and an estimated 51.9 percent of land throughout the West as a whole, federal management practices can have a tremendous impact not only on the economies of western states, but on the national economy as well. To ensure that the federal government is using the land it owns in the most cost-effective, taxpayer friendly manner possible, your important legislation requires the Secretary of the Interior to identify property that is no longer needed by the federal government and how much taxpayers would gain through its sale. In addition, the FLAIR Act requires the Secretary to use contracts with the private sector to the maximum extent possible, and it ensures that land owned for duplicative purposes be sold....
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NTU Supports H.R. 1370, the Federal Land Asset Inventory Reform Act
On behalf of the 350,000 members of the National Taxpayers Union (NTU), I write in strong support of your bill, H.R. 1370, the Federal Land Asset Inventory Reform (FLAIR) Act. This bill would require the federal government to undertake an inventory of all of its federal land holdings and more importantly, the bill stipulates that once the inventory is completed, the data will be used to improve federal land management and sell off federal lands where appropriate. Amazingly, since the federal government is unable to tell exactly how much land it owns, the federal government can only estimate its land holdings (approximately 670 million acres). Worse, the government is often unable to tell exactly what land it owns, how it is being used, and whether it is being used effectively. The sheer size of the federal government's land holdings makes the issue of land ownership incredibly important for taxpayers. Because it owns 86 percent of Nevada, nearly two-thirds of all land in Utah, and an estimated 51.9 percent of land throughout the West as a whole, federal management practices can have a tremendous impact not only on the economies of western states, but on the national economy as well. To ensure that the federal government is using the land it owns in the most cost-effective, taxpayer friendly manner possible, your important legislation requires the Secretary of the Interior to identify property that is no longer needed by the federal government and how much taxpayers would gain through its sale. In addition, the FLAIR Act requires the Secretary to use contracts with the private sector to the maximum extent possible, and it ensures that land owned for duplicative purposes be sold....
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OPINION/COMMENTARY
Climate Scientist Quits IPCC, Blasts Politicized 'Preconceived Agendas'
Citing a politicized agenda and misrepresentations of climate science, prominent climate scientist Chris Landsea on January 17 resigned his post as a participant in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Landsea's announcement is the second recent major embarrassment for global warming alarmists, whose "hockey stick" representation of world temperatures during the past millennium was recently exposed as being based on faulty data and misleading statistical methods. (See "Climate Alarmists Playing Shell Game with Data," page 9.) Landsea is one of the world's leading hurricane researchers, specializing in seasonal and climatic relationships of Atlantic tropical cyclones. He served as chair of the American Meteorological Society's (AMS) Committee on Tropical Meteorology and Tropical Cyclones for the years 2000-2002. He was recipient of a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Post-Doctoral Fellowship in Climate and Global Change for the period 1995-1996. In his resignation letter, Landsea documented how the IPCC had sanctioned a "misrepresentation" of hurricane research and issued "unfounded pronouncements" to the media that "subverted and compromised" the scientific assessment of the IPCC's hurricane researchers. According to Landsea, statements made by the IPCC to the media demonstrated "preconceived agendas" that are "scientifically unsound."
The text of Landsea's letter is reproduced below....
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Climate Scientist Quits IPCC, Blasts Politicized 'Preconceived Agendas'
Citing a politicized agenda and misrepresentations of climate science, prominent climate scientist Chris Landsea on January 17 resigned his post as a participant in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Landsea's announcement is the second recent major embarrassment for global warming alarmists, whose "hockey stick" representation of world temperatures during the past millennium was recently exposed as being based on faulty data and misleading statistical methods. (See "Climate Alarmists Playing Shell Game with Data," page 9.) Landsea is one of the world's leading hurricane researchers, specializing in seasonal and climatic relationships of Atlantic tropical cyclones. He served as chair of the American Meteorological Society's (AMS) Committee on Tropical Meteorology and Tropical Cyclones for the years 2000-2002. He was recipient of a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Post-Doctoral Fellowship in Climate and Global Change for the period 1995-1996. In his resignation letter, Landsea documented how the IPCC had sanctioned a "misrepresentation" of hurricane research and issued "unfounded pronouncements" to the media that "subverted and compromised" the scientific assessment of the IPCC's hurricane researchers. According to Landsea, statements made by the IPCC to the media demonstrated "preconceived agendas" that are "scientifically unsound."
The text of Landsea's letter is reproduced below....
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OPINION/COMMENTARY
Behind the ANWR Scare Tactics
Despite failure of hard-core environmentalist organizations to diminish George W. Bush’s convincing re-election victory, their renewed attacks on the president are clear: to obstruct his second-term environmental agenda. Yet, with sky-rocketing oil prices likely driving gasoline pump prices to new highs, many Americans begin to question the credibility of the extreme green agenda. Consider the current attack on the Bush administration by the Natural Resources Defense Council, which is using the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), a 19.6-million-acre federal reserve, for its latest membership and fund-raising drive. Even before the U.S. Senate’s recent vote to support the Bush administration’s proposal to allow oil and natural gas production on a small portion of the refuge’s northernmost region, Hollywood icon and council board member Robert Redford signed on to lead the attack. In a mailing, Mr. Redford asserts, “President Bush is now claiming a mandate... to destroy” the Arctic refuge. The actor accuses the president and congressional leaders of turning “America’s greatest sanctuary for arctic wildlife into a vast polluted oil field” for the sake of “oil company profits.”....
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Behind the ANWR Scare Tactics
Despite failure of hard-core environmentalist organizations to diminish George W. Bush’s convincing re-election victory, their renewed attacks on the president are clear: to obstruct his second-term environmental agenda. Yet, with sky-rocketing oil prices likely driving gasoline pump prices to new highs, many Americans begin to question the credibility of the extreme green agenda. Consider the current attack on the Bush administration by the Natural Resources Defense Council, which is using the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), a 19.6-million-acre federal reserve, for its latest membership and fund-raising drive. Even before the U.S. Senate’s recent vote to support the Bush administration’s proposal to allow oil and natural gas production on a small portion of the refuge’s northernmost region, Hollywood icon and council board member Robert Redford signed on to lead the attack. In a mailing, Mr. Redford asserts, “President Bush is now claiming a mandate... to destroy” the Arctic refuge. The actor accuses the president and congressional leaders of turning “America’s greatest sanctuary for arctic wildlife into a vast polluted oil field” for the sake of “oil company profits.”....
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OPINION/COMMENTARY
Goodbye ANWR, Hello Nukes
I hope environmentalists have learned a lesson from the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) vote. ANWR held up President George Bush's energy bill for three years. Conservatives claimed--correctly--that drilling wouldn't have the slightest impact on the 19-million-acre wilderness. As supporters have been pointing out for almost a decade, the entire drilling operation would occupy only 2,000 acres, about the size of Dulles Airport. But Democrats hung on anyway, calling ANWR the "crown jewels of America" and conjuring images of grimy oil derricks fouling pristine nature. Then, suddenly, drilling in the ANWR passed the Senate last month. Sure there was the usual parliamentary maneuvering but very little public protest from environmentalists. What happened?....
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Goodbye ANWR, Hello Nukes
I hope environmentalists have learned a lesson from the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) vote. ANWR held up President George Bush's energy bill for three years. Conservatives claimed--correctly--that drilling wouldn't have the slightest impact on the 19-million-acre wilderness. As supporters have been pointing out for almost a decade, the entire drilling operation would occupy only 2,000 acres, about the size of Dulles Airport. But Democrats hung on anyway, calling ANWR the "crown jewels of America" and conjuring images of grimy oil derricks fouling pristine nature. Then, suddenly, drilling in the ANWR passed the Senate last month. Sure there was the usual parliamentary maneuvering but very little public protest from environmentalists. What happened?....
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OPINION/COMMENTARY
Keep Ethanol Out of The Energy Bill
Included in the pending energy bill are provisions requiring the use of ethanol in the gasoline supply. This proposed ethanol mandate would raise the cost of gasoline, running against the original purpose of the energy bill—to make energy more affordable. For that reason, the mandate should have no place in the energy bill. Ethanol, a corn-derived motor fuel additive, has long benefited from favorable tax treatment and federal regulations encouraging its use. But its sales have not grown quickly enough to satisfy the ethanol industry or its allies in Congress. A 5 billion gallon mandate was included in an earlier version of the energy bill that was narrowly defeated, on other grounds, in 2003. The House recently reintroduced its energy bill, with the 5 billion gallon mandate, while the Senate has two proposals in the works—for 6 billion and 8 billion gallons. Any of these targets could become part of the final version of the bill. The President has already signaled his support for increased ethanol use, citing both its domestic origin and benefits to the agricultural sector. While an ethanol mandate would benefit Midwestern corn farmers and ethanol producers, it would make gasoline more expensive for everyone. Indeed, the only reason ethanol needs federal help is that it is too expensive to compete on its own....
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Keep Ethanol Out of The Energy Bill
Included in the pending energy bill are provisions requiring the use of ethanol in the gasoline supply. This proposed ethanol mandate would raise the cost of gasoline, running against the original purpose of the energy bill—to make energy more affordable. For that reason, the mandate should have no place in the energy bill. Ethanol, a corn-derived motor fuel additive, has long benefited from favorable tax treatment and federal regulations encouraging its use. But its sales have not grown quickly enough to satisfy the ethanol industry or its allies in Congress. A 5 billion gallon mandate was included in an earlier version of the energy bill that was narrowly defeated, on other grounds, in 2003. The House recently reintroduced its energy bill, with the 5 billion gallon mandate, while the Senate has two proposals in the works—for 6 billion and 8 billion gallons. Any of these targets could become part of the final version of the bill. The President has already signaled his support for increased ethanol use, citing both its domestic origin and benefits to the agricultural sector. While an ethanol mandate would benefit Midwestern corn farmers and ethanol producers, it would make gasoline more expensive for everyone. Indeed, the only reason ethanol needs federal help is that it is too expensive to compete on its own....
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OPINION/COMMENTARY
7 Things You Didn't Know About PCRM
# PCRM is an animal rights group. Less than 5 percent of its members are actual physicians. The group's goals are to stop medical research that requires the use of animals, and to remove meat and dairy foods from our diet by demonizing them as “unhealthy.” People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has already steered more than $1.3 million to PCRM. Animal People News notes that PETA and PCRM are so closely connected that they should be considered “a single fundraising unit.”# When longtime PCRM spokesperson Dr. Jerry Vlasak addressed the “Animal Rights 2003” convention, he openly endorsed the murder of doctors who use animals in their research. “I don’t think you’d have to kill---assassinate---too many,” Vlasak told the assembled activists. “I think for 5 lives, 10 lives, 15 human lives, we could save a million, 2 million, 10 million non-human lives.” # PCRM president Neal Barnard is not a nutritionist, a dietician, or a biochemist. He's a non-practicing psychiatrist who claims that cheese is “dairy crack” and “morphine on a cracker.” Barnard is also PETA's “medical advisor” and president of The PETA Foundation. # The American Medical Association (AMA) has called PCRM a “fringe organization” that uses “unethical tactics” and is “interested in perverting medical science.”....
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7 Things You Didn't Know About PCRM
# PCRM is an animal rights group. Less than 5 percent of its members are actual physicians. The group's goals are to stop medical research that requires the use of animals, and to remove meat and dairy foods from our diet by demonizing them as “unhealthy.” People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has already steered more than $1.3 million to PCRM. Animal People News notes that PETA and PCRM are so closely connected that they should be considered “a single fundraising unit.”# When longtime PCRM spokesperson Dr. Jerry Vlasak addressed the “Animal Rights 2003” convention, he openly endorsed the murder of doctors who use animals in their research. “I don’t think you’d have to kill---assassinate---too many,” Vlasak told the assembled activists. “I think for 5 lives, 10 lives, 15 human lives, we could save a million, 2 million, 10 million non-human lives.” # PCRM president Neal Barnard is not a nutritionist, a dietician, or a biochemist. He's a non-practicing psychiatrist who claims that cheese is “dairy crack” and “morphine on a cracker.” Barnard is also PETA's “medical advisor” and president of The PETA Foundation. # The American Medical Association (AMA) has called PCRM a “fringe organization” that uses “unethical tactics” and is “interested in perverting medical science.”....
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OPINION/COMMENTARY
Eco-Imperialism: Green Power, Black Death
“Ideas and ideologies have consequences. Horrid ideas and ideologies have lethal consequences.” This is the central premise of Paul Driessen’s new book, Eco-Imperialism: Green Power · Black Death. The notion that environmental theories and values should take precedence over the value of human lives has had lethal consequences for millions of people in less developed countries – and the book documents these consequences in all their chilling detail. The methods of present day eco-imperialists consist of numerous fronts from which they press their case invisibly behind the scenes of public policy. Following several intertwined doctrines of social and environmental radicalism, they impose these doctrines as the standard to which all companies, governments and individuals are to expected to conform. These doctrines are not factual evaluations, but projections of desired outcomes based upon nebulous concepts, abstract responsibilities, faulty scientific criteria and fraudulent business models. What Paul Driessen documents in his book is that by fanatically seeking to impose their agenda upon the whole of society, especially in the developing world, eco-imperialists are directly responsible for advocating policies that literally result in the deaths of countless millions of poor and desperate people about the globe....
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Eco-Imperialism: Green Power, Black Death
“Ideas and ideologies have consequences. Horrid ideas and ideologies have lethal consequences.” This is the central premise of Paul Driessen’s new book, Eco-Imperialism: Green Power · Black Death. The notion that environmental theories and values should take precedence over the value of human lives has had lethal consequences for millions of people in less developed countries – and the book documents these consequences in all their chilling detail. The methods of present day eco-imperialists consist of numerous fronts from which they press their case invisibly behind the scenes of public policy. Following several intertwined doctrines of social and environmental radicalism, they impose these doctrines as the standard to which all companies, governments and individuals are to expected to conform. These doctrines are not factual evaluations, but projections of desired outcomes based upon nebulous concepts, abstract responsibilities, faulty scientific criteria and fraudulent business models. What Paul Driessen documents in his book is that by fanatically seeking to impose their agenda upon the whole of society, especially in the developing world, eco-imperialists are directly responsible for advocating policies that literally result in the deaths of countless millions of poor and desperate people about the globe....
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OPINION/COMMENTARY
Radical Greens Further Threaten U.S. Coal Industry
Nine liberal state attorneys general filed a Clean Air Act lawsuit against the Bush Administration that, if successful, would threaten America's energy security and send manufacturing jobs overseas. Led by New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, the group is challenging the Bush Administration's market-based program to reduce mercury emissions from power plants, instead demanding a judge-imposed, command-and-control regulation that would force many Midwestern coal plants to shut down. The lawsuit was filed last week in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit by the attorneys general of New Jersey, California, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Mexico, New York and Vermont. With enthusiastic support from radical environmental groups such as the Sierra Club and the Natural Resources Defense Council, the group seeks to force individual coal plants to reduce mercury emissions 90 percent in 3 years, regardless of coal type or plant configuration--an impossible standard to meet with existing technologies. The only way to meet that standard, according to coal industry experts, is to shut down coal fired plants, which supply 52 percent of the nation's electricity....
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Radical Greens Further Threaten U.S. Coal Industry
Nine liberal state attorneys general filed a Clean Air Act lawsuit against the Bush Administration that, if successful, would threaten America's energy security and send manufacturing jobs overseas. Led by New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, the group is challenging the Bush Administration's market-based program to reduce mercury emissions from power plants, instead demanding a judge-imposed, command-and-control regulation that would force many Midwestern coal plants to shut down. The lawsuit was filed last week in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit by the attorneys general of New Jersey, California, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Mexico, New York and Vermont. With enthusiastic support from radical environmental groups such as the Sierra Club and the Natural Resources Defense Council, the group seeks to force individual coal plants to reduce mercury emissions 90 percent in 3 years, regardless of coal type or plant configuration--an impossible standard to meet with existing technologies. The only way to meet that standard, according to coal industry experts, is to shut down coal fired plants, which supply 52 percent of the nation's electricity....
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OPINION/COMMENTARY
Sierra Club Election Hijack Alert (Again)
Meet Christine Garcia, a "vegan animal-rights attorney" who could help Paul Watson turn the Sierra Club into an animal rights group that would dwarf even the gargantuan Humane Society of the United States. In addition to Watson's "Sea Shepherd" group, her candidacy has attracted the support of a radical California group named In Defense of Animals. Garcia set up a personal website less than two weeks ago to tell Sierra Club members that she "work[s] full-time doing environmental and public interest free speech advocacy." She neglected to mention her "Animal Law Office" or "Vegan Attorneys" websites -- where you can find her contradictory statement that she has "been doing 100% Animal Welfare related cases since August of 2001," and a list of her active caseload (consisting entirely of animal-rights matters). Garcia's statement to potential Sierra Club voters says that she is an "environmental attorney."....
===
Sierra Club Election Hijack Alert (Again)
Meet Christine Garcia, a "vegan animal-rights attorney" who could help Paul Watson turn the Sierra Club into an animal rights group that would dwarf even the gargantuan Humane Society of the United States. In addition to Watson's "Sea Shepherd" group, her candidacy has attracted the support of a radical California group named In Defense of Animals. Garcia set up a personal website less than two weeks ago to tell Sierra Club members that she "work[s] full-time doing environmental and public interest free speech advocacy." She neglected to mention her "Animal Law Office" or "Vegan Attorneys" websites -- where you can find her contradictory statement that she has "been doing 100% Animal Welfare related cases since August of 2001," and a list of her active caseload (consisting entirely of animal-rights matters). Garcia's statement to potential Sierra Club voters says that she is an "environmental attorney."....
===
OPINION/COMMENTARY
Global Warming in a Politically Correct Climate: How Truth Became Controversial
Again and again, these events have occurred, and they're happening once more in the global warming issue, to which Mathiesen devotes the next 70 pages of his book. There's a lot of good science in there, and I learned quite a bit from the author. I especially enjoyed his descriptions of the way CO2 is absorbed by, and released from, the ocean, along with the fallacy of sampling air bubbles in 400,000-year-old ice and assuming that the air has remained inert and stable for that time span. According to Mathiesen, the environmental issues he discuses have had four things in common: 1. They were described as having been caused primarily by mankind. 2. They all led to an unhealthy confusion of politics and science. 3. Those most vociferously involved in the creation of the scares - advocacy groups, politicians, scientists, media, bureaucrats, lawyers and even industry - had a direct self-interest in promoting the mythologies. 4. Each calamity scenario contained a few grains of truth for plausibility, but woven around them was a web of emotional, misleading and scientifically incorrect fables, which ultimately became uncritically accepted elements of "common knowledge."....
===
Global Warming in a Politically Correct Climate: How Truth Became Controversial
Again and again, these events have occurred, and they're happening once more in the global warming issue, to which Mathiesen devotes the next 70 pages of his book. There's a lot of good science in there, and I learned quite a bit from the author. I especially enjoyed his descriptions of the way CO2 is absorbed by, and released from, the ocean, along with the fallacy of sampling air bubbles in 400,000-year-old ice and assuming that the air has remained inert and stable for that time span. According to Mathiesen, the environmental issues he discuses have had four things in common: 1. They were described as having been caused primarily by mankind. 2. They all led to an unhealthy confusion of politics and science. 3. Those most vociferously involved in the creation of the scares - advocacy groups, politicians, scientists, media, bureaucrats, lawyers and even industry - had a direct self-interest in promoting the mythologies. 4. Each calamity scenario contained a few grains of truth for plausibility, but woven around them was a web of emotional, misleading and scientifically incorrect fables, which ultimately became uncritically accepted elements of "common knowledge."....
===
OPINION/COMMENTARY
‘I HAVE A NIGHTMARE’
When environmentalists are writing tracts like “The Death of Environmentalism,” you know the movement is in deep trouble. That essay by two young environmentalists has been whirling around the Internet since last fall, provoking a civil war among tree-huggers for its assertion that “modern environmentalism, with all of its unexamined assumptions, outdated concepts and exhausted strategies, must die so that something new can live.” Sadly, the authors, Michael Shellenberger and Ted Nordhaus, are right. The U.S. environmental movement is unable to win on even its very top priorities, even though it has the advantage of mostly being right. Oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge may be approved soon, and there’s been no progress whatsoever in the U.S. on what may be the single most important issue to Earth in the long run: climate change. The fundamental problem, as I see it, is that environmental groups are too often alarmists. They have an awful track record, so they’ve lost credibility with the public. Some do great work, but others can be the left’s equivalents of the neocons: brimming with moral clarity and ideological zeal, but empty of nuance. (Industry has also hyped risks with wildly exaggerated warnings that environmental protections will entail a terrible economic cost.) “The Death of Environmentalism” resonated with me. I was once an environmental groupie, and I still share the movement’s broad aims, but I’m now skeptical of the movement’s “I Have a Nightmare” speeches....
===
‘I HAVE A NIGHTMARE’
When environmentalists are writing tracts like “The Death of Environmentalism,” you know the movement is in deep trouble. That essay by two young environmentalists has been whirling around the Internet since last fall, provoking a civil war among tree-huggers for its assertion that “modern environmentalism, with all of its unexamined assumptions, outdated concepts and exhausted strategies, must die so that something new can live.” Sadly, the authors, Michael Shellenberger and Ted Nordhaus, are right. The U.S. environmental movement is unable to win on even its very top priorities, even though it has the advantage of mostly being right. Oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge may be approved soon, and there’s been no progress whatsoever in the U.S. on what may be the single most important issue to Earth in the long run: climate change. The fundamental problem, as I see it, is that environmental groups are too often alarmists. They have an awful track record, so they’ve lost credibility with the public. Some do great work, but others can be the left’s equivalents of the neocons: brimming with moral clarity and ideological zeal, but empty of nuance. (Industry has also hyped risks with wildly exaggerated warnings that environmental protections will entail a terrible economic cost.) “The Death of Environmentalism” resonated with me. I was once an environmental groupie, and I still share the movement’s broad aims, but I’m now skeptical of the movement’s “I Have a Nightmare” speeches....
===
OPINION/COMMENTARY
PETA's School Raid Rolled Into Sushi
You would be forgiven for thinking that People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) cares more about a school of fish than a school of children. Once again, the group is swimming upstream from common decency by trying to brainwash children with anti-fishing messages. This week PETA activists descended on a Florida middle school. "The only problem was," The Miami Herald reported yesterday, "the kids weren't buying it." Looking unfavorably upon a PETA activist clad in a giant fish costume, one student mustered his finest vocabulary, exclaiming: "What the hell is that? Get that out of here." Notwithstanding the merits (or lack thereof) of PETA's fish-charm offensive, finding people offended by PETA's tactics was as easy as shooting fish in a barrel. One parent complained to the Herald: "These are middle school kids and parents should be notified if they are trying to influence anything on them." The school's principal said she wasn't informed about PETA's raid, and responded by calling the school police. She added: "It's against the law to solicit to minors." Finally, one eighth-grader told the stuffed swimmer: "I'll eat you ... You're nothing but sushi to me."....
===
PETA's School Raid Rolled Into Sushi
You would be forgiven for thinking that People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) cares more about a school of fish than a school of children. Once again, the group is swimming upstream from common decency by trying to brainwash children with anti-fishing messages. This week PETA activists descended on a Florida middle school. "The only problem was," The Miami Herald reported yesterday, "the kids weren't buying it." Looking unfavorably upon a PETA activist clad in a giant fish costume, one student mustered his finest vocabulary, exclaiming: "What the hell is that? Get that out of here." Notwithstanding the merits (or lack thereof) of PETA's fish-charm offensive, finding people offended by PETA's tactics was as easy as shooting fish in a barrel. One parent complained to the Herald: "These are middle school kids and parents should be notified if they are trying to influence anything on them." The school's principal said she wasn't informed about PETA's raid, and responded by calling the school police. She added: "It's against the law to solicit to minors." Finally, one eighth-grader told the stuffed swimmer: "I'll eat you ... You're nothing but sushi to me."....
===
Saturday, April 09, 2005
NEWS ROUNDUP
Editorial: Every day is court day for some 'environmentalists' The Center for Biological Diversity, which likes to call itself an environmentalist organization, isn't. It's a litigious society bent on eliminating private property rights in America through intimidation by the courts. The environmental movement is only its cat's paw, but one which it has used with amazing success, first because it rarely encounters more than token resistance to its legal forays, and second, because most Americans are "environmentalists" in the sense that they enjoy the beauty of natural vistas and believe in the preservation of the wild. The Center counts on both these things when it attacks such groups as hunters, off-road enthusiasts, farmers, loggers, miners, oil companies, ranchers ... it's a long list. On occasion, though, the intended victim bites back with success. That happened last January in Tuscon, Ariz., where a jury found the Center for Biological Diversity's Tuscon branch guilty of making "false, unfair, libelous and defamatory statements" against Jim Chilton, a Southern Arizona rancher. The Tucson jury awarded Chilton $100,000 in actual damages, and $500,000 in punitive damages from the Center for defaming him and his family business....
Environmentalists drop timber challenge in return for protection of valley Six conservation groups said Thursday they are dropping their legal challenge to two timber sales that could provide more than a year's supply of timber to Southeast Alaska mills. It's part of an out-of-court settlement that the groups, including the Southeast Alaska Conservation Council and the Sierra Club, are finalizing with the U.S. Forest Service and other parties this week. In return, the Forest Service has agreed to withdraw an 8 million-board-foot Orion North timber sale in the Sea Level Creek valley, the last-remaining roadless watershed in Thorne Arm near Ketchikan...
Tahoe National Forest buys land The Tahoe National Forest just got a little bigger. The Truckee Ranger District added two separate chunks of land from California timber giant Sierra Pacific Industries that equal an expansion of more than 1,000 acres. The 640 acres of land the national forest bought near the American River, five miles south of Interstate 80’s Big Bend exit, complete the forest’s goal of amassing all of the private land along the rugged North Fork of the American River that has been designated as a wild and scenic. The forest service paid Sierra Pacific Industries $700,000 for the tract of land. The Trust for Public Land, a national land conservation organization, was also involved in brokering the land deal. Over the life of the program, the Tahoe National Forest has bought almost 10,000 acres along the river....
Packing up a tradition A 100-year tradition was sent out to pasture Thursday. So were Gus, Dakota, Jack and Sunny. A ceremony honoring the Gifford Pinchot National Forest's last four historic pack horses was held Thursday in Randle, Wash., where the animals were stabled. Then Gus, Dakota, Jack and Sunny climbed into a horse trailer and were on their way to Eight Mile Ranch, north of Winthrop, Wash., to meet their new wrangler, the first they've had in a year and a half. Today, for the first time since the U.S. Forest Service was created in 1905, there are no pack animals available to venture into west-of-the-Cascades wilderness. "It's really the end of an era," said Rick McClure, 49, heritage program manager for the agency. "The image of the horseback ranger has always been one of those mythological things associated with the Forest Service."....
Off-roaders join effort to curb wilderness damage The solution until now has been to close areas to motorized vehicles. Larratt, chairman of the Colorado Off-Highway Vehicle Coalition, thinks Colorado has a better option: "Keep your wheels where they belong." The new slogan and the coalition are a part of a $250,000 "Stay the Trail" campaign. A joint effort of the Bureau of Land Management-Colorado, the U.S. Forest Service, Colorado state parks and a number of environmental and off-highway vehicle groups, the campaign cautions off-roaders to stick to the designated trails or face not having trails at all....
Greens win Boulder appeal Environmental groups have won their appeal of a fuel-reduction project the U.S. Forest Service has proposed for the main Boulder River canyon south of Big Timber. The project has been halted, at least for now, because of concerns for goshawks, Kathleen A. McAllister, the appeals deciding officer at regional headquarters in Missoula, wrote in a Monday decision. She said there are "discrepancies" between two analyses of the project's impacts on goshawks. However, forest officials still hope to get some work done this year. "We'll probably deal with these deficiencies and then move forward," said Brent Foster, resource assistant for the Gallatin National Forest in Big Timber....
Paonia man fined for guiding without permit The owner of a guest ranch near Paonia has pleaded guilty to charges he provided guided snowmobile trips on U.S. Forest Service land without a permit. U.S. Magistrate ordered Edwin Allen, the owner of Whistling Acres Guest Ranch, to pay $1,700 in fines and $300 in restitution for providing the trips from the Stevens Gulch trailhead north of Paonia, the Forest Service announced in a news release. The Forest Service said delivering supplies, stock or equipment, as well as providing guiding services on federal land without a permit, is a misdemeanor with a maximum penalty of a $5,000 fine and six months in prison....
Wildlife officials drop habitat plan, cite homeland security issues Bowing to national security concerns, federal wildlife officials on Friday backed off their proposal to give heightened protection to an endangered plant's habitat near Barstow where the Army wants to expand its tank-training center. Environmental groups said the decision by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to wipe out almost 30,000 acres of critical habitat is a death sentence for the Lane Mountain milk-vetch, a perennial herb that is clinging to existence in the western Mojave Desert. The wildlife agency cited the importance of military training at the National Training Center at Fort Irwin in dropping the year-old proposal. Such designations can restrict activities to protect the land where an imperiled species is struggling to survive. Army officials hope to begin training in an expansion of the National Training Center at Fort Irwin in Barstow by 2006. The area is needed, the Army says, to better prepare troops for Iraq. "It was excluded for national security reasons, which there is a provision in the Endangered Species Act that allows for that," said Lois Grunwald, a spokeswoman for the federal wildlife agency in Ventura....
Lab solves wildlife crimes CSI: Laramie. It may lack the glitz and glamor of CSI: Miami, but for game wardens in Wyoming, Colorado and surrounding states, the Wyoming Game and Fish forensics laboratory is a critical tool in catching poachers and cracking down on illegal trade in wildlife. The fluorescent-lit rooms and Formica-topped counters look like the average college chemistry lab, but the techs are doing nearly everything human forensic labs do - and they can do it for a multitude of species. DNA fingerprinting can seal a conviction or lock in a plea bargain in game violations as solidly as in human homicides. Take the case of two cousins accused of illegally shooting a prize quality bighorn ram in December 2003....
Mixing species may be only way to save world's rarest It sounds like the plot of a cheesy sci-fi film: A futuristic army of clones saves the giant panda from extinction. But it isn't. Researchers from San Diego to New Orleans are examining and testing the powers of cloning technology. They are hoping that if all else fails, genetic duplicates can save animals such as the Sumatran rhino and Siberian tiger from extinction. Already scientists have cloned the African wildcat, Asian banteng and a rare cow-like species called a gaur. The clone of the latter species didn't last long - just a few hours - but cloning conservationists say they are making significant strides, despite charges that they are wasting their time, misusing otherwise needed conservation funds and creating creatures that not only don't belong on the planet but actually may be too unique to "re-create." Notwithstanding these concerns, zookeepers and researchers across the country literally are banking - in "frozen zoos" - as much animal tissue as they can....
LWCF - CARA Heads For Conference Committee Vote The Senate approval March 16 of a $350 million conservation fund from oil and gas leasing on the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) has a long way to go before it becomes a reality. Although the Senate approved the provision by a 51-to-49 vote as a set-aside in a fiscal year 2006 Congressional budget resolution (S Con Res 18), final passage of the budget is far from a certainty. In addition final passage of a “reconciliation” bill later this summer to provide legislative language that would implement the budget provision is also far from a certainty. The immediate hurdle is a House-Senate conference committee that is expected to meet this month to work out differences between S Con Res 18 and a House-passed budget (H Con Res 95). While the House-passed budget does not mention ANWR and the conservation fund, it does indirectly make room for an ANWR fund when it calls for reduced energy spending by authorizing committees....
Energy Plan Should Protect Western Lands, Groups Charge In a letter to the leaders of the House Energy and Commerce Committee delivered today, 25 citizen and conservation groups asked Chairman Joe Barton (R-TX) and Ranking Member John Dingell (D-MI) to ensure that the House energy bill protects western communities, landscapes, and residents from irresponsible oil and gas development. The groups emphasized responsible development of energy resources, saying “this can be done, however, without further rushing energy development or elevating it over other public land uses.” “We represent ranchers and farmers, hunters, anglers and outfitters, business owners, hikers, campers and wildlife watchers,” wrote the groups. “Many of our organizations have longstanding reputations as advocates for responsible and sustainable energy policies.”....
Building-climbing activist in jail, clamoring for attention Arrow joined the annals of activism five years ago outside the U.S. Forest Service regional headquarters, the same locale as Pax. Arrow scaled three stories of the building and camped out on a 9-inch-deep ledge for 11 days to protest Mount Hood logging. Formerly Michael J. Scarpitti before a name change, Arrow fled to Canada after the FBI accused him of domestic-terrorism acts in 2001, including the firebombing of logging and cement trucks. Caught in Victoria, B.C., last spring, Arrow has been stuck in a Port Coquitlam corrections facility awaiting an extradition hearing scheduled for June. He started his stay behind bars with a 44-day hunger strike, shedding more than 40 pounds. Arrow also has been busy making requests. According to his latest biweekly newsletter posted on the Portland Independent Media Center Web site last week -- www.portland.indymedia.org -- Arrow is on the lookout for a vehicle, preferably one that runs on biodiesel, that will help spread the word about his case through a nationwide speaking tour. Garnering celebrity support from activist sympathizers Bonnie Raitt or the Indigo Girls wouldn't hurt either, he wrote....
Nevada governor opposes bill protecting rural water supplies Legislators who face opposition from the Guinn administration to their bills that would help rural areas fighting against the export of their water to booming Las Vegas said Thursday they're not giving up. "We're going to push this as far as we can," Assemblywoman Sheila Leslie, D-Reno, said after Gov. Kenny Guinn's natural resources adviser told lawmakers existing water law adequately protects the outlying counties. "The prevailing attitude of big developers seems to be that everything is perfect right now for Nevada water law," Leslie said. "The arrogance in that statement just offends me, because we heard testimony from many Nevadans that the current law isn't working for them - and has the potential for destroying their way of life."....
Editorial: Saving Colorado River habitat For more than 1,400 miles, a great river connects seven Western states, creating one of the most valuable, complicated and controversial ecosystems on our continent. How best to manage the Colorado River presents an ongoing challenge. Many species native to the Colorado have become endangered because of the loss of habitat, introduction of non-native fish and construction of dams and other water projects. The river basin is home to 14 native fish, including four endangered species that exist nowhere else: the Colorado pikeminnow, razorback sucker, bonytail and humpback chub. Two native birds, the southwestern willow flycatcher and Yuma clapper rail, are also endangered. Last week, the U.S. Department of Interior and California, Arizona and Nevada signed a landmark agreement. The pact envisions the three states and federal government investing $626 million over 50 years to restore wildlife habitat. The key to making the deal work is sustained funding. Given the long time frame, annual appropriations should be modest enough to allow for continued congressional support....
===
Editorial: Every day is court day for some 'environmentalists' The Center for Biological Diversity, which likes to call itself an environmentalist organization, isn't. It's a litigious society bent on eliminating private property rights in America through intimidation by the courts. The environmental movement is only its cat's paw, but one which it has used with amazing success, first because it rarely encounters more than token resistance to its legal forays, and second, because most Americans are "environmentalists" in the sense that they enjoy the beauty of natural vistas and believe in the preservation of the wild. The Center counts on both these things when it attacks such groups as hunters, off-road enthusiasts, farmers, loggers, miners, oil companies, ranchers ... it's a long list. On occasion, though, the intended victim bites back with success. That happened last January in Tuscon, Ariz., where a jury found the Center for Biological Diversity's Tuscon branch guilty of making "false, unfair, libelous and defamatory statements" against Jim Chilton, a Southern Arizona rancher. The Tucson jury awarded Chilton $100,000 in actual damages, and $500,000 in punitive damages from the Center for defaming him and his family business....
Environmentalists drop timber challenge in return for protection of valley Six conservation groups said Thursday they are dropping their legal challenge to two timber sales that could provide more than a year's supply of timber to Southeast Alaska mills. It's part of an out-of-court settlement that the groups, including the Southeast Alaska Conservation Council and the Sierra Club, are finalizing with the U.S. Forest Service and other parties this week. In return, the Forest Service has agreed to withdraw an 8 million-board-foot Orion North timber sale in the Sea Level Creek valley, the last-remaining roadless watershed in Thorne Arm near Ketchikan...
Tahoe National Forest buys land The Tahoe National Forest just got a little bigger. The Truckee Ranger District added two separate chunks of land from California timber giant Sierra Pacific Industries that equal an expansion of more than 1,000 acres. The 640 acres of land the national forest bought near the American River, five miles south of Interstate 80’s Big Bend exit, complete the forest’s goal of amassing all of the private land along the rugged North Fork of the American River that has been designated as a wild and scenic. The forest service paid Sierra Pacific Industries $700,000 for the tract of land. The Trust for Public Land, a national land conservation organization, was also involved in brokering the land deal. Over the life of the program, the Tahoe National Forest has bought almost 10,000 acres along the river....
Packing up a tradition A 100-year tradition was sent out to pasture Thursday. So were Gus, Dakota, Jack and Sunny. A ceremony honoring the Gifford Pinchot National Forest's last four historic pack horses was held Thursday in Randle, Wash., where the animals were stabled. Then Gus, Dakota, Jack and Sunny climbed into a horse trailer and were on their way to Eight Mile Ranch, north of Winthrop, Wash., to meet their new wrangler, the first they've had in a year and a half. Today, for the first time since the U.S. Forest Service was created in 1905, there are no pack animals available to venture into west-of-the-Cascades wilderness. "It's really the end of an era," said Rick McClure, 49, heritage program manager for the agency. "The image of the horseback ranger has always been one of those mythological things associated with the Forest Service."....
Off-roaders join effort to curb wilderness damage The solution until now has been to close areas to motorized vehicles. Larratt, chairman of the Colorado Off-Highway Vehicle Coalition, thinks Colorado has a better option: "Keep your wheels where they belong." The new slogan and the coalition are a part of a $250,000 "Stay the Trail" campaign. A joint effort of the Bureau of Land Management-Colorado, the U.S. Forest Service, Colorado state parks and a number of environmental and off-highway vehicle groups, the campaign cautions off-roaders to stick to the designated trails or face not having trails at all....
Greens win Boulder appeal Environmental groups have won their appeal of a fuel-reduction project the U.S. Forest Service has proposed for the main Boulder River canyon south of Big Timber. The project has been halted, at least for now, because of concerns for goshawks, Kathleen A. McAllister, the appeals deciding officer at regional headquarters in Missoula, wrote in a Monday decision. She said there are "discrepancies" between two analyses of the project's impacts on goshawks. However, forest officials still hope to get some work done this year. "We'll probably deal with these deficiencies and then move forward," said Brent Foster, resource assistant for the Gallatin National Forest in Big Timber....
Paonia man fined for guiding without permit The owner of a guest ranch near Paonia has pleaded guilty to charges he provided guided snowmobile trips on U.S. Forest Service land without a permit. U.S. Magistrate ordered Edwin Allen, the owner of Whistling Acres Guest Ranch, to pay $1,700 in fines and $300 in restitution for providing the trips from the Stevens Gulch trailhead north of Paonia, the Forest Service announced in a news release. The Forest Service said delivering supplies, stock or equipment, as well as providing guiding services on federal land without a permit, is a misdemeanor with a maximum penalty of a $5,000 fine and six months in prison....
Wildlife officials drop habitat plan, cite homeland security issues Bowing to national security concerns, federal wildlife officials on Friday backed off their proposal to give heightened protection to an endangered plant's habitat near Barstow where the Army wants to expand its tank-training center. Environmental groups said the decision by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to wipe out almost 30,000 acres of critical habitat is a death sentence for the Lane Mountain milk-vetch, a perennial herb that is clinging to existence in the western Mojave Desert. The wildlife agency cited the importance of military training at the National Training Center at Fort Irwin in dropping the year-old proposal. Such designations can restrict activities to protect the land where an imperiled species is struggling to survive. Army officials hope to begin training in an expansion of the National Training Center at Fort Irwin in Barstow by 2006. The area is needed, the Army says, to better prepare troops for Iraq. "It was excluded for national security reasons, which there is a provision in the Endangered Species Act that allows for that," said Lois Grunwald, a spokeswoman for the federal wildlife agency in Ventura....
Lab solves wildlife crimes CSI: Laramie. It may lack the glitz and glamor of CSI: Miami, but for game wardens in Wyoming, Colorado and surrounding states, the Wyoming Game and Fish forensics laboratory is a critical tool in catching poachers and cracking down on illegal trade in wildlife. The fluorescent-lit rooms and Formica-topped counters look like the average college chemistry lab, but the techs are doing nearly everything human forensic labs do - and they can do it for a multitude of species. DNA fingerprinting can seal a conviction or lock in a plea bargain in game violations as solidly as in human homicides. Take the case of two cousins accused of illegally shooting a prize quality bighorn ram in December 2003....
Mixing species may be only way to save world's rarest It sounds like the plot of a cheesy sci-fi film: A futuristic army of clones saves the giant panda from extinction. But it isn't. Researchers from San Diego to New Orleans are examining and testing the powers of cloning technology. They are hoping that if all else fails, genetic duplicates can save animals such as the Sumatran rhino and Siberian tiger from extinction. Already scientists have cloned the African wildcat, Asian banteng and a rare cow-like species called a gaur. The clone of the latter species didn't last long - just a few hours - but cloning conservationists say they are making significant strides, despite charges that they are wasting their time, misusing otherwise needed conservation funds and creating creatures that not only don't belong on the planet but actually may be too unique to "re-create." Notwithstanding these concerns, zookeepers and researchers across the country literally are banking - in "frozen zoos" - as much animal tissue as they can....
LWCF - CARA Heads For Conference Committee Vote The Senate approval March 16 of a $350 million conservation fund from oil and gas leasing on the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) has a long way to go before it becomes a reality. Although the Senate approved the provision by a 51-to-49 vote as a set-aside in a fiscal year 2006 Congressional budget resolution (S Con Res 18), final passage of the budget is far from a certainty. In addition final passage of a “reconciliation” bill later this summer to provide legislative language that would implement the budget provision is also far from a certainty. The immediate hurdle is a House-Senate conference committee that is expected to meet this month to work out differences between S Con Res 18 and a House-passed budget (H Con Res 95). While the House-passed budget does not mention ANWR and the conservation fund, it does indirectly make room for an ANWR fund when it calls for reduced energy spending by authorizing committees....
Energy Plan Should Protect Western Lands, Groups Charge In a letter to the leaders of the House Energy and Commerce Committee delivered today, 25 citizen and conservation groups asked Chairman Joe Barton (R-TX) and Ranking Member John Dingell (D-MI) to ensure that the House energy bill protects western communities, landscapes, and residents from irresponsible oil and gas development. The groups emphasized responsible development of energy resources, saying “this can be done, however, without further rushing energy development or elevating it over other public land uses.” “We represent ranchers and farmers, hunters, anglers and outfitters, business owners, hikers, campers and wildlife watchers,” wrote the groups. “Many of our organizations have longstanding reputations as advocates for responsible and sustainable energy policies.”....
Building-climbing activist in jail, clamoring for attention Arrow joined the annals of activism five years ago outside the U.S. Forest Service regional headquarters, the same locale as Pax. Arrow scaled three stories of the building and camped out on a 9-inch-deep ledge for 11 days to protest Mount Hood logging. Formerly Michael J. Scarpitti before a name change, Arrow fled to Canada after the FBI accused him of domestic-terrorism acts in 2001, including the firebombing of logging and cement trucks. Caught in Victoria, B.C., last spring, Arrow has been stuck in a Port Coquitlam corrections facility awaiting an extradition hearing scheduled for June. He started his stay behind bars with a 44-day hunger strike, shedding more than 40 pounds. Arrow also has been busy making requests. According to his latest biweekly newsletter posted on the Portland Independent Media Center Web site last week -- www.portland.indymedia.org -- Arrow is on the lookout for a vehicle, preferably one that runs on biodiesel, that will help spread the word about his case through a nationwide speaking tour. Garnering celebrity support from activist sympathizers Bonnie Raitt or the Indigo Girls wouldn't hurt either, he wrote....
Nevada governor opposes bill protecting rural water supplies Legislators who face opposition from the Guinn administration to their bills that would help rural areas fighting against the export of their water to booming Las Vegas said Thursday they're not giving up. "We're going to push this as far as we can," Assemblywoman Sheila Leslie, D-Reno, said after Gov. Kenny Guinn's natural resources adviser told lawmakers existing water law adequately protects the outlying counties. "The prevailing attitude of big developers seems to be that everything is perfect right now for Nevada water law," Leslie said. "The arrogance in that statement just offends me, because we heard testimony from many Nevadans that the current law isn't working for them - and has the potential for destroying their way of life."....
Editorial: Saving Colorado River habitat For more than 1,400 miles, a great river connects seven Western states, creating one of the most valuable, complicated and controversial ecosystems on our continent. How best to manage the Colorado River presents an ongoing challenge. Many species native to the Colorado have become endangered because of the loss of habitat, introduction of non-native fish and construction of dams and other water projects. The river basin is home to 14 native fish, including four endangered species that exist nowhere else: the Colorado pikeminnow, razorback sucker, bonytail and humpback chub. Two native birds, the southwestern willow flycatcher and Yuma clapper rail, are also endangered. Last week, the U.S. Department of Interior and California, Arizona and Nevada signed a landmark agreement. The pact envisions the three states and federal government investing $626 million over 50 years to restore wildlife habitat. The key to making the deal work is sustained funding. Given the long time frame, annual appropriations should be modest enough to allow for continued congressional support....
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