BLM biologist banned from Canada

Banned from Canada. Not quite what you'd expect from a 64-year-old fish biologist based here with the Bureau of Land Management. But if he happens to be Joe Kelly -- indicted anti-war activist better known in 1970 as one of the Seattle Seven -- high-tech databases have caught up with his past. One evening this summer, Kelly says, he was told to turn around at the border, after nearly four decades of being waved through into Canada. Nothing personal, but the Canadian government doesn't mess around about turning away people who've been convicted of a crime, even really old crimes. Since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, both the U.S. and Canada have used ever-expanding criminal databases that they share with each other. For Americans crossing into Canada, the databases have snared not only Joe Kelly, but plenty of guys (and it's mostly guys) who got themselves a DUI in their younger days and now are turned back at the border in front of their wives and kids...read more

BLM employee faces corruption charges

A former U.S. Bureau of Land Management employee is facing charges in a public corruption case involving an alleged scheme to defraud the federal agency by steering contracts to his son. The U.S. Attorney's office said a federal grand jury has indicted 57-year-old Luis Ramirez of Medford on charges of wire fraud, personal financial conflict of interest and making of a false tax return statement. Federal prosecutors say Ramirez had private contractors subcontract their work to his son while Ramirez was the BLM representative responsible for approving work and submitting invoices to BLM for payment to the contractors...read more

Idaho again wants to land choppers in wilderness

Idaho again wants permission to land helicopters in the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness to dart wolves and outfit them with radio collars. The U.S. Forest Service resisted a similar request in 2006 to allow choppers into the federally protected wilderness outside of established airstrips. That didn't stop the Idaho Department of Fish and Game from landing a helicopter in the wilderness without federal permission after darting a wolf on April 12, 2009, when it was still considered an endangered species. Federal officials labeled the landing "an incursion." Environmental groups have argued that such landings disrupt the pristine wilderness. They also fear information from tranquilizing and collaring wolves here could lead to more-aggressive wolf killing across Idaho. Idaho Department of Fish and Game wildlife managers insist trapping wilderness wolves on foot has been only marginally successful. By combining wolf-collaring missions with helicopter big game counts that occur every winter, they hope to more successfully track packs that roam some of the nation's most-remote territory. "We don't even land, really. We put a toe in. It takes about 15 minutes, once you've got a dart in them," Deputy Fish and Game Director Jim Unsworth said. "We do believe we have the legal authority" even without permission, Unsworth said Friday. "The reason we want to work with the Forest Service is, because we're partners and we'd like to do things within their process, if we can." His latest plan calls for choppers to touch down up to 20 times in the 2.4-million-acre area to collar up to 12 wolves...read more

Bill would put Roan lease areas in wilderness

Draft legislation by a Denver congresswoman for new Colorado wilderness areas could trigger debate about whether wilderness and drilling can exist side by side on the Roan Plateau near Rifle. U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette, a Democrat, included the Roan Plateau in legislation that she released last week for discussion purposes. Her plan would create 34 wilderness areas covering 890,000 acres. The proposal includes more than 40,000 acres encompassing much of the 55,000 acres that the U.S. Bureau of Land Management leased last year for oil and gas development on and around the Roan Plateau top. Federal wilderness is off-limits to activities such as vehicle use and energy development. Spokesman Kristofer Eisenla said DeGette’s proposal would designate wilderness in valleys and cliff areas, whereas many of the proposed drilling locations are just off roads that follow the tops of ridgelines. “Feasibly, they could probably coexist together,” Eisenla said...read more

Has methane drilling left us high and dry?

It took two decades to pump about 174 billion gallons of water out of the Powder River Basin. Until now, those numbers have been speculative, but a new report by the Wyoming Geological Survey shows the amount of water actually pumped out of Powder River Basin aquifers since coal-bed methane drilling started. The report has not been analyzed yet, but will give regulatory agencies an idea of the effects of a decade of intense coal-bed natural gas development in the Powder River Basin. The Geological Survey’s Keith Clarey puts it in perspective. Clarey, who authored the new report on coal-bed methane water drawdown, says the water pumped from 1993 to 2006 would roughly fill Lake DeSmet twice. Clarey compiled information collected from 111 monitoring wells — some starting as early as 1993; but all were studied through 2006. Some of the monitoring wells were placed in coal aquifers and some were placed in sand aquifers. The purpose was to find out what effect coal-bed natural gas production is having on aquifer levels in the basin — the same aquifers many communities and ranchers get their water from. He appears to have come up with a glass-half-empty, glass-half-full answer. “The data are showing there are hundreds of feet of drawdown in some of the water monitoring wells, but it is a complex issue because some of the wells are showing increases in water levels,” Clarey said. The impact of that drawdown differs depending on who you ask...read more

A Utah town's love of Indian artifacts backfires

Their two worlds collided this summer when 150 federal agents swooped into the region, arresting 26 people at gunpoint and charging them with looting Indian graves and stealing priceless archaeological treasures from public and tribal lands. Seventeen of those arrested, most of them handcuffed and shackled, were from Blanding, including some of the town's most prominent citizens: Harold Lyman, 78, grandson of the pioneering Mormon family that founded the town. David Lacy, 55, high school math teacher and brother of the county sheriff. And 60-year-old Jim Redd, along with his wife and adult daughter. The next day, the doctor drove to a pond on his property and killed himself by carbon monoxide poisoning. Another defendant, from Santa Fe, N.M., shot himself a week later. The suicides horrified this town of about 4,000 with many bitterly blaming the government. More than a thousand people attended Redd's funeral, even as the mayor denounced the FBI and Bureau of Land Management agents as "storm troopers" and the sheriff called for a formal investigation. For many, the recriminations and grief masked more complicated questions — questions that have dogged the town for decades. "I'm not against them enforcing the laws, but why do they have to kill us at the same time," says Austin Lyman, a case worker at the senior center, who has vehement opinions about the raids, and his own unique way of expressing them: "Like Jackals from hell they came,
With bullet proof vests and guns, They came to arrest old men." Lyman, a burly, ruddy-faced man of 62, penned "Paradise Has Been Raided Again" on June 10, the day of the raids. He reads it aloud, eyes burning, voice cracking with emotion...read more

On The Range of Piñon Canyon: Property rights or jobs?

Their land is more than property for cattle ranchers in southern Colorado. It’s their way of life. These modern-day cowboys work land passed from one generation to the next with the hope that the weather will hold, that strong grass will grow and that their cattle will make it to market. It’s not an easy life. Today’s ranchers face many of the same challenges that confronted their ancestors 100 years ago. Fences still need mending, horses still need shoeing and cattle must be fed — no matter whether there’s a blizzard or a heat wave. However, the southern Colorado ranchers whose land is adjacent to Fort Carson’s U.S. Army training site in Piñon Canyon face a unique challenge. In the 1980s, the Army built what is known today as the Piñon Canyon Maneuvering Site. The Army uses the 235,000 acres it now owns a few months out of the year to build trenches so that soldiers in tanks can train on the land. In order to secure the current site, the Army implemented the largest use of eminent domain against U.S citizens in the nation’s history. Not surprisingly, the land grab left a bad taste with the ranchers who remained. Owners of the land that surrounds the current training site support the military and believe their patriotism runs more than skin deep. But they are finding themselves at odds with the Army, which, over the past few years, has made several attempts to condemn more land to enable expansion of the maneuvering site. The exact amount of land the Army wants for expansion is among debate...read more

Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton looking for home after $6m auction fails

Auctioneers had hoped bids would top $6 million (£3.8 million) but the highest offer was only $3.7 million (£2.3 million). Samson was the star attraction in a huge dinosaur auction at the Venetian hotel and casino. About 50 other lots, including a duck-billed dinosaur, a pair of Einiosaurus skeletons and a 5-metre long fossilised fish, fetched $1.76 million (£1.1 million). Samson consists of 170 fossilised bones discovered 17 years ago in South Dakota. They represent more than half the skeleton of a 12-metre long, 7.5-ton dinosaur that lived 66 million years ago. A similar T. rex fossil nicknamed Sue sold for $8.3 million (£5.2million) in 1997...read more

Rancher loses sheep to coyotes, but law limits him fighting back

In full camouflage gear, a double-barrel shotgun across his lap, Jack Dandridge waited among the tall weeds in the gathering darkness for the killers to appear. It wasn't long before he saw a silhouette move silently away from the trees and trot toward the open field under the massive power transmission lines. Dandridge drew a bead with the 16-gauge but held his fire. As much as he itched to pull the trigger, to avenge his loss, doing so would be against the law — the killer wasn't on his property. He watched as his chance slipped away. Weeks later, as Dandridge and his wife, Marian, slept in their home on Dry Creek Ranch Road, a marauder returned. The next morning, they found the bloody evidence. One victim lay dead, huge chunks of flesh torn from its left haunch. A second staggered from shock and gaping wounds. It has been like this for more than two years, and the Dandridges are sick of it. Coyotes have become more prevalent in Florida in recent years, moving south from the Panhandle and showing up even in urban beach communities. For some people, they evoke an exotic charm, a taste of the Old West in the Sunshine State. Such allure is lost on ranchers like the Dandridges. On Wednesday, standing next to a deep hole he had just dug to bury his slaughtered 120-pound ewe, Dandridge saw his livelihood under attack. "This is our money going into the ground," he said...read more

Groups petition feds to regulate feedlots under Clean Air Act

The Humane Society of the United States and other groups are petitioning the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to start regulating confined-animal feeding operations under the Clean Air Act. The groups submitted the 69-page petition late last month asking that emissions of hydrogen sulfide, ammonia and other gases be curbed. EPA spokesman Dave Ryan said the agency will review the petition and respond within 120 days. The EPA is wrapping up a study of emissions at 24 U.S. feedlots, but doesn't have enough information yet to decide whether confined-animal feeding operations, or CAFOs, need more regulation. "We really do not have a good handle on CAFO emissions," Ryan told the Twin Falls newspaper, The Times-News, in a story published Friday. He said that when the study is released next year, it should give the agency more information about how much pollution feedlots produce. The petition included past EPA figures plus information from United Nations reports about feedlots...read more

Census shows more Americans trying their hand at raising crops, livestock on ‘hobby farms’

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s most recent farm census shows that while the nation’s largest farms keep getting larger, a growing number of small farms also are sprouting across the nation. February’s census report found that the number of farms under 50 acres soared nearly 15 percent between 2002 and 2007 to about 853,000 nationwide. Farms under 10 acres grew even more, with their numbers rising about 30 percent to 232,000. Nearly 300,000 new farms began production since the last census in 2002, and they tended to have fewer acres, lower sales and younger operators who also work off-farm, said Ginger Harris, a demographer with National Agricultural Statistics Service, a branch of the USDA. Although the census numbers show a growing interest in small farms, she said farmers weren’t asked their motives for starting their farms or why farming isn’t their primary occupation...read more

Congress gives $5.3 million to National Animal ID

A conference committee in Congress has decided to fund the controversial National Animal Identification System for another year to the tune of $5.3 million. That will be a significant reduction from previous years, but does not placate opponents of the still floundering, five-year-old program. “We’re disappointed with the decision,” said Bill Bullard, the chief executive of the Ranchers-Cattlemen Action Legal Fund. R-CALF USA, ICON and 91 other groups asked Congress to eliminate the funds. The Senate Appropriations Committee had approved $14.6 million for the NAIS program, the amount requested by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, but the House allocated nothing. The appropriation is part of the Agriculture appropriations bill. Bullard said the $5.3 million could shore up the program where it is less expensive and cumbersome, such as in factory-style hog, poultry and cattle feeding operations. Congress appropriated $142 million for animal identification since it began in 2004. The USDA has registered only 35 percent of animal premises. Last year, the USDA got $14.2 million to run the program, but registrations increased by only three percent...read more

Cattle auctions on the decline

A half a century ago, cattle auctions were a booming business in the Big Country. With sales somewhere every day of the week, auctions were thriving. Each week, auction arena stands would fill up with ranchers eager to buy and sell livestock. But today when the dust settles, the auctioneer’s voice fades and the last trailer is loaded, things are quieter at most area auctions. “We have lost cattle auctions all over, and over time the number of cattle have declined in the U.S.,” said David Anderson an extension economist from Texas A&M. “They (auction barns) make a living by selling cattle and as the total number of cattle decline, there are fewer to go around and it makes it tougher to stay open.” As the number of ranchers decreases, so does the number of cattle auctions. Haskell, Brownwood and Ranger have all lost auctions in recent times. The auctions that remain have trimmed their operations. “People are getting older, and kids are moving to the city and not taking over the family business,” said Randy Carson, who bought Abilene Auction in 2001 with his son Cody. Carson, 60, started working at the local cattle auction when he was just 17. He gets a nostalgic twinkle in his eyes when he remembers the good old days — 30 or 40 years ago. “Back then we had sales Monday, Tuesday and Thursday,” Carson remembered. “The farmers owned cattle and that is just not the case anymore.” And, back then, the bankers wanted three crops, wheat, cotton and cattle...read more

Lone-wolf rancher is 'one of a kind'

She lives alone at the end of a gated four-wheel-drive road in the Arizona outback, beyond civilization, nestled in a valley beside a stream guarded by cottonwoods. Mountains and mesas rise on all sides of the LF Ranch west of Payson, covered with juniper and prickly pear, catclaw and oak. The Arizona Trail runs through her property, bringing occasional backpackers. When a stranger wanders past her door, she greets him with an iron handshake and kind smile: "Maryann Pratt," she says. "I run this place." More than 100 cattle range over 37,000 acres of Tonto National Forest grazing lease, the Bull Springs Allotment. It's a three-day ride from one end of her spread to the other, 52 sections in all, full of Western lore and Indian ruins. Pratt works the ranch mostly alone, camping in winter storms, mending 70 miles of barbed-wire fence, hauling salt blocks by mule through sweltering summers. A floppy old hat tops off an outfit of baggy jeans and faded paisley shirt, blending into Arizona lore like camouflage. On clear nights at the ranch house, she sleeps outside under the stars rather than in a bed. Spend a little time at the LF Ranch and it becomes clear that Pratt is not your prototypical cowpoke but a modern-day pragmatist with cow dung on her boots. She runs her 57-square-mile spread with solar power and computers, hunting dogs and a shotgun...read more

On the edge of common sense: Cowboy answers to your love questions

This cowboy advice column is inspired by the Ventura County Star. Three cowboys answer questions about love and life. DEAR TERRIFIC TRIO, I've just fallen in love with a 38-year-old bottle blonde who shoots a mean game of snooker and can chug a 16-ounce bottle of Red Dog Ale in 30 seconds! Do you believe in love at first sight? Or should I wait till tomorrow morning to pop the question? Signed, THUNDERSTRUCK, texting in the men's room @ Walter's Crescendo Lounge DEAR THUNDER, Ask her quick before the Butazoline and Acepromazine wear off and she realizes how stupid you are. DEAR TRIGEMINAL TRIPODS, My husband has come into some inheritance. We need food for the twins and a refrigerator that works, but he wants to invest in a four-wheeler to pull his roping dummy at the funeral in honor of his dead uncle. Am I being selfish? Signed, TIMOROUS IN TULARE DEAR TIMOROUS, Make sure he gets one with four-wheel drive and the beer cooler attachment. DEAR TRUCULENT TAPA- DERAS, My live-in boyfriend is starting to make eyes at other women. The other love of my life is a hard-to-handle Arabian stallion. I realize I can't afford them both. What should I do? Signed, PUZZLED IN PIOCHE DEAR PUZZLED, Flip a coin and geld the one you keep...read more

Song Of The Day #148

Let's get your blood flowin' this Monday morning with an instrumental by the great guitar picker Dan Crary. Here he is flatpicking Cotton Patch Rag. You can find it on his 10 track CD Guitar.

Cowgirl Sass & Savvy

Turning 16 - Life for the cowboy-kid is still good

By Julie Carter

He was only 6 years old when he first hit newsprint; a hazard of having a mother who is a writer. The story titled "Life doesn't get any better than this" told of the country-boy things that filled his days.

Like most ranch kids, this young cowboy's days (when not in kindergarten) were peppered with activities involving dogs, horses, cattle and miles in a feed pickup or in the shop learning guy stuff like welding and fixing broken vehicles.

The remoteness of the ranch sheltered him from the cutting edge of the "normal" '90s kid-life.

Power Rangers and Nintendo were the rage and he knew nothing of either.

His TV viewing left him thinking that the Lone Ranger and Scooby Doo were suitable heroes; no matter that they'd already been heroes to four decades of kids.

He was 7 before he ever saw a movie in a theater (Star Wars) and not far into it, he asked if he could change the channel and watch Scooby Doo.

He entertained himself daily by hooking up his red wagon to his bicycle with some well-engineered baling wire and loading up a hound pup to teach the pup to "trailer."

He would ride at breakneck bicycle speeds, the pup's ears flapping Snoopy-style, from the upper side of ranch headquarters to the bottom where the road curved to the barn.

It was here he'd make a hard turn-around, usually rolling the wagon and launching the puppy, but without missing a beat, he'd set everything back aright and get rolling again.

He began riding in the pasture during cattle workings at the age of 3 and by the time he was 6 his lack of fear kept my teeth clenched.

He learned to weld and use the cutting torch by first cutting his name, "LANE," in a metal plate and then wanted it mounted on the ranch entrance gate.

One day he leaned on his elbows on my desk as I was writing, hands under his chin, and very seriously said, "Mom, do you think it's time for a raise in my alangance?"
"Alangance?" I asked. "What is that?"

"You know," he said gesturing with his hand. "Money."

Ah, he meant allowance. However, he didn't get an allowance so I wasn't sure why he thought he needed a raise.

I quickly listed for him the work required for him to receive an allowance, and he just as quickly lost interest.

He wore only "snap shirts" (his name for Western shirts) and was al-ways geared up for play with toy guns, a worn out straw hat, gloves and usually a bugle and an American flag. Those old Westerns on TV will show a guy how to dress.

His favorite was the one I made for him out of flag-printed fabric that he selected. He called it his United States of America shirt.

A few things have changed but as many have not.

He's much larger now as he turns that magic age of teenage drivers, standing 6 foot 3 inches and weighing in like a line-backer.

He owns and operates most of the teen gadgets from iPods to cell phones and can text while he talks and runs a Google search on his laptop computer.

He still loves the American flag and still loves "snap shirts."

The old Westerns on TV are still his favorites and his excitement is in hunting, riding, roping and dinner.

Girls have hit his radar and his dreams are now of bigger toys, like a pickup to call his own and giving a worthy name to his new horse.

He can make a hand on the flanking crew at the brandings and isn't afraid to spend countless hours on his own at the ranch doing whatever needs done.

I hope the next 10 years of his life find him as grounded in the reality of what is important as he is now. My work is almost done.

Happy 16th, son.

Julie can be reached for comment at jcarter@tularosa.net.

Song Of The Day #147

Today's Gospel tune is I've Got That Old Time Religion In My Heart by The Wilburn Brothers.

Newly Declassified Files Detail Massive FBI Data-Mining Project

A fast-growing FBI data-mining system billed as a tool for hunting terrorists is being used in hacker and domestic criminal investigations, and now contains tens of thousands of records from private corporate databases, including car-rental companies, large hotel chains and at least one national department store, declassified documents obtained by Wired.com show. Headquartered in Crystal City, Virginia, just outside Washington, the FBI’s National Security Branch Analysis Center (NSAC) maintains a hodgepodge of data sets packed with more than 1.5 billion government and private-sector records about citizens and foreigners, the documents show, bringing the government closer than ever to implementing the “Total Information Awareness” system first dreamed up by the Pentagon in the days following the Sept. 11 attacks. Such a system, if successful, would correlate data from scores of different sources to automatically identify terrorists and other threats before they could strike. The FBI is seeking to quadruple the known staff of the program. But the proposal has long been criticized by privacy groups as ineffective and invasive. Critics say the new documents show that the government is proceeding with the plan in private, and without sufficient oversight. Among the data in its archive, the NSAC houses more than 55,000 entries on customers of the Cendant Hotel chain, now known as Wyndham Worldwide, which includes Ramada Inn, Days Inn, Super 8, Howard Johnson and Hawthorn Suites. The entries are for hotel customers whose names matched those on a long list the FBI provided to the company. Another 730 records come from the rental car company Avis, which used to be owned by Cendant. Those records were derived from a one-time search of Avis’s database against the State Department’s old terrorist watch list...read more

Real Reform for the PATRIOT Act?

George W. Bush may have left D.C., but the vast surveillance machine he spent eight years building via the PATRIOT Act hums merrily along. Whether or not that continues could well be determined today, as the Senate Judiciary Committee meets to mark up legislation renewing a series of PATRIOT Act powers due to expire at the end of the year. Barack Obama's Justice Department has said it's open to "modifications" of the expiring powers -- but some Democratic legislators see an opportunity to revisit and revise the whole architecture of post-9/11 spying law. If history is any guide, press attention will focus overwhelmingly on a proposal to repeal the controversial immunity Congress retroactively granted to telecoms that participated in the National Security Agency's extralegal program of warrantless wiretaps. Far more consequential for the privacy rights of Americans, however, are two surveillance powers that would finally be subject to reasonable limits by the ambitious JUSTICE Act, sponsored by Sen. Russ Feingold, a Democrat from Wisconsin: National Security Letters and the sweeping wiretap authority granted by the FISA Amendments Act. Today's markup will focus on a far more modest renewal and reform bill sponsored by Sen. Patrick Leahy, a Democrat from Vermont and the commission's chair, but civil libertarians are hoping elements of Feingold's more sweeping effort will make it into the text ultimately sent to the full Senate. Of all the vital privacy safeguards Feingold has proposed, the provisions fixing NSLs and the FISA amendments are probably the most important...read more