March 2012
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Slogan might sway elections, has no effect on gasoline prices- Whenever the price of gasoline rises, we hear what is by now a coordinated shout that there needs to be more domestic oil drilling and “damn, the damn bunnies” and the rest of the wildlife too. Thirty seconds thought tells a person that a short…
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Building the huge Interstate cut a swath through the wildlife rich mountains and foothills, and over time the wildlife impact of I-90 has grown- Interstate 90 is a vital transportation corridor from the Seattle area eastward across the northern Cascade mountains, but the magnitude of the gash has served to bisect wildlife populations and cause thousands…
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Acorns, mice and the climate pushing debilitating infection into Canada- Ten or so years ago we were writing about brucellosis in the forerunner to this newspaper. Later when anti-wolf activists tried to scare people about worm infections we examined that issue and found there was little to worry about. In following these political disease controversies,…
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Testimony heavily against current hunt levels, but commissioners completely reject suggestions- Boise, ID. Wednesday night (March 21) the Idaho Department of Fish and Game Commission met at its headquarters. In attendance were approximately 40 wolf advocates and a handful who were on the opposite side. 39 people testified. Over 30 were against continuing the wolf…
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This past September my colleagues (S.A. Enzler & A. Treves) and I published an article arguing that the public trust doctrine could provide a legal means to force protection of wolves were state policies found lacking (Bruskotter et al., 30 Sept. 2011, p. 1828). This article prompted two recent replies published by Science last month…
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Earthquakes, water pollution, political pollution, and now toxic chemicals in the air near fracking wells- It seems every day the news about the negative side effects of fracking gets worse (and the TV ads run by the American Petroleum Institute and others more manipulative). Aside from the methane in the natural gas, a number of…
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Just 9 wolves, one of which is female. It looks bleak- It’s probably the longest study of wolves in history (since 1958). The wolf numbers have been up and down along with the moose they eat many times since then. But now with just one female, it clearly looks like the end of the wolves…
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Hundreds of thousands of faults, most poorly mapped, just waiting for a bit of lubrication- We all know what causes earthquakes — preexisting long cracks in rock layers (faults) and enough pressure to make them slip. Most don’t slip very often though. Some will never slip because the pressure is just not, or ever will…