Federal Court Decision Holds That Protecting Sage-Grouse Must Take Priority Over Livestock Grazing in Owyhee Canyonlands and beyond in Southwest Idaho
Early last week the federal district court of Idaho affirmed Western Watersheds Project’s challenge to five Bureau of Land Management (BLM) grazing decisions in southwest Idaho’s Owyhee Canyonlands that harmed Greater sage-grouse.
Continue Reading →The effort to list the Greater Sage-grouse via the Endangered Species Act (ESA) has been an uphill battle. However, even as the end-game has yet to be realized, the effort itself has been remarkably successful at prompting bureaucratic backflips and a whole lot of paper-shuffling to accommodate consideration of the species. Unfortunately, many of the existing and developing [...]
Continue Reading →Years of legal pressure prompts favorable policy change
Public land domestic sheep grazers and bighorn advocates have been clashing for decades over land-use conflicts which place bighorn sheep populations at risk of deadly disease. With the passage of the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2012, favorable policy change promises new avenues of conflict resolution that [...]
Continue Reading →Bridger-Teton National Forest sued for failure to analyze new projects blocking the path of the pronghorn-
According to the Western Watersheds Project, the Bridger-Teton N.F. was talking up a good story how they were going the protect the “path of the pronghorn” which runs from the Wyoming desert, where they winter, northward to Jackson Hole [...]
Continue Reading →9th Circuit Filings – Constitutional Challenge to Wolf Delisting Rider
^Update 10/18/11 – Posted: Alliance for the Wild Rockies et al’s Emergency Motion for Injunction Pending Appeal, Motion for Summary Judgement Response Briefs (Appellees US Fish and Wildlife Service; Intervenors RMEF, NRA, & Montana/Idaho Farm Bureaus; Montana Amicus Brief)
**Update 8/24/11 – Posted: Alliance for [...]
Continue Reading →Denial of Livestock Industry’s Petition for Writ of Certiorari seals the fate of Bush era grazing regulations on 160,000,000 acres of public land
On Monday, October 3rd the United States Supreme Court denied consideration of an appeal by the Public Lands Council of prior federal court decisions won by Western Watersheds Project that overturned the [...]
Continue Reading →Western Watersheds Project wins initial court victory
Western Watersheds Project (WWP) has won a federal court order overturning the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) Resource Management Plans (RMPs) for the Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve in Idaho and the Pinedale Field Office in Wyoming. These two plans affect management on over 2.5 [...]
Continue Reading →Last week, Katie Fite and I travelled to Nevada to inspect several grazing allotments and attend a BLM meeting in Winnemucca and a BLM field trip in the Ely District. While passing through the Union Mountain Allotment in the Elko District we came across a series of water troughs which didn’t have the required wildlife [...]
Continue Reading →Conservationists have been putting in a lot of hours for a lot of years on the Green Mountain Common Allotment – and rightfully so; At 522,000 acres it’s the largest unfenced public land grazing allotment in the country, and it’s a landscape that’s been brutalized by livestock for far too long.
Green Mountain grazing decision [...]
Continue Reading →(7/1) Judge Molloy Denies Proposed Intervenors’ Stay and Reconsideration Motions – Hearing Set on Motion for Summary Judgement
Safari Club and the NRA jointly filed a Motion for Reconsideration of Judge Molloy’s previous order denying the groups intervenor status in the litigation. Asking the judge to reconsider is a procedural requirement if the groups wish to appeal to [...]
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