Currently viewing the category:
"Public Land Management"
Salmon-Challis National Forest said to not enforce grazing laws-
Boise. ID. When you drive or hike into this east central Idaho high country (Idaho’s highest mountains), you would expect to see pristine creeks. On the Salmon-Challis NF, however, one is usually disappointed. The creeks are sacrificed to appease local ranchers with tiny amounts of extra grass [...]
Continue Reading →On the mornings of Monday and Tuesday I attended the hearing in the House State Affairs Committee on HCR 21 and HCR 22. Testimony on the resolutions was interrupted when testimony for two other bills went longer than expected and the committee members were scheduled to be in the House chambers. The two resolutions involve [...]
Continue Reading →By George Wuerthner
State Fish and Game agencies are in the midst of a funding and mission crisis. They appear unable to adapt to shifting political and demographic changes much as the Republican Party is failing to adjust to new voter realities. The crisis is nowhere more evident than in their attitudes towards predators like [...]
Continue Reading →Last week Rep. Ken Ivory, R of West Jordan, Utah, came north to Idaho, up out of the smog (worst in the country), to tell Idaho’s lawmakers that they should make a play to take over the U.S. public lands like Utah has proposed to do.
(update) Judge says emergency closure by Montana wildlife commissioners with no public hearing might offend Montana’s Constitution and might deprive the public of the legal right to harvest wolves-
In a shock to wolf conservationists and to people who think Yellowstone Park is a special place, an American icon, local Montana Nels Swandal reopened hunting and [...]
Continue Reading →by George Wuerthner
Introduction
Livestock production is a contributing factor in the decline of many western species, including birds (Wuerthner and Matteson 2002). This is not surprising given the amount of land utilized for animal agriculture, including public and private lands. Approximately 578 million out of 1.9 billion acres in the West are grassland pasture [...]
Continue Reading →Yesterday the Desert Independent reported that on Election Day, after being asked about the treatment of wild horses and allegations made in a recent ProPublica article about the illegal sale of wild horses to a slaughter facility in Mexico, Secretary of Interior Ken Salazar turned to the reporter and said “If you set me up like [...]
Continue Reading →A big victory for conservation after years of political then legal wrangling-
For many years U.S. national forest users battled over development of those areas with no roads (“roadless areas”). As the more economically valuable roadless area were developed first, those that remained were usually developed only because of ever increasing federal subsidies. Roads in [...]
Continue Reading →I am the Lorax, I speak for the trees.
It seems more and more there are fewer conservation organizations who speak for the forest, and more that speak for the timber industry. Witness several recent commentaries in Oregon papers which are by no means unique. I’ve seen similar themes from other conservation groups in the [...]
Continue Reading →Fire burns into Montana, threatens U.S. 93, 9/3/12, 210,000 215,000 221,000 acres in size-
9/3-2012. Update: check with Inciweb for latest evacuations along or near U.S. Highway 93, North Fork, or in the Montana portion of the fire (such as Hughes Creek). These evacuation levels have been increased.
There are now 933 960 personnel, including [...]
Continue Reading →
