Bighorn Sheep
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Because of litigation by the Biodiversity Conservation Alliance challenging the US Forest Service over its decision to allow domestic sheep grazing in occupied bighorn sheep habitat in Wyoming, state Senator Larry Hicks has proposed a plan to remove or kill bighorn sheep to protect domestic sheep grazing. This shows the stunning depths that woolgrowers are…
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With little hope that they will prevail in Idaho District Court people are asking why the Idaho Wool Growers Association, American Sheep Industry Association, Public Lands Council, and sheep ranchers from Wyoming and Colorado have begun litigation now. According to the latest gossip, the woolgrowers hope for a Romney Administration in 2013. The woolgrowers think that,…
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After numerous humiliating defeats on whether to allow sheep grazing on the Payette National Forest, woolgrowers are going back to court to argue that domestic sheep don’t transmit deadly pneumonia to bighorn sheep. Idaho Wool Growers Association, American Sheep Industry Association, Public Lands Council, and sheep ranchers from Wyoming and Colorado have filed a suit…
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It all started with a letter in 1997 to Stan Boyd, the Executive Director of the Idaho Woolgrowers Association (IWGA). The letter, written on the letterhead of the Wallowa Whitman National Forest, was asking for the support of the IWGA for the reintroduction of bighorn sheep to parts Hells Canyon. In turn, the signatories stated they would…
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The Idaho Statesman reports that Mike Simpson has withdrawn the rider which would have prevented the BLM and US Forest Service from addressing the ongoing issue of disease transmission from domestic sheep to bighorn sheep and would have bypassed years of analysis and a long public process which generated 15,000 public comments. The rider would…
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Update: June 27, 2012 Congressman Mike Simpson has withdrawn his proposed new rider which the story below is about. He said he is going to try to bring people together in a roundtable soon. He also said his new rider had amplified the rhetoric on the issue which was not what he wanted. Ralph Maughan…
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This week there have been two significant developments for bighorn sheep in Idaho that relate to the closing of domestic sheep grazing in occupied bighorn habitat. Payette Decision Moves Forward First, in an unusual ruling from the bench, Judge B. Lynn Winmill ruled that the closing of three domestic sheep allotments on the Payette National…
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Politico‘s Pulitzer Prize winning editorial cartoonist Matt Wuerker weighs in on Idaho Rep. Mike Simpson’s use of a Congressional Rider to attempt to deny bighorn sheep protections on national forests in order to allow a few lone sheepman access to graze domestic sheep that transmit deadly disease to imperiled bighorns on National Forest public lands.