The Wildlife News

January 2007

  • Idaho’s White Clouds Wilderness Debate to Air on PBS Friday

    Ralph Maughan

    People are already debating it, the next go around in Congress for CIEDRA, the controversial White Clouds/Boulder Mountains Wilderness bill (with pay-offs to others). Todd Wilkinson has a good story on the PBS program and the issue in New West. Update Jan. 5. Given all the interest on this, I grabbed this from congressman Simpson’s…

  • Slickspot peppergrass

    Ralph Maughan

    “KT” has posted several times about slickspot peppergrass. I suppose some politicians guffaw when it is mentioned (names that sound unusual are not worth conserving, I suppose). Today the Western Watersheds Project website put up a good photo essay on slickspot peppergrass and the way the BLM lets it get ruined.

  • As Costs of Wildfires Grow, So Does a Question: Who Should Pay?

    Ralph Maughan

    This in the New York Times addresses a growing question because fighting wildfires costs more and more, and most of the cost is to protect structures that have been built, often knowingly, in areas that are very prone to natural fires. The debate echos that of who should pay for flood damage when people knowingly…

  • The real economy of Custer and Lemhi counties, Idaho

    Ralph Maughan

    Lemhi and Custer counties are two large sparsely populated counties in central Idaho. Many of the posts to this blog are about events that happen there. Politicians often like to argue that the folks there are some kind of “real Idaho” — loggers, miners, grazers. There is hardly anyone more strident in this position than…

  • Colorado fears blizzard may kill thousands of cattle.

    Ralph Maughan

    This is just in from the Denver Post. Effort to save cattle begins. By Steven K. Paulson. The Associated PressIn October 1997 a Colorado blizzard killed 26,000 head of cattle. It cost the owners over $28 million dollars. I said at the time, it would be a one week story. It was. Now something similiar…

  • More on the listing of the polar bear as "threatened"

    Ralph Maughan

    The Idaho Statesman has made a good compilation of recent newspaper editorials about the listing of the polar bear — the addition of the polar bear to the endangered species list. Story: Other Views: Polar bears and global warming. Idaho Statesman.

  • Energy/Ag Alliance In Wyoming Fractures Over Eminent Domain

    Ralph Maughan

    The power to condemn private property in the public interest (with just compensation, of course) is a fundamental power of government. Some states, including especially Wyoming, have actually allowed this fundamental power to be exercised by private entities, organizations that may very well not have the interest of the citizens of the state in mind.…

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‎”At some point we must draw a line across the ground of our home and our being, drive a spear into the land and say to the bulldozers, earthmovers, government and corporations, “thus far and no further.” If we do not, we shall later feel, instead of pride, the regret of Thoreau, that good but overly-bookish man, who wrote, near the end of his life, “If I repent of anything it is likely to be my good behaviour.”

Edward Abbey

“The continued existence of wildlife and wilderness is important to the quality of life of humans.”

Jim Fowler

“Our forests offer much more than just beautiful landscapes and wildlife. Each one has a different story to tell.”

Raveena Tandon

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