Ed. note: An earlier draft version of this post was inadvertently posted before final review. Please replace all prior copies with this final draft.
Last summer, in a remote corner of the Bighorn Mountains of Wyoming, in the one spot with just a little cell reception, I sat in my car listening by phone to […]
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Stream dried up for irrigation of livestock forage. Photo by George Wuerthner
Recently the Greater Yellowstone Coalition (GYC) announced they were working to reduce the wildlife impacts of fences. Not by removing the fences, but by changing the wire on them to facilitate easier wildlife passage. Fences, as GYC, noted […]
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The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has launched a massive juniper removal project in Idaho and plans to expand it throughout the Great Basin.
For instance, the BLM is also planning to destroy juniper woodlands in Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument.
Juniper is a common native species that grows in […]
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Western Watersheds Project (the organization that I am the Executive Director of), WildEarth Guardians and the Center for Biological Diversity are fighting the reinstatement of grazing on four allotments in eastern Oregon that are permitted to Hammond Ranches. In part, we argue that the Hammonds don’t have a great track record and are thus undeserving […]
Continue Reading →This past December 2018 the Bureau Field office of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) released a final Environmental Assessment for the Battle Creek, East Castle Creek, and Owens Allotments Grazing Permit Renewal, at least partially within the Little Jacks Creek Wilderness, part of the stunningly beautiful Owyhee Canyonlands Wilderness Complex in Idaho.
The BLM […]
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Reprinted from Waco Tribune-Herald March 9, 2019
By Steve Holmer, American Bird Conservancy
Wildlife experts concluded in 2015 that the Greater Sage-Grouse, an iconic bird of the West, did not require listing under the Endangered Species Act, thanks to then-new federal management plans with added conservation requirements. Many conservation groups, including American Bird […]
Continue Reading →Newly approved vegetation “treatment” project is questionable, expensive
News release. Western Watersheds Project
BOISE, Idaho — Today, the Bureau of Land Management approved a plan to log off or tear out native juniper trees from 617,000 acres of public land in Idaho. The agency will cut, shred, and burn juniper trees under the guise […]
Continue Reading →The Challis and Salmon BLM of central Idaho appear to be ready to destroy much of the sage grouse habitat in the Lemhi, Pahsimeroi, and Lost River valleys, ironically in the name of protecting sage grouse.
As an ecologist, and someone who has studied both sagebrush and sage-grouse ecology, I find the proposal to crush […]
Continue Reading →I wrote this letter to Dr. Naugle more than 10 days ago and have not received a response. It is worth noting that Dr. Naugle has gotten more than $4.5 million in grants to study sage grouse in the past few years. Could this influence his testimony?
Dear Dr. Naugle:
I just read your July […]
Continue Reading →This past winter, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) began preparing two Environmental Impact Statements to review the environmental of consequences creating a region-wide series of “fuel breaks” that will add thousands of miles of new linear non-sagebrush habitat across the Great Basin portion of Nevada, Idaho, Oregon and Utah.
The goal of fuel breaks […]
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