In the recent Public Lands legislation that was passed by Congress, Oregon got some new protected landscapes including the Devil’s Staircase Wilderness, 250 miles of new Wild and Scenic River segments on the Rogue and Molalla rivers and measures such as a mining ban on the Chetco River. This legislation was a good but a […]
Continue Reading →An article in the November 9th Bend Bulletin reported that due to low water reserves, the Bureau of Reclamation that controls water release from Prineville Reservoir may limit flows in the Crooked River to preserve water for irrigators to the detriment of fish and the Crooked River’s aquatic ecosystem. https://www.bendbulletin.com/localstate/6666523-151/low-flows-dry-winter-could-spell-trouble-for
In a previous low […]
Continue Reading →This editorial from Gary Burhue of the Oregon Farm Bureau was written in response to an earlier editorial I had written questioning the impoverishment of the Deschutes River by Ag water withdrawals. This editorial and a previous editorial from Coalition for the Deschutes leaves out critical information in an effort to defend the misuse of […]
Continue Reading →Here’s a piece by Senator Bob Packwood from the Eugene Register-Guard remembering the efforts to protect French Pete as part of the Three Sisters Wilderness.http://registerguard.com/rg/opinion/36532738-78/french-pete-birth-of-a-wilderness.html.csp
Probably most people visiting the Three Sisters Wilderness in Oregon today are unaware of the significance of the French Pete valley and its role in the overall wilderness preservation effort.
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Continue Reading →Recently I drove up the Lostine River corridor and hiked the trail in the Eaglecap Wilderness giving me a good opportunity to review a Forest Service proposal to log the river corridor.
The agency is using a stealth method of approving the proposed logging called a “Categorical Exclusion”. The CE allows the FS to proceed […]
Continue Reading →One result of the Bundy Gang take-over has been the abundant media attention to their assertions of government “overreach” and “aggressive enforcement“ of environmental regulations that, according to Bundy and Gang, has driven ranchers, miners, and loggers from the land. Unfortunately the media have been slow to counter such assertions.
The reality on the ground […]
Continue Reading →This fire was started just a few days ago (Aug 6), in mountains east of obscure Denio Junction in Nevada — the Trout Creek Mountains. It quickly spread north into Oregon, southward and eastward. Now it is over 270,000 acres, and a major source of interstate smoke. These are dry, mostly sagebrush and grass covered […]
Continue Reading →The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled against the many wolf advocacy groups who held that Congressman Mike Simpson’s and Senator Jon Tester’s budget rider, which delisted wolves in Idaho, Montana, and parts of Oregon, Washington, and Utah, was unconstitutional. The panel of judges upheld Judge Donald Mollloy’s ruling that the rider was constitutional.
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Continue Reading →Snake River Pack?
Although the wolf population in Oregon took a dip this year, packs continue to proliferate. Sneakcat reports one more pack* has been discovered and it has a pup. The pack is near Idaho close to and adjacent to the Snake River (the Idaho/Oregon border). According its tracks, it has at least 5 […]
Continue Reading →Demise of the Imnaha Pack is hardly the end of wolves in Oregon-
Sneakcat has a story on this cheerful news.
The Ochoco Mountains cover a large expanse of northcentral Oregon. They are not very high, but sprawl over a big area with many small drainages and […]
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