Two-hundred and fifty million acres of public lands need your help.
The Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resourcesis poised to move the so-calledGrazing Improvement Act of 2013 (S. 258) out to the floor, legitimizing this bad idea that is nothing more than an attempt to exclude conservation interests from public lands grazing management.
If […]
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 →SAGE GROUSE: PROXIMATE AND ULTIMATE CAUSES
When I was in college, one of my favorite courses was animal behavior. One of the more memorable lessons I learned was the difference between proximate and ultimate causes of behavior. Proximate and ultimate causes of events are important to distinguish.
For instance, say a researcher finds that sedimentation […]
Continue Reading →Meanwhile, the BLM sues rancher rather than remove trespass cattle from the Gold Butte allotment-
Last month it was reported that the BLM cancelled a roundup of trespass cattle on the Gold Butte/Bunkerville Allotment because they perceived a threat from Cliven Bundy who wrote to the company contracted to roundup and remove the trespass cattle saying […]
Continue Reading →A disgrace for the Salmon Challis National Forest
Basin Creek is a headwater tributary of the Little Lost River drainage in Idaho. It was home to bull trout and had a series of wet meadows which are in the process of eroding away and becoming biological wastelands.
Western Watersheds Project staff and supporters visited this […]
Continue Reading →NCBA complains about the use of “best available science” and the mandate to protect sensitive species.
In a news release published yesterday, the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) complained that the new proposed US Forest Planning Rule is too onerous to public lands ranching. In their press release they imply that science does […]
Continue Reading →On December 1st, at a presentation given by Bob Budd about the Wyoming Core Habitat Plan for sage grouse, it was pretty obvious that the livestock industry has things pretty much locked up with the agencies and politicians. The presentation was given in one of the big, new hearing rooms in the basement of the […]
Continue Reading →This morning the Idaho Statesman published the view of Margaret Soulen-Hinson, the President of the American Sheep Industry Association. The letter was a response to a letter submitted to the Idaho Statesman co-signed by John Gale, National Wildlife Federation; Rob Fraser, Idaho Wildlife Federation; Craig Gehrke, The Wilderness Society; John Robison, Idaho Conservation […]
Continue Reading →On September 14 and 15 Katie Fite and I visited the Miller Creek Allotment on the Mountain City Ranger District of the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest to check out the riparian areas there. What we found was just a horrible mess that any land manager should be embarrassed about enough to actually do something about but, […]
Continue Reading →Last week, Katie Fite and I travelled to Nevada to inspect several grazing allotments and attend a BLM meeting in Winnemucca and a BLM field trip in the Ely District. While passing through the Union Mountain Allotment in the Elko District we came across a series of water troughs which didn’t have the required wildlife […]
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