In early June, Katie Fite and I visited southeast Nevada to examine the results of past vegetation treatments meant to “restore” sage grouse habitat in the Schell Field Office of the Ely District BLM. What we found was quite astonishing. Rather than restoring sage grouse habitat, the BLM targeted the best sage grouse habitat, near […]
Continue Reading →Previous efforts to recovery pygmy rabbits to habitat in central Washington state have been conducted without success. Now, biologists hope that releasing more captive rabbits into the wild will mean greater success:
Pygmy Rabbits Face Possible Last Stand In Washington – OPB News
In north central Washington, scientists are trying once again to reintroduce […]
Continue Reading →This is what WWP calls “low hanging fruit”
For the last several years I have been appealing grazing decision issued by the Ely District of the BLM and, over and over again, the District only considers alternatives which maintain the status quo even when they have identified problems on the allotments that are either caused […]
Continue Reading →Salazar Strikes Again, Denying Meaningful Protection for Imperiled Tiny Bunny of the Sagebrush Sea
The declining condition of the Sagebrush Sea has been highlighted on a couple of occasions over the past couple of weeks. In recent Washington state news we learned that jackrabbits in sagebrush habitats are diminishing. Pygmy rabbits were rejected […]
Continue Reading →Federal government is a year overdue deciding whether to protect the smallest rabbit-
Group sues to force decision on pygmy rabbits. By Nicholas K. Geranios. Associated Press Writer
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Continue Reading →Scientific American slide show tells and shows seven species-
Slide Show: Rabbits at Risk. By Coco Ballantyne. Scientific American.
One of the rabbits in the slide show, the Columbia Basin pygmy, is now in fact extinct. Brian Ertz and KT have written much on this forum about its demise.
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Continue Reading →Bunnies, cowboys, culture, economics, demographics, the West
Can America’s West stay wild? Christian Science Monitor
Between 1970 and 2000, nonlabor jobs fueled 86 percent of this growth. Mining, timber, and agriculture (including ranching) contributed only 1 percent. Now, 93 percent of jobs in the West have no direct link to public lands, says Rasker. […]
Continue Reading →Thurston County Superior Court has ruled in favor of Dr. Steve Herman and Western Watersheds Project deciding that the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) violated the State Environmental Protection Act when issuing grazing permits on its state wildlife areas without undergoing environmental analysis. The state and Washington Cattleman’s Association had claimed that such […]
Continue Reading →This loss highlights the importance of genetic interchange and landscape-level habitat preservation
The Columbia Basin pygmy rabbit has been listed as endangered under the Endangered Species Act but efforts to restore the bunny have been unsuccesful. Even efforts at maintaining as much of the Columbia Basin ancestory/gene by interbreeding with Idaho pygmy rabbits are not […]
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