NEWS ROUNDUP
Bush order eases rules protecting wildlife in forests National forest managers will not have to adhere to strict wildlife protections that have been in place for more than two decades under a temporary rule issued yesterday by the Bush administration. Issued in 1982 by the Reagan administration, the viability requirement was often cited in lawsuits that forced the Forest Service to sharply reduce timber cutting in the Pacific Northwest and other regions with declining populations of owls and other animals. Forest Service spokesman Joseph Walsh said that there was confusion over the two rewrites and that the temporary directive, published yesterday in the Federal Register, was intended as a clarification. It states that until final regulations are issued, forest managers can follow the 1982 regulations if they wish but that they are "not in effect." Instead, it directs managers to base forest plans on "the best available science."....
Survivor recalls noise, impact of crash Jodee Hogg said she is ready to move on with her life after walking away from a plane crash last week in the Montana wilderness that killed three companions. Hogg, appearing Wednesday on ABC News' "Good Morning America," also said it's enough for her that authorities had apologized for initially believing all five on board the single-engine aircraft - a pilot and four Forest Service workers - had perished in the crash near Glacier National Park. Matthew Ramige, of Jackson, Wyo., also survived. "I'm ready to close the book and move on, and get my life started again," she said....
Jackson resort permitted more backcountry skiers The Bridger-Teton National Forest will allow Jackson Hole Mountain Resort to guide more than twice as many skiers in the backcountry this winter. The resort had been permitted to guide 300 backcountry skiers each winter, although the Forest Service routinely allowed the company to exceed that limit. Under the new permit, approved by District Ranger Nancy Hall, the resort would be guaranteed 721 skier days with an option for an additional 179 if the resort proves skier demand warrants it, the agency said Tuesday. The resort could guide up to 900 skiers total....
For the sixth time since 1990, Arizona voters are again being asked to approve land swaps By that definition, we've got some positively certifiable lawmakers up in Phoenix. For the sixth time in 14 years, legislators are asking Arizona voters to let the state back into the business of swapping State Trust Land. This time, the prop is picking up patriotic appeal by flying under the banner of the Military Base Preservation Initiative--a title that has environmental organizations, including the Sierra Club and the League of Conservation Voters, tossing around terms like "political deception" and "mislead the public."....
Mount St. Helens on Higher Eruption Alert Mount St. Helens could erupt within days, government scientists said on Wednesday, raising the alert after movement in the volcano's lava crust was detected following a week of small earthquakes. "We think that the likelihood of an eruption has increased," Cynthia Gardner, seismologist for the U.S. Geological Survey told reporters....
Reagan was right: Trees do cause smog Although scientists knew that trees contribute substantial amounts of VOCs to the atmosphere, the rate of increase in recent decades was previously unrecognized. ''If we don't understand what's going on with biogenic (plant-produced) VOCs, we are not going to be able to weigh different air-quality strategies properly,'' said Purves. ''It's a big enough part of the puzzle that it really needs to go in there with the rest.'' The study may help explain why ozone levels have not improved in some parts of the country as much as was anticipated with the enactment of clean-air laws, Purves said....
Recreation Group Says TRAIL Act Will Penalize Bad Behavior, Keep Public Lands Open Americans for Responsible Recreational Access (ARRA) said yesterday's passage by the U.S. House of Representatives of H.R. 3247, the TRAIL Act of 2004, represents an important victory for all who pursue recreation on public lands in a responsible manner. "This bill, for the first time, would provide for consistent penalties across all public lands agencies for those who would abuse our public lands," said ARRA Executive Director Larry E. Smith. "Instead of allowing those few who misbehave to deny opportunities to everyone, the TRAIL Act will make it possible to repair the damage, penalize the wrongdoers and keep our public lands open to all."....
Executive director of BlueRibbon Coalition resigns Clark Collins, an original founder of the Pocatello-based BlueRibbon Coalition, has reassumed the group's executive director role, following the recent resignation of Bill Dart. Dart was cited with outfitting without a license Aug. 20 when a Forest Service officer reportedly caught him giving a motorcycle tour to an unknown number of clients in the Sawtooth National Forest. After initially being placed on indefinite administrative leave, he announced his resignation Sept. 24....
Forest residents told to leave Within the Angeles National Forest, Larry Bartlett and his neighbors stand guard against fires, littering and loitering. Now they are waiting out an order by the U.S. Forest Service to leave their homes in the forest, most of which was closed to the public Monday until the intense fire danger subsides. Last Friday, a dozen residents who live in a cluster of historical log cabins inside the North Trail Canyon near Tujunga said they were notified by telephone they had 48 hours to leave or face a fine of $5,000. But they are refusing, awaiting official eviction notices. At that point they will decide whether to leave or to fight to stay....
No to plea for squirrel species The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has turned down another petition to list the Western gray squirrel for protection under the Endangered Species Act, the agency said yesterday. A petition filed in December 2002 by the Institute for Wildlife Protection, based in Eugene, Ore., asked the Fish and Wildlife Service to name all Western gray squirrels as endangered, not just the Washington population as other recent petitions and lawsuits have asked....
Wolves killing more domestic animals in Wisconsin Timber wolves are killing more domestic animals in Wisconsin as the population has steadily grown to nearly 400 wolves, a state wolf expert says. So far this year, there have been 21 confirmed cases of wolves killing livestock on farms compared with 14 in all of 2003 and eight in 2002, said Adrian Wydeven, head of the state Department of Natural Resources' wolf management program....
Tree-sit removals draw crowd to courthouse steps About 50 logging activists gathered at the Humboldt County Courthouse as two of their peers were scheduled to check into jail for brief stays. They were greeted with honks from passing cars, and passed by log trucks escorted by Eureka Police Department motorcycles. In August, protesters boarded a log truck and blocked traffic, but Tuesday's demonstration was mellow. Activists Matt Dicks and Kim Starr were sentenced to 10 and 15 days in county jail last week for disturbing the peace and blocking access to Palco property in Southern Humboldt....
'Slobs' force officials to kill grizzly A grizzly bear had to be killed Wednesday after it became accustomed to human food and being in close contact with people. The young female grizzly spent weeks hanging around the Eagle Creek trailhead along the North Fork of the Shoshone River, just east of the East Entrance to Yellowstone National Park. The bear regularly fed on horse grain and human food that was carelessly left out by people, according to Chris Servheen, the scientist in charge of grizzly recovery for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. "If people are going to keep acting like slobs, we're going to have to keep killing bears," Servheen said....
New Agreement Preserving Bowhunting Tradition The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service today signed a four-year agreement with the Archery Trade Association, the Bowhunting Preservation Alliance, and Arrowsport to increase archery and bowhunting opportunities, building on bowhunters' continued support for wildlife conservation. "This is another example where the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is strengthening partnerships with the hunting community," Service Director Steve Williams said....
Alaska weighs ban on hunters luring bears with food Stale doughnuts, lard, honey-drenched dog food – is this any kind of meal for a wild Alaska bear? No, say activists promoting a ballot initiative that would outlaw the controversial practice of bear baiting in Alaska, one of the many states where bear are hunted....
$26-Million Deal Will Save 8,800 Acres of Fragile Desert An 8,800-acre swath of fragile desert wilderness in the Coachella Valley — which helps to sustain palm oases, sand dunes and the endangered desert tortoise — will be preserved under a $26-million land deal finalized last week by the Nature Conservancy. The acquisition of the Joshua Hills increases the Coachella Valley Preserve by nearly 50%. It also ensures a sand source for the dunes below and forms a link for bighorn sheep, bobcats and kit foxes traveling from Joshua Tree National Park to the valley....
Park's ecosystem at risk, EPA admits The Environmental Protection Agency has acknowledged that nitrogen pollution is harming Rocky Mountain National Park, and administrator Mike Leavitt says he wants to move quickly to fix the problem. Airborne pollutants from Front Range tailpipes, smokestacks, crop fields and feedlots are damaging the park's prized mountaintop ecosystems. If unchecked, the creeping accumulation of urban nitrogen compounds could acidify park waters and soils, posing a threat to fish, forests and alpine tundra, according to park researchers. The problem is known as nitrogen deposition....
Snowmobile protest in D.C. is banned What's good for the goose isn't always good for the gander, an environmental group has found. Campaign to Protect America's Lands wanted to demonstrate the commotion 11 snowmobiles make by parking them outside the nation's Capitol. But the National Park Service denied the group a permit to do so inside Simon Bolivar Park, which is located across the main entrance to the U.S. Department of Interior. The group claims it was denied a permit because snowmobiles aren't considered an acceptable use in D.C....
Bush Administration Sits on Revised Video Until After Election In order to edit out filmed scenes of gay and abortion rights demonstrations that occurred at the Lincoln Memorial, the Bush Administration has spent more than a year and nearly $200,000 making two new versions of a video, according to agency records released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). In November 2003, under pressure from conservative religious groups, the Park Service announced that it would alter an eight-minute video containing photos and footage of demonstrations and other events taking place at the Lincoln Memorial....
Editorial: BLM and OHVs Trying to be fair," is how Rex Smart, manager of the Kanab Bureau of Land Management field office, characterizes his plan to designate some trails in the Vermilion Cliffs area for off-highway vehicles and to make others off-limits. But fairness is only part of the equation. BLM managers must also act quickly as they weigh the often-devastating effects of uncontrolled OHV use on Utah's natural outdoor treasures and the complex issue of how the delicate ecosystems of the state's deserts and mountains can survive and co-exist with OHV users and non-motorized recreationists. Smart's office is responding to a petition from the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, but BLM managers shouldn't wait for conservationists to prod them before taking action to protect public lands....
'Who Owns the West?' You Do! Anti-development groups such as the Environmental Working Group (EWG) seek to block development of domestic supplies of clean-burning natural gas. In a recent report EWG presents myths instead of facts in hopes of scaring policy- makers, media and the public and prevent developing energy resources on Western lands -- non-park, non-wilderness public lands designated to serve, and be used by, all Americans. Here is a top-line look at some of the myths in the report, and the facts available from government, industry and third-party sources....
Bison hunt scaled down A proposed bison hunt in Montana is likely to get a lot smaller, according to the regional manager for the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks. Hunting in the West Yellowstone area is no longer on the table, FWP regional manager Pat Flowers said, because of the potential for conflict with annual bison hazing operations there....
Refinery report becomes environmental hot potato A government advisory panel has delayed releasing a report on ways to boost U.S. oil refining capacity, and one source familiar with the report attributed that to the Bush administration wanting to avoid a fight over environmental regulations before the national elections. The report by the National Petroleum Council to Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham had been scheduled for release on Thursday and was eagerly awaited by the oil industry, which saw U.S. crude oil prices hit a record $50.47 a barrel this week....
Russian cabinet set to approve Kyoto accord After years of wavering, the Russian government is expected to take concrete steps today toward ratifying the Kyoto climate-change accord, something that would bring the pact into legal force for its 120 signatory nations. Both the state-run Itar-Tass news agency and the more independent Interfax news service carried reports yesterday quoting unnamed government sources who believed President Vladimir Putin's cabinet would approve the accord at a meeting today and pass it on to the State Duma, the lower house of parliament, for ratification....
Drought shrinking jewels of the desert Lake Powell is enormous, but five years of drought have sapped it badly. It's less than half full and down 130 feet. And so the launch ramp at Wahweap, a lakeside resort, ended on dry land. The lake level is still falling — 21 inches a week. So the National Park Service, which extended the ramp 300 feet in 2003, extended it again this month. "Chasing the water," park service staffers call it....
Abandoned Mines Threaten West's Waterways More than a century ago, this wild stretch of mountain and rock was one of the richest mining areas on Earth. Tons of zinc, silver and lead were extracted. Colorado's largest chunk of gold was found here -- a 13-pound nugget named "Tom's Baby." The mines are still producing, but it's a product no one wants. Bright orange water runs from open shafts into tributaries of the Blue River, one of the state's major trout fisheries. Great piles of waste rock, or mine tailings, stand 80 feet high and extend for 30 acres in all directions. Just beneath the surface, tunnels full of poisonous gas honeycomb the mountains, reaching under the nearby town of Breckenridge....
Professor goes West to study dam removal A geology professor from Western Carolina University will spend the next few months in Olympic National Park in Washington attempting to gauge the impact of the nation’s largest dam removal project on water quality in what was once one of the Pacific Northwest’s most productive salmon rivers. A $182 million federally funded plan to restore the Elwha River, the largest watershed in Olympic National Park, will result in the removal of two dams — the 108-foot-tall Elwha Dam and the 210-foot Glines Canyon Dam. The project, set to begin in 2007, is designed to re-establish the salmon fishery in the Elwha River and restore the river’s delta area to its original sandy coastal environment....
Editorial: The Hetch Hetchy fantasy BUILDING A DAM in Yosemite Park would never happen today. But more than 80 years ago, San Francisco filled the Hetch Hetchy Valley to create a water-and-power system that now serves 2.4 million people in the Bay Area. Does it make sense to tear down O'Shaughnessy Dam today? Only if dozens of questions over water purity, water rights, drought years, electricity, politics and a monumental bill can be answered. The conservation group Environmental Defense wants to take out the dam and restore a spectacular, granite-faced Sierra valley. It's an inspiring goal, advocated by no less than John Muir, who fought the dam in the 1920s....
The Saints’ Fence Horace Greeley, noted newspaperman and proponent of westward migration, had two hard and fast rules when it came to colonization — no rum, and no fences. Mr. Greeley, it seemed, had authored a book titled “What I Know of Farming,” in which he championed the European practice of herding cattle instead of fencing them, whether out or in. In retrospect, the newspaperman apparently knew a lot more about newspapers than he did about livestock....
End of an era as drive-in screen comes down With a thud and a cloud of dust, the drive-in theater era in Fallon ended with the dismantling of the old Roper Drive-In screen. The decrepit screen was leaning perilously forward, and it fell Sept. 25 at the hands of a contractor. What's left is an empty lot, a few speaker poles and memories of hot summer nights in the minds of many long-time Fallon residents. The Roper Drive-In was constructed in the summer of 1954, said Bob Erickson, current owner of Fallon Theatres and former owner of the drive-in. The famous sheep rancher Walt Whitaker first opened the theater as a business venture and operated it with various partners until the theater closed in 1978, according to the Churchill County Museum....
Thursday, September 30, 2004
Wednesday, September 29, 2004
NEWS ROUNDUP
George Bush Vs. John Kerry: The Field & Stream Interviews This much we know: The next President of the United States will be a sportsman. Whether it’s George W. Bush or John F. Kerry, each claims that hunting and fishing have been an integral part of his life. President Bush is a bass man. Senator Kerry is a saltwater fisherman. Both like to hunt birds. No matter where you stand on the political spectrum, this should come as very good news. Beyond that, of course, it gets complicated....
Activists Sue Over Calif. Forest Plan Environmental groups sued the U.S. Forest Service on Tuesday, claiming a six-year-old federal law aimed at preventing wildfires has degenerated into a backdoor effort to eventually increase logging across 340,000 acres of Sierra Nevada national forests. The federal lawsuit challenges the Forest Service's effort to log 6,400 acres over five years in the Plumas National Forest west of Quincy, where a coalition of loggers and local conservationists once met to propose what eventually became national fire-prevention policy....
House OKs forest-health youth jobs program Walden, who chairs the Resources Subcommittee on Forests and Forest Health, introduced the Healthy Forest Youth Conservation Corps Act to give young adults ages 16 to 25 the opportunity to obtain skills and valuable education in forestland management while conducting work in fuels reduction projects on federal forestlands. Projects will be directed at efforts to prevent catastrophic fire and rehabilitate public land affected or altered by fires. Most notably, work will be done in accordance with HFRA plans to reduce hazardous fuels. Young adults participating in the corps will be managed by the agency in charge of the given forestland, namely the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Land Management or the U.S. Forest Service, part of the Department of Agriculture. The managing agency can contract directly with youth, or they can enter into contracts with state-level departments of natural resources, agriculture or forestry....
Restraining order requested in prairie dog case Eight groups that have sued to prevent federal agencies from starting a program to poison and shoot black-tailed prairie dogs on federal land in southwestern South Dakota have asked a judge for a temporary restraining order. Last month, U.S. Interior Secretary Gale Norton removed prairie dogs from the list of candidates being considered for designation as endangered species, allowing states to take more steps to control prairie dogs....
BLM plans roundups, birth control for wild horses near Cody Federal land managers plan roundups and birth control measures next month to reduce an overpopulated wild horse herd near Cody. The goal is reduce the McCullough Peaks wild horse herd by some 400 animals to achieve a more manageable level of between 70 and 140 animals, according to the Bureau of Land Management. The agency also plans to use birth control methods to help stabilize and improve the health and genetic viability of wild horse herds, while also maintaining a healthy ecosystem, BLM officials said....
Next best delisting However, the "second best thing" to delisting could be in place by early next year, according to Ed Bangs, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's wolf recovery team leader. FWS is now revising what's known as the 10J rule, in order to pass along much of its authority to decide when and where to kill problem-causing wolves to the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks. The new rule would let ranchers shoot wolves they see chasing livestock on private land. Doing so is illegal now. People with grazing permits on federal land would also get more leeway, and FWP would be able, under certain circumstances, to kill wolves causing unacceptable impacts to wildlife populations such as deer and elk....
Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch Linn Blancett pulls his pickup truck to a stop and lets out a weary sigh. "You see that area there," he says, pointing to a patch of land that borders a well pad pumping out gas, the surface once covered with grass now bare. "That's supposed to be reseeded." We are in the northwest corner of New Mexico, a few miles from the Colorado border, in the heart of the San Juan Basin, a bowl-shaped, 7,500-square-mile expanse that sits atop one of the largest natural-gas reserves in the country. Linn Blancett and his wife, Tweeti, have been running cattle here for much of their lives. Their ranch stretches across 32,000 acres of mostly federal land, hilly, high-desert terrain where the Blancetts first settled as homesteaders six generations ago, back in the 1870s. On this morning, though, several hours into our trek across the range, we've yet to spot any cattle. What we have seen plenty of are roads, pipelines and drilling rigs....
Small explosion at St. Helens possible within days A small explosion of rocks, ash and steam could occur within the next few days within the crater of Mount St. Helens, where earthquake activity has been steadily building for nearly a week, scientists said Tuesday. "It could certainly happen today; it might not happen for weeks or months," said seismologist Seth Moran of the U.S. Geological Survey's Cascade Volcano Observatory. He added that the likelihood of a significant eruption "is fairly small."....
Gates Close for Good at Ponderosa Ranch The old, if fictional, homestead has closed for good. The Ponderosa Ranch, made famous in the 1960s television program Bonanza, entertained its last visitors Sunday. The 548-acre ranch, located on a hill above Incline Village at the north end of Lake Tahoe, was sold to a developer in July. A Western theme park since 1967, the ranch provided several backdrops, including the horse stables, used in the Bonanza television series....
Rodeo's rumor mill churning Rodeo, much like auto racing, is also rife with rumors. The latest rumor blowing up cell phones among cowboys and cowgirls is possible changes for the National Finals Rodeo. The NFR has been in existence since 1959 with basically the same format. Each performance features the top 10 qualifiers in each event for 10 rounds of competition. The cowboy or cowgirl with the most money won at the end of the year is crowned world champion....
George Bush Vs. John Kerry: The Field & Stream Interviews This much we know: The next President of the United States will be a sportsman. Whether it’s George W. Bush or John F. Kerry, each claims that hunting and fishing have been an integral part of his life. President Bush is a bass man. Senator Kerry is a saltwater fisherman. Both like to hunt birds. No matter where you stand on the political spectrum, this should come as very good news. Beyond that, of course, it gets complicated....
Activists Sue Over Calif. Forest Plan Environmental groups sued the U.S. Forest Service on Tuesday, claiming a six-year-old federal law aimed at preventing wildfires has degenerated into a backdoor effort to eventually increase logging across 340,000 acres of Sierra Nevada national forests. The federal lawsuit challenges the Forest Service's effort to log 6,400 acres over five years in the Plumas National Forest west of Quincy, where a coalition of loggers and local conservationists once met to propose what eventually became national fire-prevention policy....
House OKs forest-health youth jobs program Walden, who chairs the Resources Subcommittee on Forests and Forest Health, introduced the Healthy Forest Youth Conservation Corps Act to give young adults ages 16 to 25 the opportunity to obtain skills and valuable education in forestland management while conducting work in fuels reduction projects on federal forestlands. Projects will be directed at efforts to prevent catastrophic fire and rehabilitate public land affected or altered by fires. Most notably, work will be done in accordance with HFRA plans to reduce hazardous fuels. Young adults participating in the corps will be managed by the agency in charge of the given forestland, namely the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Land Management or the U.S. Forest Service, part of the Department of Agriculture. The managing agency can contract directly with youth, or they can enter into contracts with state-level departments of natural resources, agriculture or forestry....
Restraining order requested in prairie dog case Eight groups that have sued to prevent federal agencies from starting a program to poison and shoot black-tailed prairie dogs on federal land in southwestern South Dakota have asked a judge for a temporary restraining order. Last month, U.S. Interior Secretary Gale Norton removed prairie dogs from the list of candidates being considered for designation as endangered species, allowing states to take more steps to control prairie dogs....
BLM plans roundups, birth control for wild horses near Cody Federal land managers plan roundups and birth control measures next month to reduce an overpopulated wild horse herd near Cody. The goal is reduce the McCullough Peaks wild horse herd by some 400 animals to achieve a more manageable level of between 70 and 140 animals, according to the Bureau of Land Management. The agency also plans to use birth control methods to help stabilize and improve the health and genetic viability of wild horse herds, while also maintaining a healthy ecosystem, BLM officials said....
Next best delisting However, the "second best thing" to delisting could be in place by early next year, according to Ed Bangs, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's wolf recovery team leader. FWS is now revising what's known as the 10J rule, in order to pass along much of its authority to decide when and where to kill problem-causing wolves to the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks. The new rule would let ranchers shoot wolves they see chasing livestock on private land. Doing so is illegal now. People with grazing permits on federal land would also get more leeway, and FWP would be able, under certain circumstances, to kill wolves causing unacceptable impacts to wildlife populations such as deer and elk....
Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch Linn Blancett pulls his pickup truck to a stop and lets out a weary sigh. "You see that area there," he says, pointing to a patch of land that borders a well pad pumping out gas, the surface once covered with grass now bare. "That's supposed to be reseeded." We are in the northwest corner of New Mexico, a few miles from the Colorado border, in the heart of the San Juan Basin, a bowl-shaped, 7,500-square-mile expanse that sits atop one of the largest natural-gas reserves in the country. Linn Blancett and his wife, Tweeti, have been running cattle here for much of their lives. Their ranch stretches across 32,000 acres of mostly federal land, hilly, high-desert terrain where the Blancetts first settled as homesteaders six generations ago, back in the 1870s. On this morning, though, several hours into our trek across the range, we've yet to spot any cattle. What we have seen plenty of are roads, pipelines and drilling rigs....
Small explosion at St. Helens possible within days A small explosion of rocks, ash and steam could occur within the next few days within the crater of Mount St. Helens, where earthquake activity has been steadily building for nearly a week, scientists said Tuesday. "It could certainly happen today; it might not happen for weeks or months," said seismologist Seth Moran of the U.S. Geological Survey's Cascade Volcano Observatory. He added that the likelihood of a significant eruption "is fairly small."....
Gates Close for Good at Ponderosa Ranch The old, if fictional, homestead has closed for good. The Ponderosa Ranch, made famous in the 1960s television program Bonanza, entertained its last visitors Sunday. The 548-acre ranch, located on a hill above Incline Village at the north end of Lake Tahoe, was sold to a developer in July. A Western theme park since 1967, the ranch provided several backdrops, including the horse stables, used in the Bonanza television series....
Rodeo's rumor mill churning Rodeo, much like auto racing, is also rife with rumors. The latest rumor blowing up cell phones among cowboys and cowgirls is possible changes for the National Finals Rodeo. The NFR has been in existence since 1959 with basically the same format. Each performance features the top 10 qualifiers in each event for 10 rounds of competition. The cowboy or cowgirl with the most money won at the end of the year is crowned world champion....
Tuesday, September 28, 2004
NEWS ROUNDUP
Scientists watching unusual events near volcano A series of unusual earthquakes near Mount St. Helens in recent days has scientists warning that something more serious could be imminent. The "hazardous event" the U.S. Geological Survey warns is possible could be an explosion caused by steam building up inside the volcano, or it could be more serious -- involving molten rock and deadly gas....
Mount St. Helens: Scientists in a scramble Small earthquakes rattled Mount St. Helens at the rate of one or two a minute yesterday, and seismologists were scrambling to determine the significance of some of the most intense seismic activity in nearly 20 years. Early tests of gas samples collected above the volcano by helicopter yesterday did not show unusually high levels of carbon dioxide or sulfur. "This tells us that we are probably not yet seeing magma moving up in the system," said Jeff Wynn, chief scientist with the U.S. Geological Survey in Vancouver, Wash. He noted additional tests are necessary to better define whether there's magma moving under the mountain's crater....
School fences out bears Construction of a bear fence at Valley School will be a community project Oct. 2. After several recent bear sightings, including two on the steps of the teacher's cabin Monday night, Sept. 13, the Forest Service gave the school permission to build the fence. Teacher Audra Morrow, who lives in a cabin next to the school on the upper South Fork, didn't see the two grizzlies at first. "I walked right past the door and didn't notice them, but my dog went crazy," she said. "I looked out and expected to see people, but there were two bears."...
The Nature Conservancy and Partners Complete Acquisition of Baca Ranch After more than a decade of work to conserve the 151-square mile Baca Ranch, The Nature Conservancy today announced it had completed the last of a complex set of real estate transactions, clearing the way for the protection of the ranch and the designation of the nation's newest national park, the Great Sand Dunes National Park. Upon closing the Baca Ranch transaction, the Conservancy transferred management responsibility for 27,000 acres of land within the designated national park boundaries to the National Park Service. The Conservancy will continue to manage the remainder of the Baca lands in partnership with the U.S. Department of the Interior pending a final $3.4 million federal appropriation. Once the remaining monies are appropriated, the full ownership of the ranch will be transferred to the National Park Service, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and USDA Forest Service to create the Baca National Wildlife Refuge and expand the existing Rio Grande National Forest....
Putting Out Fires At 8:15 a.m. on a day in mid-August, Rick Ochoa, the top weatherman at the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC) in Boise, Idaho, walks into a briefing room filled with personnel from the multiple federal agencies that staff the center. As he does every morning during the peak spring and summer fire season, he provides a detailed weather report for the entire country on a floor-to-ceiling screen. But unlike the forecasts on nightly TV, Ochoa's zeroes in on weather conditions of little interest to laymen but of key importance to firefighting agencies. He talks about relative drought and the presence of "dry" thunderstorms, which can spark and then help spread a fire....
Feds may add toad to roster Colorado's only alpine toad, the forest-dwelling boreal toad, would be added to the U.S. Endangered Species List under a proposal about to be submitted by federal wildlife officials. Listing the toad would strengthen protections for the warty 4-inch amphibian, whose numbers have plummeted in the last 20 years, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist said Monday. But some state wildlife officials say the federal designation is unnecessary and could create burdensome land-use restrictions, especially on U.S. Forest Service property above 7,000 feet....
West Nile bald eagle deaths confirmed Bald eagles face a new threat this year, but humans and toxins are not the culprits. The University’s Raptor Center confirmed that the West Nile virus killed four male bald eagles in the Minnesota and Wisconsin area last week, and the number could keep climbing. Professor and Raptor Center Director Patrick Redig said he is “reasonably certain” another bald eagle in the center will test positive for the virus. The virus is transmitted from mosquitoes and can cause death in humans and animals....
Fish list grows crowded Another federally protected fish could be entering the fight for Klamath Basin water. Seven hundred and six miles of streams and 33,939 acres of lakes and marshes around Oregon were designated as critical habitat for the threatened bull trout last week. All of the lakes and marshes are in the Klamath Basin. Federal officials are still trying to determine what the impact could be on the other protected fishes, two species of endangered suckers and the threatened coho salmon, and on the Klamath Irrigation Project....
The American River's Hidden Fish Kill The Klamath River fish kill of September 2002, when 68,000 salmon died because of low, warm water conditions on the lower river, is considered the largest of its kind in U.S. history. However, another "hidden fish kill" that took place on the American River in the fall of 2001, 2002 and 2003 is now vying for this dubious distinction. Only a few short miles from the Caliornia State Capitol, huge numbers of adult chinook salmon return from the ocean to spawn. But 181,709 of these fish recently perished before spawning. River advocates and fishery biologists blame the fish kills on poor water management by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and on the continuing lack of flow and water temperature standards on the American, while federal officials claim that they are forced to balance the needs of different users in managing the river....
Two conservation groups sue over wildflower habitat Two conservation groups have made good on their promise to sue the Department of Interior over what they say is its failure to follow through in protecting two endangered plant species in the St. George area. The Tucson, Ariz.-based Center for Biological Diversity and the Utah Native Plant Society on Monday filed a federal complaint in Washington to force the Bush Administration to provide "critical habitat" for the Holmgren milkvetch and the Shivwits milkvetch - a pair of nearly extinct wildflowers found only in the Mojave Desert near the Utah-Arizona border. The two plant species are in the path of a planned freeway interchange and roadway in St. George's south corridor that would link the city with its proposed new airport and a planned community....
Judge questions plan on dams The Bush administration's dismissal of dam removal as an option for restoring salmon has been met with skepticism by the federal judge overseeing the protection of the fish. At issue is a draft plan by federal authorities for balancing the needs of salmon against the demand for electricity, irrigation water and barge transportation provided by dams in Oregon, Washington and Idaho. U.S. District Judge James Redden has raised several questions about the legal and scientific footing for the plan and will lay out his concerns at a status conference Tuesday with government lawyers and those for conservation groups and American Indian tribes....
Group urges feds to let locals lead on sage grouse The rapid growth of state and local conservation efforts aimed at preserving the Greater Sage Grouse --which wildlife experts say is the species' best chance for long-term success -- will be reversed dramatically if the federal government commandeers these efforts through an Endangered Species Act listing. So said the Partnership for the West coalition in recent testimony to the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works Subcommittee on Fisheries, Wildlife, and Water....
Politics skew park budgets The Cuyahoga River in Cleveland caught on fire in 1969, or at least the pollution in it did. But it has been cleaned up, and Congress even made its scenic upstream valley a national park in 1974. But that park isn't well-known nationally, and few faraway families would plan summer vacations specifically to see it. Still, the Cuyahoga park has a bigger base budget ($9.5 million this year) than some of the true icons of the park system, including Grand Teton National Park ($9.35 million), Mount Rainier National Park ($9.29 million), Utah's Lake Powell ($9.28 million) and Zion National Park ($6 million) among many others. Why? "I believe it's politics," said former Rep. Jim Hansen, R-Utah, who served in Congress for 22 years and retired as chairman of the House Resources Committee....
EPA seeks stricter park snowmobile plan The Environmental Protection Agency is urging the National Park Service to change its latest proposal for snowmobiling in Yellowstone National Park to reduce the amount of pollution emitted by the machines. Scaling back emissions could mean changing the type or number of snowmobiles that are allowed into the park, according to an EPA official....
Park Service Retiree Group Wades Into Political Waters This is not the kind of group you would want as your enemy. Its members have experience, political savvy and an insider's knowledge of how the place is run. They also aren't afraid to talk. Call them the AARP of the National Park Service. The Coalition of Concerned National Park Service Retirees is a newcomer to the phalanx of interest groups in the nation's capital, but it has managed to leverage its influence by disclosing leaked internal memos, taking its case to Capitol Hill and zeroing in on key regulatory issues that the Bush administration has on its agenda for park management....
Environmental groups urge more study of drilling plans Environmental groups want the government to take a much harder look at EnCana Oil & Gas Co.'s plans to drill more than 1,200 natural-gas wells on 17,000 acres in western Colorado. The federal Bureau of Land Management released an environmental assessment of the plans in July, but the environmental groups say a more detailed environmental impact statement should be done. EnCana plans to drill the wells from 120 well pads. It would build 62 miles of roads, 71 miles of pipeline and two compressor stations in the area about 30 miles southwest of Meeker and 160 miles west of Denver....
BLM proposes wind turbine to help power new building A 120-foot-tall wind turbine could reduce by about 25 percent the electricity bill at the U.S. Bureau of Land Management's new Rawlins Field Office. The 20-kilowatt wind turbine would generate about 330,000 kilowatt hours per year, worth about $15,000 at current rates....
Hunters, environmentalists protest federal land swap A controversial bill sponsored by U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski that would trade federal land to two Native corporations in the Berners Bay region near Juneau has raised the ire of some Alaska hunters, and Monday they called the bill "plain wrongheaded." The trade, known as the Cape Fox Land Exchange, would give two Southeast Native corporations up to 12,000 acres of federal land around the popular recreation area of Berners Bay near Juneau. The corporations, Sealaska and Cape Fox, would give up other land and mineral rights in Southeast....
Column - Cheaper vs. cleaner: big differences Consider two recent news items: oil prices creeping up toward $50 a barrel and Antarctic glaciers breaking up into icebergs at an accelerated pace, probably due to global warming. They may not seem related. And with war in Iraq and the economy topping the list of election concerns, energy and the environment aren't exactly front-page political news. But the two overlap considerably. And while they may not rank as top-tier issues among voters, they resonate deeply and personally for millions of Americans - including many who've yet to make up their minds whom to vote for....
Even some foes cheer Bush for new diesel-pollution rules While environmentalists and many Democrats in Congress consistently disparaged the Bush administration's clean-air record, one of the president's most far-reaching achievements went largely unheralded. Bush agreed to cut diesel pollution 90 percent in everything from tractors and construction equipment to lawnmowers, forklifts and diesel generators. The administration also forced the refining industry to reduce sulfur — the primary ingredient in ozone pollution — in fuel by 99 percent....
Bush cut some diesel pollution but let big ships keep spewing Through a filament of haze they emerge: containerships long enough to ferry the Space Needle, some belching as much exhaust as 12,000 cars, cutting through the bay toward the ports of Los Angeles/Long Beach. During a decade in which scientists learned diesel pollution was even worse for our health than once thought, Murphy's agency made an astounding discovery: Ocean-going ships that cruised past Santa Barbara's coast each year emitted more smog-forming pollution than all vehicles on the county's roads combined....
Roslyn hires consultant to research water rights The small town of Roslyn on the Eastern slope of the Cascades has hired a consultant to research new water rights after the town's irrigation district shut off the spigot this summer. Roslyn, which was built in 1886 as a mining town, is a junior water rights holder in the Roza Irrigation District. During the dry summer months, residents were forced to conserve water when the district shut off the domestic water supply for the first time. In years past the district had threatened to reduce the amount of water the city received, but never made good on those threats. This was the first time Roslyn was ever cut off from its domestic water supply, said Mayor Jeri Porter....
Environmentalists dream of restoring Yosemite's Hetch Hetchy Valley Of all the battles waged over natural resources in California, perhaps none is bolder, or more romantic, than a campaign by environmentalists to tear down a dam in Yosemite National Park that has provided water and electricity to much of Northern California for 80 years. A report released Monday by Environmental Defense is the latest attempt to sway public opinion in favor of draining Hetch Hetchy Valley and restoring to nature what conservationist John Muir called Yosemite Valley's little brother - a "precious mountain temple" and "grand landscape garden" that now lies 300 feet under water. The authors of the report, "Paradise Regained," argue that water quality, supply and storage, as well as power generation, could be maintained if the Hetch Hetchy Valley, in the Sierra Nevada mountains about 160 miles east of San Francisco, were drained and restored. The study proposes a variety of alternative water and power sources for the San Francisco Bay area and the Central Valley if the O'Shaughnessy Dam were taken down....
It's All Trew: Whetstone was also an important tool According to Roy Underhill, author of "The Woodwright's Companion," the smaller and sharper the sand particles the better the whetstone. As metal is rubbed across the stone, the particles are dulled and glazed over with the metal removed during sharpening. Oil or water must be added to flush away the dulled sand particles and surplus metal. This explanation is important as it helps explain why the whetstone requires special care and storage by owners. Our family always kept a good whetstone at hand in the house, bunkhouse and barn. My folks spent hours honing their pocket knife blades making ready for the next use. When Dad honed his knife, Mother invariably handed him a paring or butcher knife and I remember several lessons given to me on how to sharpen a knife blade. A whetstone had to be kept alive by generous applications of oil or water. I venture to guess more knives were sharpened by using saliva than oil as spit was always handy. Many whetstones, like ours, were mounted on wooden blocks with wooden lids. The wood held all surplus oil and moisture thus keeping the rock alive and not dried out and dead. Many cowboys carried their own small whetstones in leather holsters in their pockets....
Scientists watching unusual events near volcano A series of unusual earthquakes near Mount St. Helens in recent days has scientists warning that something more serious could be imminent. The "hazardous event" the U.S. Geological Survey warns is possible could be an explosion caused by steam building up inside the volcano, or it could be more serious -- involving molten rock and deadly gas....
Mount St. Helens: Scientists in a scramble Small earthquakes rattled Mount St. Helens at the rate of one or two a minute yesterday, and seismologists were scrambling to determine the significance of some of the most intense seismic activity in nearly 20 years. Early tests of gas samples collected above the volcano by helicopter yesterday did not show unusually high levels of carbon dioxide or sulfur. "This tells us that we are probably not yet seeing magma moving up in the system," said Jeff Wynn, chief scientist with the U.S. Geological Survey in Vancouver, Wash. He noted additional tests are necessary to better define whether there's magma moving under the mountain's crater....
School fences out bears Construction of a bear fence at Valley School will be a community project Oct. 2. After several recent bear sightings, including two on the steps of the teacher's cabin Monday night, Sept. 13, the Forest Service gave the school permission to build the fence. Teacher Audra Morrow, who lives in a cabin next to the school on the upper South Fork, didn't see the two grizzlies at first. "I walked right past the door and didn't notice them, but my dog went crazy," she said. "I looked out and expected to see people, but there were two bears."...
The Nature Conservancy and Partners Complete Acquisition of Baca Ranch After more than a decade of work to conserve the 151-square mile Baca Ranch, The Nature Conservancy today announced it had completed the last of a complex set of real estate transactions, clearing the way for the protection of the ranch and the designation of the nation's newest national park, the Great Sand Dunes National Park. Upon closing the Baca Ranch transaction, the Conservancy transferred management responsibility for 27,000 acres of land within the designated national park boundaries to the National Park Service. The Conservancy will continue to manage the remainder of the Baca lands in partnership with the U.S. Department of the Interior pending a final $3.4 million federal appropriation. Once the remaining monies are appropriated, the full ownership of the ranch will be transferred to the National Park Service, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and USDA Forest Service to create the Baca National Wildlife Refuge and expand the existing Rio Grande National Forest....
Putting Out Fires At 8:15 a.m. on a day in mid-August, Rick Ochoa, the top weatherman at the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC) in Boise, Idaho, walks into a briefing room filled with personnel from the multiple federal agencies that staff the center. As he does every morning during the peak spring and summer fire season, he provides a detailed weather report for the entire country on a floor-to-ceiling screen. But unlike the forecasts on nightly TV, Ochoa's zeroes in on weather conditions of little interest to laymen but of key importance to firefighting agencies. He talks about relative drought and the presence of "dry" thunderstorms, which can spark and then help spread a fire....
Feds may add toad to roster Colorado's only alpine toad, the forest-dwelling boreal toad, would be added to the U.S. Endangered Species List under a proposal about to be submitted by federal wildlife officials. Listing the toad would strengthen protections for the warty 4-inch amphibian, whose numbers have plummeted in the last 20 years, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist said Monday. But some state wildlife officials say the federal designation is unnecessary and could create burdensome land-use restrictions, especially on U.S. Forest Service property above 7,000 feet....
West Nile bald eagle deaths confirmed Bald eagles face a new threat this year, but humans and toxins are not the culprits. The University’s Raptor Center confirmed that the West Nile virus killed four male bald eagles in the Minnesota and Wisconsin area last week, and the number could keep climbing. Professor and Raptor Center Director Patrick Redig said he is “reasonably certain” another bald eagle in the center will test positive for the virus. The virus is transmitted from mosquitoes and can cause death in humans and animals....
Fish list grows crowded Another federally protected fish could be entering the fight for Klamath Basin water. Seven hundred and six miles of streams and 33,939 acres of lakes and marshes around Oregon were designated as critical habitat for the threatened bull trout last week. All of the lakes and marshes are in the Klamath Basin. Federal officials are still trying to determine what the impact could be on the other protected fishes, two species of endangered suckers and the threatened coho salmon, and on the Klamath Irrigation Project....
The American River's Hidden Fish Kill The Klamath River fish kill of September 2002, when 68,000 salmon died because of low, warm water conditions on the lower river, is considered the largest of its kind in U.S. history. However, another "hidden fish kill" that took place on the American River in the fall of 2001, 2002 and 2003 is now vying for this dubious distinction. Only a few short miles from the Caliornia State Capitol, huge numbers of adult chinook salmon return from the ocean to spawn. But 181,709 of these fish recently perished before spawning. River advocates and fishery biologists blame the fish kills on poor water management by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and on the continuing lack of flow and water temperature standards on the American, while federal officials claim that they are forced to balance the needs of different users in managing the river....
Two conservation groups sue over wildflower habitat Two conservation groups have made good on their promise to sue the Department of Interior over what they say is its failure to follow through in protecting two endangered plant species in the St. George area. The Tucson, Ariz.-based Center for Biological Diversity and the Utah Native Plant Society on Monday filed a federal complaint in Washington to force the Bush Administration to provide "critical habitat" for the Holmgren milkvetch and the Shivwits milkvetch - a pair of nearly extinct wildflowers found only in the Mojave Desert near the Utah-Arizona border. The two plant species are in the path of a planned freeway interchange and roadway in St. George's south corridor that would link the city with its proposed new airport and a planned community....
Judge questions plan on dams The Bush administration's dismissal of dam removal as an option for restoring salmon has been met with skepticism by the federal judge overseeing the protection of the fish. At issue is a draft plan by federal authorities for balancing the needs of salmon against the demand for electricity, irrigation water and barge transportation provided by dams in Oregon, Washington and Idaho. U.S. District Judge James Redden has raised several questions about the legal and scientific footing for the plan and will lay out his concerns at a status conference Tuesday with government lawyers and those for conservation groups and American Indian tribes....
Group urges feds to let locals lead on sage grouse The rapid growth of state and local conservation efforts aimed at preserving the Greater Sage Grouse --which wildlife experts say is the species' best chance for long-term success -- will be reversed dramatically if the federal government commandeers these efforts through an Endangered Species Act listing. So said the Partnership for the West coalition in recent testimony to the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works Subcommittee on Fisheries, Wildlife, and Water....
Politics skew park budgets The Cuyahoga River in Cleveland caught on fire in 1969, or at least the pollution in it did. But it has been cleaned up, and Congress even made its scenic upstream valley a national park in 1974. But that park isn't well-known nationally, and few faraway families would plan summer vacations specifically to see it. Still, the Cuyahoga park has a bigger base budget ($9.5 million this year) than some of the true icons of the park system, including Grand Teton National Park ($9.35 million), Mount Rainier National Park ($9.29 million), Utah's Lake Powell ($9.28 million) and Zion National Park ($6 million) among many others. Why? "I believe it's politics," said former Rep. Jim Hansen, R-Utah, who served in Congress for 22 years and retired as chairman of the House Resources Committee....
EPA seeks stricter park snowmobile plan The Environmental Protection Agency is urging the National Park Service to change its latest proposal for snowmobiling in Yellowstone National Park to reduce the amount of pollution emitted by the machines. Scaling back emissions could mean changing the type or number of snowmobiles that are allowed into the park, according to an EPA official....
Park Service Retiree Group Wades Into Political Waters This is not the kind of group you would want as your enemy. Its members have experience, political savvy and an insider's knowledge of how the place is run. They also aren't afraid to talk. Call them the AARP of the National Park Service. The Coalition of Concerned National Park Service Retirees is a newcomer to the phalanx of interest groups in the nation's capital, but it has managed to leverage its influence by disclosing leaked internal memos, taking its case to Capitol Hill and zeroing in on key regulatory issues that the Bush administration has on its agenda for park management....
Environmental groups urge more study of drilling plans Environmental groups want the government to take a much harder look at EnCana Oil & Gas Co.'s plans to drill more than 1,200 natural-gas wells on 17,000 acres in western Colorado. The federal Bureau of Land Management released an environmental assessment of the plans in July, but the environmental groups say a more detailed environmental impact statement should be done. EnCana plans to drill the wells from 120 well pads. It would build 62 miles of roads, 71 miles of pipeline and two compressor stations in the area about 30 miles southwest of Meeker and 160 miles west of Denver....
BLM proposes wind turbine to help power new building A 120-foot-tall wind turbine could reduce by about 25 percent the electricity bill at the U.S. Bureau of Land Management's new Rawlins Field Office. The 20-kilowatt wind turbine would generate about 330,000 kilowatt hours per year, worth about $15,000 at current rates....
Hunters, environmentalists protest federal land swap A controversial bill sponsored by U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski that would trade federal land to two Native corporations in the Berners Bay region near Juneau has raised the ire of some Alaska hunters, and Monday they called the bill "plain wrongheaded." The trade, known as the Cape Fox Land Exchange, would give two Southeast Native corporations up to 12,000 acres of federal land around the popular recreation area of Berners Bay near Juneau. The corporations, Sealaska and Cape Fox, would give up other land and mineral rights in Southeast....
Column - Cheaper vs. cleaner: big differences Consider two recent news items: oil prices creeping up toward $50 a barrel and Antarctic glaciers breaking up into icebergs at an accelerated pace, probably due to global warming. They may not seem related. And with war in Iraq and the economy topping the list of election concerns, energy and the environment aren't exactly front-page political news. But the two overlap considerably. And while they may not rank as top-tier issues among voters, they resonate deeply and personally for millions of Americans - including many who've yet to make up their minds whom to vote for....
Even some foes cheer Bush for new diesel-pollution rules While environmentalists and many Democrats in Congress consistently disparaged the Bush administration's clean-air record, one of the president's most far-reaching achievements went largely unheralded. Bush agreed to cut diesel pollution 90 percent in everything from tractors and construction equipment to lawnmowers, forklifts and diesel generators. The administration also forced the refining industry to reduce sulfur — the primary ingredient in ozone pollution — in fuel by 99 percent....
Bush cut some diesel pollution but let big ships keep spewing Through a filament of haze they emerge: containerships long enough to ferry the Space Needle, some belching as much exhaust as 12,000 cars, cutting through the bay toward the ports of Los Angeles/Long Beach. During a decade in which scientists learned diesel pollution was even worse for our health than once thought, Murphy's agency made an astounding discovery: Ocean-going ships that cruised past Santa Barbara's coast each year emitted more smog-forming pollution than all vehicles on the county's roads combined....
Roslyn hires consultant to research water rights The small town of Roslyn on the Eastern slope of the Cascades has hired a consultant to research new water rights after the town's irrigation district shut off the spigot this summer. Roslyn, which was built in 1886 as a mining town, is a junior water rights holder in the Roza Irrigation District. During the dry summer months, residents were forced to conserve water when the district shut off the domestic water supply for the first time. In years past the district had threatened to reduce the amount of water the city received, but never made good on those threats. This was the first time Roslyn was ever cut off from its domestic water supply, said Mayor Jeri Porter....
Environmentalists dream of restoring Yosemite's Hetch Hetchy Valley Of all the battles waged over natural resources in California, perhaps none is bolder, or more romantic, than a campaign by environmentalists to tear down a dam in Yosemite National Park that has provided water and electricity to much of Northern California for 80 years. A report released Monday by Environmental Defense is the latest attempt to sway public opinion in favor of draining Hetch Hetchy Valley and restoring to nature what conservationist John Muir called Yosemite Valley's little brother - a "precious mountain temple" and "grand landscape garden" that now lies 300 feet under water. The authors of the report, "Paradise Regained," argue that water quality, supply and storage, as well as power generation, could be maintained if the Hetch Hetchy Valley, in the Sierra Nevada mountains about 160 miles east of San Francisco, were drained and restored. The study proposes a variety of alternative water and power sources for the San Francisco Bay area and the Central Valley if the O'Shaughnessy Dam were taken down....
It's All Trew: Whetstone was also an important tool According to Roy Underhill, author of "The Woodwright's Companion," the smaller and sharper the sand particles the better the whetstone. As metal is rubbed across the stone, the particles are dulled and glazed over with the metal removed during sharpening. Oil or water must be added to flush away the dulled sand particles and surplus metal. This explanation is important as it helps explain why the whetstone requires special care and storage by owners. Our family always kept a good whetstone at hand in the house, bunkhouse and barn. My folks spent hours honing their pocket knife blades making ready for the next use. When Dad honed his knife, Mother invariably handed him a paring or butcher knife and I remember several lessons given to me on how to sharpen a knife blade. A whetstone had to be kept alive by generous applications of oil or water. I venture to guess more knives were sharpened by using saliva than oil as spit was always handy. Many whetstones, like ours, were mounted on wooden blocks with wooden lids. The wood held all surplus oil and moisture thus keeping the rock alive and not dried out and dead. Many cowboys carried their own small whetstones in leather holsters in their pockets....
Monday, September 27, 2004
NEWS ROUNDUP
Can you hear me now? The call of the wild is getting louder. But it's people, not animals, who are responsible for the uproar. From birds in European cities to killer whales off the U.S. coast, some animals are ratcheting up their calls in order to be heard above the human clamor. Recordings of whale calls made during the past three years, for example, show that orcas on the West Coast increase the length of their calls when surrounded by rumbling engines from whale-watching boats. And studies of a common European songbird reveal that city crooners shift into a higher pitch range during rush hours to transcend the traffic noise....
Editorial: Wrong recipe for the Biscuit U. S. Sen. Gordon Smith should abandon his threat to push through legislation to lock environmentalists out of the courtroom and accelerate salvage logging on the Biscuit fire. Smith is understandably frustrated with the delays and legal roadblocks thrown in front of the U.S. Forest Service's Biscuit salvage plan. Two years after the fire swept half a million acres of the Siskiyou forest, dead trees worth millions of dollars, and hundreds of good jobs, are rotting even though they could be safely salvaged without lasting environmental harm. Yet a legislative rider is a poisonous way to attempt to resolve the conflict over Biscuit salvage. Any effort to legislate one of the largest logging projects in the history of the national forest would undermine public trust in the Forest Service and Congress....
In the Mojave Preserve, Emotions Still Run Hot As the preserve's 10th anniversary approaches, its proponents celebrate it as a citadel of nature amid an onrushing tide of development, while local residents continue to resent the limits on off-road exploration, hunting, cattle ranching and other economic activities. About an hour's drive northeast of Barstow, the preserve was established as part of the California Desert Protection Act. The legislation set aside more land than any previous conservation law in the lower 48 states. It expanded Joshua Tree and Death Valley national monuments, conferring national park status on each, and it created new wilderness in areas managed by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. In all, the act increased protection for more than 9 million acres of desert....
Measures to designate NW lands foundering in Congress The Sierra Club and 26 other conservation groups have withdrawn support for the proposed 300,000-acre Hemingway Wilderness near Idaho's Sun Valley. A growing number of off-road vehicle recreationists are opposing that plan. A proposal to designate the Wild Sky Wilderness in the Cascade Range northeast of Seattle also withered Wednesday in Congress. And prospects are dimming this year for action on wilderness designation for the Owyhee canyonlands of southern Idaho, although Inland Northwest conservationists are still optimistic for the long term....
Column: Let's protect the Front As a rancher from Dupuyer, and a former Pondera County commissioner, I appreciate that the Front's beauty and natural values are essential to the enjoyment and economic security of local families, Front communities and all of Montana. Montanans have a long tradition of working together to protect the Front, and the wise judgments of past generations have kept the Front one of our most treasured places. This summer, Montanans again demonstrated the depth of their attachment to the Front. During a public comment period conducted by the BLM, 93 percent of Montanans participating urged the government to abandon a proposal to drill federal lands along the Front. Instead, Montanans and Americans overwhelmingly urged that the Front be protected for future generations to enjoy....
Editorial: Yellowstone grizzlies, roaring success complicated by controversy For the past 30 years, conservationists have worked to restore Yellowstone Park's most popular, living tourist attraction: the grizzly bear. The success of grizzly recovery in Yellowstone Country is both a boon and a bane. Now that we've got a healthy number of bears, we've got to live with them. Bears and people actually coexist reasonably well in the 2.2-million-acre park. There's a force of rangers to keep people and bears apart, to enforce safety measures. And there's no livestock grazing within the park boundaries. Outside the park, the greater griz population is more problematic. Bears ramble over public lands leased for private grazing and onto private land where they aren't welcome. Increased development with growing populations of seasonal and year-round residents increase potential for friction in bear country....
Editorial: Suit over hunter's death raises safety issues Timothy "Omar" Hilston, a 50-year-old experienced outdoorsman from Great Falls, was attacked and killed by a grizzly bear in 2001 as he field dressed an elk. In the suit, his widow accuses the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks of negligence in their bear management practices. The news brought into sharp relief two questions: What's the responsibility of hunters and others who use the woods to be aware of the dangers there and to prepare for them? How much responsibility does the government have to protect people from wildlife and other threats?....
Old bear spray ineffective during attack Pepper spray that did little, if anything, to prevent a bear from attacking a mountain biker might have been ineffective because it was old and unapproved, experts say. Chris Servheen, grizzly bear recovery coordinator with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, recommends that back-country travelers carry a can of EPA-approved bear pepper spray that is less than a year old. Old spray tends to separate from its propellant and does not discharge it properly, he said....
Groups spar with feds over protection for spotted owl Rebuffed by a federal wildlife agency last year, environmental groups aren't giving up on their fight to secure protection for the mysterious, mottled-brown-and-white California spotted owl, which lives in the mountains of Riverside and San Diego counties. The groups are charging ahead with efforts on two fronts. Led by the Arizona-based Center for Biological Diversity, which has a regional office in Riverside County, environmentalists sued in May to challenge the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's 2003 decision not to place the California spotted owl on the endangered species list....
Plague found in sick prairie dog Plague has been confirmed in a prairie dog in western Custer County, the first such confirmed case in South Dakota wildlife in recent history, Dr. Sam Holland, state veterinarian, said Friday. A rancher who lives near the Wyoming border discovered the sick prairie dog, he said. Testing found that the animal has sylvatic plague, which is spread by infected fleas....
Bush switches nation's tack on protecting species When it comes to saving America's most endangered plants and animals, George W. Bush has listed fewer species for protection than any other president. In nearly four years in office, Bush has protected one-tenth as many species as his father did under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). Even as species slipped toward extinction, most of the protection he did extend came as a result of court orders....
Going, going, gone: Three case studies It was as if the furry, back-floating marine mammals had simply vanished. After learning some Alaskan sea-otter populations were plummeting up to 17 percent a year — perhaps because they were being eaten by killer whales — federal scientists in 2002 knew what to do: They filed the paperwork to list the creatures under the Endangered Species Act (ESA)....
Pair near end of epic West Coast Trail hike For 3½ months, they have been on the move constantly, walking nearly 20 miles a day, threading their way across beaches, rainforests and farm country. On Tuesday, they expect to reach the end of the West Coast Trail — the fence marking the U.S.-Mexico border. Olive, 28, and his companion, Sarah Janes, 23, set out in June from the northwest tip of Washington. Both are taking a break from jobs with the National Park Service. Once they cross the border, the pair will become the first hikers to complete the journey in a single trip....
National parks in budget turmoil Actually, the administration cut the base budgets at three of every four parks nationally this year — including at 10 of the 13 National Park Service units in Utah, according to a Morning News analysis of published operating budgets for individual parks. Where did the money go? Much apparently helped protect "national icon" parks against terrorist threats — including the Statue of Liberty, Independence Hall, Mount Rushmore, the Gateway Arch in St. Louis and memorials in Washington, D.C. So terrorism may be creating cuts at many parks to protect a few from terrorists....
For good or ill, Bush clears path for energy development Roads and well-drilling pads etched from the sagebrush now stretch to the horizon in ghostly cul-de-sacs. A decade ago this wind-swept swath of country was largely untouched by humans. Today, nearly 500 natural-gas wells dot the Green River Valley, and the Bush administration has called for up to 3,100....
Battle over NPR-A heated Officials with the U.S. Bureau of Land Management say the marshy tundra around a giant North Slope lake could hold hundreds of millions of barrels of crude oil, enough to significantly boost domestic oil production for a nation heavily dependent on foreign imports. To get at the oil, the agency recently proposed rolling back restrictions imposed in 1998 during the Clinton administration that keep oil explorers out of areas important for migratory geese and other wildlife....
Nuclear power slides back onto the agenda Reviled for more than a quarter of a century, nuclear energy is poised for a comeback. Soaring energy costs, worries about energy dependence and growing fears of global warming have combined to revive a once-doomed industry that remains the butt of pop-culture satire such as The Simpsons and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Three utility consortiums — Exelon, Entergy and Dominion Resources — recently filed early site applications with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) for new plants — the first in nearly three decades....
SUWA petitions BLM for closure of certain off-road trails It's no surprise, then, that the 1978 plan for the area did not address the potential effects of off-road vehicles, and those effects are dramatic enough in the Vermilion Cliffs area that the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance petitioned the BLM last week for an emergency closure of some trails in the area. The conservation group contends those ORV trails were developed only in the last couple of years and threaten critical habitat for native wildlife and some archaeological resources....
St. Helens Activity May Signal Explosion A strengthening series of earthquakes at Mount St. Helens prompted seismologists Sunday to warn that the once-devastating volcano may see a small explosion soon. The U.S. Geological Survey issued a notice of volcanic unrest in response to the swarm of hundreds of earthquakes that began Thursday....
Column, Invasive species: The newest threat to property rights If you have foreign weeds, grass, trees, or shrubs on your property (and you most certainly do), you're in trouble. Under "Invasive Species" provisions currently sitting in the Senate's version of the Federal Transportation Bill (S. 1072), your property could quickly become the target of radical environmentalists and bureaucrats. Imagine the Endangered Species Act on steroids. Now multiply its devastating effect on property rights by one million. That should give you a pretty good idea of what "Invasive Species" legislation will mean for property owners in every state, county, city and suburb in the nation....
Major shift mapped for Delta water Under pressure from some of California's biggest cities and farm districts, federal and state officials are planning major changes in how water is stored and distributed across the state, including increased pumping of supplies from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. The proposed changes, outlined in an obscure state-federal document called the Operations Criteria and Plan, sets the stage for California's most far-reaching plumbing shifts in a decade. Under the plan, water contractors would increase pumping from the Delta by 27 percent, sending more to Southern California and the San Joaquin Valley. Less water would flow to the San Francisco Bay and less would be reserved for endangered salmon during the driest of droughts....
Government official praises Animas-La Plata project progress The head of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation said he is happy with the progress of the Animas-La Plata Project, the $500 million plan to build a huge reservoir in southwest Colorado. "It's a good project and will settle water-right obligations (to American Indian tribes)," bureau Commissioner John Keys said Thursday. "I was pleased with the reaction of three private consultants who have been here to see what we're doing and how we're doing."....
On The Edge Of Common Sense: Veterinary questions for new millennium have been pondering the state of veterinary medicine in the new millennium. These subjects deserve some deeper thought, or at least a grant application for further study: 1. The plethora of chickens, the dearth of chicken practitioners. 2. The value of veterinarians in the war against bioterrorism. 3. Is there a place for grooming in an exclusive reptile practice? 4. What is the most important discovery in vet medicine since 1969? 5. What do you think of quacks in horse medicine, human medicine and brokerage firms?....
Can you hear me now? The call of the wild is getting louder. But it's people, not animals, who are responsible for the uproar. From birds in European cities to killer whales off the U.S. coast, some animals are ratcheting up their calls in order to be heard above the human clamor. Recordings of whale calls made during the past three years, for example, show that orcas on the West Coast increase the length of their calls when surrounded by rumbling engines from whale-watching boats. And studies of a common European songbird reveal that city crooners shift into a higher pitch range during rush hours to transcend the traffic noise....
Editorial: Wrong recipe for the Biscuit U. S. Sen. Gordon Smith should abandon his threat to push through legislation to lock environmentalists out of the courtroom and accelerate salvage logging on the Biscuit fire. Smith is understandably frustrated with the delays and legal roadblocks thrown in front of the U.S. Forest Service's Biscuit salvage plan. Two years after the fire swept half a million acres of the Siskiyou forest, dead trees worth millions of dollars, and hundreds of good jobs, are rotting even though they could be safely salvaged without lasting environmental harm. Yet a legislative rider is a poisonous way to attempt to resolve the conflict over Biscuit salvage. Any effort to legislate one of the largest logging projects in the history of the national forest would undermine public trust in the Forest Service and Congress....
In the Mojave Preserve, Emotions Still Run Hot As the preserve's 10th anniversary approaches, its proponents celebrate it as a citadel of nature amid an onrushing tide of development, while local residents continue to resent the limits on off-road exploration, hunting, cattle ranching and other economic activities. About an hour's drive northeast of Barstow, the preserve was established as part of the California Desert Protection Act. The legislation set aside more land than any previous conservation law in the lower 48 states. It expanded Joshua Tree and Death Valley national monuments, conferring national park status on each, and it created new wilderness in areas managed by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. In all, the act increased protection for more than 9 million acres of desert....
Measures to designate NW lands foundering in Congress The Sierra Club and 26 other conservation groups have withdrawn support for the proposed 300,000-acre Hemingway Wilderness near Idaho's Sun Valley. A growing number of off-road vehicle recreationists are opposing that plan. A proposal to designate the Wild Sky Wilderness in the Cascade Range northeast of Seattle also withered Wednesday in Congress. And prospects are dimming this year for action on wilderness designation for the Owyhee canyonlands of southern Idaho, although Inland Northwest conservationists are still optimistic for the long term....
Column: Let's protect the Front As a rancher from Dupuyer, and a former Pondera County commissioner, I appreciate that the Front's beauty and natural values are essential to the enjoyment and economic security of local families, Front communities and all of Montana. Montanans have a long tradition of working together to protect the Front, and the wise judgments of past generations have kept the Front one of our most treasured places. This summer, Montanans again demonstrated the depth of their attachment to the Front. During a public comment period conducted by the BLM, 93 percent of Montanans participating urged the government to abandon a proposal to drill federal lands along the Front. Instead, Montanans and Americans overwhelmingly urged that the Front be protected for future generations to enjoy....
Editorial: Yellowstone grizzlies, roaring success complicated by controversy For the past 30 years, conservationists have worked to restore Yellowstone Park's most popular, living tourist attraction: the grizzly bear. The success of grizzly recovery in Yellowstone Country is both a boon and a bane. Now that we've got a healthy number of bears, we've got to live with them. Bears and people actually coexist reasonably well in the 2.2-million-acre park. There's a force of rangers to keep people and bears apart, to enforce safety measures. And there's no livestock grazing within the park boundaries. Outside the park, the greater griz population is more problematic. Bears ramble over public lands leased for private grazing and onto private land where they aren't welcome. Increased development with growing populations of seasonal and year-round residents increase potential for friction in bear country....
Editorial: Suit over hunter's death raises safety issues Timothy "Omar" Hilston, a 50-year-old experienced outdoorsman from Great Falls, was attacked and killed by a grizzly bear in 2001 as he field dressed an elk. In the suit, his widow accuses the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks of negligence in their bear management practices. The news brought into sharp relief two questions: What's the responsibility of hunters and others who use the woods to be aware of the dangers there and to prepare for them? How much responsibility does the government have to protect people from wildlife and other threats?....
Old bear spray ineffective during attack Pepper spray that did little, if anything, to prevent a bear from attacking a mountain biker might have been ineffective because it was old and unapproved, experts say. Chris Servheen, grizzly bear recovery coordinator with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, recommends that back-country travelers carry a can of EPA-approved bear pepper spray that is less than a year old. Old spray tends to separate from its propellant and does not discharge it properly, he said....
Groups spar with feds over protection for spotted owl Rebuffed by a federal wildlife agency last year, environmental groups aren't giving up on their fight to secure protection for the mysterious, mottled-brown-and-white California spotted owl, which lives in the mountains of Riverside and San Diego counties. The groups are charging ahead with efforts on two fronts. Led by the Arizona-based Center for Biological Diversity, which has a regional office in Riverside County, environmentalists sued in May to challenge the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's 2003 decision not to place the California spotted owl on the endangered species list....
Plague found in sick prairie dog Plague has been confirmed in a prairie dog in western Custer County, the first such confirmed case in South Dakota wildlife in recent history, Dr. Sam Holland, state veterinarian, said Friday. A rancher who lives near the Wyoming border discovered the sick prairie dog, he said. Testing found that the animal has sylvatic plague, which is spread by infected fleas....
Bush switches nation's tack on protecting species When it comes to saving America's most endangered plants and animals, George W. Bush has listed fewer species for protection than any other president. In nearly four years in office, Bush has protected one-tenth as many species as his father did under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). Even as species slipped toward extinction, most of the protection he did extend came as a result of court orders....
Going, going, gone: Three case studies It was as if the furry, back-floating marine mammals had simply vanished. After learning some Alaskan sea-otter populations were plummeting up to 17 percent a year — perhaps because they were being eaten by killer whales — federal scientists in 2002 knew what to do: They filed the paperwork to list the creatures under the Endangered Species Act (ESA)....
Pair near end of epic West Coast Trail hike For 3½ months, they have been on the move constantly, walking nearly 20 miles a day, threading their way across beaches, rainforests and farm country. On Tuesday, they expect to reach the end of the West Coast Trail — the fence marking the U.S.-Mexico border. Olive, 28, and his companion, Sarah Janes, 23, set out in June from the northwest tip of Washington. Both are taking a break from jobs with the National Park Service. Once they cross the border, the pair will become the first hikers to complete the journey in a single trip....
National parks in budget turmoil Actually, the administration cut the base budgets at three of every four parks nationally this year — including at 10 of the 13 National Park Service units in Utah, according to a Morning News analysis of published operating budgets for individual parks. Where did the money go? Much apparently helped protect "national icon" parks against terrorist threats — including the Statue of Liberty, Independence Hall, Mount Rushmore, the Gateway Arch in St. Louis and memorials in Washington, D.C. So terrorism may be creating cuts at many parks to protect a few from terrorists....
For good or ill, Bush clears path for energy development Roads and well-drilling pads etched from the sagebrush now stretch to the horizon in ghostly cul-de-sacs. A decade ago this wind-swept swath of country was largely untouched by humans. Today, nearly 500 natural-gas wells dot the Green River Valley, and the Bush administration has called for up to 3,100....
Battle over NPR-A heated Officials with the U.S. Bureau of Land Management say the marshy tundra around a giant North Slope lake could hold hundreds of millions of barrels of crude oil, enough to significantly boost domestic oil production for a nation heavily dependent on foreign imports. To get at the oil, the agency recently proposed rolling back restrictions imposed in 1998 during the Clinton administration that keep oil explorers out of areas important for migratory geese and other wildlife....
Nuclear power slides back onto the agenda Reviled for more than a quarter of a century, nuclear energy is poised for a comeback. Soaring energy costs, worries about energy dependence and growing fears of global warming have combined to revive a once-doomed industry that remains the butt of pop-culture satire such as The Simpsons and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Three utility consortiums — Exelon, Entergy and Dominion Resources — recently filed early site applications with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) for new plants — the first in nearly three decades....
SUWA petitions BLM for closure of certain off-road trails It's no surprise, then, that the 1978 plan for the area did not address the potential effects of off-road vehicles, and those effects are dramatic enough in the Vermilion Cliffs area that the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance petitioned the BLM last week for an emergency closure of some trails in the area. The conservation group contends those ORV trails were developed only in the last couple of years and threaten critical habitat for native wildlife and some archaeological resources....
St. Helens Activity May Signal Explosion A strengthening series of earthquakes at Mount St. Helens prompted seismologists Sunday to warn that the once-devastating volcano may see a small explosion soon. The U.S. Geological Survey issued a notice of volcanic unrest in response to the swarm of hundreds of earthquakes that began Thursday....
Column, Invasive species: The newest threat to property rights If you have foreign weeds, grass, trees, or shrubs on your property (and you most certainly do), you're in trouble. Under "Invasive Species" provisions currently sitting in the Senate's version of the Federal Transportation Bill (S. 1072), your property could quickly become the target of radical environmentalists and bureaucrats. Imagine the Endangered Species Act on steroids. Now multiply its devastating effect on property rights by one million. That should give you a pretty good idea of what "Invasive Species" legislation will mean for property owners in every state, county, city and suburb in the nation....
Major shift mapped for Delta water Under pressure from some of California's biggest cities and farm districts, federal and state officials are planning major changes in how water is stored and distributed across the state, including increased pumping of supplies from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. The proposed changes, outlined in an obscure state-federal document called the Operations Criteria and Plan, sets the stage for California's most far-reaching plumbing shifts in a decade. Under the plan, water contractors would increase pumping from the Delta by 27 percent, sending more to Southern California and the San Joaquin Valley. Less water would flow to the San Francisco Bay and less would be reserved for endangered salmon during the driest of droughts....
Government official praises Animas-La Plata project progress The head of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation said he is happy with the progress of the Animas-La Plata Project, the $500 million plan to build a huge reservoir in southwest Colorado. "It's a good project and will settle water-right obligations (to American Indian tribes)," bureau Commissioner John Keys said Thursday. "I was pleased with the reaction of three private consultants who have been here to see what we're doing and how we're doing."....
On The Edge Of Common Sense: Veterinary questions for new millennium have been pondering the state of veterinary medicine in the new millennium. These subjects deserve some deeper thought, or at least a grant application for further study: 1. The plethora of chickens, the dearth of chicken practitioners. 2. The value of veterinarians in the war against bioterrorism. 3. Is there a place for grooming in an exclusive reptile practice? 4. What is the most important discovery in vet medicine since 1969? 5. What do you think of quacks in horse medicine, human medicine and brokerage firms?....
Sunday, September 26, 2004
OPINION/COMMENTARY
Senate Mounts Sneak Attack on Sound Science
In a behind-the-scenes move with far reaching implications, the Senate Appropriations Committee last week approved a bill including language that would shield one of the federal government’s most important scientific agencies from legal requirements mandating integrity in government science. A clause in the annual appropriations bill for the Department of Commerce and other agencies (S. 2809) would exempt research produced by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration from complying with the Federal Data Quality Act, which requires that data circulated by federal agencies conform to standards of scientific integrity.
“This quiet ploy is clearly aimed at avoiding the inevitable lawsuits exposing the junk science, much of it traceable to NOAA, which has been employed in government publications in recent years, including two alarmist global warming reports,” said Christopher C. Horner, Senior Fellow and Counsel at the Competitive Enterprise Institute. “The apparent strategy here – that any agency or department report using NOAA science will now be above the law – guts existing data quality rules in the very context which forced Congress to enact them in the first place.”....
Senate Mounts Sneak Attack on Sound Science
In a behind-the-scenes move with far reaching implications, the Senate Appropriations Committee last week approved a bill including language that would shield one of the federal government’s most important scientific agencies from legal requirements mandating integrity in government science. A clause in the annual appropriations bill for the Department of Commerce and other agencies (S. 2809) would exempt research produced by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration from complying with the Federal Data Quality Act, which requires that data circulated by federal agencies conform to standards of scientific integrity.
“This quiet ploy is clearly aimed at avoiding the inevitable lawsuits exposing the junk science, much of it traceable to NOAA, which has been employed in government publications in recent years, including two alarmist global warming reports,” said Christopher C. Horner, Senior Fellow and Counsel at the Competitive Enterprise Institute. “The apparent strategy here – that any agency or department report using NOAA science will now be above the law – guts existing data quality rules in the very context which forced Congress to enact them in the first place.”....
OPINION/COMMENTARY
Green versus Black
What are rich people doing, in the first place, trying to stop poor people on the other side of the world from getting something to eat? They are feeding their own egos by hindering poor Africans from feeding themselves.
It's not a racial thing. The green zealots would stop anybody from doing anything they don't approve of. They talk grandly about "protecting" this, "preserving" that, or "saving" something else.
From what? From other people. Nor is this just a matter of buying up things to keep them out of other people's hands. Far more often, green zealots want the government to deprive other people of the right to use land or resources for their own purposes, rather than for the recreational or other purposes preferred by the green zealots....
Green versus Black
What are rich people doing, in the first place, trying to stop poor people on the other side of the world from getting something to eat? They are feeding their own egos by hindering poor Africans from feeding themselves.
It's not a racial thing. The green zealots would stop anybody from doing anything they don't approve of. They talk grandly about "protecting" this, "preserving" that, or "saving" something else.
From what? From other people. Nor is this just a matter of buying up things to keep them out of other people's hands. Far more often, green zealots want the government to deprive other people of the right to use land or resources for their own purposes, rather than for the recreational or other purposes preferred by the green zealots....
The Myth of the Tree Shortage
The USDA Forest Service took the lead in this study and enlisted help from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the Tennessee Valley Authority. For over two years, more than 25 scientists and analysts worked on this study. More than 100 scientists from universities, state and federal agencies, industry and conservation organizations provided peer reviews to enhance the accuracy and completeness of this report. Finally, in late 2001, the report was made public and was received with huge waves of apathy.
Why? The report was of no use to the radical environmental community because, with painstaking research and documented facts, it destroyed every assertion they had made concerning the forests of the south. It gave the lie to their "chicken little" scenarios and was impregnable to their attack because of the unimpeachable integrity of those who had created the study. So the radical environmental community just acted as if it had never happened.
From the stump landscapes of the early 1900’s, the southern forests have recovered to become one of the wood baskets of the world. Vibrant, never static, quickly responding to changing conditions, the southern forests meet the needs of today and are poised to embrace tomorrow.
The Resource Assessment does not cover the why of this marvelous transformation, but I will tell you why. It is because the southern forests are privately owned. The essential difference between the southern forests and the burning, stagnant forests of the west and looted forests of foreign lands is that of private ownership. Each landowner managing his own lands (and doing it very well as the Assessment shows) for his own perceived self-interest....
The USDA Forest Service took the lead in this study and enlisted help from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the Tennessee Valley Authority. For over two years, more than 25 scientists and analysts worked on this study. More than 100 scientists from universities, state and federal agencies, industry and conservation organizations provided peer reviews to enhance the accuracy and completeness of this report. Finally, in late 2001, the report was made public and was received with huge waves of apathy.
Why? The report was of no use to the radical environmental community because, with painstaking research and documented facts, it destroyed every assertion they had made concerning the forests of the south. It gave the lie to their "chicken little" scenarios and was impregnable to their attack because of the unimpeachable integrity of those who had created the study. So the radical environmental community just acted as if it had never happened.
From the stump landscapes of the early 1900’s, the southern forests have recovered to become one of the wood baskets of the world. Vibrant, never static, quickly responding to changing conditions, the southern forests meet the needs of today and are poised to embrace tomorrow.
The Resource Assessment does not cover the why of this marvelous transformation, but I will tell you why. It is because the southern forests are privately owned. The essential difference between the southern forests and the burning, stagnant forests of the west and looted forests of foreign lands is that of private ownership. Each landowner managing his own lands (and doing it very well as the Assessment shows) for his own perceived self-interest....
OPINION/COMMENTARY
Anti-Logging Blues... Wood construction is greener
A new report concludes that wood is one of the most environmentally-sensitive building materials for home construction -- it uses less overall energy than other products, causes fewer air and water impacts and does a better job of the carbon “sequestration” that can help address global warming.
The research showed that wood framing used 17 percent less energy than steel construction for a typical house built in Minnesota, and 16 percent less energy than a house using concrete construction in Atlanta. And in these two examples, the use of wood had 26-31 percent less global warming potential.
This $1 million study was prepared by the Consortium for Research on Renewable Industrial Materials, a non-profit corporation of 15 research universities....
Anti-Logging Blues... Wood construction is greener
A new report concludes that wood is one of the most environmentally-sensitive building materials for home construction -- it uses less overall energy than other products, causes fewer air and water impacts and does a better job of the carbon “sequestration” that can help address global warming.
The research showed that wood framing used 17 percent less energy than steel construction for a typical house built in Minnesota, and 16 percent less energy than a house using concrete construction in Atlanta. And in these two examples, the use of wood had 26-31 percent less global warming potential.
This $1 million study was prepared by the Consortium for Research on Renewable Industrial Materials, a non-profit corporation of 15 research universities....
OPINION/COMMENTARY
CONSERVATION SUBSIDIES DON’T WORK
Paying for conservation outright is more efficient than trying to preserve ecosystems through subsidized, profit-driven enterprises, says Professor R. David Simpson.
Over the last 20 years, conservationists have sought to preserve fragile ecosystems and biological resources by putting them to economically profitable, but ecologically sustainable use.
But Simpson says that investments in activities that are believed to be compatible with conservation -- such as bio-prospecting and ecotourism -- tend not be the most cost-effective way of conserving imperiled habitats:
---There is uncertainty figuring out what incentives an investment in an eco-friendly business will generate; for example, eco-tourist areas may end up over-used by visitors.
---Eco-friendly enterprises tend to be unprofitable, often requiring subsidies to continue operating.
---Paying for conservation directly, which Simpson calls the “true market” approach to conservation, would generate greater incentives for the private sector to preserve habitats.
While realizing some income through eco-friendly enterprises can defray some of the costs of conservation, Simpson says attempts to address the many problems of conservation, development and social equity, all in one step, usually result in the failure to resolve any of them.
Ultimately, conservation is a costly endeavor, but alternatives to a true market approach make it more, rather than less, expensive.
Source: R. David Simpson, “Conserving Biodiversity through Markets: A Better Approach,” Property and Environment Research Center Policy Series No.32, July 2004.
For text http://www.perc.org/publications/policyseries/biodiverse.php
CONSERVATION SUBSIDIES DON’T WORK
Paying for conservation outright is more efficient than trying to preserve ecosystems through subsidized, profit-driven enterprises, says Professor R. David Simpson.
Over the last 20 years, conservationists have sought to preserve fragile ecosystems and biological resources by putting them to economically profitable, but ecologically sustainable use.
But Simpson says that investments in activities that are believed to be compatible with conservation -- such as bio-prospecting and ecotourism -- tend not be the most cost-effective way of conserving imperiled habitats:
---There is uncertainty figuring out what incentives an investment in an eco-friendly business will generate; for example, eco-tourist areas may end up over-used by visitors.
---Eco-friendly enterprises tend to be unprofitable, often requiring subsidies to continue operating.
---Paying for conservation directly, which Simpson calls the “true market” approach to conservation, would generate greater incentives for the private sector to preserve habitats.
While realizing some income through eco-friendly enterprises can defray some of the costs of conservation, Simpson says attempts to address the many problems of conservation, development and social equity, all in one step, usually result in the failure to resolve any of them.
Ultimately, conservation is a costly endeavor, but alternatives to a true market approach make it more, rather than less, expensive.
Source: R. David Simpson, “Conserving Biodiversity through Markets: A Better Approach,” Property and Environment Research Center Policy Series No.32, July 2004.
For text http://www.perc.org/publications/policyseries/biodiverse.php
OPINION/COMMENTARY
Fairy Shrimp vs. Man
The shrimp lives -- exists? -- in a depression at the end of a runway. Officials have fenced off 108 acres for its privileged use, even though no shrimp worth eating has been found there, just eggs that haven't yet hatched, even after having been in the spot for years. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service wants the area to be designated as a preserve for the fairy shrimp. That probably sounds reasonable, since the property is likely to sit idle because of its location. Who would want it for anything? But an argument by LAX officials demonstrates that this is yet another case of man forcing man to yield to a lower life form.
It's not that the relatively small tract has been set aside. It's the ripple effect that area would have. Designating the area as a preserve for the fairy shrimp would require it to have standing water. That attracts birds. Though they both have wings and fly, birds and aircraft do not mix well.
Sometimes the results are disastrous. Yeah, it makes a mess of the bird. But too often it's equally as ruinous for humans. Jetliners full of passengers have been known to go down after sucking birds into their engines....
Fairy Shrimp vs. Man
The shrimp lives -- exists? -- in a depression at the end of a runway. Officials have fenced off 108 acres for its privileged use, even though no shrimp worth eating has been found there, just eggs that haven't yet hatched, even after having been in the spot for years. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service wants the area to be designated as a preserve for the fairy shrimp. That probably sounds reasonable, since the property is likely to sit idle because of its location. Who would want it for anything? But an argument by LAX officials demonstrates that this is yet another case of man forcing man to yield to a lower life form.
It's not that the relatively small tract has been set aside. It's the ripple effect that area would have. Designating the area as a preserve for the fairy shrimp would require it to have standing water. That attracts birds. Though they both have wings and fly, birds and aircraft do not mix well.
Sometimes the results are disastrous. Yeah, it makes a mess of the bird. But too often it's equally as ruinous for humans. Jetliners full of passengers have been known to go down after sucking birds into their engines....
OPINION/COMMENTARY
Honk If You Support World Car-Free Day
Washington, D.C., September 21, 2004—Anti-automobile activists around the world will celebrate “World Car-Free Day” this Wednesday, envisioning a world where cars have been forcibly replaced by pedestrians, bicyclists, and mass transit. For all of their rhetoric, however, the anti-car enthusiasts are generally vague on how their utopia will accommodate the handicapped, the elderly, parents with kids, or anyone who lives outside of a central city.
“Since so many anti-car activists are young and healthy, it’s no surprise they forget what a car-free world would actually be like,” said Sam Kazman, General Counsel at the Competitive Enterprise Institute. “For many people, a car isn’t a luxury – it’s the only way to get to work, transport their kids, or pick up groceries.”
The dramatic revolution in mobility made possible by the personal automobile has faced hostility from central planners for decades. In the words of philosopher Loren Lomasky, “People who drive cars upset the patterns spun from the policy intellectual’s brain.” (Lomasky study “Autonomy and Automobility” available online at http://www.cei.org/gencon/025,01437.cfm)....
Honk If You Support World Car-Free Day
Washington, D.C., September 21, 2004—Anti-automobile activists around the world will celebrate “World Car-Free Day” this Wednesday, envisioning a world where cars have been forcibly replaced by pedestrians, bicyclists, and mass transit. For all of their rhetoric, however, the anti-car enthusiasts are generally vague on how their utopia will accommodate the handicapped, the elderly, parents with kids, or anyone who lives outside of a central city.
“Since so many anti-car activists are young and healthy, it’s no surprise they forget what a car-free world would actually be like,” said Sam Kazman, General Counsel at the Competitive Enterprise Institute. “For many people, a car isn’t a luxury – it’s the only way to get to work, transport their kids, or pick up groceries.”
The dramatic revolution in mobility made possible by the personal automobile has faced hostility from central planners for decades. In the words of philosopher Loren Lomasky, “People who drive cars upset the patterns spun from the policy intellectual’s brain.” (Lomasky study “Autonomy and Automobility” available online at http://www.cei.org/gencon/025,01437.cfm)....
OPINION/COMMENTARY
Famous Lobster Liberator Pinched By Police
In an effort to take away the saltwater half of your Surf and Turf, the radicals at People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) operate an entire website dedicated to "lobster liberation," including practical "Tips for Releasing Lobsters." Doing his part for this crazy crustacean cause, "Terminator 2" child actor and long-time PETA activist Edward Furlong was arrested in a drunken stupor Wednesday after trying to release live lobsters from a Kentucky grocery store's tank. As we've reported before, Furlong's PETA-related troubles are nothing new.
PETA Education Director Jacqueline Domac, the staffer in charge of PETA's outreach to children, began an affair with Furlong when he was 16 and she was 30. As we told you in July, Domac started as Furlong's on-set tutor, later expanding her role to include managing his acting career....
Famous Lobster Liberator Pinched By Police
In an effort to take away the saltwater half of your Surf and Turf, the radicals at People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) operate an entire website dedicated to "lobster liberation," including practical "Tips for Releasing Lobsters." Doing his part for this crazy crustacean cause, "Terminator 2" child actor and long-time PETA activist Edward Furlong was arrested in a drunken stupor Wednesday after trying to release live lobsters from a Kentucky grocery store's tank. As we've reported before, Furlong's PETA-related troubles are nothing new.
PETA Education Director Jacqueline Domac, the staffer in charge of PETA's outreach to children, began an affair with Furlong when he was 16 and she was 30. As we told you in July, Domac started as Furlong's on-set tutor, later expanding her role to include managing his acting career....
OPINION/COMMENTARY
IS ORGANIC FOOD REALLY SAFER AND HEALTHIER?
Americans spent $10.4 billion on organic foods last year, but several studies are questioning the assumption that organic foods are safer and healthier than conventional foods.
A recent survey indicated that two out of three consumers choose organic foods because they support “better health,” but two recent symposia (the American Chemical Society and the First World Congress on Organic Food) have concluded that evidence is lacking to support the claimed superior benefits of organic foods. Furthermore,
---A report by the Texas Department of Agriculture indicates that conventional produce was eight times more likely to have pesticide residue than organic, but of the few samples in which a residue was found, the amount was negligible (between 1 and 5 percent of government standards).
---Because organic farmers rely on cow and pig manure for fertilizer, organic foods are vulnerable to bacterial contamination – two recent outbreaks of E-coli involved organic strawberries and lettuce.
---Free-range birds (organic poultry) have higher rates of bacterial contamination than conventional poultry due to their higher exposure to wild bird droppings.
Moreover, a study by the American Council on Science and Health reveals that organic produce does not have significantly higher vitamin contents than conventional produce. A comparison of organically and conventionally grown vegetables revealed that a higher vitamin C content for the organic vegetables, but only by about 10 percent of the recommended daily intake, which can be compensated for when adding fruits.
What is important, say observers, is that consumers make fruits, vegetables and dairy products a part of their diet, and they should not feel guilty if they can’t afford more expensive organic foods.
Source: Melissa Healy, “Behind the Organic Label,” Los Angeles Times, September 6, 2004; Nancy McGuire, “Assessing Organic Food,” American Chemical Society, August 30, 2004; and Mary Wilson, “First World Congress on Organic Food: Meeting the Challenges of Safety and Quality for Fruits, Vegetables and Grains,” Michigan State University, National Food Safety and Toxology Center, March 29-31, 2004.
For LA Times text (subscription required) http://www.latimes.com/features/health/la-he-organic6sep06,1,7058760,print.story
For ACS report: http://www.chemistry.org/portal/a/c/s/1/feature_pro.html?id=c373e9fe9f15cae18f6a17245d830100
For WCOF report: http://www.mosaorganic.org/symposium.pdf
IS ORGANIC FOOD REALLY SAFER AND HEALTHIER?
Americans spent $10.4 billion on organic foods last year, but several studies are questioning the assumption that organic foods are safer and healthier than conventional foods.
A recent survey indicated that two out of three consumers choose organic foods because they support “better health,” but two recent symposia (the American Chemical Society and the First World Congress on Organic Food) have concluded that evidence is lacking to support the claimed superior benefits of organic foods. Furthermore,
---A report by the Texas Department of Agriculture indicates that conventional produce was eight times more likely to have pesticide residue than organic, but of the few samples in which a residue was found, the amount was negligible (between 1 and 5 percent of government standards).
---Because organic farmers rely on cow and pig manure for fertilizer, organic foods are vulnerable to bacterial contamination – two recent outbreaks of E-coli involved organic strawberries and lettuce.
---Free-range birds (organic poultry) have higher rates of bacterial contamination than conventional poultry due to their higher exposure to wild bird droppings.
Moreover, a study by the American Council on Science and Health reveals that organic produce does not have significantly higher vitamin contents than conventional produce. A comparison of organically and conventionally grown vegetables revealed that a higher vitamin C content for the organic vegetables, but only by about 10 percent of the recommended daily intake, which can be compensated for when adding fruits.
What is important, say observers, is that consumers make fruits, vegetables and dairy products a part of their diet, and they should not feel guilty if they can’t afford more expensive organic foods.
Source: Melissa Healy, “Behind the Organic Label,” Los Angeles Times, September 6, 2004; Nancy McGuire, “Assessing Organic Food,” American Chemical Society, August 30, 2004; and Mary Wilson, “First World Congress on Organic Food: Meeting the Challenges of Safety and Quality for Fruits, Vegetables and Grains,” Michigan State University, National Food Safety and Toxology Center, March 29-31, 2004.
For LA Times text (subscription required) http://www.latimes.com/features/health/la-he-organic6sep06,1,7058760,print.story
For ACS report: http://www.chemistry.org/portal/a/c/s/1/feature_pro.html?id=c373e9fe9f15cae18f6a17245d830100
For WCOF report: http://www.mosaorganic.org/symposium.pdf
OPINION/COMMENTARY
UN Threatens to Trump US Land Policy
It’s a clash of the titans. On one side there are well-funded environmental groups and eco-lobbyists; on the other, free-market advocates and strict constitutional constructionists. But these are just the internal forces at play. At the global level, the United Nations is proposing a new treaty that holds potential to render moot US congressional decisions.
The outcome of this battle will determine whether the Roadless Area Conservation Rule (passed Jan. 12, 2001) should be amended to open the doors to timber harvesting on our nation’s federally protected lands. The Dept. of Agriculture’s Forest Service just extended the comment period on these suggested changes, from Sept. 14 to Nov. 15, but tying into the issue is an almost simultaneous proposal from the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development. This body wants to develop a “successor agreement” to its U.S.-backed International Tropical Timber Agreement (ITTA). If enacted, this agreement would require participating nations to abide by restrictive land management policies that will likely include blanket prohibitions on timber harvests. In effect, it could usurp conclusions reached at the congressional level regarding America’s forests....
UN Threatens to Trump US Land Policy
It’s a clash of the titans. On one side there are well-funded environmental groups and eco-lobbyists; on the other, free-market advocates and strict constitutional constructionists. But these are just the internal forces at play. At the global level, the United Nations is proposing a new treaty that holds potential to render moot US congressional decisions.
The outcome of this battle will determine whether the Roadless Area Conservation Rule (passed Jan. 12, 2001) should be amended to open the doors to timber harvesting on our nation’s federally protected lands. The Dept. of Agriculture’s Forest Service just extended the comment period on these suggested changes, from Sept. 14 to Nov. 15, but tying into the issue is an almost simultaneous proposal from the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development. This body wants to develop a “successor agreement” to its U.S.-backed International Tropical Timber Agreement (ITTA). If enacted, this agreement would require participating nations to abide by restrictive land management policies that will likely include blanket prohibitions on timber harvests. In effect, it could usurp conclusions reached at the congressional level regarding America’s forests....
Saturday, September 25, 2004
Indians give a cheer for the name 'Redskins'
Ninety percent of American Indians say the name Washington Redskins does not offend them, according to a new national survey. Only 9 percent of polled Indians say they find the name of Washington's professional football team "offensive," according to the results of the University of Pennsylvania's National Annenberg Election Survey. The other 1 percent did not respond. "I thought more people would have had" problems with the name, said Adam Clymer, political director of the survey, which questioned more than 65,000 Americans of all races and ethnic groups between Oct. 7, 2003, and Sept. 20, 2004. Mr. Clymer, formerly a reporter for the New York Times and other newspapers, says it was his idea to ask Americans polled who identified themselves as American Indians or Native Americans if they objected to the team name Redskins, a moniker that many Indian leaders and activists have said is offensive....
Ninety percent of American Indians say the name Washington Redskins does not offend them, according to a new national survey. Only 9 percent of polled Indians say they find the name of Washington's professional football team "offensive," according to the results of the University of Pennsylvania's National Annenberg Election Survey. The other 1 percent did not respond. "I thought more people would have had" problems with the name, said Adam Clymer, political director of the survey, which questioned more than 65,000 Americans of all races and ethnic groups between Oct. 7, 2003, and Sept. 20, 2004. Mr. Clymer, formerly a reporter for the New York Times and other newspapers, says it was his idea to ask Americans polled who identified themselves as American Indians or Native Americans if they objected to the team name Redskins, a moniker that many Indian leaders and activists have said is offensive....
NEWS ROUNDUP
Stories of heroism emerge from crash The airplane was already aflame, burning hot, when Jodee Hogg pushed open the cargo door and fell into the cold mountain air. That she was alive has been called remarkable. That she was relatively unhurt has been called miraculous. That she climbed back into the burning plane to rescue a friend is being called nothing short of heroic. In fact, as details of Monday's wilderness airplane crash continue to emerge, the story is shifting quickly from one of tragedy to one of survival, and finally to one of heroism....
Weather likely played role, but answers still unknown Low clouds and high mountains remain the prime suspects in Monday's wilderness plane crash that killed three, but firm answers as to the cause of the accident likely won't come for at least nine months. "It is far too soon to be making conclusions," said Georgia Struhsaker, senior air safety investigator for the Northwest Regional Office of the National Transportation Safety Board. Struhsaker, whose job it is to investigate airplane crashes, arrived on the scene Wednesday, and has been working at the site alongside teams from the Forest Service and Federal Aviation Administration. A team from the Cessna airplane company is also on hand, she said....
Brother of crash survivor describes grief, joy On Friday, Ryan Hogg, whose sister survived a plane crash in northeastern Montana, outlined his family's week. Hogg, 27, said the family was informed by Forest Service officials on Tuesday at about 3 p.m. that Jodee had died in the contract plane with four others, because "it wasn't a survivable crash." Twenty-four hours later, they were told that two people from the crash had walked out of the wilderness. After another half hour, they learned that one of them was Jodee, 23. The other was Matthew Ramige, 29, of Jackson, Wyo....
Report: Spotted owls still declining Fourteen years after coming under federal protection, the northern spotted owl continues to decline, particularly in Washington state, a new study shows. The owl — an icon of the Northwest timber wars — no longer faces the severe threat from logging it once did, but it faces new threats, including catastrophic wildfires that rage through overgrown forests and the barred owl, a relative that is rapidly taking over spotted owl habitat in the West, the report said. The study, conducted by a Portland firm on behalf of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, appears to be a blow to timber industry efforts to loosen restrictions on federal forest logging in Washington, Oregon and Northern California....
Drillers awaiting word on protection of grouse's habitat Some wildlife experts want to make the greater sage grouse an endangered species icon. Its Western habitat, unfortunately, is atop some of the nation's largest untapped natural gas fields. The grouse has lost about nine-tenths of its 2 million population in Western states and Canada since the early 19th century. A decision by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on whether it should be listed as an endangered species is expected by the end of the year. Developers wanting to drill for natural gas in the grouse's habitat, in sagebrush-covered areas of Colorado, Montana, Utah and Wyoming, are tense....
Development holds reins in the Wild West But the administration's most enduring environmental legacy may lie here in the West, where a series of policy decisions and little-noticed administrative actions have eased development restrictions on millions of acres of federal lands. More than 60 million acres -- an area twice the size of Virginia -- are more vulnerable to logging or drilling as a result of policies that weakened federal restrictions on their development. Other administration actions have made it harder for government officials to apply the most stringent protections to federal wild lands. As part of a legal settlement reached last year with Utah, the administration banned government workers from surveying public lands to identify areas worthy of being set aside by Congress as federal preserves off-limits to development of any kind. More than 3 million acres of land that had been nominated for a congressional designation lost their protected status....
California Backs Plan for Big Cut in Car Emissions California regulators approved a plan on Friday aimed at drastically reducing over the next 11 years the vehicle emissions of gases that scientists have linked to global warming. It would be the first such regulation in the nation and one that, if it survives legal challenges, would force automakers to increase sharply the fuel efficiency of millions of vehicles. Though the plan is being put into place by only one state, automakers see it as the most challenging demand from government since Congress first imposed standards to improve fuel economy in the 1970's....
Retailer Gets Out the Green Votes Patagonia Inc.'s corporate mission is to protect planet Earth. So, when the Ventura, California-based1 company's executives sat down in January to map out the company's marketing strategies for the year, they decided to focus on convincing Americans to vote in the 2004 election for candidates with sound environmental records. This summer, the private company -- which sells about $250 million worth of fleece clothing, camping equipment, climbing gear and other outdoor products a year -- launched a $500,000 multimedia Vote the Environment campaign that will run until Election Day. As Nov. 2 nears, Patagonia is stepping up its get-out-the-vote campaign. It is sending e-mails to 400,000 subscribers, printing essays penned by well-known environmentalists in its catalogs, communicating with visitors in hundreds of environmental and outdoor-sports chat rooms, message boards and blogs, and funding the national distribution of Monumental, a documentary on David Brower, the Sierra Club's first executive director....
Canal Mule Reaches Retirement There's a mule in Georgetown who puts the term 'workhorse' to shame. Frances has worked for more than two decades pulling visitors along the C&O Canal, and on Saturday she will end her career with one last tow. At 28, Frances is a senior citizen by mule standards. But she's a spry thing who doesn't act her age, which is the equivalent of 84 human years. She doesn't even have gray hair. "Frances is a genetic marvel. She looks and acts like the day we got her. Her health is great. She loves to work," said Kathy Kupper of the National Park Service....
Stories of heroism emerge from crash The airplane was already aflame, burning hot, when Jodee Hogg pushed open the cargo door and fell into the cold mountain air. That she was alive has been called remarkable. That she was relatively unhurt has been called miraculous. That she climbed back into the burning plane to rescue a friend is being called nothing short of heroic. In fact, as details of Monday's wilderness airplane crash continue to emerge, the story is shifting quickly from one of tragedy to one of survival, and finally to one of heroism....
Weather likely played role, but answers still unknown Low clouds and high mountains remain the prime suspects in Monday's wilderness plane crash that killed three, but firm answers as to the cause of the accident likely won't come for at least nine months. "It is far too soon to be making conclusions," said Georgia Struhsaker, senior air safety investigator for the Northwest Regional Office of the National Transportation Safety Board. Struhsaker, whose job it is to investigate airplane crashes, arrived on the scene Wednesday, and has been working at the site alongside teams from the Forest Service and Federal Aviation Administration. A team from the Cessna airplane company is also on hand, she said....
Brother of crash survivor describes grief, joy On Friday, Ryan Hogg, whose sister survived a plane crash in northeastern Montana, outlined his family's week. Hogg, 27, said the family was informed by Forest Service officials on Tuesday at about 3 p.m. that Jodee had died in the contract plane with four others, because "it wasn't a survivable crash." Twenty-four hours later, they were told that two people from the crash had walked out of the wilderness. After another half hour, they learned that one of them was Jodee, 23. The other was Matthew Ramige, 29, of Jackson, Wyo....
Report: Spotted owls still declining Fourteen years after coming under federal protection, the northern spotted owl continues to decline, particularly in Washington state, a new study shows. The owl — an icon of the Northwest timber wars — no longer faces the severe threat from logging it once did, but it faces new threats, including catastrophic wildfires that rage through overgrown forests and the barred owl, a relative that is rapidly taking over spotted owl habitat in the West, the report said. The study, conducted by a Portland firm on behalf of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, appears to be a blow to timber industry efforts to loosen restrictions on federal forest logging in Washington, Oregon and Northern California....
Drillers awaiting word on protection of grouse's habitat Some wildlife experts want to make the greater sage grouse an endangered species icon. Its Western habitat, unfortunately, is atop some of the nation's largest untapped natural gas fields. The grouse has lost about nine-tenths of its 2 million population in Western states and Canada since the early 19th century. A decision by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on whether it should be listed as an endangered species is expected by the end of the year. Developers wanting to drill for natural gas in the grouse's habitat, in sagebrush-covered areas of Colorado, Montana, Utah and Wyoming, are tense....
Development holds reins in the Wild West But the administration's most enduring environmental legacy may lie here in the West, where a series of policy decisions and little-noticed administrative actions have eased development restrictions on millions of acres of federal lands. More than 60 million acres -- an area twice the size of Virginia -- are more vulnerable to logging or drilling as a result of policies that weakened federal restrictions on their development. Other administration actions have made it harder for government officials to apply the most stringent protections to federal wild lands. As part of a legal settlement reached last year with Utah, the administration banned government workers from surveying public lands to identify areas worthy of being set aside by Congress as federal preserves off-limits to development of any kind. More than 3 million acres of land that had been nominated for a congressional designation lost their protected status....
California Backs Plan for Big Cut in Car Emissions California regulators approved a plan on Friday aimed at drastically reducing over the next 11 years the vehicle emissions of gases that scientists have linked to global warming. It would be the first such regulation in the nation and one that, if it survives legal challenges, would force automakers to increase sharply the fuel efficiency of millions of vehicles. Though the plan is being put into place by only one state, automakers see it as the most challenging demand from government since Congress first imposed standards to improve fuel economy in the 1970's....
Retailer Gets Out the Green Votes Patagonia Inc.'s corporate mission is to protect planet Earth. So, when the Ventura, California-based1 company's executives sat down in January to map out the company's marketing strategies for the year, they decided to focus on convincing Americans to vote in the 2004 election for candidates with sound environmental records. This summer, the private company -- which sells about $250 million worth of fleece clothing, camping equipment, climbing gear and other outdoor products a year -- launched a $500,000 multimedia Vote the Environment campaign that will run until Election Day. As Nov. 2 nears, Patagonia is stepping up its get-out-the-vote campaign. It is sending e-mails to 400,000 subscribers, printing essays penned by well-known environmentalists in its catalogs, communicating with visitors in hundreds of environmental and outdoor-sports chat rooms, message boards and blogs, and funding the national distribution of Monumental, a documentary on David Brower, the Sierra Club's first executive director....
Canal Mule Reaches Retirement There's a mule in Georgetown who puts the term 'workhorse' to shame. Frances has worked for more than two decades pulling visitors along the C&O Canal, and on Saturday she will end her career with one last tow. At 28, Frances is a senior citizen by mule standards. But she's a spry thing who doesn't act her age, which is the equivalent of 84 human years. She doesn't even have gray hair. "Frances is a genetic marvel. She looks and acts like the day we got her. Her health is great. She loves to work," said Kathy Kupper of the National Park Service....
Friday, September 24, 2004
NEWS ROUNDUP
Survivors' footprints in snow disappeared The footprints in the snow could have been a clue - if they hadn't disappeared. Jodee Hogg, 23, of Billings, and Matthew Ramige, 29, of Jackson, Wyo., left the prints behind Tuesday morning after spending a cold and bitter night near the burned wreckage of the Cessna that crashed the day before in the rugged hills of northwestern Montana Monday afternoon. When the two U.S. Forest Service workers limped away from the wreckage Tuesday, both burned and injured and cold, there were apparently footprints in the snow around the mangled plane, according to Flathead County Sheriff Jim Dupont....
Woman recounts struggle to survive Jodee Hogg was staring idly out the airplane window, relaxed, enjoying the mountain view, when suddenly the ground seemed much, much too close. "She was sitting behind the pilot," said Flathead County Sheriff Jim Dupont. "Everything was fine. And then all of a sudden, there it is - the side of a mountain." Hogg, 23, was one of two to survive the wilderness plane crash Monday, walking out of the mountains injured, cold, exhausted and very grateful two days later. Alongside the Billings woman was 29-year-old Matthew Ramige of Jackson Hole, Wyo., badly burned, his back broken, but still on his feet....
Survivors had ‘seconds’ to escape The survivors of the plane crash that killed three people Monday probably had only seconds to escape the wreckage before it was consumed by fire. That's a preliminary assessment by Georgia Struhsaker, a senior air safety investigator for the National Transportation Safety Board. She arrived in Kalispell on Wednesday. She examined the wreckage on Mount Liebig, where officials on Tuesday had pronounced the crash "unsurvivable," even as two passengers were moving through the woods trying to save themselves....
Local reaction to handling of crash mostly negative At coffee shops, in health clubs and on the street, people were talking about the plane crash and the improbable tale of tragedy and survival. "I think it's a little surprising they didn't check who should be on the plane," Anderson said of rescuers who called off Tuesday's search after finding the devastated wreckage. "They used weather for an excuse," Patti McIlhargey said. "It sure doesn't give me much hope if I'm up there. "It was only a rain storm. A little Montana rain storm." According to Anderson, "They didn't assume anybody could live through that. I think it's inexcusable."....
Environmentalists denounce feds' plan for the bull trout Oregon environmental groups say the federal government's final plan for protecting bull trout habitat in Northwestern states, which cuts original proposals by 90 percent, imperils the fish's future in the Deschutes River basin. The bull trout, an aggressive and migratory member of the salmon family, was listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act in 1999. The fish need cold, clean water and silt-free stream beds to survive....
Groups sue over wolf program A coalition of more than two dozen Wyoming agricultural, sportsmen, predator control and county government groups has followed through on its intention to sue over the federal gray wolf recovery program. The Wolf Coalition is seeking judicial and monetary relief in federal court for alleged violations of the Endangered Species Act because of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's rejection of the Wyoming wolf management plan....
New rules on pesticides challenged Environmental groups went to court yesterday against Bush administration rules that allow the use of new pesticides with fewer checks on how they affect endangered species. Eight groups filed suit in federal district court in Seattle claiming the rule changes in July violated several environmental laws. The changes let the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) review some pesticides without consulting Interior and Commerce department experts....
New UN Talks Bid to Save Fish, Plants and Timber Long a forum for protecting endangered species like whales or tigers, a U.N. meeting in Bangkok next month will seek a wider role in regulating the billion-dollar trade in timber, fish and medicinal plants. Obscure but commercially valuable species like the humphead wrasse fish, the Chinese yew tree or the hoodia cactus are likely to steal some of the limelight at the October 2-14 meeting from elephants, bald eagles and great white sharks....
The $50 million faucet: Cougar Dam's temperature control tower expected to benefit salmon The big tower is, in effect, a giant faucet that will allow the Corps to correct water temperatures thrown out of balance when it built the dam. It's an elaborate and expensive attempt to fix a temperature imbalance that helped push native spring chinook salmon to an endangered species listing. Water temperatures have been all wrong on the South McKenzie - and on a sizeable stretch of the mainstem McKenzie - since 1963, the year Cougar Dam was completed and ice-cold water began flowing through turbines at its base....
Park's pepper-spraying report done; still secret The National Park Service’s Internal Affairs Division is "reviewing" its investigator’s report on the July 28 pepper-spraying of two Inverness Park teenagers. It should release its findings within 10 days, the Park Service told The Light Wednesday. Agent Paul Crawford, based at Lake Mead National Recreation Area, was assigned to investigate the actions of Point Reyes National Seashore rangers Roger Mayo and Angelina Gregorio who pepper-sprayed Jessica Miller, 17, and Chris Miller, 18, repeatedly even after both were restrained on the ground and Jessica was handcuffed. At least that is what the victims and witnesses have said publicly. Both siblings were released without charge. Victims and witnesses have called the incident, off park property in Point Reyes Station, a case of unprovoked brutality....
Grandmother Being Forced Out Of National Park A grandmother who is one of the few people who can legitimately call Rocky Mountain National Park her home is being forced out. Betty Dick's husband bought the wild land in the 1960s, before the park expanded. But a feud between her dead husband and his first wife is forcing Dick out, and she's not ready to go. "I'm just kind of in a little corner here where the mountains wind around," said Dick, who is 82....
House panel passes Lincoln County land bill A House panel on Wednesday approved sweeping legislation reconfiguring federal land in Lincoln County and allowing a pipeline to deliver water from the rural county to Las Vegas. The bill was pushed forward by voice vote after lawmakers on the House Resources Committee made several changes that Nevada sponsors said they could accept in the interest of getting it passed through Congress this year....
Bush, Kerry court sportsmen in hopes of reeling in votes There they are, on the cover of the newsstand edition of Field & Stream: George W. Bush and John Kerry, wearing blaze orange, wielding shotguns. "This much we know: The next president of the United States will be a sportsman," the magazine declares in its new election issue. "Beyond that, of course, it gets complicated." The pursuit of voters who hunt and fish is one of the inner battles in this campaign. It's a testament to the clout of the country's nearly 40 million sportsmen, especially in such battlegrounds as Wisconsin, Minnesota, Pennsylvania and West Virginia....
Schwarzenegger approves conservancy, signs 20 other enviro bills Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger chose a woodsy mountain setting Thursday to sign legislation establishing a 25 million-acre Sierra Nevada Conservancy, while also signing nearly 20 other bills to protect the Pacific Ocean, curb smog and clean up blighted urban land. With numerous strokes of the pen, Schwarzenegger opened 1,100 miles of car pool lanes to hybrid cars, established the nation's first Cabinet-level Ocean Protection Council in state government and barred cruise ships from burning garbage and dumping sewage inside state waters. He also banned commercial fishing fleets from bottom trawling along designated parts of the California coast and required 100-foot firebreaks around homes in mountain wildfire zones....
EPA's chief under Nixon rips Bush on environment Russell Train is so disappointed in President Bush's environmental record that the staunch Republican, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's second leader 30 years ago, is casting his vote in November for Democrat John Kerry. Train, 84, EPA administrator under Presidents Nixon and Ford from 1973 to 77, was in Madison Tuesday in support of Environment2004, an organization trying to end what it calls the anti-environmental agenda of the Bush administration....
Outfitters can float down Snake River through Monday River outfitters in Grand Teton National Park will have five more days of floating the Snake River this season after the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation agreed to hold off reducing river flows. The bureau said it will keep releases from Jackson Lake Dam steady at 2,500 cubic feet per second until Monday afternoon, at which time it will begin the process of cutting back the flow to store water for next summer....
Town fights to keep its post office in business Local residents are planning to fight like the dickens for the last business in Dickens, Neb. That business is a part-time post office operated on a contract basis for the past 12 years by Roni Melton, a local rancher's wife. The post office serves as the last gathering place in the unincorporated town of 23 people, about 30 miles southwest of North Platte. It's the only place in Dickens to post a sale bill or grab a cup of coffee from a pot set out by Melton....
Column: End of an era As I sat and listened to the bedridden old cowboy talk about the adventures he had lived, I detected a sorrow in his eyes that I did not fully understand. But some 60 years later I am beginning to understand, for the sadness is coming into my eyes as well. B.E. “Cyclone” Denton had seen the West, as he knew it, settled and fenced. He had seen the buffalo slaughtered for hide and tongue. In their place Longhorn cattle were raised to feed a hungry nation. As the country settled these were replaced by the more efficient English breeds of cattle like the Hereford and Angus. It didn’t change suddenly, but civilization was steadily creeping west as a nation hungered for more land to farm and raise beef....
Survivors' footprints in snow disappeared The footprints in the snow could have been a clue - if they hadn't disappeared. Jodee Hogg, 23, of Billings, and Matthew Ramige, 29, of Jackson, Wyo., left the prints behind Tuesday morning after spending a cold and bitter night near the burned wreckage of the Cessna that crashed the day before in the rugged hills of northwestern Montana Monday afternoon. When the two U.S. Forest Service workers limped away from the wreckage Tuesday, both burned and injured and cold, there were apparently footprints in the snow around the mangled plane, according to Flathead County Sheriff Jim Dupont....
Woman recounts struggle to survive Jodee Hogg was staring idly out the airplane window, relaxed, enjoying the mountain view, when suddenly the ground seemed much, much too close. "She was sitting behind the pilot," said Flathead County Sheriff Jim Dupont. "Everything was fine. And then all of a sudden, there it is - the side of a mountain." Hogg, 23, was one of two to survive the wilderness plane crash Monday, walking out of the mountains injured, cold, exhausted and very grateful two days later. Alongside the Billings woman was 29-year-old Matthew Ramige of Jackson Hole, Wyo., badly burned, his back broken, but still on his feet....
Survivors had ‘seconds’ to escape The survivors of the plane crash that killed three people Monday probably had only seconds to escape the wreckage before it was consumed by fire. That's a preliminary assessment by Georgia Struhsaker, a senior air safety investigator for the National Transportation Safety Board. She arrived in Kalispell on Wednesday. She examined the wreckage on Mount Liebig, where officials on Tuesday had pronounced the crash "unsurvivable," even as two passengers were moving through the woods trying to save themselves....
Local reaction to handling of crash mostly negative At coffee shops, in health clubs and on the street, people were talking about the plane crash and the improbable tale of tragedy and survival. "I think it's a little surprising they didn't check who should be on the plane," Anderson said of rescuers who called off Tuesday's search after finding the devastated wreckage. "They used weather for an excuse," Patti McIlhargey said. "It sure doesn't give me much hope if I'm up there. "It was only a rain storm. A little Montana rain storm." According to Anderson, "They didn't assume anybody could live through that. I think it's inexcusable."....
Environmentalists denounce feds' plan for the bull trout Oregon environmental groups say the federal government's final plan for protecting bull trout habitat in Northwestern states, which cuts original proposals by 90 percent, imperils the fish's future in the Deschutes River basin. The bull trout, an aggressive and migratory member of the salmon family, was listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act in 1999. The fish need cold, clean water and silt-free stream beds to survive....
Groups sue over wolf program A coalition of more than two dozen Wyoming agricultural, sportsmen, predator control and county government groups has followed through on its intention to sue over the federal gray wolf recovery program. The Wolf Coalition is seeking judicial and monetary relief in federal court for alleged violations of the Endangered Species Act because of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's rejection of the Wyoming wolf management plan....
New rules on pesticides challenged Environmental groups went to court yesterday against Bush administration rules that allow the use of new pesticides with fewer checks on how they affect endangered species. Eight groups filed suit in federal district court in Seattle claiming the rule changes in July violated several environmental laws. The changes let the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) review some pesticides without consulting Interior and Commerce department experts....
New UN Talks Bid to Save Fish, Plants and Timber Long a forum for protecting endangered species like whales or tigers, a U.N. meeting in Bangkok next month will seek a wider role in regulating the billion-dollar trade in timber, fish and medicinal plants. Obscure but commercially valuable species like the humphead wrasse fish, the Chinese yew tree or the hoodia cactus are likely to steal some of the limelight at the October 2-14 meeting from elephants, bald eagles and great white sharks....
The $50 million faucet: Cougar Dam's temperature control tower expected to benefit salmon The big tower is, in effect, a giant faucet that will allow the Corps to correct water temperatures thrown out of balance when it built the dam. It's an elaborate and expensive attempt to fix a temperature imbalance that helped push native spring chinook salmon to an endangered species listing. Water temperatures have been all wrong on the South McKenzie - and on a sizeable stretch of the mainstem McKenzie - since 1963, the year Cougar Dam was completed and ice-cold water began flowing through turbines at its base....
Park's pepper-spraying report done; still secret The National Park Service’s Internal Affairs Division is "reviewing" its investigator’s report on the July 28 pepper-spraying of two Inverness Park teenagers. It should release its findings within 10 days, the Park Service told The Light Wednesday. Agent Paul Crawford, based at Lake Mead National Recreation Area, was assigned to investigate the actions of Point Reyes National Seashore rangers Roger Mayo and Angelina Gregorio who pepper-sprayed Jessica Miller, 17, and Chris Miller, 18, repeatedly even after both were restrained on the ground and Jessica was handcuffed. At least that is what the victims and witnesses have said publicly. Both siblings were released without charge. Victims and witnesses have called the incident, off park property in Point Reyes Station, a case of unprovoked brutality....
Grandmother Being Forced Out Of National Park A grandmother who is one of the few people who can legitimately call Rocky Mountain National Park her home is being forced out. Betty Dick's husband bought the wild land in the 1960s, before the park expanded. But a feud between her dead husband and his first wife is forcing Dick out, and she's not ready to go. "I'm just kind of in a little corner here where the mountains wind around," said Dick, who is 82....
House panel passes Lincoln County land bill A House panel on Wednesday approved sweeping legislation reconfiguring federal land in Lincoln County and allowing a pipeline to deliver water from the rural county to Las Vegas. The bill was pushed forward by voice vote after lawmakers on the House Resources Committee made several changes that Nevada sponsors said they could accept in the interest of getting it passed through Congress this year....
Bush, Kerry court sportsmen in hopes of reeling in votes There they are, on the cover of the newsstand edition of Field & Stream: George W. Bush and John Kerry, wearing blaze orange, wielding shotguns. "This much we know: The next president of the United States will be a sportsman," the magazine declares in its new election issue. "Beyond that, of course, it gets complicated." The pursuit of voters who hunt and fish is one of the inner battles in this campaign. It's a testament to the clout of the country's nearly 40 million sportsmen, especially in such battlegrounds as Wisconsin, Minnesota, Pennsylvania and West Virginia....
Schwarzenegger approves conservancy, signs 20 other enviro bills Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger chose a woodsy mountain setting Thursday to sign legislation establishing a 25 million-acre Sierra Nevada Conservancy, while also signing nearly 20 other bills to protect the Pacific Ocean, curb smog and clean up blighted urban land. With numerous strokes of the pen, Schwarzenegger opened 1,100 miles of car pool lanes to hybrid cars, established the nation's first Cabinet-level Ocean Protection Council in state government and barred cruise ships from burning garbage and dumping sewage inside state waters. He also banned commercial fishing fleets from bottom trawling along designated parts of the California coast and required 100-foot firebreaks around homes in mountain wildfire zones....
EPA's chief under Nixon rips Bush on environment Russell Train is so disappointed in President Bush's environmental record that the staunch Republican, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's second leader 30 years ago, is casting his vote in November for Democrat John Kerry. Train, 84, EPA administrator under Presidents Nixon and Ford from 1973 to 77, was in Madison Tuesday in support of Environment2004, an organization trying to end what it calls the anti-environmental agenda of the Bush administration....
Outfitters can float down Snake River through Monday River outfitters in Grand Teton National Park will have five more days of floating the Snake River this season after the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation agreed to hold off reducing river flows. The bureau said it will keep releases from Jackson Lake Dam steady at 2,500 cubic feet per second until Monday afternoon, at which time it will begin the process of cutting back the flow to store water for next summer....
Town fights to keep its post office in business Local residents are planning to fight like the dickens for the last business in Dickens, Neb. That business is a part-time post office operated on a contract basis for the past 12 years by Roni Melton, a local rancher's wife. The post office serves as the last gathering place in the unincorporated town of 23 people, about 30 miles southwest of North Platte. It's the only place in Dickens to post a sale bill or grab a cup of coffee from a pot set out by Melton....
Column: End of an era As I sat and listened to the bedridden old cowboy talk about the adventures he had lived, I detected a sorrow in his eyes that I did not fully understand. But some 60 years later I am beginning to understand, for the sadness is coming into my eyes as well. B.E. “Cyclone” Denton had seen the West, as he knew it, settled and fenced. He had seen the buffalo slaughtered for hide and tongue. In their place Longhorn cattle were raised to feed a hungry nation. As the country settled these were replaced by the more efficient English breeds of cattle like the Hereford and Angus. It didn’t change suddenly, but civilization was steadily creeping west as a nation hungered for more land to farm and raise beef....
Thursday, September 23, 2004
GAO REPORT
International Convention and U.S. Laws Protect Wildlife Differently (pdf)
Implementation of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora has become increasingly complex and controversial since its inception. Complexity has increased in part because of the sheer number of member countries (166) and species protected (more than 33,000) and because the criteria for identifying protected species have become more scientific and specific, resulting in heavier data-gathering, permitting, enforcement, and reporting requirements for member countries. Controversy, in turn, has increased because the Convention membership has recently contemplated, and in some cases approved, protection of commercial species such as sharks and Patagonian toothfish (commonly marketed as Chilean seabass)—species that in some cases are already managed under regional fisheries agreements. Over the 9-year fiscal period 1995 through 2003, the United States spent more than $50 million on Convention-related activities. As the agency primarily responsible for U.S. implementation of the Convention, the Fish and Wildlife Service spent the largest portion of these funds—about $37 million over the period. Other agencies have roles as well, including the Department of State, which makes U.S. contributions to help administer the Convention internationally. The Convention and the Endangered Species Act protect species differently. In some cases, the act prohibits imports that are allowed by the Convention. For example, the act generally prohibits the import of a popular exotic fish, the Asian arowana, although the Convention allows some commercial trade in the species. The Convention establishes mandatory requirements and recognizes countries’ rights to establish stricter protections. However, such protections have generated heated debates among affected parties. Those in favor say that the United States should impose stricter protections than the Convention, when needed to protect endangered species or their habitats. Opponents say that U.S. actions should be consistent with the agreements reached by a majority of the Convention’s members....
International Convention and U.S. Laws Protect Wildlife Differently (pdf)
Implementation of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora has become increasingly complex and controversial since its inception. Complexity has increased in part because of the sheer number of member countries (166) and species protected (more than 33,000) and because the criteria for identifying protected species have become more scientific and specific, resulting in heavier data-gathering, permitting, enforcement, and reporting requirements for member countries. Controversy, in turn, has increased because the Convention membership has recently contemplated, and in some cases approved, protection of commercial species such as sharks and Patagonian toothfish (commonly marketed as Chilean seabass)—species that in some cases are already managed under regional fisheries agreements. Over the 9-year fiscal period 1995 through 2003, the United States spent more than $50 million on Convention-related activities. As the agency primarily responsible for U.S. implementation of the Convention, the Fish and Wildlife Service spent the largest portion of these funds—about $37 million over the period. Other agencies have roles as well, including the Department of State, which makes U.S. contributions to help administer the Convention internationally. The Convention and the Endangered Species Act protect species differently. In some cases, the act prohibits imports that are allowed by the Convention. For example, the act generally prohibits the import of a popular exotic fish, the Asian arowana, although the Convention allows some commercial trade in the species. The Convention establishes mandatory requirements and recognizes countries’ rights to establish stricter protections. However, such protections have generated heated debates among affected parties. Those in favor say that the United States should impose stricter protections than the Convention, when needed to protect endangered species or their habitats. Opponents say that U.S. actions should be consistent with the agreements reached by a majority of the Convention’s members....
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