Recently I attended a meeting with the Bridger Teton National Forest (BTNF) officials to discuss future grazing plans for the Upper Green River grazing allotment.
The allotment, one of the most outstanding wildlife areas in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, contains the headwaters of the Green River and lies north of Pinedale Wyoming between the Wind River Range and the Gros Ventre Range.
Basically, the Forest Service plans to allow the continued degradation of public resources by livestock grazing on what is one of the most important wildlife areas on the entire BTNF. The Upper Green Allotment is an excellent example of PPSC or “privatize profit, socialize costs.”
The Upper Green Allotment is the largest Forest Service grazing allotment in the West. It is a mixture of aspen, rolling sagebrush/grassland, willow-lined creeks, intermixed with ponds, and springs.
It contains the best wildlife habitat outside of a national park. Home to grizzlies and wolves, endangered Colorado cutthroat trout, sage grouse, elk, moose, pronghorn, and various rare amphibians, among other outstanding wildlife values.
That is one reason why the BTNF Forest Plan has categorized 93% of the area as DFC 10 and 12 status where protecting wildlife values is the primary goal. Yet the FS manages it as more or less a feedlot for a few local ranchers.
Unfortunately, this amazing wildlife habitat is annually trashed by private livestock for the profit of a few ranchers, all with the collusion and indeed the cooperation of the BTNF.
In a recent Final Environmental Impact Statement, the BTNF acknowledges that the range condition of the clear majority of the allotment is between poor and fair. Don’t let the word “fair” fool you. It’s a nice sounding euphemism chosen by range managers to hide the real condition of the landscape. In range parlance, this means that much of the Upper Green allotment is in terrible range conditions.
Some 74% of the plant species that would be expected on this allotment are so rare as to be non-existent due to livestock grazing. In other words, by their own admission, the allotment is already severely degraded.
Worse, their proposed solution identified in their FEIS would only tweak the functional condition of the allotment slightly upwards. That assumes of course that the BTNF implements all the standards and guidelines and maintains regular monitoring as outlined in its FEIS.
Most of the proposed changes in grazing practices are “aspirational” rather than mandatory. In other words, they hope that ranchers will do this or that, and they hope that this will improve things for public lands.
I can assure you from my prior experience as a BLM biologist and many reviews of western lands such an assumption is questionable.
And even if there is some slight improvement, the FEIS also acknowledges that any improvements will be slow and incremental due to on-going livestock grazing.
This is readily acknowledged by many of the FS own biologists, hydrologists, and other “ologists” who all voiced their opinion to the FEIS staff that the preferred alternative chosen by the BTNF would not protect the resources under their purview.
Indeed, when confronted about this, the Forest Supervisor admitted that she had not read any of the scientific reports, and yet she went ahead and approved the deficient grazing plan anyway.
The only alternative that would create a significant improvement in the allotment to all resources is the no-grazing option. And, of course, the BTNF did not pick this option.
During our meeting, we were prevented from even discussing this option since the Forest Supervisor had summarily decided that No Grazing was not going to be entertained.
Yet a chart on page 157 table 19 summary of effects on the resource by alternatives of the FEIS compares the four alternatives, including the No Grazing alternative on dozens of resource values. In every instance, the No Grazing allotment would bring about more rapid improvement, more positive benefits and better ecological outcomes than any of the other grazing options. Indeed, the only negative impact reported would be on “traditional uses” which is a euphemism for livestock grazing.
Click to access 3077_FSPLT3_4092241.pdf
In other words, no grazing would be best for ground cover, detrimental soil disturbance, soil compaction, soil erosion, soil quality, riparian streambank stability and water quality, stream temperatures, riparian function, elk, grizzlies, cutthroat trout, sage grouse, amphibians, recreation, plant communities, and a host of other values, yet the BTNF would not even entertain discussion about it, much less choose it as the preferred alternative?
When I questioned the FS officials why they were ignoring the No Grazing option, when by their own analysis, it had the greatest public benefits, the District Range Con lamely defended grazing by suggesting the FS was a “multiple use” agency and therefore livestock grazing was permitted.
But the Forest Service is charged with protecting the public interest, not the financial interests of resource exploiters. If the use of businesses impacts public values like water quality, wildlife, plant communities, and recreation, then the agency is not required to continue to permit this degradation. Indeed, we the public, are paying the agency to manage public lands for the public interest, not private interests.
Another example of their preference for the profits of ranchers than for the good of the public’s wildlife came during a discussion of grizzly bears. Since 1995, 34 grizzly bears have been “removed” from the Upper Green River allotment. When I questioned why the public’s wildlife was being removed instead of private livestock using our public lands, I was shut down and told I wasn’t allowed to debate these issues.
The discussion went on about some things the ranchers could do to reduce conflicts like the removal of carrion, and other measures, but these were all “voluntary” and not mandatory.
The FS was quick to point out that the permittees had range riders out on the allotment to “scare away” predators like wolves and grizzlies, not to mention this also affects elk and other wildlife.
Again, I questioned the FS why the public’s wildlife should be chased off the public land so that private businesses could operate on our public lands. If one assumes that elk, grizzlies, and wolves were picking the best habitat for their survival, then animals displaced by range riders would be relegated to habitat that was less desirable. It might also increase conflicts between individuals and packs, again to the detriment of the public’s wildlife.
Over and over when the BTNF had a chance to protect public resources or protect the livestock industry’s use and abuse of the Upper Green River allotment, they deferred to the ranchers.
One reason for this continued support of a destructive industry has to do with the makeup of the decision-making team. The review of grazing management is usually done by Range Conservationists or Range “cons” as they are called. And believe the public is “conned” by these people.
If you are a range con, your entire job depends on the continued use of public resources by ranchers. As a result, you are not going to recommend something like a No Grazing alternative for any public lands because it would result in no reason for your position. As a result, range cons have a financial vested interest in continuing livestock grazing on public lands.
As someone who studied range management as an undergraduate and in graduate school, I can also assure you that most range cons are “want to be” ranchers who were not lucky to be born the son or daughter of a rancher. So the next best thing is to become a range con so you can mingle with the ranchers, and get to drive a big government pick-up-and wear cowboy boots like the people you idolize.
The Upper Green Allotment’s importance for wildlife is being sacrificed to facilitate the exploitation of our land for private profit.
The only way this will change is if people continue to remind the BTNF that they have a legal and more importantly, a moral responsibility to manage these lands for the public good.
Comments
Reminding them of their duties won’t change things because of the political pressure these people are under. The only way to effect change is to sue them for violating statutes/regulations and/or making arbitrary and capricious decisions.
This is the area where many grizzlies are killed, because they harass or kill cattle in the area. The cattle should be removed, rather than the grizzlies. This area is also a migration corridor between Yellowstone Area and the entire Wind River Range for grizzlies and wolves. The cattle in the Upper Green River Area create a bottleneck for migrating of wildlife.
Suing the Forest Service may be in order, but even if the lawsuit is successful — a questionable proposition —
it is not a permanent solution.
The way to permanently solve this problem is to expand Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks. That would phase out livestock grazing, logging, fracking and other resource extraction. It would protect bison, grizzlies, wolves, elk, pronghorn, and other wildlife from these damaging activities, as well as end ecologically harmful trophy hunting. It would also protect roadless areas and connecting lands that are not now designated as wilderness.
Expand the parks all the way to Pinedale?
I see the answers above from people who know more than me and certainly I do not live anywhere near these areas, I only get to enjoy them. My question is always what can the average person do to change this destruction of habitat and infringement of public lands? It is such a political issue with so much corruption it is frustrating to see our public spaces taken away or destroyed.
Sandy, you can support the groups who have been trying to protect the natural values in the Upper Green that George and others describe so well. Involved in the effort are Western Watersheds Project, Sierra Club (including the Wyoming Chapter), Wyoming Wildlife Advocates, Center For Biological Diversity, Yellowstone to Uintas, and others.
What would it cost to buy out the allotments? This would seem to be the easiest way forward while avoiding costly and time consuming lawsuits.
Thankyou. I wanted to know what is was worth too. The public needs a way where if they are willing to pay for it the grazing stops – teach me more about the mechanism. We can concentrate on one area at a time perhaps, so the change is dramatic, obvious, and gets public attention.
There’s already have been many, many buy-outs of ranchland and other lands to return to their natural condition. The results should be obvious already.
Maybe a decrease in the demand for beef. Anyone who eats beef shouldn’t complain that too much land is being used up for cattle, it just is illogical. And of course, the larger the population gets of beef eaters, there you go.
But for decades, there have been buyouts of ranchland that have been returned to their natural state.
The Upper Green River is in need of a buyout….
“Maybe a decrease in the demand for beef”
Not going to happen Ida what with other countries now importing more & more beef:
http://www.dasnr.okstate.edu/Members/donald-stotts-40okstate.edu/u-s-beef-sales-to-china-expected-to-remain-limited-in-near-term
At least 3 ranches in my area have increased the size of their herds (and they all have grazing allotments on public lands)
I don’t see it happening either. 🙁
I’ve been watching the machinations of recent US administration policies of export of beef.
As you see, the trade relationship with China, a major emerging market, is practically contradictory from day to day, with the latest activity pure corruption and involved with constitutional emoluments clause.
So far some South American exporters are managing to produce export beef far more cheaply, which has several effects:
1. Areas of Brazil and Argentina ecologically suffer due to expansion of ranching industry there. (It must be clearly understood that ranching is and always has been urban-dependent It was not viable before rail and clearing of natural species and ecosystem. The cheap method of ranching is largely industrial, using feedlots at least during final months, which places extreme pressure on large landscapes, which are transformed into huge monocropping of feed plants. The US mountain west actually only produces about 2% or 3% of US beef production, and closing down the industry from the Pacific to the Rocky front ranges would do little to change US beef production. as many Montanans and Idahoans know, ranching is a hobby and/or tax-sheltering industry. my comment is getting lengthy and your research on the subject is well-warranted)
2. As a result of 1., much of the republican and Trump efforts, as well as the previous Obama admin., have been less than forthcoming to ranchers. Japan has vastly increased its consumption and importation over time, and it appears that other populous Asian nations (India) are also increasing consumption. USDA policies are rather more focused on increasing export than on protecting forests, George. Thus, forest supervisors tend to be selected with a strong, if unpublicized, mandate to show production, even though pretty much all production sectors operate at a public loss.
3 conservation, preservation, and restoration, gather almost no lobbyinng force. States, having more geographically-selected internatal representation, tend to be the instigators of the extreme divides you see. One could frame this as local-area corruption, but even though ranchers have only existed for less than 150 years (I knew a man born before any of this existed; He pointed out that the industry occurred only after the 1870s had removed the indigenous and advent of rail and the slaughterhouse cities. The original beef producers used the then-free Great Plains for range cattle (except in the Southwest, which is another story – although grasslands extended into AZ and to the Brazos mouth and Galveston coast, making much of what Euroamericans call desert an extremely recent phenomenon. The bison, wolf, and other organisms suffered earlier loss, due to international trade occurring since earlier times and Coronado’s introduced longhorns being a fiercer form of Bos, able to fend for itself in arid areas and fend off the predators remaining after the great Pleistocene extinctions)
4. Thus, much of the perception of threat, loss, consequent frustration and rage inherent in the ranching industry is beyond the capacity of US government remedy, unless huge markets are opened. That self-perception as victims, as you saw during the Bundy debacles (traditionalists since 1948), is due to avoidance coping. This is the most common way to escape cognitive dissonance, and why the USA has so much cultural resistance to science and even historical fact. This sociocognitive momentum explains much of the incapacity to change until commercial extinction, and due to fragmentation of biogeographical habitat connectivity, the high likelihood of a real culmination to the Anthropocene Extinction Event.
Further, so long as human populations increase, I’d expect governments to be composed of the more exploitative members of a society; until that reverses, all conservation is mere slowing of the devastation.
“Further, so long as human populations increase, I’d expect governments to be composed of the more exploitative members of a society; until that reverses, all conservation is mere slowing of the devastation”
Sadly, you’ve “hit the nail on the head” with that comment, Makuye.
I eat very little beef. Cattle erode stream sides and take precedence over wildlife in many areas. There are something like 90 million cattle in the US. Beef, is not that healthy for a person.
Beef eaten by human animals isn’t healthy for bovines, either. But your point is well-taken.