Author: Ralph Maughan

  • One of the most beautiful pollinators bites the dust- One of the fun things I remember from childhood is capturing the black, yellow and white monarch butterfly caterpillars. They were not hard to find. I would put them in a Mason jar and feed them milkweed which was commonplace. It was where I got the…

  • These are rescheduled hearings due to the government shutdown- Federal hearings on wolf delisting are underway at four locations this week. They are “make up” hearings because those scheduled for October had to be cancelled when congressional Republicans shut down the federal government. The first hearing was in Denver yesterday Nov. 19, 2013. It was…

  • Untabulated comments overwhelmingly opposed hunt- More were just tossed away- One of the most consistent characteristics of right wing movements is a distaste for democracy.  From the beginning with Edmund Burke (1729-1797) who invented the word “conservatism,” is the argument that some small elite knows better than the public. Whether based on land ownership or…

  • Anti-coal port candidates now appear in charge in Whatcom County- In recent years there has been a big effort to clear the way to build a huge coal terminal (seaport) near Bellingham, Washington to ship Wyoming and Montana coal to China. This has caused a big controversy in Whatcom County where Bellingham is, next to…

  • Year isn’t over but griz deaths in Greater Yellowstone only about half of 2012- Earlier we wrote that grizzly bear deaths in the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem (GYE) this year appeared lower than expected.  It was hard to say more at the time because the government was shut down and the official grizzly mortality count was…

  •   Our readers find lots of news and have many comments. Please post yours below in comments –“Leave a reply”. Here is the link to the old thread that’s now being retired (Oct. 1, 2013).

  • The Facebook photo has gone viral. It drips with symbolic hostility and one actually dead wolf. Now the photo has been taken down on Facebook, but you can see it many places in case it hasn’t already been emailed to you. We received a half dozen or so by email. Our experience is hardly unique.…

  • More effective and less expensive than logging, beaver also provide fish, wildlife and flood control benefits- After almost every large wildfire or fires that do significant damage to structures, people ask for proactive measures. The desire for this is rational. It needs no explanation. Officeholders usually respond, verbally at least. Politicians’ solutions, however, are often…

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