Grazing and Livestock
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Although the nomination of Jim Caswell, aide to former Idaho Governor Dirk Kempthorne has now passed the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, Colorado’s U.S. Senator Ken Salazar (Democrat) says he will keep “a hold” on the nomination and not let it come to a vote before the full Senate. The hold is there because…
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Oh boy, these Idaho politicians acted fast to try to define what caused the fires, protect their butts, and try to get a bit extra for their good buddies out there. It’s quite a scene — the BLM and 1000 of their staff diverted to help fight fires in Idaho caused not by the Clinton…
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Charred and scarred. Ranchers blame grazing rules for fire’s huge size. By Matt Christensen. Times-News writer. This story features none other than Idaho State House of Representatives Bert Brackett, R-Rogerson, of whom KT has written. Brackett is correct that the grazing rules led to the size of the fire, but in exactly the wrong way.…
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The largely non-story (in Idaho) about Idaho losing its brucellosis free status has now ended. Idaho has been declared “brucellosis free” again. Idaho cattle had been infected by Wyoming elk near the Wyoming border in, naturally, a winter elk feeding operation close to cattle. Idaho media barely covered the story, and, of course, Wyoming the…
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A relatively new forest fire, Trapper Ridge, is pumping a lot of smoke into Stanley Basin. There will be a big controversy over grazing when the Murphy Complex and other range fires are out. Burned areas should be rested a good while and seeded with native grass, forbs, and brush to reduce the liklihood of…
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Blaze ignites criticism. Ranchers question rules of engagement in Murphy fire. Times News. By Nick Coltrain. This is very irritating. Some of the ranchers are blaming the fire on not enough grazing and BLM’s tiny attempts to rest a few areas. The years of abusive grazing are the reason for the cheatgrass spread. You don’t…
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It seems the cattle industry has maintained it’s scapegoat for the time being. Montana representative Rehberg killed a house amendment based on Schweitzer’s plan to buffer the rest of the state’s brucellosis free status from those that wander around Yellowstone. That would have protected the buffalo AND the livestock industry’s sacred brucellosis free status. Rehberg…
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The Watersheds Messenger for Summer 2007 is on-line. Here is the pdf version (much better quality). This is the newsmagazine of the Western Watersheds Project. It has a lot of good articles, and they are not the bland generic stuff like that produced by many organizations.