Wildlife Habitat

  • More water release from dams could bring new cottonwoods on the Upper Missouri River

    Ralph Maughan

    Cottonwood along the Upper Missouri in Montana all date before the dams. Some are two centuries old- More flow could bring back trees. By Karl Puckett. Great Falls Tribune Staff Writer

  • Interior Chief Slams Oil and Gas Groups' 'Election-Year Politics'

    Ralph Maughan

    Salazar condemns oil industry lies about leasing on public lands- Well good for the Secretary of Interior! I don’t watch much television, but when I do, I’m amazed at the number of ads energy companies are producing. I’d bet 90% of the population believes that “BP” stands for beyond petroleum, not the company’s actual name…

  • The need to manage national forests as carbon sinks

    Ralph Maughan

    Forest fire prevention? Thinning? Maximize size of individual tress? Leave it alone? It’s hard to say The article below is related to the one posted about “Sen. Udall sponsors bill to attack pine beetles.” It’s good to finally see some attention to the role of forests as carbon sinks, but it is not clear how…

  • Sen. Udall sponsors bill to attack pine beetles

    Ralph Maughan

    Colorado Democrat Udall says his bill will combat a great natural disaster- Yes there are millions of  acres of beetle killed pine trees in Colorado, but also Wyoming, Utah, Idaho, Montana, eastern Oregon and Washington, New Mexico, British Columbia, Alberta and the Yukon. Local politicians respond to local demands to do something, but rarely do…

  • Wyoming Game and Fish establishes a season on antler gathering

    Ralph Maughan

    Season established to reduce disturbance of ungulates on their winter range- Antlers and some horns (such as bighorn) are very valuable. There a quite a few “horn hunters” — people who gather them after they have fallen. As a result, there is competition and an incentive to get into the wintering grounds early, often when…

  • Work progresses on wildlife overpass near Elko, Nevada

    Ralph Maughan

    Stimulus funds being used to solve high vehicle/ungulate collision area on US 93, north of Wells- Story on wildlife overpass. Las Vegas Sun

  • Interior Board rejects all appeals to BLM travel plan in SW Montana

    Ralph Maughan

    New rules governing use of vehicles on BLM land will now go into effect- I’m not familiar with the details of vehicle use in this area, but it sounds like all sides appealed, although probably more on the off-roaders side. Travel plans, once relatively non-controversial documents, have become major public land controversies almost everywhere in…

  • Idaho to pay to settle lawsuit on who can bid for grazing leases

    Ralph Maughan

    Lawsuit’s aftermath forces Idaho’s Land Board set rules allowing conservationists to lease state grazing lands- The Western Watersheds Project was born when Jon Marvel outbid a rancher at a state grazing lease auction, and the Land Board gave the lease to the rancher anyway*. Finally, Idaho’s Land Board is apparently going to let other interests…

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‎”At some point we must draw a line across the ground of our home and our being, drive a spear into the land and say to the bulldozers, earthmovers, government and corporations, “thus far and no further.” If we do not, we shall later feel, instead of pride, the regret of Thoreau, that good but overly-bookish man, who wrote, near the end of his life, “If I repent of anything it is likely to be my good behaviour.”

Edward Abbey

“The continued existence of wildlife and wilderness is important to the quality of life of humans.”

Jim Fowler

“Our forests offer much more than just beautiful landscapes and wildlife. Each one has a different story to tell.”

Raveena Tandon

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