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Recently I drove up the Lostine River corridor and hiked the trail in the Eaglecap Wilderness giving me a good opportunity to review a Forest Service proposal to log the river corridor. The agency is using a stealth method of approving the proposed logging called a “Categorical Exclusion”. The CE allows the FS to proceed…
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Whenever I am driving around Central Oregon in summer, I see the Deschutes River being sprayed in the air by thousands of sprinklers used by farmers and ranchers primarily to grow forage for livestock like irrigated pasture, alfalfa, and hay. Because of these water withdrawals for irrigation, the aquatic ecosystem of the Deschutes River…
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The House Subcommittee on Natural Resources chaired by Tom McClintock (R) of California is advocating more active management of our national forests based on the presumption that logging/thinning will reduce large wildfires. A clear indication of McClintock’s perspective is found in the title of a recent hearing he chaired called “Oversight Hearing on Burdensome Litigation…
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Many rural counties with sizeable amounts of federal lands within their jurisdictional boundaries depend on federal payments to support basic services like fire, police, schools, and the like. The main programs include the Payments In Lieu of Taxes (PILT), Refuge Revenue Sharing, Secure Rural Schools and Community Self Determination Act (SRS). One of the…
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Conservation groups challenge disease-breeding feedground on public lands JACKSON, Wyoming –– Four conservation groups filed a lawsuit today to challenge the U.S. Forest Service’s authorization of the Alkali Creek elk feedground on the Bridger-Teton National Forest. The high-risk feedlot, run by the Wyoming Game and Fish Department, baits and unnaturally concentrates wild Jackson elk…
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This week Donald Trump withdrew the United States support and leadership in the Paris Climate Accords, demonstrating that he prefers buggy whips to automobiles. There is overwhelming agreement by scientists and most of the world’s leaders that climate change is real and is occurring. It is not a “hoax” as Trump asserts. The consequence of…
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Olympia, Wash — Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife officials late Thursday released a new protocol that would allow wolves to be killed too soon after incidents with livestock and without enough oversight. The new “wolf-livestock interaction protocol” guides when the agency will move to kill wolves in response to livestock depredations. Conservation groups are…
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Fed by giant springs in many of its tributaries, historically the Deschutes River of Central Oregon had one of the most constant flows of any river in the West. Even in “flood” the Deschutes rarely rose more than a foot. Due to its cold, clear, and steady flow, the Deschutes was once one of the…