Common human brain parasite Toxoplasma gondii doesn’t just make rats like cats- It works like this. The protozoan Toxoplasma comes to maturity inside a cat and the cysts are expelled in cat feces. Any cat that lives part of the time outside may be infected. The parasite doesn’t hurt the cat, however. A rat or…
Will either side win the hearing? The Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission will discuss the proposed state wolf plan and hold a public hearing. The state plan calls for 15 breeding pairs of wolves in the state for 3 years running before a state delisting can happen. About 2/3 of the land area in Washington…
Latest chapter in a thick book of controversy over hunt is being written- The inclusion of most of the area inside Grand Teton National Park (the valley portion) happened after a long and bitter controversy. The present boundary of the Park was established in 1950 after significant concessions to the usual opponents of change in…
Busy Moose-Wilson paved road closed to accommodate GB399, 610 and families- We have posted a number of stories on the photogenic and often seen extended grizzly family of grizzly bears 399, her adult daughter 610 and their various cubs, including a cub who actually switched (reason unknown) from 399 to 610 last summer. About a…
Lawsuit tries to permanently derail plan to let bison use Gardiner Basin in the winter. Early last spring bison were suddenly allowed to use the Gardiner Basin just north of Yellowstone Park for the first time in over a generation. State, federal and tribal officials signed what was to be a landmark agreement to let…
Autumn 2011- Golden aspens and cottonwoods, plus a dusting of early snow, set the lovely autumn scene in Yellowstone, giving a hint of winter to come. As the grizzlies head up to the high country to fatten up on white bark pine nuts before hibernation, bugling elk stream back into the valleys, coming down from…
Another story about the reoccupation of the Montana plains by grizzly bears- Roaming grizzlies discovering Montana’s plains offer abundant food. AP
Record mortality in 2010 took its toll- Population goes from 602 to 593. Fifty-five grizzly died or were killed by people in 2010, a record. That pace is off slightly in 2011 (35 so far). A large number of grizzly food sources have disappeared in recent years, most notably whitebark pine seeds and cutthroat trout.…
Dr. Ralph Maughan is professor emeritus of political science at Idaho State University. He was a Western Watersheds Project Board Member off and on for many years, and was also its President for several years. For a long time he produced Ralph Maughan’s Wolf Report. He was a founder of the Greater Yellowstone Coalition. He and Jackie Johnson Maughan wrote three editions of “Hiking Idaho.” He also wrote “Beyond the Tetons” and “Backpacking Wyoming’s Teton and Washakie Wilderness.” He created and is the administrator of The Wildlife News.