Free Republic

Seeing the big picture Ranchers who practice Holistic Resource Management focus on keeping the native grasses healthy—everything else follows from there. By Lisa Hamilton, Posted June 14, 2004The palette of the High Plains is subtle. From the moment the sun rises in the enormous sky until the moment it sets in the mountains, the land is flooded with sunlight. As the light hits it wrings out the reds and the greens, drains even purples and oranges into submission. There is color here, but no contrast. The valley known as Iron Creek would be no different were it not for the...

President Bush is leading steady progress toward a more rational, realistic and responsible approach to a host of environmental and resource issues close to the hearts of all Idahoans. For three years, the Bush administration has been encouraging stewardship, engaging those who know and understand the issues best. The idea is that people most influenced by federal policies should play a larger role in developing them. The president is committed to being a partner with local folks in the best interest of people and the resources on which they depend. President Bush is working to roll back policies from eight...

On January 29, 2002, the United States Court of Federal Claims (Court) issued its Final Opinion and Finding of Fact in the property phase of Hage v U.S. This litigation was initiated by the government's argument that Plaintiff could not access the forage and water on lands then administered by the United States Forest Service (USFS) and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) without a grazing permit. The government's argument was premised on its claim that the grazing lands in question were "public lands"; that the government owned these lands, and therefore, the waters arising on those lands. According to...

    The Bureau of Land ManagementNEWS News Menu (Graphics) News Menu (Text) Home Page Last updated: 01/02/04 Bureau of Land Management For Release: Friday, January 2, 2004 Contact: Tom Gorey (202) 452-5137 Molly Brady (202) 452-7714   BLM Announces Availability of Draft Environmental Impact Statement On Proposed Grazing Rule; Sets Public Meetings on Impact Statement The Bureau of Land Management today announced the availability of a Draft Environmental Impact Statement prepared in connection with a proposed grazing rule that the BLM published last month. The Bureau also announced a series of public meetings that it will hold in the...

Cattle Grazers Welcome New Grazing Rules By JOHN HEILPRIN ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON (AP) - Livestock interests in the West are welcoming the Interior Department's proposed new federal rules for grazing on public lands, though they could cause some short-term harm to the environment. The department's Bureau of Land Management released a draft environmental impact statement Friday that conceded "some short-term adverse effects" from the new rules could result among 160 million acres of public lands considered suitable for livestock grazing. But what is grazed is considerably less than that due to drought, wildfires and business decisions. "The numbers are down...

CFBF seeks habitat restoration pacts with agencies Dan Bryant Online Exclusive, Nov 4 2003 The California Farm Bureau Federation wants to see "partnerships for restoration" with governmental agencies supporting both commercially viable agriculture and habitat for endangered species, according to CFBF managing counsel, Brenda Jahns Southwick. These, she said, would preserve farmland as a valuable resource, not only for production of food and fiber but as a preferred wildlife habitat based on the natural movement of animals, without human manipulation of the environment. During her talk during the recent 22nd Annual Agribusiness Management Conference in Fresno, Southwick said her 95,000-member,...

Thursday, August 14, 2003 Cattle in Gila Forest Stir Protest By Rene RomoJournal Southern Bureau     SILVER CITY— The protest signs being paraded in front of the Forest Service headquarters here Wednesday said: "Remove the sacred cows" and "Where's the beef? Trespassing in our wilderness."     Roughly two dozen sign-carrying protesters staged an hourlong demonstration in front of Forest Service offices Wednesday to express their impatience with the agency's failure to remove cattle that Catron County ranchers Kit and Sherry Laney are running in the Gila National Forest without a permit.     Forest Service officials said the case is being...

CANBERRA, Australia (AP)--The Australian army will kill as many as 15,000 kangaroos to keep a southeastern army base from being overgrazed, a military spokesman said Wednesday. The Defense Department said the plant-eating marsupials threatened the environment in the 104,000-acre Puckapunyal training ground near Melbourne, said Brigadier Mike Hannan. Animal activists vowed to protest, saying the real problem was a fence surrounding the training ground that prevented the kangaroos from roaming freely. Animal Liberation Australia spokeswoman Rheya Linden said more killing could not be justified. ``Kangaroo numbers are severely reduced, not only because of the slaughter last year but because the...

Land rules almost done Project addresses off-road vehicles, habitats By Jim Skeen Staff Writer PALMDALE -- A decade-long undertaking to set environmental management rules for the western Mojave Desert will reach two milestones this spring with the release of draft environmental documents evaluating off-road vehicle routes and habitat conservation plans. The U.S. Bureau of Land Management is planning to release its draft environmental impact statement for the West Mojave Plan in mid-May and have the plan finalized by February 2004. "The main goal is species and habitat protection and the refining the permitting process," said BLM spokesman Doran Sanchez. "It's...

<p>In a frontal assault on one of the most contentious federal subsidies in the West, eight environmental groups sued the U.S. Forest Service on Wednesday for failing to complete a plan in the mid-1990s to increase fees that ranchers pay to graze livestock on public lands.</p>

Judge wants to cows to leave Imnaha River The Associated Press 2/19/03 3:30 AM BAKER CITY, Ore. (AP) -- The U.S. Forest Service must re-examine its rules governing grazing on private land inside the Hells Canyon National Recreation Area. U.S. Magistrate Judge Dennis Hubel gave the order this month after the Hells Canyon Preservation Council, a La Grande-based environmental group, accused the Forest Service of failing to protect Imnaha River salmon from the effects of more than 1,000 head of cattle. Hubel did not order grazing to cease, but his ruling is the first step toward cleaning cow excrement from...

Ecologist to lead BLM effort to restore Great BasinBy Karl Horeis, Appeal staff writer Mike Pellant, a rangeland ecologist from Boise, Idaho, will head the Bureau of Land Management's effort to restore ecological health to the Great Basin -- an area which includes five states. "Mike is one of the smartest guys I know, when it comes to rangeland," said John Singlaub, manager of BLM's Carson City field office. "I've known him for years. He's got some great ideas on how we can do things better both in the Great Basin and throughout the West." The BLM effort, formally called...

Advocates say free-range cattle can have environmental benefits By Rachel Proctor, E/The Environmental Magazine Tuesday, December 24, 2002 In 1995, when Richard Sechrist took over the Texas ranch his family had owned since 1947, it looked like much of the grazed land in the West: barren. Generations of cattle had been allowed to roam freely over the 1,100-acre ranch, trampling favorite pastures into a rock-hard state and munching native plants down to nothing. Weeds and thistles were abundant, while riparian areas were muddy, erosion-prone swamps. Conventional environmental wisdom would suggest that the only way to heal this land is to...

Friday, August 9, 2002 Task Force Says Some Grazing OK By Brendan Smith Journal Staff Writer     Range conditions in the Santa Fe National Forest are much better than reported by forest officials, and about half of the closed grazing allotments can still support cattle this year, the New Mexico Range Improvement Task Force reported Thursday.     The task force evaluation was requested by ranchers who were ordered last month to remove all or part of their herds from about 40 grazing allotments, which forest officials said had been damaged by severe drought and overgrazing.     However, the task force...

BILLINGS, Mont.- A federal judge on Thursday ordered a halt to cattle grazing on land near Yellowstone National Park's western border until the U.S. Forest Service studies how it affects bison. U.S. District Judge Ricardo Urbina adopted the recommendation made by a federal magistrate earlier this month. Conservation groups called the decision a win in their effort to stop grazing in the Horse Butte area, which is frequently used by bison that leave the park each winter in search of food. Fears the bison may spread the disease brucellosis to cattle herds led to a management plan that sometimes calls...

For education and discussion only. Not for commercial use. Second conviction includes 30 days in halfway house RENO -- A Nevada rancher convicted twice for trespassing cattle on national forest land was sentenced Monday to a halfway house for 30 days and to house arrest for three months. Cliff Gardner, 63, of Ruby Valley, also was ordered to pay a $5,000 fine and placed on probation for a year for his latest conviction in an 8-year feud with the Forest Service over livestock grazing regulations. After his release from the Reno halfway house, which a federal prosecutor described as a...