Free Republic

Interior bears have been seen spreading northward over the years. Shotgun-toting guards who scan the Arctic Ocean for white polar bears spent last week looking for a brown mass of fur on the reddening tundra surrounding this Inupiat village. The grizzly, a threat to anglers and backcountry hikers across much of Alaska, isn't a problem here. Usually. They're rarely spotted this far north. But two brown bear sightings recently put some residents on edge and prompted managers at a research area east of the village to evacuate scientists doing fieldwork on the tundra. Polar bears, which top 1,000 pounds, commonly...

Sheep don't mix well with grizzly bears and wolves. Now they won't mix at all on more than 70,000 acres in the Absaroka-Beartooth wilderness. A 74,000-acre sheep grazing allotment south of Big Timber in the Gallatin National Forest has been permanently closed and the ranchers who used it for generations have been paid to move their sheep elsewhere... The agreement is the eighth -- and second-largest -- in the greater Yellowstone ecosystem in recent years that has led to the retirement of about 300,000 acres from grazing. The latest involves the Ash Mountain and Iron Mountain allotments used for generations...

WASHINGTON - Noting that the grizzly bear population in the Yellowstone area has thrived in recent years, the Bush administration on Tuesday announced that it plans to remove federal protections for the animals in the areas around the national park. "A population that was once plummeting towards extinction is now recovered," Interior Secretary Gale Norton said in making the announcement. "These bears are now no longer endangered" and should be removed from the Endangered Species Act listing. The Interior Department, through the Fish and Wildlife Service, implements the Endangered Species Act. "We are sure that these bears will have the...

The goal of Grizzly People, its website explains, is "to elevate the grizzly to the kindred state of the whale and dolphin through supportive education in the hopes that humans will learn to live in peace with the bear, wilderness and fellow humans." But, as Werner Herzog's latest documentary, "Grizzly Man," demonstrates, the best way for man to live at peace with the bear is to not romanticize grizzlies and to give them a wide berth. Alas, Grizzly People founder Timothy Treadwell had Disney-fied the object of his affection. So, as Herzog chronicles, the 46-year-old bear activist and his 37-year-old...

MISSOULA, Mont. — As the Bush administration prepares to remove Yellowstone's grizzly bears from the endangered-species list, a schism has emerged in the environmental movement over whether the bears remain at risk. The nation's largest environmental group, the National Wildlife Federation, supports delisting the bears, whose numbers have bounced back impressively after three decades of federal protection. But other powerful organizations, including the Sierra Club, the Natural Resources Defense Council and Earthjustice, are threatening to sue the Bush administration if, as expected, it removes Yellowstone grizzlies from the list. "The recovery has been a huge success, but removing federal protection...

BILLINGS, Mont., Dec. 29 (AP) - Thirty-one grizzly bears in and around Glacier National Park in northwestern Montana have died this year as a result of human actions, the largest total in any year since grizzlies were listed as a threatened species three decades ago and about double the number killed in 2003. Seven were hit by trains or cars. Ten were killed illegally, often shot and left to die. Thirteen were killed by wildlife officials because they had menaced humans or otherwise become a nuisance. One was killed in self-defense. State and federal wildlife officials attribute the rise in...

CONDON, Mont. -- Along about Labor Day, a tall, dark stranger known as "M-23" is likely to take a 40-mile trek south to Seeley Lake. There, peering out from a wooded, marshy area, he'll see tourists sunning themselves outside lakefront cabins and motorboats buzzing through the placid waters of this popular resort. Chances are, nobody will see M-23, which may be just as well. Weighing 325 pounds and standing more than 6 feet tall, with a distinctive shoulder hump, he sports long scimitar-like claws and has a face scarred from years of vicious fights with other male grizzly bears. Though...

NOXON, Mont. — Before the Europeans came to North America, the grizzly bear reigned, hunting the plains as far east as Minnesota, south to the deserts of Mexico and along the salmon-choked rivers of the Pacific Coast. Two centuries of settlement beat them back, and now just two main populations remain outside of Alaska — one with 400 to 600 bears in and around Glacier National Park, the other in Yellowstone, with 500 to 600 bears. They are designated as threatened under the Endangered Species Act, but many biologists consider their population levels healthy. Three tiny populations, however, were stranded...

County disclaims arena cost overruns $30,000 approved for laptop computers By Michael Erskine erskine@gomemphis.com December 3, 2002 The County Commission on Monday passed a resolution disavowing responsibility for any cost overruns on the downtown arena project. County Atty. Donnie Wilson said the resolution wouldn't absolve the county from any future liabilities, but commissioners passed it anyway. Also Monday, the commission voted to amend the budget to appropriate $30,000 to buy laptop computers for commissioners, though some may pay for their own. Commissioner John Willingham proposed the arena resolution, which declared that the commission "will not assume any funding responsibility for...

Land Near Yellowstone Added to National Forest BOZEMAN, Montana, July 24, 2002 (ENS) - The Trust for Public Land (TPL) has protected almost 1,300 acres of prime elk and grizzly bear habitat northwest of Yellowstone National Park, in the Gallatin National Forest. The deal, completed Monday, is intended as the first phase of a two year purchase that will protect 3,246 acres of private lands in the Taylor Fork drainage, one of Montana's most scenic wildlife and recreation areas. The land is being conveyed to the U.S. Forest Service for addition to the Gallatin National Forest. Funding for the...

Grizzly Team Shows Value of Species Protection LawWASHINGTON, DC, July 23, 2002 (ENS) - Protection under federal and state law is critical to conserving grizzly bears in the lower 48 states, a new report concludes. The study could offer support for legislation aimed at strengthening the federal Endangered Species Act, and counter arguments for weakening protections for grizzly bears. The debate over the effectiveness of the 1973 Endangered Species Act ranges from arguments to weaken its protections to making it stronger, but there has been little good evidence for either side. Now new research shows that legal protections are...

PBA executive director resigns, recommends abolishing the agency By By Tom Bailey Jr. baileytom@gomemphis.com March 26, 2002 The executive director of the public authority in charge of building the new downtown NBA arena resigned Tuesday afternoon. He had complained publicly last week about the Memphis Grizzlies exercising too much control over arena construction, a complaint he repeated Tuesday. Don Smith, executive director of the New Memphis Arena Public Building Authority, said the agency should be abolished "if it’s not going to be given any real authority" over the $250 million project. The bulk of the money, about $190 million to...