BLM Seeks Applicants for Wild Horse & Burro Advisory Board

http://www.blm.gov/or/news/files/Final_Advisory_Board_PR.pdf

Old But Interesting News (OBI) - "Classifying Fed. Public Land Grazing Permits

Publication restricted to suscribers to The Journal of Rangeland Management; 55 (1) Jan. 2002;
http://www.jstor.org/pss/4003256

Read where 85% of all public lands is utilized for private grazing, and there are 29,925 permittees. Would be interesting to be able to read the whole report,..but access is limited ......as you will see when you open the link

Energy Companies Big Plans to Exploit American West to Feed Chinas Insatiable Appetite for Coal

So this is why the Powder River Herds had to go?


The coal-rich Powder River Basin, which straddles the Montana and Wyoming border, holds about 800 billion short tons of coal, or 20 percent of our nation's entire reserves. Coal from the area is highly desirable due to its low sulfur content, which often allows coal to be burned without exceeding air limits for sulfur emissions.
As such, companies in the U.S. are working fast to figure out the best way to ship Powder River Basin coal to Asia, and China in particular. It's just a short rail journey from Wyoming to the Pacific Northwest, where a new port is being eyed to become coal ready. These companies are also working hard to open up additional mines in the region, as most of the coal available in the Powder River Basin has yet to be tapped.


Full article here; http://www.truth-out.org/energy-companies-big-plans-exploit-american-west-feed-chinas-insatiable-appetite-coal65530

The Henke Affair

And I am just finding this out? How come ya'll didnt tell me someone from the BLM got caught with their fingers in the cookie jar again? But then again, what else is new, eh? Lol.

http://pogoblog.typepad.com/pogo/2010/10/blm-chief-asks-inspector-general-to-renew-investigative-inquiry-.html

Battle Mt. Allotment Reported to be in EXCELLENT Condition!

Click on title above for map of the Battle Mt. allotment area ajunct to Diamond Springs Ranch;

From the realtors discription; found here - http://www.aranchbroker.com/DiamondSprings.htm



Range consists of native grass and sagebrush as well as pinion and juniper stands. BLM permit is good for 2120 AUMs and runs from 3/15 to 11/30. Range is in excellent condition with several stock water wells spread throughout allotment.

The American Equine Protection Act of 2010

In passing the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971, the 92nd Congress Declared: That wild free-roaming horses and burros are living symbols of the historic and pioneer spirit of the West; that they contribute to the diversity of life forms within the Nation and enrich the lives of the American people;

In 2004,the 108th Congress recognized the first official National Day of the Horse. The text of the resolution states:

Encouraging citizens to be mindful of the contribution of horses to the economy, history, and character of the United States and expressing the sense of Congress that a National Day of the Horse should be established.

Whereas the horse is a living link to the history of the United States;

Whereas, without horses, the economy, history, and character of the United States would be profoundly different;

Whereas horses continue to permeate the society of the United States, as witnessed on movie screens, on open land, and in our own backyards;

Whereas horses are a vital part of the collective experience of the United States and deserve protection and compassion;

Whereas, because of increasing pressure from modern society, wild and domestic horses rely on humans for adequate food, water, and shelter; and

Whereas the Congressional Horse Caucus estimates that the horse industry contributes well over $100,000,000,000 each year to the economy of the United States: Now, therefore, be it Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), That Congress--

(1) encourages all citizens to be mindful of the contribution of horses to the economy, history, and character of the United States;

(2) expresses its sense that a National Day of the Horse should be established in recognition of the importance of horses to the Nation's security, economy, recreation, and heritage; and

(3) urges the President to issue a proclamation calling on the people of the United States and interested organizations to observe National Day of the Horse with appropriate programs and activities.

On the fifth anniversary of the first official National Day of the Horse, horse enthusiasts are encouraged to celebrate the horse's contribution to the United States.

Why Should We Celebrate and Protect Our American Equines?

The people of the United States need to be mindful of the contribution of horses to the economy, history, heritage, society, and character of the United States from the beginning starting with the Native Americans.

There are 9.2 million horses in the United States.
4.6 million Americans are involved in the industry as horse owners, service providers, employees and volunteers.
2 million people own horses.
The horse industry has a direct economic effect on the U.S.of $39 billion annually.
The industry has a $102 billion impact on the U.S.economy when the multiplier effect of spending by industry suppliers and employees is taken into account.
The industry directly provides 460,000 full-time equivalent (FTE) jobs.

Currently the horse industry has more than a $ 102,000,000,000* ( 102 billion) impact on the U.S. economy when the multiplier effect of spending by industry suppliers and employees is taken into account. Including off-site spending of spectators would result in an even much higher figure.

Currently the horse industry has a direct economic effect on the U.S. of more than $ 39, 000,000,000* ( 39 billion) annually.

Currently more than 4,600,000* ( 4.6 million) Americans are involved in the industry as horse owners, service providers, employees and volunteers. Tens of millions more participate as spectators.

The Horse industry pays 1, 900,000,000* ( 1.9 billion) in taxes to all levels of government.

Forty-five states have at least 20,000 horses each*.

There are 9,200,000* ( 9.2 million) horses in the United States. Including horses used for racing, showing, competition, sport, breeding, recreation, farm and ranch work, rodeo, carriage horses, polo, police work, informal competitions etc. This includes horses used both commercially and for pleasure.

Horse Competitions including the Fédération Equestre Internationale (FEI) games involve over 60 countries, 1000 horses and contestants which will be competing for the first time in the United States specifically in Lexington KY in 2010. The popularity of horses is increasing among the world countries. The FEI is the international governing body of equestrian sport recognized by the International Olympic Committee.

The Horse industry directly employs 701,946* people. Some people are part time and some people are seasonal, so this equates to 460,000* full-time equivalent (FTE) jobs.

Spending by suppliers and employees generates additional jobs for a total employment impact of 1,400,000* (1.4 million) jobs.

*American Horse Council Statistics

To: The 111th Congress of the United States

Be it that the BLM is currently holding more wild horses and burros in captivity than it can afford to maintain, (said to be approximatly 35,-40,000 and growing) and be it that by BLMs own admission, there is far more adoptable horses being held in these holding facilities than there is a demand for,...and be it that again, by the BLMs own admission, the Wild Horse and Burro Management Program is in crisis because of the great number of wild equines currently being held in captivity at these facilities,....We, the People of the United States who care about the welfare of Americas Equines and in particular our Wild & Free-roaming herds,...hereby submit this proposal to our representatives as well as to all members of Congress in hopes of providing a way for interested parties to come together and work towards enactment of these clauses as listed below which would allow a viable, cost-effective alternative to "un-restricted sale" and/or the extreme measure of euthansia that these thousands of American wild horses and burros being held in captivity are facing.

A Proposal

A BILL TO AMEND THE WILD FREE-ROAMING HORSES AND BURROS ACT OF 1971

Preserving those provisions of the 1971 Act not amended herein, including that provision which entitles the wild horses and burros to principal use of their historic rangelands "as found in 1971," and;

Amending,removing,replacing and/or adding certain portions and provisions of The Act to:

1. Declare American Equines a National Treasure;

2. Prohibiting the slaughter of any American Equine as well as prohibiting their sale or transfer to other parties for the purpose of slaughter.

3. Remove the Burns/Reid rider amendment that allows for the unrestricted sale of some wild horses or burros and replace with a "Pickins Plan" Amendment that would allow for placement of excess wild horses and burros in private or public sanctuaries while still maintaining the protections of this Act.

4. Correct the Omission of the 92nd Congress in failing to provide protections in the 1971 Act for ALL wild free-roaming horses and burros on all of our Nations public lands.

5. Declare, as the 109th Congress did, and re-affirm that December 13th is a National Day of the Horse and is to be celebrated annually.

The New Act, once written up and incorporated with the un-amended portions of the Old (1971) Act,...will superceede and replace the Wild Horse & Burro Act of 1971, and will be known as "The American Equine Protection Act of 2010."

*This is only a rough draft and suggestions on improvement are welcome and strongly encouraged.

Research for Management/ In Partnerhsip with USGS

Click on title above to see full reports;

WFH&B Historic Ranges EXEMPT from FLMPAs "Multiple Use & Sustained Yield" Requirements!!!'

Sec. 302 (a)of the Federal Land Management & Policy Act requires the Secretary to manage BLM lands under the principles of multiple use and sustained yield, in accordance with available land use plans developed under Sec. 202 of FLPMA.

There is one exception: where a tract of the BLM lands has been dedicated to specific uses according to other provisions of law, it shall be managed in accordance with such laws.

Here we have yet another FEDERAL STATUTE that IF enforced, would require that the BLM adhere to the provisions of the WFH&B Act, which means managing them on their historic rangelands NO MATTER what else they may have planned for those lands....under this provision of the FLMPA, the wild ones COULD NOT be removed from their historic rangelands FOR ANY REASON (other than emergencies) as the land was designated principally for their use PRIOR to the passage of the FLMPA. Section 302(a) of FLMPA EXEMPTS those lands marked out by the BLM as "principally for wild horse and burro use" from FLMPAs' "Multiple use and sustained yield" requirements .

Of course, the language of the WFH&B Act of 1971 itself indicates that wild horse and burro ranges MAY be used for other uses (as long as the principal use is for the wild ones) but absent the FLMPA "multiple use and sustained yield" requirements, there is no statutorily required "balancing" of all resources nor any "sustained yield" requirments to consider when making land use decisions in wild horse and burro lands- as the relevant laws are clear that the lands marked out by the BLM after the passage of the 1971 WFH&B Act intend that those lands be reserved throughout eternity as principally for wild horse and burro use. The relevant laws are The WFH&B Act if 1971 itself,....and Code of Federal Rules (CFR) another federal statute, sec. 4710.5 also indicates that in matters of conflict of resources,...the BLM "may,"....."if necessary to provide habitat for wild horses or burros, to implement herd management actions, or to protect wild horses and burros from disease, harassment or injury, the autrhorized officer MAY close appropriate areas of the public lands to grazing use by all or a particular kind of livestock."

These two federal statutes, coupled with Sec. 302(a) of the FLMPA as mentioned above, which exempts designated wild horse and burro ranges from the "multiple use and sustained yield" requirements, if enforced, would serve efficient enough protections to insure the wild herds a statutory right to remain on their traditional and historic rangelands. (Getting the BLM to maintain the herds in viable numbers is another thing all together.)

The importance of the exemption under the Sec. 302(a) of the FLMPA is this: one of the general reasons the BLm uses to rely on in deciding to remove the herds or declimate their numbers is their claim that they must do so in order to comply with the "multiple use and sustained yield" provisions of FLMPA when in fact,...persuant to Sec. 302(a)of that act,..those provisions DO NOT apply for wild horse and burro range since it was designated PRIOR to the FLMPA,...as principally for their use.

Enforce the existing laws and there is no need for no new act - but what IS needed is an amendment to the 1971 Act that will strike out the Burns Rider and (maybe) replace it with (Madeline) Pickins Plan (that would concern only the placement of those horses and burros LEGALLY removed from their historic rangelands.)

As for the rest, we pray for a return to freedom for them, upon their own (historic) and statutorily protected lands. Without statutory entitlement to their historic lands,...the wild ones will in effect, be without a homeland, and America will have lost not only its wild and free roaming herds, but will have lost millions of acres of historic wild horse rangeland to boot.

What will become of our historic wild horse rangelands once the wild ones are gone?
We will look out upon the lands and see gas and oil rigs, utility corridors, wind farms and the like, and we will think to ourselves in quiet resignation, "Wild horses and burros used to roam free here - it used to be their land." And maybe we will ask ourselves, "why did we let their right to these lands slip away?"

We are fighting hard, but we must fight harder,...in one voice saying: keep their historic rangelands as "principally for their use." This is a right of the wild ones that we must fight for or lose forever. This provision of the WFH&B Act of 1971 is the "deed" to their land and is the only thing holding them there. Absent this provision, there is no legal or statutory "right" for them to be upon ANY land but will be left to the sole discretion of the BLM of where to put them and with whom. And now, the question begs asking, "do we trust the BLM to do the right thing for the wild ones?" As for me, I will put my trust in the laws as mentioned above and fight harder to get them enforced.

What say you, amigos?

USA Today: Wild Horse Debate Gallops On

Wild horse debate gallops on

By William M. Welch, USA TODAY

LOS ANGELES — The Obama administration's first try at resolving the debate over the wild horses of the West has not gone over well with some.
Animal rights groups say that Interior Secretary Ken Salazar's proposal to relocate thousands of mustangs to preserves in the East and Midwest would compound years of federal mismanagement of the horses.

They want the 37,000 horses now roaming federal lands in the West to remain despite the risk of starvation and conflicts with cattle. In response to Salazar's proposal, they reiterated their stand during the Bush administration: let the mustangs run loose on millions of acres of federal land where beef cattle are raised.

"Why are we, a cowboy nation, destroying the horse we rode in on?" asks Deanne Stillman, author of Mustang: The Saga of the Wild Horse in the American West. "We may be heading toward the point where we only have wild horses in zoos."

Tom Gorey, spokesman for the Bureau of Land Management, the agency that manages the rangelands, said the federal government is aware "of the heritage and symbolic importance of these horses." Even so, the bureau says, the cost of keeping the horses at a sustainable population is far too much.

"We're protecting horses, rangelands and the taxpayer," Gorey said.

TAX BURDEN: Wild horses face slaughter

The wild horse population, which ranges largely in Nevada, keeps growing, as does the cost to the bureau to maintain them. This year alone, the cost of the horse program will be an estimated $50 million, the bureau says.

Much of that money goes to care for and feed 32,000 horses rounded up and taken off 29 million acres of federal land. The Bureau of Land Management says the land cannot sustain such a large horse population.

Taxpayers currently pay to let the horses live out their lives at 11 private pastures and corrals in Oklahoma, Kansas and South Dakota. The horses can be adopted, but few are.

Gorey said the agency needs to reduce the wild herd size to 26,600 horses and to neuter enough horses so the breeding population drops to 17,500.

Salazar's plan is to spend $96 million buying and configuring two ranches and contracting with five private ranches. The properties and what states they would be in have not been identified.

Horse advocates such as Stillman accuse the bureau of consistently favoring ranchers with low grazing fees and say this latest proposal is in keeping with that policy.

"We have almost 300 million acres of public land in the West, and they (the horses) are going to come East. ... That's ridiculous," says Chris Heyde, lobbyist for the Animal Welfare Institute in Washington.

The bureau denies favoring cattle ranchers.

"We don't remove horses so we can put cattle on the range," Gorey says. "We're not trying to make room for more cattle grazing."

Some cattle ranchers like the solution offered by Salazar, himself a former rancher.

Dan Gralian, who manages a large grazing range out of Battle Mountain, Nev., and is president of the Nevada Cattlemen's Association, calls the plan "a great thing, taking this icon of America back to where it originally came from, the East."

He says wild horses and burros are in the West were brought there by pioneers, cattle barons and prospectors. He disputes the contention of horse advocates that the horse is indigenous to the West.

"We were here first — that's the bottom line," Gralian says, referring to cattle ranchers.

Fencing in and sterilizing horses violates a 1971 law that protected the West's wild horses and set aside land for them to roam free, says Ginger Kathrens, a filmmaker who has done documentaries on the mustangs.

"We'd like to see our wild horses staying free roaming on public lands we already own," she says. "If we return some of the holding horses to the land, we think that would be a better solution than sticking them on tourist attractions in Ohio."

Makendra Silverman, associate director of the Cloud Foundation, agrees.

"It's a bad idea because the nation deserves and wild horses deserve to live on their rangelands in the West, on public lands," she said.

---------BLOGGERS NOTE:

So the BLM is concerned about wasting taxpayer money on our wild equines. First of all, the high cost of caring for our wild equines is due soley to the mismanagement of the BLM in conducting un-necessary round-ups to the point where we have more WH&Bs in pens than in freedom. Despite the allegations of the BLM, the horses do manage to thrive and it costs nothing to feed them in the wild.

Secondly, it is nice to hear that the BLM is concerned about wasting taxpayer money.....the 50M a year they say it cost to care for all these (un-necessiarily) penned up WH&Bs is a mere pittance compared to burden put upon tax-payers for the cost of administration of the BLMs Grazing Program,...which, all told, is estimated to be near $500M a year. As we all know, the grazing program benefits a handful of "so-called" ranchers who produce LESS THAN 3% of the Nations beef. So what is $50M per year for a resouce that all Americans enjoy compared to $500M that only a handful of already wealthy "welfare ranchers" enjoy? Time to end the gravy train and REVOKE all grazing permits in wild horse country....let them buy hay and grain like the rest of the farmers and ranchers "in the real world" or find a new line of work. I hear McDonalds is building 33,000 new stores in China,.. perhaps they would like to flip McMadCow Burgers for them there...I hear the managers make good money....in some places upwards of $100,000 per year. Say what? And Im still here?!
------------


Click on title above to go to article and comment;
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/environment/2009-10-26-wild-horses_N.htm#Close

Tragedy at Dakota Wild Horse Auction

ASSHOLES! Look at what you have done by treating wild horses like domestic cattle at livestock auction-you DO NOT go yelling at them and poking at them with things!!I will say it again: ASSHOLES!!


from dickinson press newspaper, dickinson, north dakota
http://www.thedickinsonpress.com/event/article/id/28646/

Issues arise with TRNP wild horses at auction
Lisa Call - 10/24/2009

A wild-horse auction turned chaotic when a stud tried to jump a fence, another horse escaped during loading into a trailer and another reportedly died Friday afternoon in Dickinson.
To control population and administer a research contraceptive, wild horses in Theodore Roosevelt National Park near Medora were rounded up earlier this week and sold at auction Friday at Stockmen's Livestock Exchange. The auction was moving quickly when bidding on Bashful, a 2-year-old stud, began and about four minutes into his bidding, things came to a screeching halt. After being tapped on the rear by a ring attendant's flag, an anxiety-ridden Bashful attempted to jump a 6-foot fence separating him from the crowd. Screams erupted and people began to scramble. As the horse was struggling to get his rear portion over the fence, his rear right leg became entangled between thick wires. The horse began to violently thrash in an attempt to break free, biting anything in its way. Bystanders said the horse's front legs knocked an elderly man to the ground. As the horse began thrashing, its front legs stomped the man. "He landed in the crowd, then crawled over it (fence) and then he was in the first walkway and he was just stomping and kicking because the man was underneath him," said Dan Sparling of Bismarck, a witness to the incident.
Larry Schnell, manager of Stockmen's Livestock Exchange, said he was unaware if anyone was hurt, but had heard reports. Stark County Sheriff Clarence Tuhy said a man was transported to the hospital in an ambulance. No tranquilizers, rope or wire cutters were on hand to assist in freeing the horse. "I've been doing this for 35 years and I don't remember anything close to that happening," Schnell said. Status of the injured man is unknown. Some people experienced with wild horses feel the event could have been handled differently. "Anybody that's got a little common sense, you don't start bringing these wild horses in," said Frank Kuntz, executive vice president of the Nokota Horse Conservancy, a nonprofit group aimed at wild-horse preservation. "Bring them in separate. Plus, who knows how these guys are handling them out back? They should have the fence higher. It's total stupidity and total inexperience."
Horses were dropped off at the livestock yard Thursday afternoon, said Valerie Naylor, TRNP superintendent. "They bring them here to the sale barn, turn them loose to these guys and leave," Kuntz said. Rev. James Kilzer of Richardton said one buyer who loaded his newly purchased horse into a trailer found it dead a short time later. "The buyer checked for breath … the horse died of shock," Kilzer said. Calls to Dr. John Rowe, a veterinarian on hand during the auction, went unreturned. Later, a gray mare escaped a corral while being loaded into a trailer. Several people went after her with trucks and on foot. Michael Sparling of Bismarck, who didn't intend to buy a horse at the auction, purchased Bashful for $35 with plans to rehabilitate and train the horse using a natural training method. "A horse like this, you should never trap like that," Sparling said. Patty Griffith, a horse trainer from Toppenish, Wash., plans to train the 11 horses she and her husband purchased. Griffith has attended several wild-horse auctions and said horses and protocol at the auction could have been handled better. "Those horses wouldn't even be rattled if they didn't come along with those fly swatter things and scare them," Griffith said. "They are in a hurry. They're doing their job, but these aren't cows."
The horses sold for prices ranging from $35 to more than $1,400, surprising many. "The prices were much higher than we expected," said Marylu Weber, a volunteer for the roundup and a member of Nokota Horse Association, another wild-horse preservation organization. "This is phenomenal prices for these horses," said horse buyer Nola Robson of Hayfield, Minn. Naylor said 77 horses were sent to auction and 77 were sent back into the park, including most of the breeding-age mares. "Everything went very well," Naylor said. "It's unfortunate this had to happen at the sale."

BLOGGERS NOTE: I hope the injured man sues the pants off of the NPS as well as the livestock co for gross negligence in the handling of wild horses. Maybe they will stop offering them at public auction with no limitations. Maybe its time to amend the 1971 WFH&B Act to Include protections for the National Parkland Wild Horses & Burros - after all, it was clearly the intent of the Act to protect all of our nations wild horses on their historic lands everywhere. This is what we must fight for,...to keep them wild and free and in viable numbers on their historic rangelands, ....the ROAM Act will "strike out" the "where found in 1971" provision of the WFH&B Act which will effectively divest them of their right to stay upon their historic rangelands. Is this the kind of protection we want for our National Herds? To allow them to be shuffeled off of their historic rangelands and into the hands of public and/or private individuals all across the country who will put them in long term holding pens and/or in zoo-like settings the stallions to be gelded and the mares given birth control? That is what the ROAM Act will allow!!

__._,_.___
Click on title above for article and place to comment;
http://www.thedickinsonpress.com/event/article/id/28646/

R.O.A.M. Act a Land-Grab!!! Do Not Support!!

Finally, I have formed an opinion on the ROAM ACT, thanks to George Lea, President of the Public Lands Foundation...and heres why. The ROAM Act would elimitate the provision in the 1971 WFH&B Act that stipulates the horses and burros are to be protected on "the lands they were found on in 1971,".....In other words, the equines would be robbed of their traditional, historic and statutorily protected rangelands. Any Wild Horse and Burro Advocate should be really concerned about this and think twice if they support the ROAM Act. Mr Lea is right. We DO NOT need no new act and we NEED to keep the herds on their historic rangelands. If anything needs amending it is the 1971 WFH&B Act to include protection for ALL our wild equines located on ALL our public lands, not just some as is the case now.(See earlier post about our National Parklands Wild Horses and Burros)


Senators Bingaman and Murkowski re: HR. 1018 and S.1579
October 14, 2009
Senator Jeff Bingaman, Chairman
Senate Energy and Natural Resource Committee
304 Dirksen Building
Washington D.C., 20510

Dear Senator Bingaman:

H.R. 1018, the Restore Our American Mustangs Act, was referred to your Committee July 20, 2009 and Senator Robert C. Byrd introduced the Senate’s version, S.1579 on August 5, 2009. The Public Lands Foundation (PLF), as it did with H.R. 1018, respectfully disagrees with the content and provisions found in S.1579.

PLF is a national non-profit, all volunteer membership conservation organization dedicated to the ecological stability of the public lands administered by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). Our mission is to advocate and work for the retention of America’s Public Lands in public hands, professionally and sustainably managed for responsible common use and enjoyment.

PLF does not believe amending the 1971 Wild Free-roaming Horses and Burros Act as proposed is necessary to deal with the problems associated with wild horses and burros. Overall, the Act has had considerable success. According to the GAO-09-77 report titled “Effective Long-Term Options Needed to Manage Unadoptable Wild Horses,” dated October 9, 2008, approximately 235,700 horses have been adopted from passage of the 1971 Act through 2007. However, since 2007, the adoption demand for horses has tapered off and BLM now faces a major crisis for the funding and continued management of the program.

Neither H.R. 1018 nor S.1579 address the resolution of the two major challenges facing BLM spelled out in GAO’s October 9, 2008 report. These challenges were addressed in a PLF letter to Congressman Rahall. They bear repeating.

1. If not controlled, off-the-range holding costs will continue to overwhelm the program. The percentage of the program’s direct costs for holding animals off the range increased from $7 million in 2000 (46%) to $21 million in 2007 (67%). In 2008 these costs could account for 74 percent of the program’s budget.

2. BLM has limited options for dealing with unadoptable animals. The Act provides that unadopted excess animals shall be humanely destroyed or, under certain circumstances, sold without limitation. However, BLM only manages these animals through sales with limitations because of the concern about the public’s reaction to the destruction of healthy animals.

PLF is gravely concerned that the thrust of S.1579 is to eliminate the cornerstone of the 1971 Act by striking out a key sentence in the first paragraph that states, “…in the area where presently found,...” BLM has relied on this phrase to build a system of Herd Management Areas (HMAs) and establish Appropriate Management Levels of wild horses so they can be, as Congress dictated, “an integral part of the natural system of public lands.” Removing this phrase to consider allowing wild horses to expand outside of their HMAs will result in management chaos by guaranteeing an increase in their numbers and direct conflicts with wildlife, recreation, livestock and most other uses of public lands. If S. 1579 is striving for “a thriving ecological balance” as stated in Sec.4, Definitions, (6) (g), this is undeniably not the way to achieve it.

Sec. 5, Inventory and Determinations, of S.1579 proposes to add a paragraph (7) that states, “ensure that, to the extent practicable, the acreage available for wild and free-roaming horses and burros shall never be less than the acreage where wild and free-roaming horses and burros were found in 1971.” The finality of “shall never” creates a potential impediment for future management options, which could include the establishment of a National Wild Horse Range(s), the redesign of the existing 199 HMAs and other options that more appropriately are focused on available forage rather than acreage.

There are a variety of opinions of how many wild horses the government should have. However, there is no legitimate argument that the thousands of horses making up the current Appropriate Management Levels are suggestive of a population either threatened or endangered of being lost. Portions of proposed legislation intended to increase the acreage devoted to wild horses and to increase their numbers is clearly the wrong fix at the wrong time.

PLF believes that amending the 1971 Wild Free-roaming Horses and Burros Act as proposed will drastically alter multiple-use management on public lands and threaten “a thriving natural ecological balance.” Instead of new legislation, PLF strongly recommends, as it did to Congressman Rahall regarding H.R. 1018, focusing on solutions to the immediate problems of 30,000 horses being held in holding facilities and management of another nearly 30,000 out on the range. The cost of maintaining these animals is spiraling out of control and accounts for three-fourths of BLM’s $37 million budget for the program. As the GAO report correctly states, BLM finds itself in a difficult position and has limited options for dealing with unadopted and unsold animals within its finite budget. There is a need to reconcile the difference between the tools given to BLM by Congress to manage excess horse numbers and the apparent reluctance of BLM to use them out of concern that they lack congressional support.

There is no doubt, that instead of amending the 1971 Wild Horse and Burro Act, it is imperative that discussions with Congress be initiated to address BLM’s reluctance to use the tools in the 1971 Act, as amended, and seek solutions to this crisis.

Sincerely,

/s/ George Lea

George Lea, President

Cc: Lisa Murkowski, Ranking Member
Energy and Natural Resources Committee Office
304 Dirksen Senate Building
Washington, DC 20510






Click on title above to go to the Public Lands Website. Lots of good info there that you wont find anyplace else; http://www.publicland.org/

A Shameful Legacy

The Shocking Mismanagement of America's Public Lands
An essay by Scott Bidstrup

"There is as yet no social stigma in the possession of a gullied farm, a wrecked forest, or a polluted stream, provided the dividends suffice to send the youngsters to college. Whatever ails the land, the government will fix it."

The above words by one of the founders of the modern U.S. Forest Service seem to sum up the views of many in the past who viewed the public lands as a boundless resource to be used as needed and discarded when exhausted. It was the frontier mentality. But alas, those days are long gone.

For those of us who have spent a great deal of time on the public lands, the massive forest fires of the summer of 2000, and especially the great Arizona Rodeo-Chediski fire of 2002 came as no surprise. Tens of thousands of acres of charred forest in the Sequoia, one of America's most treasured national forests, did not surprise me. Merging complexes of "Type 1" fires, visible from space, burning on the Payette, an exquisitely beautiful forest in the Idaho panhandle, did not surprise me. Complaints by forest fire "incident commanders" that the lack of resources and the accumulation of slash left by logging operations was wreaking havoc on their control efforts, did not surprise me.

You see, I've lived on the American public lands. For six years, they were my home as I took advantage of the "14 day" camping law. I've spent time on public lands in nearly every forest in every state in the West. And I've been shocked at what I've seen.

I understand the problems faced by public land managers. I grew up in ranching country, and spent most summer weekends of my childhood in the summer home my family owns on the Targhee National Forest near Yellowstone. I have worked in the forest fire fighting industry (yes, it really is an industry), and I have lots of friends who are foresters or other public lands managers. So I know their problems. I can appreciate their dilemmas.

Yet the public lands are held in trust on behalf of the American people. They are not the property of the monied interests who have always, since the land management agencies were founded, effectively governed the policies by which public lands have been managed.

This essay is not intended to be a criticism of most of the employees of the forest service or the Bureau of Land Management. Most are dedicated employees who work for those agencies as much to make a difference as to make a living. And it has been my experience that many, if not most, are discouraged by the policies forced on them by ignorant bureaucrats and self-serving politicians in Washington. When I described my ideas for forest management to one forester, for example, tears welled up in his eyes, and he told me he'd dreamed all his life of managing a forest that way. But he can't, and neither can the other dedicated, hardworking managers who really understand the problem and want to solve it.

Environmentalists have typically focused their efforts on the mismanagement of the forests by the U.S. Forest Service, which is an agency of the Department of Agriculture. It's not surprising to me that the Forest Service culture is not really governed by a "maximum sustained yield" mentality, even though that has been the objective of the Department of Agriculture in it's focus on farming and agriculture, but rather at meeting quotas established by bureaucrats who often have connections with the industries their decisions benefit. Originally, when the Forest Service was founded, forests were vast, covered much of the continent, and were much more important for their economic resources than for their recreational and watershed values, which at the time were insignificant.

Today, the situation has changed. Forests in the west have shrunk, through overharvesting and bad management, to less than five percent of what they once were. Population has grown by orders of magnitude, placing intense new pressures on the land, not just for timber, but as places of recreation and sources of water and minerals. No longer can we, as a nation, afford to look at the forest system as merely a source of timber, to be managed on a "maximum sustained yield" basis.


Land of Many Uses

We've all seen the signs. The signs announcing that we're entering a national forest, with the slogan, "land of many uses." Few people know the origins of that slogan. It dates back to the very early days of the U.S. Forest Service, when the forests were regarded popularly as little more than wasteland, and political pressure existed (then as now) to privatise them to improve the economic benefit to local communities. The Forest Service came up with that slogan to convince the American people that the forests were a resource worth preserving, and to show that the Forest Service had a legitimate function to perform and was needed. It was propaganda.

Today, we are all aware of the multiple uses of the national forest system. Most of us spend time there in recreational uses of the forests at least. Others make our living there, and a few are lucky enough to live there. We all know of the many uses of the forest system.

A few of us have even seen some of the abuse. The overuse by recreation seekers, the dumping of trash and other wastes, the abandoned mines and piles of timber slash left by careless loggers. But few, with the exception of the environmental movement, have taken the time to really analyze the whole situation. And those who do, find without exception, that the public lands are badly mismanaged and are often in a pitiful state.


Land of Many Abuses

The evidence is everywhere. In some places, it is difficult to escape. In the Pacific Northwest, in the coastal mountains of Washington and Oregon, large patchwork quilts of vast clearcuts exist with only the occasional stand of old growth forest remaining. In Idaho, particularly in the Payette and Targhee forests, large slash heaps from clearcuts decades old remain, an eyesore and a fire hazard, even though by law, the loggers are supposed to burn them. This is a particular problem in forests in Idaho, where lodgepole pine, a species evolved to burn and burn hot and fast, are a major source of timber for stud mills. The slash left behind is attractive to firewood cutters, but the forest service, embarrassed by its failure to enforce the law, won't allow it to be cut. So it remains, waiting for a lightning strike to turn it into a major fire.

Clearcutting and replanting to a single, monocultured species, is a common practice in western forests. It is not uncommon, for example, in the Sierra Nevada forests of California, to clearcut communities of many species of trees and replant (if replanting is done at all) to the single most valuable species that will grow there, usually ponderosa pine. This has been widely done on the Sequoia forest, the home of some of America's most treasured trees. I have to wonder if trying to hide this practice is the reason that most forest roads on the Sequoia are closed year round except during the deer hunt in the fall.

A "seedwood cut" done in the 1960's was replanted to a single
species, ponderosa pine, which failed to prosper.
The natural succession species, incense cedar, tried to
re-establish itself, but couldn't, because the land was
severely overgrazed, and cattle suppressed the seedlings
everywhere except in the road cut, where the cattle couldn't
reach. Overgrazing has suppressed the native grasses, and
the cattle trails are leading to
erosion of the hillside. Lack of ground cover is drying
soils, leading to the death of the few remaining mature trees.

Managers hide this kind of abuse from the public by keeping nearly
all forest service roads gated and locked year round, except
during hunting season.

When clearcuts are done, it's relatively rare that the forest comes back in a healthy manner. If the forest is old growth, there often aren't enough seeds on the ground for a healthy forest to regrow. If it's young when the clear cut is done, it often comes back to what foresters call "dog hair," a regrowth so dense that you can't walk through it. Young trees a foot or two apart are so crowded that they can't get adequate air, moisture and light, and so are quite weak and very vulnerable to a fire or disease. Planting monoclonal monocultures doesn't help matters any. On south facing slopes in the Sequoia, for example, inadequate soil moisture is present to give the ponderosa trees being planted there a good start. Overgrazing suppresses the natural succession species, incense cedar, so few seedlings of either species establish themselves, leaving the forest floor wide open for weedy shrubs and erosion.

The forest service has made much of the problem of forest management, and how they're hindered by lawsuits from environmentalists. This was something of which a great deal was made during the great Rodeo Fire in Arizona during the summer of 2002. This is a diversion from the real issue, which is timber management, not just timber sales. The normal practice in timber sales is to allow the purchaser to cut any and all trees in the sale area, and in most cases, the purchaser will clear cut, simply because it's faster and easier. The result is what is seen in this photo.

That isn't timber management. Timber management involves the creation of a healthy forest, through prescribed burns, thinning "dog hair" regrowth, careful management of grazing on timberlands, and selective cutting and removal of old, diseased or dead trees. Yes, this is much more expensive, but the quality of timber produced, as well as the reduced costs of fighting wildfires, will more than pay the difference. And the beauty and recreational value of the forests is greatly enhanced.

But the Department of Agriculture has a bureaucratic mindset that, like other agricultural commodities, a forest should be managed for maximum economic return. That creates, in the minds of the bureaucrats, the need to plant to single-species monocultures, often monoclonal, harvested at one time, in bulk, in the same manner that other agricultural assests, i.e., farms, are managed. Sometimes, it is believed that even allowing the forest grow to trees is not considered the maximum economic return. The result for forests couldn't be worse.

In Utah, in the La Sal mountains, a scenic highway winds through some of the tallest and most stately forests of pinion and juniper to be found anywhere, but it's all a sham. It's a practice managers call "beauty stripping." A few hundred yards off the roadway, out of sight of the tourists, the forest has all been "chained" down, the slash left to rot, so that new grass will grow to improve graze for cattle. Dragline chaining, a highly controversial practice, is where a heavy chain is connected between two bulldozers. The dozers are then driven in parallel with the chain between them, tearing down pinion and juniper trees in a wide swath as they go. The resulting wreckage is left to rot where it fell in a tangled, jumbled, fire-prone mess. Needless to say, as it dries, it quickly becomes a huge fire hazard, particularly in late summer when fuel moistures are low. This is a very common practice in the dryland pinion-juniper forests of the Great Basin and the Columbia and Colorado Plateaus.

On BLM land, cattle grazing seems to have top priority in many places, even though the recreational uses of the land have long since outgrown ranching in the importance to the local economy in most areas of the West. This is because the local BLM managers themselves often come from the ranching community.

A favorite example of the abuse of BLM land by ranching interests is found on "Island In The Sky," in southeastern Utah near Moab. The island is a large mesa, surrounded by thousand-foot cliffs, and is several tens of thousands of acres in size. The National Park Service, which manages half of the island, does not allow grazing within the bounds of its Canyonlands National Park. The Bureau of Land Management manages the other half, and it does allow grazing. The results are painfully obvious.


A bizarre-looking
juniper is growing on
"protected" BLM land around
Sand Flats Road near Moab,
Utah. It has been stripped
bare of greenery by starving
cattle as high as they can
reach. Given any other choice,
cattle won't eat juniper.
Note the total absence
of grass around it - undisturbed,
the grass would be three feet
high. Yet the area is severely
restricted to campers, mountain
bikers, etc., under the theory
that the land is "fragile" and
needs "protection." Protection
from what? From people who see
what the BLM grazing policies
are doing to it?

On the part managed by the BLM, only small shrubs, inedible to cattle, mostly purple sage and Mormon tea are the only vegetation in evidence. Soil is bare and gullies are common. As one travels down the road approaching the Park Service boundary, one sees a remarkable transformation. About a mile from the park boundary, grass begins to appear. Closer to the boundary sign, it gets thicker and thicker, until by the time one arrives at the sign itself, the grass is waist-high and almost impenetrably thick.

The only difference is grazing. Grazing management by the BLM office in Moab would seem to take little notice of the deterioration of the land. The island is not the only place that overgrazing is clearly ruining the land - the Sand Flats Road, above Moab, and a favorite of mountainbikers, is another place. Here one can see junipers that have a peculiar growth habit. There are no branches growing below about four feet above the ground, then the tree spreads out almost horizontally. This is a very unnatural growth pattern for the Utah juniper. The reason they grow this way is that hungry cattle, clearly starved for lack of adequate pasture, have been forced to eat the very unpalatable small branches and twigs down low on the trees. An obvious sign of severe overgrazing.

It doesn't end there. Negro Bill Canyon is a favorite picnic spot for residents of Moab, and a favorite hiking and backpacking canyon. At least it used to be. The BLM has allowed grazing rights holders to vastly overgraze cattle in that little canyon, with the result that the riparian gallery forests that used to exist there are now all gone - trampled and eaten by cattle. No more does the stream that runs through that canyon invite skinnydipping, as it's laden with cattle wastes. No longer do you see the ducks and the crayfish and the glowworms that used to inhabit that canyon. They're all gone now. It would be interesting to know how much money the taxpayers got for the destruction of Negro Bill Canyon. But I'll bet it didn't amount to even a hundred dollars.

Ah, you say, but what would we do for meat if cattle grazing weren't permitted? Well, a study by an agronomy professor at Brigham Young University, hardly a bastion of left-wing environmentalism, showed that if all cattle grazing on arid public lands in the west were ended, the result would be a 3% reduction in the meat supply in the U.S. In other words, you'd hardly notice the difference in the price of meat. Arid lands in the west just aren't that productive as a source of cattle graze. At least not anymore.

Of course it wasn't always like this. The vast areas of sagebrush you see today in the Great Basin are the result of overgrazing. Sagebrush was once a fairly rare shrub. It was grass that once dominated the western landscapes. Grass so high and so thick, that when the Mormon pioneers first arrived in the Salt Lake Valley, their diaries indicate that they had a hard time finding a place to camp the first night.

With the pioneers came their cattle. It was the first real industry to take root in the west. The grass was high and thick, and cattle could be readily driven out to railheads in Wyoming, Texas and the midwest, and so cattlemen came. What few failed to appreciate, however, was that the native grasses were fragile and could not withstand heavy grazing pressure. Within twenty years, the grass that had attracted the cattlemen was gone, and it had been replaced. Replaced by what had been an inconspicous little shrub that had always been there, but had been held in check by the faster growing grass. That shrub was sagebrush. A plant that is unpalatable to cattle and has little nutritional value, it exploded across the west. It has come to so dominate the landscape that most Westerners assume it has always been there.

Seeking to repair some of the damage, cattlemen introduced a grass from the steppes of Russia, called cheetgrass (or sometimes junegrass). Fast growning and quickly maturing, it was intended to provide early spring graze before the native grasses were mature enough to withstand grazing. What the cattlemen hadn't counted on was the fact that cheetgrass readily hybridized with native grass to produce a grass that was highly invasive, had little nutritional value and was an extreme fire hazard where it grew well. This grass has become the dominant grass anywhere in the west that soils have been disturbed.

Another inadvertent environmental disaster was the accidental introduction of Russian thistle on the hoofs of imported cattle. Commonly called tumbleweed, this native of the Crimea had no natural enemies here, and so it spread, within just a few years, to become one of the dominant annuals of the arid west. Anywhere a soil disturbance allows its seeds to settle, tumbleweed will quickly sprout and grow into a round, aggressively thorny plant that, with the first autumn winds, will break off its roots and roll in the wind, often for miles. When it comes to a fence, it will pile against it, in some areas as high as telephone wires.

These environmental changes seem to conspire with land mismanagement to cause problems. Overgrazing on public lands removes native grasses and churns up the soil, allowing tumbleweed to get a foothold. Sagebrush, a dry shrub that burns readily, spawns wildfires that can burn over hundreds of thousands of acres, costing millions of dollars to extinguish. Where it invades forest edges, it drives back the forest by discouraging seedlings and burning them in the wildfires it spawns. And many of the native species of grass such as Indian ricegrass have been completely extirpated from the environment in much of the west. This extirpation of native grass is why sagebrush still grows in highway right of ways where grazing has not allowed for decades.

Vast areas of sagebrush, piles of tumbleweeds that run for miles, land bare of native grasses, and vast areas of thick, dry cheetgrass are recipes for uncontrollable wildfires.

This is the high price, literally in hundreds of millions of dollars, we are paying for our mismanagement of the western public lands. And as we have seen, it's not the only price. Loss of major areas of incalculable recreational value are just a part of it. Loss of forests has led to a loss of watershed for our growing western towns, and a loss of native fish in what few streams are left.


A Better Way

There is a way to end all of this. It will require political sacrifice and wise planning, but I believe it can be done. It is possible to have back a lot of what we and our forefathers have robbed from the land.

I propose the following as a way of solving some of these problems and beginning a new regime of managing the public lands for higher values than just marginal grazing and rapacious logging.


A Plan for Non-Forested Arid Western Lands

We'll get nowhere fast if we don't change the way we're doing things. I have a few ideas as to what I think, based on my experience with the west, we should do:
Abolish the Mining Law of 1872. This anachronism, designed to draw settlement to the west, is obsolete and has been for a century now. It's high time we recognize that it's an open invitation to environmental disaster and no longer serves any interest except the interests of the mining industry.

Redesign grazing regulation on arid public lands or public lands with a high recreational value. I recognize that this will big changes to a way of life for many ranchers who have lived on public lands grazing rights for many decades, if not all their lives. As an old sagebrush cowboy myself, it grieves me to have to say it, but this is a way of life that is too expensive, from a public policy point of view, to continue the way it is. It truly brings a tear to my eye to realize that the way of life I've loved can no longer be, and never really was sustainable. Ranching on arid public lands has to be radically changed or ended outright. We didn't subsidize buggy whip manufacturers when the Model "T" made their way of life obsolete; we should quit subsidizing grazing rights on arid public lands for what amounts to a historical nostalgia.

Allow controlled burns to remove sagebrush, and replace it with native grass. I propose that cultivated grass seed should be planted in areas of the west consumed by sagebrush fires. Cultivated seed will have to be used, since native grasses are extinct in most areas of the West. Grass should not be grazed, except by deer, elk, bison and antelope until native ecologies have been restored. Only then should cattle grazing, carefully controlled, be reintroduced. The Quivera Coalition, discussed below, can show the way.

Where grazing is to continue, we need to adopt the "range at rest" philosophy of range management. It has been demonstrated as economically viable by the Quivera Coalition, headquartered at the Carrizon Ranch in Capitan, New Mexico. Not only economically viable, but even more productive than current practices. Basically, it emulates the grazing practices of the old bison and elk herds of centuries past. At any given time, only about two percent of the allotment is being grazed. The herds (and they are large) are moved from one area to the next on a daily basis. When the cattle have moved on, less than 10% of the available forage is eaten, and their hooves have cultivated the soil by driving grass seed into it. With the next spring rain, the grass sprouts much more heavily than it would otherwise; the additional growth is great enough to more than compensate for the expense of keeping the herd moving. Based on the premise that poor range management, not cattle themselves, are the problem, it seeks to ensure that maximum forage growth is allowed to mature before it is eaten by cattle. This is beneficial to the cattle; keeping the grazing pressure as light as possible in the spring means that in the summer, more forage is available and hiefers can be kept with thier mothers, reducing supplimental feed costs. Cattle are kept away from riparian areas. This style of range management encourages native species over cheetgrass. For more information on this style of range management, contact the Quivera Coalition at 505-820-2544.

Reorient the Bureau of Land Management and the Forest Service away from extractive resources and towards recreational and preservational interests. Recreational and preservational interests are becoming increasingly important, while extractive industrial interests continue to decline. It's high time public policy recognizes this trend and accomodates it. We need to cease drawing our BLM land managers from the ranks of cattle interests who are practicing the ways of their grandfathers with little change or improvement, and towards the managers who understand the ecology of range management as taught by Quivera and others

A Plan for Forested Lands of the West

Our forests are our treasures. Beyond just the timber and minerals they provide, they inspire us, offer us solitude, a place for introspection, recreation and the companionship of others who are drawn to them as we are. We should recognize that fact and completely rethink the way we manage our national forests. Here are my thoughts on what we should be doing, and still accomodate the economic interests that are so vital to our nation's spiritual, as well as its economic future:
Move the Forest Service into the Department of the Interior. If we do anything at all, we should do something about Forest Service culture, which has a "get the timber out no matter what" mentality. This notion of the forests being a giant farm for trees is as obsolete as the mining law, and we need to fix this fact and fast. The notion that we need to clearcut and replace with monocultures of often monoclonal trees, is a sure recipe for ecological disaster - inviting vast plagues of disease and pest infestations, and huge, uncontrollable, expensive forest fires. It has to end.

Change the management methods used in the national forests. I propose that we consider adopting the "jaegermeister" system used by the Swiss to manage their forests. The "jaegermeister" system involves intense local management, based on local needs with local accountablility. I believe such a system could be adopted here. A careful analysis I have done of this shows it will actually produce far more timber, of far better quality, than the system we are using now. This is how I propose to do it:

Break up forest management areas into small parcels that can be managed by a single person or family. This is the jaegermeister. He will be responsible for the health of the forest in his area, and will make a living by extracting the timber from it as trees become available through excessive maturation or disease. Rather than clear-cut, he will cut individual trees, and remove the logs by means of horse-drawn log axles, the way it was done prior to the invention of mechanized logging.

Give the jaegermeister an incentive to manage for the long term health of the forest. He could be granted a right to sell his parcel management rights to his sons or others interested in taking over his parcel on his retirement, and the value of it would depend on the quantity and quality of the trees that remain there. The better the quality of the trees, the more money he'll be able to retire on. This encourages him to remove only dying and diseased trees, and keep the forest healthy through prophylactic management of the resource.

Ensure that the jaegermeister is a qualified forester. Require a candidate for jaegermeister complete some basic college-level coursework in forest management and tree and forest biology.

To prevent a rape of the forest by an unscrupulous jaegermeister, audit and limit the amount he is allowed to harvest in any given year. The forest supervisor would limit the amount a jaegermeister could sell in any one year, and that limit would be a function of the health of the stand, along with it's maturity. The jaegermeister would be allowed to sell firewood as he sees fit to manage the undergrowth in his forest.

allow the jaegermeister to put his harvested trees up for bid. This would encourage him to manage for the highest value of the wood, not just sell to the local mill for what he can get. This would encourage the growth of old, mature timber of various species, not just 30-year old trees of genetically modified monoclonal ponderosa pine.

This system has proven its value in Europe, where vastly smaller forests than we have here, have traditionally met most of Europe's need for timber, with better quality product than what Americans have to live with. The system could be readily adapted to work well here, too.

Keep foresters and the forest products industry at arm's length. Right now, there's often an incestuous relationship between the forest products industry and the managers of the national forests. That has to end. I propose that the foresters should be working closely with the jaegermeisters, rather than the big corporations that make money from the timber the taxpayers own.

Recognize that recreational values are as important as timber management. As population increases and people find solitude an ever more scarce commodity, the recreational values of the forest are going to become increasingly important. We should begin to manage our forests with that in mind right now.

Much To Be Done

In short, there is much to be done. We need to begin to do these things now, as soon as possible, so that we can have public lands we can be proud of to hand off to future generations.
Let us not be afraid to make the difficult political choices that lie ahead in rethinking our public land use policy. We can fix much of the damage that has been done. It won't be easy, but we can do it. And in doing so, we'll not only have healthier and more beautiful places to visit, but we'll have a proud legacy we can hand on to our children.



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Books I recommend (which, if you wish, you can buy from Amazon.com by pursuing the links here):
The Waste of the West by Lynn Jacobs is probably the best and most thorough analysis of the public lands abuse problem I've yet seen. Highly recommended.
Who Controls Public Lands?by Christopher McGory is a good analysis of how public land policy came to be the way it is.

Cadillac Desert is Marc Reisner's excellent analysis of how water policy by misguided bureaucracies has forever altered the course of public land management. It became the subject of a PBS special by the same name.

Beyond the Beauty Strip by Mitch Lansky is a good example of industrial forestry taken to the limit. The book is about forests in Maine, but applies equally well-if not more so to forestry management practices in the west.



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Plan for million-acre horse sanctuary hits hurdle as "Friends of Harry Reid" Object

Here the Elko Co Board of Commissioners (Friends of Reid) object to this plan claiming that the 9,000 cattle running there are "currently generating revenue which contributes to the county's economy," but what they "forget" to tell us is that the cost of administration of the Grazing Permit Program to taxpayers is approximately 500 mil per year, all tolled. Truth is, those 9,000 cows now grazing on that ranch are costing U.S. money to keep them there.....so how can they say the cows are contributing to the economy? This is what I mean when I say dont believe the hype that cows on welfare are good for the economy,...and since when does a County Bd. of Commissioners have a say to what use the ranch is put? Is it not a privately owned ranch of which only the owner would have a say? Afterall, we are not talking about a re-zoning or any other "change of use" plan here. The place would still be a ranch used primarily for grazing.


October 14, 2009

The Winecup-Gamble Ranch is about a million acres in size.

Plans to use a million-acre ranch in northeastern Nevada once owned by the actor Jimmy Stewart as a wild horse sanctuary have been rejected by officials.
A proposal by Winecup-Gamble Ranch to change from cattle to horse grazing has been rejected by the Elko County Board of Commissioners.

The ranch, about 110km northeast of the city of Elko, comprises about 250,000 acres of deeded land and 750,000 acres owned mostly by the Bureau of Land Management, as well as some private land. The ranch has full access and a grazing permit over the bureau lands.

The property, which was also once owned by Bing Crosby, has operated as a cattle and sheep property since the late 1800s and runs about 9000 cattle, with the ability to support up to 12,500.

The Elko County Board of Commissioners heard an application to move the ranch from cattle to horses, the intention being to take up to 10,000 of the wild horses currently held in captivity by the bureau.

The plan for the property includes a lodge, visitor centre and museum detailing the history of wild horses.

However, the county commissioners ruled against the proposal.

In its written decision, it said the ranch currently generated revenue which contributed to the county's economy. (BS)

"If the ranch becomes a holding facility for wild horses, it will become an enterprise supported by the American taxpayers and will cost millions of dollars," they said. (BS)

"There are many wild horses in the state of Nevada," (BS) they continued. "If that were not the case, there may be some justification for having wild horses on a controlled area such as the Winecup-Gamble Ranch to provide a place for the public to view wild horses.

"However, because of the large number of horses in the state, they are visible from nearly every highway in the state." (BS)


The commissioners pointed out that before horses could be placed on the ranch, the 1971 legislation that provided protection to mustangs would have to be changed as horses did not exist in the area before that date. (BS)

"To open the 1971 Wild Horse Act for this reason would set a bad precedence that may result in the wild horse ranges expanding throughout the state." (BS)

Containment of wild horses within the ranch boundaries would be difficult, the commissioners believed. (BS)

"Most importantly, this is only a temporary solution to the overpopulation problem of wild horses within the state of Nevada. This only diverts attention from the serious problem that needs to be dealt with - that of controlling the wild horse population in order to protect the ranges upon which they live."

The commissioners' ruling came just days before a proposal by the US Interior Secretary Ken Salazar to establishment up to seven new preservation areas further east of the western rangelands to accommodate wild horses in non-reproducing herds.

The commissioners also decided to write to local senators and the Interior Department opposing the ranch's proposal.

Elko County is the fourth-largest county in the United States by land area.

Update: Wild Horse & Burro Protection Campaigns

Click on title above to see our latest "Rally Congress" petitions. If you believe in our cause(s) as outlined in them,...please sign and pass them around. Once signed, a copy will be automatically sent in your name to your own state legislatiors.

I-Team Special: The Stampede to Oblivion

Sunday, October 11, 2009 11:52 PM EST
LasVegasNow.com

On Saturday the I-Team aired a primetime special detailing the long history of alleged mismanagement in the BLM's wild horse and burro program.

Half of the country's wild horses are in Nevada and the BLM is gathering them off of public land in record numbers with increasingly thin justifications behind the roundups.

Critics allege the BLM has repeatedly engineered or otherwise contributed to the conditions on public ranges, which are later used to justify the removal of horses. Fences have cut the horses off from water and forage all over the west, which BLM then uses as a reason to round them up.

Overall, BLM has gathered a quarter of a million horses off the public range, but what's happening now is different from previous years, both in scale and long-term intent, and it is happening with virtually no oversight.

"They are saying, ‘Okay, we will do what we want.' They just totally caved in. What the public doesn't already realize is that these greatly reduced herd management areas are already a very serious reduction. But now they're just going for broke. They are saying, ‘Hell, get rid of them,'" said Craig Downer.

"We have taken the number of horses off the range by over 50-percent in 20 years. For these people to say the horses are out of control, the numbers are out of control, there isn't anything out there that's realized a 50-percent decrease in the last two decades. Certainly not the number of cattle out there," said Jerry Reynoldson.

By almost any measure, there has been a dramatic shift. The pace of the government roundups has jumped over the last several years, averaging more than 9,000 head per year. As of early 2009, there are more than 33,000 horses in places like Ridgecrest, California or Fallon, Nevada -- more horses than exist on the open range.

Once they get to government corrals, they're no longer wild horses. Essentially they become wards of the state -- welfare horses living off the public dole and for the rest of their lives, they will be warehoused at either government pens or private ranches.

Chief Investigative Reporter George Knapp will explore how the wild horse program got in such bad shape and what can be done to turn it around, including a plan by billionaire philanthropist Madeleine Pickens that would create an eco-tourism destination featuring the horses.

Click on title above to go to the orignal publication to see a five (5) part hour long video of the Investigation, and a place to leave comments...

http://www.lasvegasnow.com/Global/story.asp?S=11285225

Another "Pro-Plan" Article and a Really Stoopit Comment

"New wild horse plan reflects political reality"

Star-Tribune Editorial Board | Posted: Sunday, October 11, 2009 1:00 am | 1 Comment


Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has developed a wild horse plan that makes much more sense and is less costly than one approved by the House in July.

Salazar has proposed creating seven wild horse preserves, including two owned and operated by the Bureau of Land Management. The remaining five preserves, which would be run by nonprofit, private groups, would be located in the Midwest and East.

Interior officials created a stir earlier this year when they warned that slaughtering some of the 69,000 wild horses and burros now under federal control might be necessary to combat the rising costs of maintaining them. The House then passed the Restore Our American Mustangs Act, which would direct the BLM to find an additional 20 million acres of rangeland for the animals.

The Congressional Budget Office estimated the cost of the House action at up to $500 million. The agency said the cost of enacting all of the programs in the bill would be about $200 million over the next five years, if the Senate goes along with the plan.

Salazar said the two federally owned wild horse preserves, at locations yet to be determined, would cost about $92 million to buy and build. But the cost to taxpayers for care of the horses and burros would be reduced in the long term. The annual operating and maintenance cost of the BLM preserves would be only about $1.7 million.

Some ranchers, American Indian groups and Western lawmakers -- including Rep. Cynthia Lummis, R-Wyo. -- want to reverse a decades-old ban on selling horses for slaughter. Such killing would be done humanely under federal guidelines, but Salazar -- who has heard plenty about wild horses in his few months on the job -- said the idea is a "nonstarter."

"The fact is that the American public has shown that it does not want to have slaughtering of these animals," the secretary said.

The Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971 was supposed to protect wild horses by properly managing the animals on available public rangeland and allowing people to adopt excess animals that were rounded up by the BLM. But adoption numbers have dwindled dramatically in the past few years, and now there are nearly 37,000 wild horses and burros roaming the West. The BLM estimates the current rangeland can support about only 26,600 of the animals. Another 32,000 are cared for in corrals and pastures in Rock Springs, Kansas, Oklahoma and South Dakota.

In reality, the 1971 law placed the BLM in a no-win situation: It had to round up animals where they were too plentiful, but it couldn't humanely kill them when no one wanted to adopt them.

All of the horses and burros living on the preserves would be sterilized or segregated by sex, so that they would not reproduce. The BLM would seek to sterilize or control the reproduction of enough animals on the range so that the birth rate is 3,500 foals a year, about the current annual adoption total, so there would be no net growth of the wild herd.

An added bonus of Interior's plan is that the preserves would be open to the public, so there would be some tourism benefits that could help offset the overall cost of maintaining the herds.

Given the political realities outlined by Salazar, he's offered a workable, affordable compromise that will preserve the wild horses while limiting the damage they do to Western rangelands.

Posted in Editorial on Sunday, October 11, 2009 1:00 am Updated: 4:02 pm. | Tags: Chad Baldwin, Editorial, Editorial Board, Kerry Drake, Nathan Bekke, Opinion, Ron Gullberg, Sally Ann Shurmur, Wild Horses, Ken Salazar, Interior Department

Click title above to go to the article. Once there, look for the "Discussion" tab underneath the title to see the stoopit comment that needs rebutting; this guy thinks all the opposition to Salazers Plan is coming from a bunch of tree-huggers "back east."

http://www.trib.com/news/opinion/editorial/article_96c96f55-3229-5169-83cd-4c33f2650140.html

Grijalva lauds Obama plan on preserves for wild horses

Conservationist, however, calls it 'the easy way out'
By Tony Davis
Arizona Daily Star
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 10.09.2009

A Tucson Democratic congressman who has led the fight to save wild horses had high praise this week for a new Obama administration plan to move thousands of the horses and burros to new preserves in the Midwest and East.

An official with the Arizona branch of a national conservation group, however, denounced the new program as unrealistic and "the easy way out."

On Wednesday, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced a plan to create seven new preserves — two federally owned and five privately owned — each to take about 3,600 horses and burros. It is a dramatic change from earlier Interior Department warnings that slaughtering some of the 69,000 wild horses and burros now under federal control might be necessary to combat rising costs of maintaining them.

Nearly 37,000 wild horses and burros roam in Nevada, California, Wyoming and other Western states. Arizona has only about 400 wild horses and 1,800 wild burros on Bureau of Land Management Land and another 200 to 400 on Forest Service land. Another 32,000 horses and burros are cared for in corrals and pastures in Kansas, Oklahoma and South Dakota.

U.S. Rep. Raúl Grijalva of Tucson praised the proposal, although it didn't go as far as the bill he has proposed that would free up 19 million acres across the West for horses to roam. That bill has passed the House and is pending in the Senate.
"It's a step forward in the right direction, even though it's not everything we want," said Natalia Luna Rose, Grijalva's press secretary. "The administration is listening. The congressman is happy to see this in motion."

But there's no way the feds can avoid having horses killed unless horse adoption rates increase tenfold, Larry Audsley countered, and they've been declining in recent years for what federal officials say are reasons linked to the bad economy.
"The plan they are coming up with is not sustainable," said Audsley, speaking for the Arizona Wildlife Federation. "They are taking the easy way out. They are seeking a political solution, not an environmentally sustainable solution."
But the current program is not sustainable for the animals, the environment or taxpayers, Salazar said.

The Bureau of Land Management's wild horse program cost about $50 million this year, and the cost is expected to grow to at least $85 million by 2012, officials said. The cost of buying land for the proposed preserves — at locations that have yet to be disclosed — is estimated at about $96 million

Salazar and the BLM have to do something, since a Senate committee was preparing to vote on Grijalva's bill, commonly known as the ROAM act, said Julianne French, a wild-horse advocate in Tucson. It's already passed the House.
"But I don't think the horses belong in sanctuaries," said French, a board member of the Cloud Foundation, a Colorado Springs organization dedicated to preserving wild horses and burros on public lands.

Ginger Kathrens of Colorado Springs, filmmaker and wild- horse advocate who has chronicled the lives of a wild-horse herd in Montana, said that blocking reproduction could alter the animals' behavior. "It takes the wild out of wild-horse herds," she said. "They're families in sophisticated societies. Creating gelding herds and preventing them from reproducing is managing them toward extinction."

But ranchers, who see wild horses as competing with cattle for grasses and water, welcomed the proposal. Jeff Eisenberg, executive director for the Public Lands Council, a group that works on public-lands issues for ranchers, said Salazar's proposal was a big step toward a solution. "Horses are important, but people and their livelihood and food production are important, too," Eisenberg said. "We're for balance."

Grijalva called Salazar's plan a significant improvement from those of previous Republican administrations, and said he looks forward to continuing to forge common ground among various advocates.

A Tucson environmentalist who comes down in the middle on this question is state Rep. Daniel Patterson, a Democrat who is also Southwest director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility. "There are big problems that wild horses and burros can do to native wildlife, but the big question is how do you deal with them? On one side some people say gun them down, others say do nothing. I believe they should be humanely managed."

The New York Times and the Associated Press contributed to this story. Contact reporter Tony Davis at 806-7746 or tdavis@azstarnet.com. Follow Tony Davis on Twitter at twitter.com/tonydavis987


Click on title above to go to original article and to comment;
http://www.azstarnet.com/metro/312481

Former Ore. BLM employee faces corruption charges

I suppose the good news is that this one got caught, but I am thinking of all the ones that are getting away with it. This guy they let go must have pizzed someone in "The Department" off.

10/3/2009, 10:56 a.m. PDT
The Associated Press

(AP) — MEDFORD, Ore. - A former U.S. Bureau of Land Management employee is facing charges in a public corruption case involving an alleged scheme to defraud the federal agency by steering contracts to his son.

The U.S. Attorney's office said a federal grand jury has indicted 57-year-old Luis Ramirez of Medford on charges of wire fraud, personal financial conflict of interest and making of a false tax return statement.

Federal prosecutors say Ramirez had private contractors subcontract their work to his son while Ramirez was the BLM representative responsible for approving work and submitting invoices to BLM for payment to the contractors.


http://www.oregonlive.com/newsflash/index.ssf?/base/national-67/1254595549187250.xml&storylist=orlocal

Bureau of Reclamation Responsible for Disappearing Wild Horses?

Section 2. Authority to Enter into an Agreement: Through delegation of authority from the Secretary of the Interior to the Director of BLM and to the Commissioner of Reclamation, agreements may be executed between Reclamation and BLM to provide for mutually beneficial land and water use planning and management activities. Statutory authority for such agreements includes: section 307, Federal Land Policy and Management Act (FLPMA), 43 U.S.C. 1737; Economy Act, 31 U.S.C. 686; and the
Reclamation Act of 1902, 43 U.S.C; Chapter 12, as amended and supplemented.

Excerpt of Agreement “Law” Between Bureau of Reclamation and the BLM

Sec. “S” – “ Wild and Free-Roaming Horses and Burros. When wild and free-roaming horses or burros inhabit areas crossing aministrative boundaries between BLM and Reclamation, their management and protection will be the responsibility of BLM, under its regulations. Upon request from Reclamation, BLM will cooperate in the removal, and relocation or disposal, of such animals from Reclamation lands (see section S.A.)”

Bureau of Reclamation Website;http://www.usbr.gov/

The Law: Click on title above to read; http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/realestate/fltmanual/fltappend12.pdf

Wyoming "selling" Wild Horses Cheap: Creating a "Kill-buyers Ball"

Wild horses roam the Red Desert in this 2006 file photo. (Ken Driese/Star-Tribune correspondent)

Oh yes, they call it "adoption," but we know what happens to the "adopted" ones after only one year.....

By JEFF GEARINO
Southwest Wyoming bureau
Friday, March 6, 2009 11:01 PM MST


ROCK SPRINGS -- It's a sure sign that things really are tough all over: rock-bottom prices for horses.

Bureau of Land Management officials announced the agency will offer 30 mares for adoption at its Rock Springs holding facility next week for a "special incentive fee" of $25 per animal, or $100 off the regular fee.

Three other horses will be available for adoption at the regular fee of $125, said BLM spokeswoman Lorraine Keith.

The offer is a spin on a past BLM price offer -- $125 per horse and $25 more for a "buddy" -- and is indicative of the agency's struggle to find buyers for wild horses.

The 30 mares, two halter-trained two-year-old geldings and one halter-trained five-year-old mare to be offered in the Rock Springs sale were captured last year during BLM wild horse roundups.

The roundups depleted herds in the Salt Wells, White Mountain, Little Colorado, Great Divide Basin and Adobe Town herd management areas in southwest Wyoming.


The reduced fee is one of the agency's latest efforts to boost sagging wild horse adoptions, which have declined sharply in the past year because of the economic downturn.

The BLM rounds up wild horses from herds in Wyoming that have grown too large to be sustained by the available forage, and makes them available for adoption by the public.

Without any predators, wild horse populations can grow quickly and put strains on available federal habitat.

There are about 33,000 wild horses on public rangelands across the West and some 4,500 wild horses in Wyoming, most of which are located in Sweetwater County.

There are also about 33,000 horses and burros currently in BLM holding pens across the country at a cost of about $28 million per year.

In 2002, more than 7,700 horses were adopted nationwide, according to BLM figures. But last year, as part of a steady decline, the number of adopted horses dropped to 3,700.

For the past several years, BLM biologists have been ramping up contraceptive programs in an effort to reduce fertility in wild herds. The Government Accountability Office has suggested the BLM consider euthanizing wild horses to cut costs.

And last year, Madeleine Pickens, the wife of Texas oil tycoon T. Boone Pickens, proposed establishing a privately financed wild horse sanctuary that could be home to the excess animals gathered from Western ranges.

Contact southwest Wyoming bureau reporter Jeff Gearino at 307-875-5359 or gearino@tribcsp.com




http://www.casperstartribune.net/articles/2009/03/07/news/wyoming/3227093a9b0c8f138725757200057060.txt