This could be the week – the week when the Senate approves the most anti-environment, anti-wildlife legislation in the last fifteen years.

It’s a bill that would deny life-saving protections for wolves, polar bears, walruses and scores of other species. It’s a bill that would slash conservation funding, mean dirtier air and water and effectively shutter national wildlife refuges for lack of funding.

Let’s stop this before it’s too late.

We don’t have much time. Please call your senators using the information below:

Richard ‘Dick’ J. Durbin – (202) 224-2152
Mark Steven Kirk – (202) 224-2854

If contact information for your senators does not appear above, please call the Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121 and ask to be connected to your senators.

… and deliver this simple message:

“My name is XXX and I’m calling today from XXX to urge my senators to reject H.R. 1, the House-passed continuing resolution. This bill contains many awful elements, but I especially object to that bill’s provisions to…

Eliminate Endangered Species Act protections for gray wolves in the Northern Rockies and Greater Yellowstone;
Prohibit the Environmental Protection Agency from regulating emissions that cause climate change that now threaten polar bears and walruses;
Slash funding for national wildlife refuges and the essential Land and Water Conservation Fund, which protect wildlife habitat across the country; and
Complicate enforcement of the Clean Water Act that protects our drinking water and essential waters for aquatic wildlife.

Link

Will Minnesota finally come to its senses and adjust the hunting season? Or will they wait until there are 500 moose?

http://dfnd.us/e7BeMQ

For Immediate Release: Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Contact: Karen Schambach (530) 333-2545; Kirsten Stade (202) 265-7337

http://www.peer.org/news/news_id.php?row_id=1449

FEDERAL COUGAR HUNTERS MUST OBEY CALIFORNIA LAW

Fish & Game Contractors Cannot Evade Ban on Leg Snares and Other Inhumane Practices

Sacramento — Federal contract hunters employed by the California Department of Fish & Game may not use poison, snares, leg-hold or metal-jawed traps to kill mountain lions, even when the lions pose a threat to Sierra Nevada bighorn sheep, according to a new Legislative Counsel opinion released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). The opinion was requested by Senate Natural Resources Chairwoman Fran Pavley after PEER relayed internal reports that mountain lions were being killed inhumanely and unnecessarily by federal contract hunters.

The state Department of Fish & Game (DFG) pays federal Wildlife Services, an ironically named arm of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, $600,000 under a three-year contract to capture and kill predator species. California law bans the use of poison, snares, leg-hold or metal-jawed traps, but DFG and Wildlife Services believed the federal agents were not bound by California law. PEER has received information that Wildlife Services contractors were directed by DFG managers to –

Ø A shoot-on-sight protocol which directs ”removal” of any mountain lion entering bighorn winter ranges even though the likelihood of predation remains low in some areas;

Ø Disregard a previous protocol that prohibited the killing of a female lion without first determining if she has dependent offspring, resulting in the inhumane death of kittens by exposure and starvation; and

Ø Ignore the bans on snares which voters enacted more than 20 years ago under Proposition 117, which designated the mountain lion as a specially protected mammal.

“California voters have created these protections for mountain lions,” Said Senator Pavley. “The Legislative Counsel opinion affirms that even federal employees must obey California law.”

“Scarce state dollars should not be used to sterilize the Sierras of all mountain lions,” stated California PEER Director Karen Schambach, noting that the new DFG protocol goes well beyond the requirements of the Bighorn Recovery Plan, which prescribes adverse conditioning to discourage lions from preying on sheep and limits killing to mountain lions which have actually eaten a bighorn. “The current shoot-on-sight policy is both coarse and counterproductive. It essentially ignores the likelihood that indiscriminately destroyed mountain lions that are not preying on sheep will be replaced by immigrant lions with a taste for bighorns.”

In a May 21, 2010 letter, PEER urged DFG to rewrite its protocols to end inhumane practices and reduce needless lion killings but the agency has yet to respond. The new Legislative Counsel opinion affirms that it is illegal for even state and federal employees to harm or kill a mountain lion, except when a lion poses a threat to public safety or livestock, or harms animals protected under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). Sierra Nevada Bighorn Sheep are listed as endangered under the ESA.

“Protecting bighorns does not require wiping out mountain lions,” added Schambach. “In these tough fiscal times, we should ask whether taxpayers are getting their money’s worth from this contract with Wildlife Services.”

This is horrible news.

Link

I’ve been at Soda Butte a few times and the place always left me feeling a bit spooked.

According to early reports, this happened at around 4 a.m., which seems to be a very bad time to encounter a bear.

You can see a very detailed page of Soda Butte Campground here:

Soda Butte Campground

UPDATE:

The Billings Gazette seems to have the most info on this story and their proximity to Cooke City is good. You can follow the story at their link:

Billings Gazette

I feel horrible for the guy who was camped by himself at the edge of the campground. I guess because I see a lot of myself in that situation. It can happen to anyone.

Although bears are not “evil” as some would have you believe, they are dangerous and not cute and cuddly.

My heart goes out to the man’s family. They even used his tent fly as part of the culvert trap.

Who knows what the morning light will reveal.

Update # 2:

They have captured a grizzly mother and two cubs. A third cub is on the perimeter and will likely be trapped soon. In all honesty I hope this isn’t the bear. It would be sad to see this mother grizzly killed, and her three cubs also killed or sent to a zoo.

Those in charge are waiting for a DNA test to confirm, and the results should be back today.

Something always felt “off” to me about this campground. It’s very scenic, but it also seems to be in a wildlife corridor between the Absaroka Range and the Beartooth Range.

Update # 3:

The mother grizzly has been killed after DNA tests revealed her to be the attacker. The cubs will either be brought to a zoo or killed.

Very sad story all around.

Bizarre story. This is a monster, 40 pound and 100 foot long jellyfish known as a Lion’s Mane.

Link

What a remarkable creature!

I wish the headline was a joke, but it’s not. Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks killed the bear after it ate two chickens. They tried to find a zoo for a few days, but there were no takes so now it’s dead. Wow, they really tried hard.

I honestly can’t wait for $10 a gallon gas. I’ve mentioned this before, but it will likely be the single best thing for wildlife. It will force many of these “ranchers” (really just junkyards with a few lammas and chickens) back into the city.