All posts by nfpa

Petition seeks restoration of grizzly bears to more habitat

Environmental Issues, News,

The Center for Biological Diversity wants grizzly bears restored to more of their historic range . . .

An environmental group called on federal wildlife managers Wednesday to update a decades-old recovery plan for grizzly bears to ensure the animal’s return to the Grand Canyon and other areas of the West.

The Center for Biological Diversity, in a petition filed with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, accused the agency of using a fragmented approach as it tries to recover the threatened species. Efforts are currently focused on a fraction of the bear’s historic range, but the petition identifies more than 171 square miles around the West that could provide suitable habitat.

Those areas include a forested region straddling the Arizona-New Mexico border, the Grand Canyon, the Sierra Nevada in California and parts of Utah and Colorado.

Read more . . .

U.S. Forest Service releases proposed new travel rule for snowmobiles

News,

The proposed new Forest Service snowmobile regulations are pretty much the same as the current set . . .

Snowmobile access decisions on U.S. Forest Service land would remain at the local level, under a new travel rule the agency published on Wednesday.

That’s a relief for snowmobile clubs that worried their ability to use some areas might be moved to regional or national levels. But the conservation group whose lawsuit forced the Forest Service rewrite said the new rule didn’t fix any of the old problems.

Read more . . .

Additional material: full text of the proposed snowmobile travel rule

New USFS draft snowmobile guidelines to be released this week

News, ,

Here we go again. The U.S. Forest Service is writing new snowmobile guidelines . . .

New draft guidelines for snowmobile management in the National Forest System will be released [this] week, but advance details remain scarce.

The U.S. Forest Service announced it will publish its “over-snow vehicle travel management rule” in the Federal Register on Wednesday. That starts a 45-day public comment period. The Forest Service plans to release the final rule by Sept. 9.

“We’ve been asking for input or anything else, but we’ve been completely locked out of the negotiations,” said Kurt Friede, owner of Kurt’s Polaris in Seeley Lake and a member of several snowmobile advocacy groups. “How can we find out if it’s good for us or bad for us, when we haven’t been allowed to have any input on it? It creates a lot of irritation.”

Read more . . .

Feds: Lynx recovery plan ready by 2018

Environmental Issues, News,

The feds are almost ready to be ready to create a lynx recovery plan . . .

U.S. wildlife officials revealed Monday that they expect to complete a recovery plan for imperiled Canada lynx in early 2018 — almost two decades after the snow-loving wild cats first received federal protections.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service laid out that timetable in court documents filed as part of a federal lawsuit in Montana brought by environmentalists unhappy with prior delays.

Lynx were designated a federally protected threatened species in 2000. Since then, federal officials have repeatedly missed their own deadlines to start work on a plan to help the animals. Officials have blamed budget limitations, other species that took priority and lawsuits that challenged the government’s designation of critical habitat for the animals.

Read more . . .

Firefighting costs scuttled several other projects

News,

Fighting wildfires pulled Forest Service money away from a number of other projects last year . . .

Paying for forest fires pre-empted lots of U.S. Forest Service work last year, according to a report released Monday by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Mine cleanup work in the Ninemile Ranger District and partnership arrangements with the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks were among the western Montana jobs dropped in 2013 when the federal agency had to redirect $505 million of its annual budget for fire suppression.

The Forest Service also pulled $440 million away from its regular budget in 2012.

Read more . . .

Glacer Park’s glaciers ‘have paused in active retreat’

Environmental Issues, News,

After a four-year pause, the USGS expects glacial retreat to resume in Glacier Park this year . . .

Healthy snowpack and cooler summers over the past four years have slowed melting of remaining glaciers in Glacier National Park in Montana, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

“So the glaciers have paused in active retreat,” said Dan Fagre, a research ecologist with the USGS’ Northern Rocky Mountain Science Center in Bozeman who is stationed at Glacier.

But Fagre anticipates the glaciers, which are receding or disappearing, will likely resume retreating this year, if a forecast for El Nino-induced warmer temperatures comes to pass later this summer.

Read more . . .

Flathead Forest Plan collaboration thank-you

Commentary,

Several NFPA members were involved in the Flathead National Forest Plan revision meetings . . .

The Meridian Institute would like thank everyone who participated in the Flathead National Forest plan revision stakeholder collaboration meetings over the past eight months. It has been our pleasure to work with the forest staff and more than 165 people who attended up to 16 evening meetings to talk about how the forest should be managed.

Participants included wildlife experts, snowmobilers, wilderness advocates, mountain bike enthusiasts, timber company employees, horse packers, rafters, summer motorized users, aviators, county commissioners, students, people who simply care about the forest because it is in their back yard, and many others. Other interested stakeholders contributed comments electronically.

 

Read more . . .

Early results suggest habituated mountain goat behavior, terrain use different

Environmental Issues, News, ,

The Glacier Park mountain goat study begun last year is starting to show some results . . .

As mountain goat research prepares to continue this summer in Glacier National Park, preliminary data suggests goats that are habituated to humans display different herding behavior, and use habitat differently, than wild goats.

The three-year research study began late last summer. Glacier officials call it a critical component of the ongoing Going-to-the-Sun Road corridor management planning effort.

Read more . . .

As Wilderness Act turns 50, dealing with new technologies

Environmental Issues, News, ,

Here’s a thoughtful article by Rob Chaney of the Missoulian concerning new issues technology brings to wilderness management . . .

When the Wilderness Act was passed in 1964, NASA was sending astronauts into space guided by an IBM 360 computer with 1 megabyte of memory. That’s enough to hold one minute of a video on today’s iPhone.

And that’s a conundrum for people like Pat Tabor. His Swan Mountain Outfitters lead paying customers into the Bob Marshall Wilderness for camping and hunting trips. That’s considered a “proper” commercial service under the special provisions clause of the Wilderness Act. But shooting a video of the experience with a smartphone for a movie about his company is not.

“Now with the 50th anniversary of the Wilderness Act, it calls into question the viability of what we’re doing,” Tabor said. “There are immense restrictions that come into play when a place is designated wilderness. The language in the Wilderness Act speaks of commercial activity ‘to the extent necessary.’ That means commercial services. But what’s the extent of that?”

Read more . . .