All posts by nfpa

Larry Wilson: Talking bucks, poachers and larch

Commentary, , , , ,

Larry puts his feet up and talks about this October on the North Fork . . .

Nearly everyone has already reported a slow start to the general hunting season, and that has been the case among North Fork residents, too.

Neighbor Lynn Ogle shot a nice white-tailed buck this week, and since I was with him, I don’t really feel skunked. That is the only legal kill I’m aware of.

Two white-tailed bucks were illegally killed on Trail Creek on private property. A license plate number was written down by another hunter and, if correct, the shooter may be arrested.

Continue reading . . .

Some of last winter’s snow persists in Glacier and other parts of Rockies

Environmental Issues, News, ,

From today’s Missoulian . . .

Scientists who monitor the effects of global warming are watching glaciers shrink all over the world, but this year could be an exception in parts of the Rocky Mountains.

Snow is already piling up in the high country, but not all of the unusually deep snow from last winter has melted. As a result, some glaciers and snowfields are actually gaining volume this year.

Scientists have measured new ice in Glacier National Park and atop Colorado’s Front Range mountains. In northwest Wyoming, there is photographic evidence of snowfield growth…

Continue reading . . .

Wolf hunt totals 44 animals so far

Environmental Issues, News, , ,

Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks released end-of-month totals for hunting season so far. The Daily Inter Lake has the story, including the wolf numbers . . .

So far this hunting season, hunters have taken 44 wolves in Montana.

The overall statewide quota is 220 wolves spread across 16 hunting districts.

In Northwest Montana’s six districts, a total of 17 wolves have been harvested; the quota of allowable wolf kills is 71.

Continue reading . . .

Crown of the Continent highlighted in federal initiative

News, ,

From today’s Flathead Beacon . . .

Stretched across a state and two provinces, the Crown of the Continent is one of the last wild places in America and now it is being highlighted in a report by the U.S. Department of Interior promoting the outdoors.

The report, to be released this week, features two prominent projects in each state that reconnect the public with nature. Here in Montana, that includes both the Crown of the Continent – the region encompassing Glacier and Waterton Lakes national parks and surrounding areas all the way south to Missoula – and the Fort Missoula Regional Park.

Continue reading . . .

Baucus will sponsor Rocky Mountain Front Heritage Act

Environmental Issues, News, ,

Posted yesterday evening to the Missoulian (includes a nice map) . . .

U.S. Sen. Max Baucus announced Friday he will sponsor a bill to expand the wilderness on the Rocky Mountain Front, saying the proposal has a good chance of being the first wilderness designation in the state since the early 1980s.

Conservationists who have been working on the Rocky Mountain Front Heritage Act for about six years tout the measure as a compromise among varied groups aimed at keeping development and road access on the Front at its current levels. Opponents have said more wilderness designations could hinder access, mineral exploration and ranching operations.

Continue reading . . .

Nine bears trapped & moved in Northwest Montana

Environmental Issues, News, ,

October, as usual, is a big month for bear-human conflict . . .

The busy season for bear management is well under way in Northwest Montana.

Over the past two weeks, Fish, Wildlife and Parks bear conflict biologists have captured and relocated eight grizzly bears from the northeast portion of the Flathead Valley, according to a news release Friday from the state wildlife agency. A ninth was captured in the Yaak.

Three of the grizzly bears were captured north of Columbia Falls; five others were captured east of Montana 206.

Continue reading . . .

Online cameras stream polar bear migration

Environmental Issues, News, , ,

A few of our readers have seen the polar bear migration in person. Now, thanks to a grant from the Annenberg Foundation, it is possible to watch it online. [Note: Although it was up yesterday, the web site is broken right now.]

From an AP article posted to the Flathead Beacon site . . .

In the harsh, remote wilds of the Canadian tundra, a wolverine scampers up to a polar bear snoozing near the shore of the Hudson Bay. The bear rises and makes a half-hearted charge, driving away the fierce, badger-like animal.

The brief encounter Thursday was streamed live to computers around the world through a new program that aims to document in real time the annual migration of hundreds of polar bears outside Churchill, Manitoba.

Continue reading . . .

Larry Wilson: North Fork boat ramps won’t work

Commentary, , ,

This week, Larry has some observations about the U.S. Forest Service bureaucracy . . .

As promised early in the summer, the Forest Service has rebuilt boat access sites at the Canada border and at Ford Ranger Station. Although it will be easier to launch at Ford due to the removal of the wooden terraces, I have mixed feelings about the new boat ramps…

The Forest Service is my favorite government agency. They have many excellent employees who are unable to do their best due to stupid regulations written in Washington, D.C. Mostly, they are no longer really involved in timber management but have been pushed into managing tourists. As a result, they make funny decisions which give columnists something to write about…

Continue reading . . .

Sarah Gilman: ‘Wilderness Lite’ wins the day

Commentary, Environmental Issues,

Here’s some pretty good commentary by Sarah Gilman of the High Country News concerning last Friday’s resurrection of the “roadless rule” . . .

One of the last decades’ most scintillating (that is, in the headachey confusing sense…) enviro-legal ping-pong matches may finally be drawing to a close. On Friday, a three-judge panel at the federal 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver effectively reinstated the Clinton-era Roadless Area Conservation Rule, which banned new road building and most logging on more than 50 million acres of National Forest. The rule was meant to prevent further fragmentation of wildlife habitat, sedimentation of streams, and other negative effects of roads on lands that had been previously inventoried as “roadless.”

Continue reading . . .

Roadless rule reinstatement protects 6.4M acres in Montana

Environmental Issues, News,

After 10 years of squabbling, the “roadless rule” is back in force. From today’s Missoulian . . .

A decade of uncertainty over managing public roadless lands may have cleared with last Friday’s federal appeals court ruling.

A three-judge panel from the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously agreed that a 2001 rule governing inventoried roadless areas was the law of the land. That dovetailed with earlier 9th Circuit Court rulings saying the same thing.

The decisions prohibit road construction and timber cutting in 58.5 million acres of inventoried roadless areas, including 6.4 million acres in Montana. That covers about 30 percent of the national forest system.

Continue reading . . .