All posts by nfpa

DNA study doubles bear census

Environmental Issues, News, , , , ,

Here’s a better article on the recently completed grizzly bear DNA study. Yesterday’s AP write-up was a little thin.

From the Wednesday, September 17, 2008 online edition of the Daily Inter Lake . . .

The estimate is in: There were 765 grizzly bears roaming the Northern Continental Divide Ecosystem during the summer of 2004.

That’s the official result of an ambitious and unprecedented genetic study of the largest grizzly bear population in the lower 48 states. The study will be published in the January edition of the Journal of Wildlife Management.

Read the entire article . . .

Federal Study Says Grizzlies Thriving in Montana

Environmental Issues, News, , , , ,

From the Tuesday, September 16, 2008 online edition of the Flathead Beacon . . .

The majestic grizzly bear, once king of the Western wilderness but threatened with extinction for a third of a century, has roared back in Montana…

Researchers with the U.S. Geological Survey announced Tuesday that there are approximately 765 bears in northwestern Montana. That’s the largest population of grizzly bears documented there in more than 30 years, and a sign that the species could be at long last rebounding.

Read the entire article . . .

A Piece of Polebridge in Downtown Kalispell

News

From the Thursday, September 11, 2008 online edition of the Flathead Beacon . . .

Downtown Kalispell has a lot of things Polebridge doesn’t. If you’re the type of person who goes for such amenities, Kalispell offers paved roads, shopping, restaurants, schools and other trappings of modern life. But for a long time, Polebridge had one big advantage: the legendary baked goods at the Polebridge Mercantile. Now, with Ben Kaufman, the son of the baker at the Polebridge Mercantile, about to open his own place on First Avenue East, Kalispell may be evening the score on the bakery front as well.

Read the entire article . . .

Road dust litigation ill-advised

Commentary

The following editorial commentary by Pat Cole of the North Fork Landowners’ Association appeared in this week’s Hungry Horse News . . .

In an Aug. 28 letter to the editor, Mr. Dennis Groebe stated, “at the last meeting of the North Fork Landowners’ Association, it became very clear that a ‘small vocal minority’ has decided to portray the position that the North Fork property owners do not want any steps taken to control the road dust, while the NFLA Board acknowledged that in their own recent poll, 77 percent of the respondents stated that they desired the road to be maintained and some form of ‘dust control measures’ to be implemented.”

As a full-time resident in the North Fork and secretary/treasurer of the NFLA for the past eight years, I have maintained all the minutes of the Association’s business meetings. At no time during the Aug. 2 meeting of the NFLA, nor any of the other meetings that I attended, have I heard the position put forth either by the NFLA board members or association members that North Fork property owners do not want any steps taken to control the road dust. To state that this position has been portrayed is simply not factual.

Continue reading Road dust litigation ill-advised →

Flathead Basin Commission hears of new coal mine

Environmental Issues, News

From the Friday, August 29, 2008 online edition of the Hungry Horse News . . .

Potential mining projects in the Canadian Flathead seem slowed for now, but a new project just outside the Flathead is in its early stages.

A British Columbia representative last week told the Flathead Basin Commission that little has developed with proposed mining projects. At the same meeting in West Glacier, representatives from a third company explained plans for a mine near the Canadian Flathead.

Read the entire article . . .

Suspect arrested in Moose City break-ins

News

From the Tuesday, August 25, 2008 online edition of the Daily Inter Lake . . .

A man wanted in connection to a string of burglaries to cabins in Moose City was arrested Friday after apparently spending almost a week in the wilderness along the U.S.-Canadian border.

John Paul Lynn, 44, is accused of breaking into several cabins and shooting at the long-closed Trail Creek border station, north of Polebridge.

Read the entire article . . .

County Weakens Neighborhood Plans

News

From the Tuesday, August 26, 2008 online edition of the Flathead Beacon . . .

Flathead County commissioners voted last week on two contentious policy issues stemming from a Montana Supreme Court ruling last January over a West Valley community group and a West Valley gravel pit.

The commission voted 2-1 to approve a zoning text amendment that states all neighborhood plans are non-regulatory.

Read the entire article . . .

Glacier Park: The next century – Threats from all sides

Environmental Issues, News

Another in a series of articles about Glacier National Park by Michael Jamison, this one discusses threats to the park, including things like climate change, nearby resource extraction and even road paving. From the Wednesday, August 20, 2008 online edition of the Missoulian . . .

One hundred years ago, when Glacier National Park first became a park, grizzly bears roamed along the spine of the Rocky Mountains, north into Canada, south into Sun River country, west to the Cabinets and east onto lowland plains.

Wolves wandered, too, and wolverines and big bull elk.

They had no idea someone had drawn a new political boundary onto their landscape.

They still don’t.

Read the entire article . . .

Road dust solutions elusive

News

From the Tuesday, August 19, 2008 online edition of the Daily Inter Lake . . .

Flathead County commissioners will adopt next fiscal year’s budget in early September, and it’s a safe bet that there won’t be money earmarked for paving gravel roads.

“The commission hasn’t changed any direction,” Public Works Director David Prunty said. “No new paving.”

Read the entire article . . .

Glacier park: The next century – Paradise in peril

News

From the Sunday, August 17, 2008 online edition of the Missoulian . . .

These mountains have always been old, weighed heavy with age and rooted in deep time, the kind of place where you can heft a handful of early, early earth and wonder at the world before.

Rippled rock at 10,000 feet is sediment laid down 1.6 billion years ago, the oldest rock there is, Proterozoic history heaved up some 170 million years back when the Rocky Mountains pushed skyward. A sheet of stone three miles thick and 160 miles long crashed eastward then, advancing 50 miles and folding old rock over new, creating the block from which vast chisels of ice would carve what we now know as Glacier National Park.

“That’s what people have always come to see in the park,” Leigh Welling said. “They came to look into the past, to see something pristine. To me, the park’s first century was defined by a certain stability.”

Read the entire article . . .