A federal judge in Idaho recently overturned the 1995 convictions of 12 wilderness activists on the charge of violating a road closure in the Cove-Mallard area (HCN, 9/2/96). District Judge Edward Lodge ruled that when the Forest Service closed roads to the Jack Creek sale, it infringed on the First Amendment right to petition the […]
Idaho activists win one
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
Tepee blockade spurs talks
In early January, a small group of Navajos blocked Mobil Oil Corp. offices near Aneth, Utah, with a 20-foot tepee, demanding a halt to oil and gas drilling on their desolate corner of the reservation. The tribe’s Aneth Chapter accused Mobil of contaminating local springs, ruining prime grazing lands and not hiring enough Native Americans. […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
Green groups stick to their guns
-It’s a tough sell,” admits Randy Payne, a board member of Olympic Park Associates, one of several environmental organizations that support killing non-native mountain goats in Washington’s Olympic National Park. “We’re not excited to go out and shoot the goats, either.” But the high-altitude animals, first introduced to the park in the 1920s, are now […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
Who shot the wolf?
A large gray wolf set free into the greater Yellowstone ecosystem was shot in January and dumped in the Madison River, 15 miles south of Three Forks, Mont. Authorities picked at the ice for an hour to free the wolf carcass, says U.S. Fish and Wildlife agent Commodore Mann. An X-ray of the animal indicates […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
Is there oil under Utah’s new monument?
Conoco announced recently that it wants to drill one or two exploratory wells in the heart of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, the newly established 1.7 million-acre wilderness preserve in southeastern Utah (HCN, 9/30/96). The oil company hopes to begin testing wells on two 10-year leases before they expire in November, but the company is […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
Outdoor writer aims to change his culture
The Insightful Sportsman: Thoughts on Fish, Wildlife and What Ails the Earth, by Ted Williams. Camden, Maine: Down East Books, 1996. 299 pages, $14.95 trade paper. “The hard thing about writing real conservation pieces is not finding material, but finding editors who dare to publish it consistently,” says Ted (Edward French) Williams in his preface […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
Venison is not an option
Mule deer don’t just wander through the Boulder, Colo., neighborhood where I live. They drop fawns in our backyards. They browse on almost everything. In Table Mesa, surrounded by open space, it’s a love-it-or-leave-it situation. Don’t like Odocoileus hemionus eating your garden? The solution is simple: move. Venison is not an option. When I moved […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
Heard around the West
Virtual relationships? They’re all the rage. But over at the San Francisco regional office of the Forest Service, leaders of the forester team fret. In a nutshell, nobody talks shop face to face; the preferred method of communication is computer e-mail. So the team leaders sent a message – by e-mail, of course: On the […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
An unabashed green’s snapshot of Northwest forest activism
Tree Huggers: Victory, Defeat, and Renewal in the Northwest Ancient Forest Campaign Kathie Durbin. Seattle, Washington: The Mountaineers Books, 1996. 303 pages, illus.; foreword by Charles Wilkinson. $24.95 hardcover. In 1993, Northwest environmentalists were fractured over President Clinton’s Northwest forest plan. While the plan seemed to save millions of acres of old-growth forests, Clinton wanted […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
Oregon’s ranchers vote for survival
From the start, it was easy to see that the meeting on a bleary January 1994 day in Albuquerque, N.M., would go nowhere. The purpose was to look for a compromise, but four New Mexico environmentalists and ranchers spent most of the time hurling barbs at each other. Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt and Gov. Bruce […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
‘Un-logging’ the national forests? It might just happen
Should conservation groups be able to buy federal timber just so they can leave it standing? Three environmental organizations recently posed that question in a formal petition to the Secretary of Agriculture, whose department oversees the Forest Service. Currently, the Forest Service designates only logging outfits as “responsible bidders’ on tree sales. But with their […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
Lawns and pools close in on desert lab
Tumamoc Hill, Ariz. – When the Carnegie Institution established its desert laboratory on this stony, black basalt hill 94 years ago, some 12,000 residents lived in the small town of Tucson two miles to the east. Today Tucson has grown to almost half a million people, and Sunbelt sprawl threatens the future of one of […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
‘Good’ rancher goes berserk with an assault rifle
MEETEETSE, Wyo. – A rancher known here as a good steward of his land has been charged with illegally firing on a herd of elk with an assault rifle Jan. 16, leaving at least 10 animals either dead or crippled. Game wardens say they cannot recall another slaying of so many big game animals all […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
Nuclear dump could waste the Colorado, foes say
WARD VALLEY, Calif. – Through the chill of winter and 120-degree heat in the summer, activists have camped for the past 16 months among the lizards, cacti and creosote of the Mojave Desert. Their mission: To stop California from building a low-level nuclear dump in this long, desolate valley. At times, this protest on a […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
Wilderness has a new foe: snowmobiles
SEELEY LAKE, Mont.- The February drizzle has done little to dampen the spirits of the crowd here for the Snowmoblivious festival. Snowmobile aficionados from as far away as Washington and Colorado bounce along the shoulders of the main street and buzz through the woods on groomed trails. “We’re out with the whole family,” says one […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
Dear friends
Heaven-o … Kissy lives! Stories here and elsewhere about a south Texas county that decided its employees should answer the phone with a spritely “HEAVEN-O” were tough on those who picked up the phone. It rang a lot. We were among those who called Kleberg County to see how the anti-HELLo greeting was going, and […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
What happens when two tree-huggers meet a tentful of hunters
Last November, I joined Nez Perce tribal biologist Timm Kaminski on one of his difficult “hunter education” trips into the southern Bitterroots on the Idaho-Montana border. His job: to walk into tents of heavily armed hunters and tell them about the possibility of wolves showing up in the woods. He has to ask hunters questions […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
The NRA’s powder may be getting damp
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. If the Wildlife Legislative Fund of America uses sportsmen to advance a pro-development agenda at the expense of habitat, the National Rifle Association uses them to advance a pro-gun position. But hunters are apparently wising up, at least to the NRA, and that may […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
The WLFA: ‘Who are these guys?’
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. When Tony Jewett first heard that the late Mollie Beattie, at the time U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service director, was trying to ban hunting in the nation’s wildlife refuges, he became alarmed and outraged. The news came in a 1993 “alert” from the Wildlife […]
Posted inMarch 3, 1997: Hunters close ranks, and minds
Tough love for hunters
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. Before coming to Outdoor Life, Stephen Byers worked for Rolling Stone and Men’s Journal. Since his highly publicized resignation from Outdoor Life last summer, he’s been writing a novel and shopping “ever so selectively” for another top editorial slot. Byers talks about his days […]