Battle Looms Over Gray Wolf Protection

This is interesting.

I don't support hunting wildlife simply for bragging rights and Instagram/ Twitter selfies. At one point there were millions of gray wolves covering every corner of the United States. Now, there's about 6,000. They're on the federal Endangered Species List. I don't have an opinion on whether federal protection is better or not, but it's worth considering. Conservatism is about conservation, and smart use of our natural resources is conservative.

In any case, at the Los Angles Times, "Plan to remove gray wolves from Endangered Species Act sparks battle":

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and environmentalists are at war over the agency’s latest plan to strip gray wolves of their federal protections and turn management of the often-reviled predators over to states and tribes. https://t.co/xgg8fQastb

— Los Angeles Times (@latimes) March 28, 2019

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and environmentalists are at war over the agency’s latest plan to strip gray wolves of their federal protections and turn management of the often-reviled predators over to states and tribes.

“If the agency’s proposal gets finalized, we will see them in court,” Michael Robinson, a spokesman for the Center for Biological Diversity said on Wednesday. “Delisting is simply out of the question.”

Surprisingly, however, in the latest chapter of a long-running battle to keep an estimated 6,000 gray wolves safe from trophy hunters and trappers, the center and the Humane Society of the United States are suggesting a compromise.

“We are proposing an alternate path forward — downlisting the gray wolf from federally endangered to threatened status,” said Brett Hartl, an attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity. That action, he said, “would maintain federal protections the animal needs to survive in certain areas, while allowing states to share management oversight.”

His organization doesn’t oppose state management of wolves, but it does oppose hunting wolves for sport, he said. “Free-for-all hunting of wolves is not management, it’s slaughter.”

Similarly, Nick Arrivo, an attorney with the Humane Society of the United States, said, “We don’t oppose the idea of state management. The problem is that certain states like Wisconsin, Minnesota and Michigan have shown that they are not inclined to maintain healthy populations of gray wolves.”

Federal wildlife authorities removed protections from gray wolves in the Great Lakes region in 2011, allowing thousands of gray wolves in those three states to be hunted or trapped. The protections were restored by federal court decisions in 2014.

The prospect of removing wolf protections aroused rage yet again earlier this month when the Fish and Wildlife Service touted the species' recovery as "one of the greatest comebacks for an animal in U.S. conservation history,” a characterization that some conservation groups called misguided and premature.

David Bernhardt, acting secretary of the Department of Interior, said the plan to delist the species “puts us one step closer to transitioning the extraordinary effort that we have invested in gray wolf recovery to other species who actually need the protections of the Endangered Species Act, leaving the states to carry on the legacy of wolf conservation.”

However, the Humane Society, in a statement, warned that the plan catered “to a narrow group of special interests: the trophy hunters and trappers who want to kill wolves for bragging rights, social media opportunities and to increase deer and elk populations.”

It pointed out, for instance, that in November, “Americans were heartbroken” by the killing of the famous Yellowstone black wolf, Spitfire, by a trophy hunter in Montana.

It also argued that gray wolves are worth millions of dollars to the economies of Idaho, Montana and Wyoming, studies show, because of the visitors they attract to national parks in the northern Rocky Mountains...

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Fighting for Elephants, in One of Africa's Most Dangerous Corners

From today's front-page, at the Los Angeles Times, "'Am I going to get out of here alive?' In one of Africa's most dangerous corners, a fight to the death for the elephants":

The elephant was trumpeting in terror, and bleeding. Kambale Mate wanted desperately to save it from the poachers. But would he make it out alive himself? Part 1 of our look at an alarming spike in killings of environmental activists around the world. https://t.co/BTU4knhSwq pic.twitter.com/KqePLvISpF

— L.A. Times World (@latimesworld) December 22, 2017

Kambale Mate huddled beneath a tangle of grass, looking up at bright stars in a moonless sky, a tumble of chaotic events cascading through his mind.

Where were the other wildlife rangers, Jean de Dieu Matongo and Joel Meriko Ari? Were they alive?

He had been a ranger for only five months at Garamba National Park, the last remaining preserve for disappearing populations of elephants and giraffes in this part of Africa. Yet here he was with two comrades, hiding like small, petrified mammals in the grass. If any of them moved, a large band of poachers nearby could find and kill them.

A hassock of grass cradled his back as he looked up. He couldn’t remember quite how he had escaped the shrieking storm of bullets. What he remembered was the crunch of the crisp, dry leaves as boot steps crept through the dusk.

The world is experiencing an epidemic of environmental killings. Last year 200 environmental defenders — citizens protesting mining, agribusiness, oil and gas development and logging, as well as land rights activists and wildlife rangers — were killed, according to the London-based nonprofit Global Witness. In the first 11 months of this year, the number was 170.

The reasons are many: corruption; rising global demand for natural resources; companies’ growing willingness to exploit new areas; and a dearth of accountability, as governments and corporations increasingly work together on resource development agendas.

“We’ve seen impunity breeding more violence,” said Billy Kyte, a Global Witness official. “Those carrying out those attacks know they can get away with it. We’re seeing more brazen attacks than before.”

Total attacks have doubled from what they were five years ago, and they have been spreading. In 2015, Global Witness recorded killings in 16 countries. Last year, it was 24.

Latin America, in the midst of a boom in resource extraction as billions of dollars in new investments stream in from China and elsewhere, was the deadliest region — 110 were killed through the end of November, with the heaviest toll, 44 dead, in Brazil.

But few places in the world are as consistently dangerous for environmental defenders as Africa’s wildlife preserves. In Garamba National Park, a sprawling UNESCO World Heritage site in a remote corner of northeastern Congo, some of the planet’s last, struggling populations of elephants, white rhinoceroses and giraffes are under assault by poachers seeking to cash in on the millions of dollars the animals can bring in illegal international markets.

Of the 105 park rangers around the world killed over the 12 months that ended in July, most of them were in Africa, according to the nonprofit International Ranger Federation. Garamba saw 21 attacks within a year, leading to five deaths.

The 1,900-square-mile Garamba park lies at the crossroads of international chaos. Raiders from Sudan and Chad sweep south along a route used centuries ago to traffic slaves and ivory. Soldiers, deserters and armed rebels spill into the park from South Sudan on the other side of the border. An estimated 150 fighters with the Lord’s Resistance Army, which has left a trail of death, mutilation, child sex slavery and kidnapping across a broad swath of central Africa, are believed to roam the hunting preserves bordering the park.

“It’s the Wild West here,” said Naftali Honig, the park’s anti-poaching information coordinator. “They’re coming in from multiple countries and armed groups. We have a porous border and corrupt officials who are in the ivory chain. We also have collapsed states.”

Garamba National Park is jointly managed by the Congolese government and African Parks, a nongovernmental organization based in South Africa that teams up with governments to manage 12 of the continent’s most vulnerable national parks, covering more than 7 million acres.

Days before the April 11 attack that forced Kambale Mate to hide overnight in the grass, African Parks pilot Frank Molteno had spotted five dead elephants from the air, including two youngsters. When Honig investigated the site he was sickened to find the tiny tusks of the young elephants taken.

“The adults had their faces hacked off. There’s almost no ivory in the juveniles. They would have just killed them for nothing,” said Honig.

There were multiple gunmen, from the evidence, and they were not finished. Searching from the air days later, Molteno spotted a fire site. Mate, 24, went out as part of a team of six patrollers, accompanied by four Congolese soldiers...

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Furry Floaters: Sea Otters, Hunted to Near Extinction in the 1700s and 1800s, Have Rebounded Along California's Coast

This is really cool.

I love sea otters.

At LAT:

The sea otters of Morro Bay have made a comeback, defying man and nature https://t.co/BOsKziwRdx

— Los Angeles Times (@latimes) March 27, 2017

'Dirty Hippies' No Match for Donald Trump (VIDEO)

At the Rebel, "U.S. grants Keystone XL permit: “Dirty hippies” no match for President Trump."

Donald Trump's Cabinet Picks Signal Coming Deregulation Moves

Well, the Scott Pruitt pick for the E.P.A. sends a particularly strong signal on deregulation.

And now with the nomination CKE CEO Andy Puzder, expect some serious calls to roll back onerous governmental bureaucracy.

Leftists are going to be wiggin'.

At WSJ, "Donald Trump’s Cabinet Selections Signal Deregulation Moves Are Coming":

Business leaders are predicting a dramatic unraveling of regulations on everything from overtime pay to power-plant emission rules as Donald Trump seeks to fill his cabinet with determined adversaries of the agencies they will lead.

The president-elect’s pick Thursday to head the Labor Department, fast-food executive Andrew Puzder, is an outspoken critic of the worker-pay policies advanced by the Obama administration. Mr. Trump’s choice for the next administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt, is a primary architect of legal challenges on President Barack Obama’s environmental regulations.

Other cabinet nominees critical of regulations advanced under Mr. Obama include Rep. Tom Price to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, financier Wilbur Ross Jr. at the Commerce Department and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson at the Department of Housing and Urban Development. All will require Senate confirmation.

Those picks suggest the Trump administration, backed by a Republican Congress, is determined to advance labor, environmental and financial regulatory policies more favorable to many American corporations, though not all will back his proposals.

Appearing in Des Moines, Iowa, on Thursday as part of his postelection “thank you” tour, Mr. Trump said he will push to do away with regulations that are crimping job growth. “On regulations, we’re going to eliminate every single regulation that hurts our farms, our workers and our small businesses,” he said.

Business leaders say all Americans stand to benefit from a lighter regulatory touch that would boost profits, growth and hiring, particularly for small and midsize businesses.

“If government can stimulate business to hire more, rather than vilify us, that’s going to be a better milieu,” said Andrew Berlin, CEO of Chicago-based Berlin Packaging LLC, which makes glass and plastic bottles for consumer products.

“The continual onslaught of regulation over the last eight years—that probably has been pretty much our No. 1, overall concern as manufacturers,” said Jason Andringa, CEO of the Vermeer Corp., a Pella, Iowa-based maker of construction and farm machinery. “That there may be some relief from that is very appealing to us.”

Mr. Andringa said mounting Obama-era regulations have drained the time of several employees dedicated to complying with them. That has eaten into profits, despite overall rising sales in recent years. But the company has’t resorted to layoffs in more than a decade, he added.

Mr. Andringa said he does have reservations about Mr. Trump’s trade policies because Vermeer exports around one-fifth of the equipment it makes in Iowa. “We certainly hope not to see tariffs that are implemented here that then cause corresponding tariffs overseas,” he said.

While a push to freeze and rollback new regulations could cheer some CEOs, Mr. Trump’s relationship with the business community has had plenty of rough spots. Throughout the campaign he threatened to impose taxes on companies that moved jobs overseas. He lambasted big banks and multinational corporations in a campaign video that ascribed dark motives to the forces of globalism.

Mr. Trump also has taken to Twitter since the election to confront individual businesses and labor leaders by name over specific disputes, a tactic some economists warn could amplify corporate uncertainty around his policies...

More.

Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt Picked to Head Environmental Protection Agency (VIDEO)

God what a great pick!

At USA Today, "Scott Pruitt: Trump's pick to lead the EPA," and "Trump's choice to lead EPA has a history with the agency."

Also at NYT, "Trump Picks Scott Pruitt, Climate Change Denialist, to Lead E.P.A." (via Memeorandum).

The Pine Marten Constantly on the Hunt (VIDEO)

"The Hunt" is back on for a new episode tonight, on BBC America.

I'm enjoying it.

P-32 Mountain Lion Killed Trying to Cross Interstate 5 Near Castaic

It's almost inevitable. The lions just aren't going to have enough living space when the come down by metropolitan Los Angeles. This P-32 guy is apparently the most-tracked Southern California puma ever. But he made one last crossing, and it was fatal.

I love these guys too. Sad.

At LAT, "Male puma known as P-32 is killed crossing 5 Freeway in Castaic":

Mountain Lion Famous for Crossing LA Freeways Is Killed Crossing a Freeway http://t.co/Du0Ww27ea1

— ECommerce News (@ECommerceNews1) August 13, 2015

The journey of a mountain lion that successfully crossed four highways came to an end early Monday when it was struck and killed by a vehicle as it tried to make another run across a major L.A. freeway.

The puma named P-32 is the only known male to venture out of the Santa Monica Mountains and wander north into other habitat areas, said Kate Kuykendall, a spokeswoman for the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area.

P-32 was best known for dashing across the 101 Freeway near Thousand Oaks on April 3. He managed to cross Highway 23 near the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and settled into a natural area in the Simi Hills. He had also crossed highways 118 and 126.

But P-32’s journey, deemed to be “a textbook case of successful dispersal," was cut short. The 21-month-old puma headed east and tried to cross the 5 Freeway between 4 and 6 a.m. when he was hit in Castaic.

“This case illustrates the challenges that mountain lions in this region face, particularly males,” wildlife ecologist Seth Riley said in a statement.

“P-32 conquered all kinds of freeways and highways to reach the Los Padres," he continued, "but it was probably another dominant male that made him leave the area and attempt one last crossing, which obviously was not successful.”

P-32 is the first male to be studied that successfully fled the mountains.

He is the 12th mountain lion killed on a freeway or road since researchers began studying the mountain lion population in 2002 to determine how they survive in the city...

Mayor Eric Garcetti Releases 20,000 'Shade Balls' Into Los Angeles Reservoir on Monday (VIDEO)

I imagine there are kookier things.

At LAT, "Shade balls in the L.A. Reservoir," and "Q&A Millions of shade balls helping protect California's precious water."

And watch, at CBS Evening News, "To fight drought, Los Angeles turns to 'shade balls'":

Los Angeles dumped 96 million plastic balls into a reservoir as a way to combat the drought. The balls protect the water and slow the rate of evaporation, reports CBS News correspondent John Blackstone.

At Katmai National Park, With Thousands of Bears Near Campground Every Summer, Visitors Must Follow the Rules

Can't be too careful with those bears. Big bears. Hungry bears, heh.

Here's video, "The Bears are Back!"

And at the New York Times, "At Katmai National Park in Alaska, Bears Rule":

Katmai National Park sprawls over four million acres in southern Alaska. So why does its only established campground allow for just 60 people per night — a limit that leads to an online booking fray every January? The answer is also one of the park’s main draws, and its primary claim to national fame: bears. Lots of them — about 2,200 at the National Park Service’s last count, with 60 or so regulars that hang around Brooks Camp every summer. In theory, you can camp elsewhere in Katmai, but the campground has an electric fence and constant activity, making it an unlikely place to find a bear too close to your tent for sleeping comfort.

By last spring, just about a year into my life as a full-time Alaskan, I had designs on spending time at Brooks Camp, long considered one of the state’s premier bear-viewing spots. Campground spots for July — peak season for viewing brown bears fishing, establishing hierarchy and practicing their version of flirting (the boys can be such pests) — can be reserved as of Jan. 5 every year, and go quickly. So by early May, having missed my window, I had long given up on making it, figuring I would have to spend another season watching the bears via webcams.

Streaming since July 2012, Katmai’s webcams, set up by Explore.org, (there are four trained on brown bear fishing areas) have turned the local bears into social media celebrities and, for their most loyal followers, the biggest incentives to board a floatplane to Brooks, where dozens of bears return each summer to bulk up on salmon in the Brooks River. (Bulk is the operative word; by November, when the bears start turning in for their long winter’s naps, the males can weigh 1,000 pounds or more.)

My Facebook feed had been lighting up with bear news for weeks — friends across the country all playing a seasonal parlor game trying to figure out if bear 32, a.k.a. Chunk, had improved his fishing skills or if bear 814, a.k.a. Lurch, was going to calm down this year, or if he would continue to intimidate other bears out of their prized fishing spots. The live streams had interrupted more than a few of my own work hours, too.

While on a spring camping trip in Denali National Park, an acquaintance casually presented a near-miraculous offer: “I reserved a camping spot for two people at Brooks Camp in July but can’t use it. You want it? I think it was about $50.” I recruited my Anchorage-born friend Tara Stevens, an experienced angler, and we were off. The virtual experience, I hoped, would soon be real.

After an Alaska Airlines flight from Anchorage to the town of King Salmon, we collected our bags stuffed with layers of clothing, rain gear, camping and cooking gear, and food, and headed to the Katmai Air Service office for the flight to Brooks Camp, which sits at the confluence of Naknek Lake and the Brooks River. After weighing in for the flight — when traveling by floatplane in Alaska, you get used to people telling you to hop on a scale — we were soon climbing skyward in a blue and white 1962 de Havilland Otter, its single engine drowning out any conversation.

Thick clouds hung overhead and even the grassy areas below looked slightly gray. Color broke through now and again — bright green roofs on a small group of buildings below, a pale aqua river threading through the glum landscape.

Twenty minutes later, we descended onto Naknek Lake, the plane bumping along on its floats toward the driftwood-strewn beach and the Brooks Camp employees waiting there. (Brooks Camp also has cabins run by a park concessionaire, Katmailand; they’re spare and pricey but a good option for the camping-averse.) Everybody on the plane, which holds 10 passengers, was a bit giddy as we rolled toward the start of the summer adventure, like the first moments arriving at sleep-away camp.

We were directed to the visitors’ center for the “Brooks Camp School of Bear Etiquette,” meant to keep visitors and the bears coexisting peacefully. Orientation started with a 10-minute film. The clothing and hairstyles were delightfully out of date, but the how-to’s still applied: Keep 50 yards from any bear; 100 yards from a bear with cubs. Move back as a bear moves closer. When hiking, stay alert and make sounds — talking and clapping — so bears know you’re there. If a bear gets too close, don’t run — it may think you’re prey. Speak to the bear in a firm but calm voice. Then start to walk back slowly. Give the bear the right of way.

After the film, a ranger rehashed some of the key points, gave us lapel pins that indicated we had been through bear school, and sent us on our way.

We loaded our gear onto a wheeled cart and headed down the trail toward the campground. Though it was about a third of a mile from the visitors’ center, that first walk seemed quite a bit longer. Thick woods were on the left and, on our right, a thinnish strip of trees blocking our view of the beach, where, it had been made clear, bears loved to wander.

“How has nobody been mauled here?” Tara asked. We kept a slightly-louder-than-normal rambling conversation going. There might have been singing.

Soon enough we rolled the cart through the campground’s electric fence, which didn’t look as if it could keep out a kitten. It was tempting to touch the fence, but I decided to trust the park service and stayed shock free.

The tent up, we headed back down the trail to grab dinner at the lodge.

But before long: “Bear in camp! Bear in camp!”

A ranger’s shout went up outside the lodge, warning people to stay or get inside. The dining room tables emptied as people ran to the windows. Two brown bears, their long claws in clear view, loped through the camp, did a few circles just feet from the lodge porch, and ran back off. I had spent plenty of time in bear country before, but the pair’s romp made it so much clearer that we were playing in the bears’ world. I got ever that much giddier about spending two nights exploring the area...

A great story.

Keep reading.

Mark Levin Hilariously Slams 'Munchkin' Republican 'Backbenchers': Says He's 'One Inch' from Leaving the GOP

I started giggling at the "munchkin" line.

Levin gets on an angry roll here, at the Right Scoop, "Mark Levin to the GOP: I AM ONE INCH AWAY FROM LEAVING YOU!"

Peter Wehner takes issue, at Commentary, "Mark Levin Should Leave the Republican Party."

Actually, I'd bet Levin has Wehner in mind when he hammers the "dissembling" Republicans.

Me, I'll all "meh." I'm a neocon. I don't identify as a Republican. I'll vote for them, mainly to stop the Democrat-Socialists. But you gotta give it to Levin for really letting it rip here. Hopefully the idiot "munchkins" boosting rhinos like Jeb Bush will get the message. Sheesh.

Be sure to give it a listen.

Spectacular GoPro® Great White Shark Photo from South Africa

Great work from Amanda Brewer!

Photo of the Day! Amazing image from Amanda Brewer who is working to promote shark conservation in South Africa. pic.twitter.com/xt368fyaOg

— GoPro® (@GoPro) October 5, 2014

Pink the Pelican Returns to the Wild

Well, here's a happy ending. Hopefully this bird will stay healthy.

At the Los Angeles Times, "Pelican whose mutilation sparked outrage is released into the wild."

And at the Long Beach Press-Telegram, "This pelican named Pink was mutilated and left for dead in Long Beach. Today he flew to freedom."

GoPro Video of Kevin Richardson, the 'Lion Whisperer'

I've never seen this, despite the video being viewed over 15 million times on YouTube.

Via Debra Burlingame.



RELATED: At ABC News, "1-Minute Video Shows Why GoPro's IPO May Be Hot."