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"Cliven Bundy has had multiple court orders to remove his cattle from federal public lands and he has not paid his grazing fees and he has not abided by the law," Jewell told the Las Vegas Review-Journal. "We will continue to pursue that."
This statement echoes what she and other officials have said over the past 14 months, though the rancher and most of his supporters who pointed guns at the feds that day have seen no legal repercussions. Earlier this month, six anonymous gunshots were fired on public land near the camp of three Bureau of Land Management contract researchers from the Reno-based nonprofit Great Basin Institute who were monitoring water in the Gold Butte area, near the Bundy Ranch. The BLM has said it would take extra precautions in the area as a result.
Environmental groups that are concerned about the impact of grazing say that by allowing ranchers like Bundy to let livestock graze illegally in sensitive habitat encourages others to do the same, to the detriment of ecosystems. At least three green organizations, Center for Biological Diversity, WildEarth Guardians and Oregon Wild, have now partnered with the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, the Southern Poverty Law Center and others to create the Ballots not Bullets Coalition. The Coalition launched in May, around the time that the conservative militia-type organization Oath Keepers and others, including two Bundy family representatives, gathered in southern Oregon to support gold miners in a dispute with the BLM.
There's a long history of violence toward federal public lands officers, as was evident in the results of last year's High Country News investigation on the topic. And since 1995, the nonprofit watchdog group Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) has compiled annual reports of such cases that involve BLM officials. Last week, they released their 2014 report, which included 15 incidents involving BLM officers. Despite the Bundy fracas, it was the lowest number since 1996.
The new data include only two incident reports related to the Bundy standoff, including: "Threatening phone call in connection with Gold Butte operation." Reports of the Bundy supporters pointing guns at federal officers during an impoundment of the rancher's cattle did not make the list. Other BLM documents that PEER acquired in April indicate that there were many threats during and following the impoundment and standoff. This contradiction raises the question of how many other incidents the BLM has left off this list in previous years.
Last fall, HCN published a map of reported incidents involving BLM and U.S. Forest Service employees, which we've republished below. Click on each point to get a link to the actual incident report. The map now includes PEER's newest data from 2014. Though the new data doesn't include actual incident reports, it does give some details as to the nature of the threat or violence.
If you are a public lands agency federal employee and have been the victim of a threat or assault, you can share that information with HCN here.
Tay Wiles is the online editor of High Country News.
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Cities have siphoned more than 100,000 acre-feet of ag water — enough for about 200,000 Colorado homes — from the Arkansas River Basin alone since the 1970s. In neighboring Crowley County, farming has vanished, school-class sizes are half what they were 50 years ago, and tumbleweeds from dried-up fields pile up along fences and block roads. "That's what they're stuck with, because there's no more water," Schweizer says. "It's gone forever."
Schweizer is president of the 35-mile-long Catlin Canal, which irrigates about 18,000 acres of farms. He's hoping that the trial run of something called the Arkansas Valley Super Ditch will save the basin's remaining communities and farms. The initiative is not actually a big ditch, but rather a scheme that allows six of the valley's irrigation canals to pool their water rights and temporarily lease them to cities. Starting in March, five Catlin irrigators "leased" a total of 500 acre-feet of water, which would normally supply their fields, to nearby Fowler and the cities of Fountain and Security, 80 miles away. Under the agreement, communities can use the farm water to supply homes and recharge wells for up to three years out of every decade. During those years, the irrigators will have to fallow, or rest, some fields, yet will still be able to earn money from the water itself and farm the rest of their land.
Supporters believe the Super Ditch could eventually enable farms and cities to share up to 10,000 acre-feet of water. "We look at leasing water just like raising a crop," says Schweizer, who is avoiding any potential conflict of interest by keeping his own farm out of the pilot. "It is a source of income, and anybody who's doing that can have the water next year if they want to farm with it. And they are still in the valley, so the community stays viable."
Statewide, cities have acquired at least 191,000 acre-feet of agricultural water, eliminating farming and ranching on millions of acres. Water managers estimate Colorado could lose up to 700,000 more acres by 2050. Like Schweizer, officials consider water leasing, also called lease-fallowing or rotational fallowing, a promising way to slow that loss while satisfying urban thirst, particularly since alternatives like new dams and other big water-development projects face regulatory hurdles and environmentalist opposition. Colorado's draft water plan suggests the state could meet up to 50,000 acre-feet of its future water needs — and avoid more buy-and-dry — through such water-sharing deals.
But it wasn't easy to get anyone to commit to even a trial run of the Super Ditch. Farmers worry that leasing is just the first step toward selling out, and cities are leery of year-by-year arrangements. With the pilot finally in motion, supporters hope it will build enough trust to attract more participants and inspire similar efforts elsewhere. Farmers and cities are watching, says Schweizer, "without a doubt."
Other Western states already tap into lease-fallowing. California has had a major long-term program since 2004, designed to meet urban needs without drying up farms in the Palo Verde and Imperial valleys, while Arizona began its own pilot project in 2014. The combination of drought and urban growth in the early 2000s spurred on Colorado's discussions. In 2004 and 2005, the city of Aurora, facing severe shortages, was able to lease water from farmers along the High Line Canal, another Arkansas Valley ditch. In 2007, the Legislature created a $4 million grant program to study and support leasing and other ways to avoid buy-and-dry, leading to the establishment of the Super Ditch Company in 2008.
Previous Super Ditch pilot projects, however, failed to launch. Cities, rural power providers and some farmers and ranchers formally complained in Colorado water court that the project could "injure," or deplete, their own water rights and supplies, or take more water than allowed. Irrigators have also gotten "cold feet," says Jay Winner, general manager of the Lower Arkansas Valley Water Conservancy District, which backs the project. In several years, project farmers feared they wouldn't have enough water to both lease and raise crops, due to drought.
Agricultural water users also worry that temporary transfers will diminish their legal water rights. Under state law, an irrigator who wants to lease water typically has to legally repurpose his water rights in water court to enable municipal or industrial use. Theoretically, a water court could then re-measure and reduce those rights — although that isn't the -intent.
Some farmers believe that the deals threaten agriculture, rather than protect it, says MaryLou Smith, policy specialist at Colorado State University's Colorado Water Institute. But Smith says that if they don't become more common, "agricultural water will be bought up and converted to urban use. (Farmers) are going to get run over."
Cities have also balked at leasing, saying it's easier and cheaper to just acquire farmers' water rights and build a "firm" supply than to invest in water that may or may not be available, depending on snowpack and farmers' needs. Some urban water providers argue that having access to water only in relatively wet years, when farmers are more willing to share, isn't that useful, because urban supplies are also plentiful then.
State lawmakers have eased some worries with a number of new laws, though. One 2013 bill, backed by Lower Arkansas water managers and others, clarified the rules for long-term water leases, helping to keep irrigators out of water court. Another allowed the Colorado Water Conservation Board to authorize up to 10 pilot projects, giving the state an oversight role. The measures helped finally launch the Super Ditch this spring.
But other projects are still running into opposition — including from some Super Ditch supporters. In northern Colorado, the Colorado Corn Growers Association, Aurora Water and Ducks Unlimited tried to develop a "flex market," where farmers could have their water rights amended to allow them to be used for other purposes. Then they could auction them off in years when they weren't planning to use them, and cities, industry or conservation groups could bid for the flows. But the Lower Arkansas Conservancy and others helped defeat a bill that would have authorized the market this spring. Winner says the setup looked like an illegal "speculation" scheme that could allow water to be auctioned off for non-agricultural uses every year — thus actually accelerating buy-and-dry and water diversions from one river system to another.
Andy Jones, a Johnstown, Colorado, water attorney who was involved with the legislation, responds that the flex market is a "narrow, intentional exception" to the state's anti-speculation rule. But the opposition hasn't surprised him, considering the water plundering that's occurred in the Lower Arkansas. "I think the novelty is a concern to them," Jones says, "but I don't think it's justified in the sense that we're really all on the same page, trying to create incentives for water to stay in agriculture."
Other approaches to water sharing for agriculture — and the environment — are having more luck. This spring, the nonprofit Colorado Water Trust and state Water Conservation Board established the state's first permanent split-season water right, another legal water-sharing option. It allows water from a ranch, recently purchased by the Western Rivers Conservancy to prevent subdivision, to be used for irrigation during the early summer. After that, it will be returned to a once-dry stretch of the Little Cimarron River the rest of the year to benefit fish and improve water quality. "This project shows the environment can have a place, and it's not a zero-sum game where you take water from one use and it never goes back again," says Colorado Water Trust attorney Zach Smith.
And following the flex-market setback, a new working group in northern Colorado is discussing a sort of land-and-water bank, where farmers ready to call it quits could sell their resources. The "bank" would then broker conservation easements and land sales, allowing only a limited portion of water to be sold to cities. The rest would go back to farms. "It has gotten people excited," MaryLou Smith says.
The long-awaited Super Ditch pilot project and other efforts are hopeful signs. But as demand grows and water supplies dwindle, preserving farms in Colorado and much of the West will require more than gradual, piecemeal progress. The clock is ticking: This spring, just as Catlin Canal irrigators finally began sending off Super Ditch flows, a developer announced plans to buy 14,600 farmland acres and connected water rights from the nearby Fort Lyon Canal for $53 million, the latest massive selloff to rock southeastern Colorado.
"Once it's sold, it will never, ever come back," says Schweizer. "We've had plenty of opportunities to throw our hands up and say, 'To hell with it,' but if I'd have done that, I wouldn't have been farming for the last 50 years either. If what you think you're doing is the right thing to do, then you work for it."This story is part of an ongoing series that looks at the people and ideas helping the West better understand and use its water.
Because of water shortages, they'd already decided not to plant a quarter of their 10,000 acres. Then, just a few days before he testified in a Senate hearing, Michael learned that much of the tomatoes, melons and corn he did plant are in jeopardy too. The deal between state and federal officials about how to divvy up the scarce water supplies from the Central Valley Project was revoked because water temperatures are higher than anticipated. Officials are legally obligated to ensure cooler temperatures during runs later in the year of endangered Chinook salmon.
At issue is whether Michael and other farmers will get the water they expected through the summer or if the water will be held in a deep reservoir so it can be released later and lower water temperatures when the fish need it.
Michael fears the decision expected any day now could mean that for the first time in six generations his farm would have so little water that his family would have to let thousands of tons of vegetables and fruit die on the vines and take a major financial loss. And he's just one of many big growers at risk in a region that produces a major amount of the nation's fruit and vegetables.
Michael's testimony was part of a hearing before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Tuesday on droughts that are becoming more severe and frequent as a result of climate change.
Although California's multi-year drought is most severe, 11 other Western states also have declared drought emergencies.
In Washington state, the agriculture industry expects a $1.2 billion in crop losses this year because of the drought there. It is a "challenging time for fish and farms in Washington," said Tom Loranger, water resources program manager for Washington State Department of Ecology. The situation this year is better in Arizona, thanks to water storage projects in recent years.
"Arizona is not in a water crisis and is well situated to deal with the drought," said Thomas Buschatzke, director of the water planning commission of the Arizona Department of Natural Resources.
Buschatze and Loranger both told senators that their states' biggest worries concern the next couple of years. For example, Arizona worries that historic low levels in Lake Mead will trigger a need for the state to reduce how much it withdraws from the Colorado River. Washington State worries about the depletion of its reservoirs if the drought continues.
Many Western states are scrambling to figure out how to use water more efficiently and build more storage capacity for water. The federal Bureau of Reclamation has a role to play in many of their projects.
"We need to be as creative as possible and figure out how we're going to address that role because it is critical and this is the new normal," Deputy Interior Secretary Michael Connor said.
Senator Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, who chairs the committee, said the testimony would help senators craft new legislation aimed at helping communities and agriculture respond to the challenge of droughts now and in the future across the West.
"We need to be trying to be as long-term in our view and our vision on this as possible because if this is the new normal going forward, then we've got a lot of work to be doing," Murkowski said.
As for whether Michael's tomatoes, corn and melons will get the water they need this summer, state and federal water and fish managers are meeting this week to figure that out.
State and local officials are legally obligated to make sure water temperatures are cool enough for the endangered Chinook salmon. Calculations they made this spring were off. Lots of factors have driven up water temperatures. The four-year-drought has left water levels low in Lake Shasta, the biggest reservoir, and in rivers. Shallower water is warmer. There's virtually no snow pack in the Sierra Nevada, so no snowmelt will be coming to cool down those waters. Air temperatures have been warm too.
"That has thrown our whole plan into question," said Erin Curtis, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. "How's it going to impact farmers? We really don't yet know."
Officials hope to come out with a new plan about how to divvy up scarce water supplies by week's end.
In the meantime, Michael is worrying about whether he will have to lay off his 55 workers. "It's pretty disconcerting," Michael told HCN in an interview after the hearing. "I don't get a good night's sleep very often any more."
Elizabeth Shogren is HCN's DC Correspondent. Homepage image of Hoover Dam by Flickr user Raquel Baranow.
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The next bonanza could be just around the corner, though, thanks to the controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership — the largest international free-trade agreement that the United States has ever negotiated. By slashing tariffs and lowering regulatory hurdles, the TPP could make it easier to sell Western natural gas to Japan, potentially igniting another boom. The agreement could also affect Western ranchers, who face both pros and cons: opportunities for bigger beef markets, but also the threat of increased competition from producers in member nations.
In the works since 2008, the TPP includes 12 countries: the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Japan, Vietnam, Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei, Australia, New Zealand, Chile and Peru. Those nations' economies comprise nearly 40 percent of the global gross domestic product, a bloc second in trade volume only to the European Union. That's led critics to dub the TPP "NAFTA on steroids," referring to the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement, which has been blamed for the immigration rush, the crash of American manufacturing, and the rise of industrial farming and mining in Mexico.
The nations are still hammering out the details — much of what's known has come through leaked drafts posted on WikiLeaks — but President Barack Obama has made its approval a priority.
In late April, Senate and House committees approved "fast-track" legislation for the TPP, meaning that Congress would surrender its right to amend the pact once it's negotiated and presented for approval. Both chambers of Congress are expected to vote on the bill soon, with Republicans, shockingly, behind the president. The Democrats, however, are split, with some senators insisting that tougher child-labor and trade-practice measures and currency-manipulation rules be tied to fast-track support.
Analysts agree that energy, particularly natural gas, will be a major focus of the agreement. Japan phased out nearly all of its nuclear power after the 2011 Fukushima meltdown, replacing much of it with electricity from natural gas, nearly all of which it must import. Due to market inefficiencies and Asia's still-developing pipeline capacity, gas prices across the Pacific have been four to eight times higher than in the U.S.
The overseas market, in other words, is thirsting for cheap and abundant U.S. natural gas. But before it can get there, it must be supercooled and turned into liquefied natural gas, or LNG, in special terminals, then loaded onto refrigerated tankers for shipping. The only existing U.S. Western LNG export terminal is a relatively small facility in Kenai, Alaska. Construction of new facilities involves billions of investment dollars and the regulatory approval of both the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the Department of Energy.
Currently, there are only seven terminals in the country operating or fully approved, though there are 54 applications for building new LNG production facilities and export terminals. A company called Oregon LNG proposes to build a terminal in Astoria, Oregon, near the mouth of the Columbia River, which would ship up to 9.6 million tons of LNG annually — enough to supply hundreds of thousands of American-sized homes a year. And Calgary-based Veresen Inc. is also seeking approval for its planned Jordan Cove export terminal in Coos Bay, Oregon, and expects to ship 6 million tons a year.
Environmentalists, along with many locals, oppose both projects. The two terminals are awaiting a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission permit, but have already received approval from the Energy- Department, which determines whether export to countries lacking free-trade pacts are in "the public interest." If the TPP is approved, however, future projects exporting to the Asia Pacific will no longer need Energy Department permits. Under the agreement, "every LNG facility would be de facto approved (by the Energy Department)," says Jake Schmidt, director of the Natural Resources Defense Council's International Program.
The two terminals would likely receive gas through the Northwest Pipeline, a 4,000-mile network of lines that crosses six Western states and reaches into Canada. That system plugs into the under-utilized Ruby Pipeline, a 680-mile delivery route stretching from western Wyoming to southern Oregon, and the Rockies Express Pipeline, a north-south system that goes from Wyoming into New Mexico. That should mean an uptick in business for gas drillers and communities along the way, especially in western Colorado's Piceance Basin, the San Juan Basin on the Colorado-New Mexico border, and the Uinta Basin on the Colorado-Utah border. A 2014 report by Mercator Energy, a Colorado gas broker, notes: "The predictability of Piceance Basin reserves and abundant … pipeline export capacity should be very attractive to any foreign country or foreign consumer of LNG." Wyoming, with 20,000 planned new oil and gas wells, has spent the last two years studying how to further increase LNG production and storage and its pipeline capacity and connections.
Increased trade with Japan could also benefit ranchers, says David Salmonsen, senior director of congressional relations for the American Farm Bureau. Producers now face steep tariffs on meats and dairy in Japan and Asia, but reports from -negotiation talks indicate Japan would chop its current 38.5 percent tariff on beef to just 9 percent.
But some Western ranchers are worried because the trade deal would also increase U.S. beef imports. "The United States keeps mounting a horrendous deficit in the trade of live cattle, beef, and processed meats," says Bill Bullard, CEO of R-CALF, a Billings, Montana-based independent-rancher advocacy group. Plus, Bullard says, global trade deals typically weaken domestic food-safety rules.
With so many details still unknown, some ranchers as well as environmentalists who have come to loathe NAFTA see the TPP as a scary extension of "free trade." But for Western energy producers in the Piceance and other drilling hotspots, the deal looks like it's coming down the pipe just in time.]]>
The cottonwoods on this stretch of the river "have one foot in the grave and one foot on a banana peel," explains Chad Krause, a young BLM hydrologist. Most are over 100 years old, and there are very few younger trees to replace them. Several possible culprits have been cited — upstream dams have reduced seed-propagating floods; winter ice flows are scouring the banks; and grazing cattle are chomping the young trees. But the impacts are clear: The BLM has warned that in a few decades, river floaters might have to start packing their own shade with them, because there won't be enough trees left to cool their campsites.
This 149-mile stretch of river, plus 585 square miles of adjacent BLM land where the northern plains crumble into a fractal-like network of coulees and canyons, is the Upper Missouri River Breaks National Monument. And that 2001 monument designation, I'm told, is the reason the cottonwoods are now being planted.
President Clinton's proclamation, in a few pages of sweeping prose, describes the "objects" this monument is to protect: plentiful bighorn sheep and other wildlife, traces of history left by numerous Native tribes and the Lewis and Clark expedition, riverside cottonwood ecosystems and more. The proclamation also laid out the terms of protection, including withdrawal of all monument lands from future oil and gas leasing and a new travel plan to manage motorized traffic. But — in a nod to local input — it permitted continued grazing and hunting.
The BLM's management plan, released in 2008, made so few changes that it even garnered the support of the Missouri River Stewards, a local group of ranchers who had opposed the monument designation. But it drew opposition from the Friends of the Missouri Breaks Monument — the nonprofit group organizing the cottonwood planting — and other conservation groups, who argued that the plan was too lax on roads and airstrips. As a result of their lawsuit, settled in 2013, the BLM is moving ahead with plans to close about 200 miles of backcountry routes.
But tensions remain. Even though the proclamation allows grazing, the Western Watersheds Project, an aggressive grazing reform group, argues that the BLM actually has authority to restrict it in order to protect monument "objects," like the threatened cottonwoods. That group's lawsuit is ongoing.
Glenn Monahan, who has guided this stretch of river for 20 years, has amassed evidence that livestock are primarily responsible for the decline of the cottonwoods and other vegetation. He also thinks livestock have caused a drop in the number of river visitors, from roughly 5,000 in 2009 to 3,000 in 2014. He's counted as many as 1,360 cattle along a 46-mile stretch of river popular with floaters, and he and his guides carry shovels for scraping cow patties from campsites. Although the BLM says it plans to erect fences around some campsites, Monahan thinks the agency should go much further, removing cattle from the river entirely. "This is now a national monument," he says, "and we need to start asking, 'What is the highest use of this land?' "
This is why the 120-odd landowners within the monument still largely resent the monument — not for what it's done, but for what it might do. Ron Poertner, a leader of the Missouri River Stewards, sees the Western Watersheds Project lawsuit as an ominous sign of things to come: increased public attention and scrutiny over local grazing practices. "We're always waiting for the other shoe to drop," he says.
Hugo Tureck, who has a ranch on the edge of the Breaks and helped found the Friends in 2001, told me that he sees the monument staying pretty much the way it is, maybe with slightly stricter grazing in the future. But one thing has changed: "(This area) now has a stage presence that it never had before," he says. "That's what a national monument means."
Back on the grassy bank, we place each slender cottonwood cutting in a hole along with a watering pipe, tamp in a slurry of dirt, river water and rooting hormone, and erect a ring of wire fence to keep out cows. Dark clouds build over the white cliffs, spit rain and then clear to blue sky. I ask Rick Pokorny, who was born and raised in the Breaks, why he's here. "To plant trees, because they need to be planted," he says.]]>
Wyoming's new data trespassing law made national headlines last week when an opinion column in Slate raised the question of whether it attempts to criminalize data collection activities among citizens, including taking photos on public lands such as Yellowstone National Park.
That was the argument of Justin Pidot, a University of Denver assistant professor of law. He's not an uninterested bystander in the issue, because he represents the Western Watersheds Project. The group has raised the hackles of Wyoming ranchers and lawmakers, who allege the group has trespassed on private land to collect water quality data to support an agenda of curtailing public lands grazing.
That controversial cause has made WWP the subject of a recent lawsuit in Wyoming, and one of the key reasons agricultural groups lobbied for the passage of the data trespassing law.
The law makes it a crime to collect data on "open land" outside of towns and subdivisions if the data collector lacks written or verbal permission to both access the land and collect data.
It provides for a fine of up to $5,000 for a second violation, requires the expungement of illegally collected data from state agency databases, and prohibits the use of the data in court except as evidence to bring conviction.
Importantly, the law is not explicit in limiting the trespassing charge to private land.
At issue is that the law portends to apply to state public lands, and that it creates a question of whether it attempts to apply to federal public lands, as the non-profit Western Watersheds Project believes.
Pidot's client has a strong interest in opposing the data trespassing law because it is one of the West's most active environmental groups engaged in water quality monitoring on public lands. Its efforts to track water quality on public grazing allotments and to file lawsuits to push for cleaner watersheds have made made WWP highly unpopular among ranchers and agriculture interest groups.
"There are other powerful interests in Wyoming that would like to prevent citizens from poking around too much, and would prefer citizen scientists to stay home rather than go on public lands," Pidot said.
Opposition to WWP is evident in the Legislature and in state courts.
While lawmakers debated a data trespassing bill last summer, 15 ranchers sued Jonathan Ratner and the WWP for allegedly trespassing on private land to access Bureau of Land Management parcels to collect water samples. Ratner denies the accusations, saying he only crossed private lands using roads with BLM easements for public travel.
Ratner, Pidot, and the WWP attended a court hearing in Lander this week in which they attempted to have the case dismissed. The case awaits a ruling from Judge Norman E. Young, 9th Judicial District Court for Fremont County, expected in the next few weeks.Pidot believes the lawsuit fits the definition of a strategic lawsuit against public participation, also known as a SLAPP suit — which are used to rack up legal bills to the point that an individual or organization can no longer remain active on an issue.
Two themes run deep in both the lawsuit against WWP and Wyoming's data trespass law: private property rights, and the right of citizens to collect data to inform the management of public lands.
From Pidot's perspective, WWP pushes state and federal agencies to fully enforce the Clean Water Act — an action that the organization believes would result in better public lands grazing management, as well as an overall reduction in public lands grazing. The group participates in a public process to inform management, Pidot says, but the lawsuit and the data trespassing bill seem designed to hinder these types of efforts.
"The mere fact that you have a criminal statute that applies to this conduct sends a real chilling message to citizens who might like to engage in these [data collecting] activities," Pidot said. "I can't read anyone's mind, but my sense is they would like to stop citizen groups from monitoring public lands to uncover violations of federal law."
Bobbie Frank, director of the Wyoming Association of Conservation Districts, lobbied for the data trespassing law, and supports the ranchers in the lawsuit against WWP. Her husband, Dan Frank was one of the attorneys who argued for the ranchers against WWP during the hearing in Lander yesterday.
"The article in Slate tries to portray this as 'Wyoming landowners trying to hide from this environmental group,'" Bobbie Frank said. "I certainly disagree with the notion that landowners are trying to hide something."
She called Pidot's column a selective reading of the legislation. "It is inflammatory, and my assumption is that was its purpose," Frank said.
In her view, the law protects landowners who face incursions from unauthorized data collectors. The state law leaves the door open for data collection on federal lands according to existing laws and regulations, she said.
"When you collect data, if you are going to cross private property you should ask permission to do so," Frank said. "That seems fairly basic and it brings some integrity back to data collection."
For 10 years Ratner has collected water samples on public lands to measure e coli levels in streams, which he says directly correlate to the presence of domestic livestock. He regularly submits the data to the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality.
So far, WWP data has played a role in the listing of two Wyoming streams in 2012, according to Ratner. Wyoming DEQ did not use any third-party data in creating the 303(d) list for 2014, according to agency spokesman Keith Guille. The agency is currently drafting a response to comments on its 2014 draft 303(d) report.
"Some of the samples they [WWP] have taken indicate e coli levels at 200 times the compliance standards," Pidot said. "Rather than come into compliance, the effort [from agriculture and lawmakers] seems to hide the violation, and therefore not have to deal with the problem."
Frank accused Ratner of "blatant trespasses," and questioned WWP's technical ability to collect accurate data.
"I think you'd be hard pressed to say that Western Watersheds is collecting data in an unbiased fashion," Frank said.
In June 2014, Cheyenne attorney Karen Budd-Falen filed a lawsuit on behalf of 15 landowners in Fremont, Sublette, and Lincoln counties alleging that WWP and Jonathan Ratner trespassed on private land to collect water quality data.
A release posted on the Wyoming Farm Bureau Federation website that month stated that the Farm Bureau supported the plaintiff ranchers in the lawsuit, as did the Wyoming Association of Conservation Districts, the Wyoming Stock Growers Association, and the Wyoming Wool Growers Association.
While data trespassing bill champion Sen. Larry Hicks (R-Baggs) may not have made the connection between the bill and the WWP trespass lawsuit in drafting legislation during the 2013 and 2014 interims, these agriculture-affiliated groups certainly did.
All of those groups, with the exception of the Wool Growers, later voiced their support for the data trespassing bill before the Judiciary Committee. Frank lobbied in favor of the bill, noting the lawsuit against WWP.
The Office of State Lands and Investments also supported the bill, noting that WWP collected data on state land without permission. While members of the public can access state land for recreation, collecting data on state land requires a permit, according to Office of State Lands and Investments rules 14-3(k) and 16-4(a).
On April 1, 2014, the agency sent a cease and desist letter to Jonathan Ratner, who had collected water samples on state land without a permit on one occasion. Ratner later submitted a research permit application to the state, but it was not approved.
Jason Crowder, assistant director of Land Management with the Office of State Lands and Investments, said the agency advised Ratner that it needed more information. It asked Ratner to submit a survey permit application with specific grazing allotment information, rather than the research permit application used for university and educational purposes.
"As long as [WWP] went through the proper channels there wouldn't be a reason that we would deny it," Crowder said.
During the 2015 session the data trespassing law was introduced as two mirror bills, both sponsored by the Joint Judiciary Committee. Senate File 12 created the crime of data trespassing, and Senate File 80 made data trespassing a civil violation.
For much of the session, Senate File 12 specified that the data trespassing charges only applied to "private open land."
After the bill passed the Senate and the House, a conference committee met to iron out differences between amendments passed by each house. The conference committee, which included Sen. Larry Hicks (R-Baggs), amended the bill to strike the word "private" from the phrase "private open land."
Hicks said he agrees the bill cannot apply to federal land, since state can't tell private citizens they aren't legally allowed to enter lands like Yellowstone.
"We don't have the authority to tell you what you can or can't do on federal lands, that's not in our legislative purview," Hicks said. "If you legally access federal lands, that doesn't apply. You are not captured under this law. … As long as [Ratner] stays off private property he can do any damn thing he wants…."
Pidot says his reading of the law is not hyperbole.
"I think as a matter of law the Senator is wrong," Pidot said. "The way the [data trespassing] law is phrased, there is no exemption for federal land, and a local sheriff could try to prosecute someone [for collecting data] on federal land."
Pidot and Ratner believe the bill's term "open land" and its definition to include all land outside of incorporated cities and subdivisions is an insinuation that the data trespass bill applies to all lands — private, state, and federal.
"If the intent was really what [Hicks] says, it wouldn't be written how it is written, because it is very plain that it covers all unincorporated lands within the state of Wyoming," Ratner said. "Why they couldn't have put in those three additional acronyms [for private, state, and county land]?"
Pidot says legal precedent shows federal lands don't always preempt state laws. For example, driving on BLM land without a state-issued driver's license is an enforceable crime under state law. He cited the United States Supreme Court case California Coastal Commission v. Granite Rock Co. as an example that state law can apply on federal land. That means the data trespassing law could very well apply on federal lands, he said.
University of Wyoming law professor Debra Donahue thinks federal access law would likely preempt the state data trespassing law, "but to make that conclusion official, the courts would have to rule," she said. "Defending a trespass claim or charge would be costly — the tactic of a SLAPP suit."
For Hicks, the intent of the legislation makes clear that it doesn't apply to federal lands.
"You can spin this any way you want, but this was designed to safeguard private property rights," Hicks said.
Since the law will be interpreted by law enforcement and the courts, Hicks' intent is irrelevant if the letter of the law says otherwise, Ratner said.
"It is a fascinating story and particularly fascinating because it sounds like the sponsors of the bill are saying they meant to do less than they did," Pidot said. "Lawmakers made a law with a lot of unintended circumstances, and then the question becomes, 'what do you do about that law?'"
Regardless of Hicks' interpretation, Ratner says attorneys have advised him not to collect any data on federal public land without express written permission from management agencies.
That's because Wyoming's data trespass law states that citizens must have legal authority to enter open land and have written or verbal authorization to collect data. If it applies to federal land, that requires getting permission from the BLM or Forest Service to collect data.
Pidot said the Forest Service doesn't issue tickets for collecting water data, but neither does it issue blanket authorization to collect data, or offer "express" permission. That means WWP may need to have Forest Service permission to collect water on a case-by-case basis.
Meanwhile, the BLM says it is still reviewing the law. "From the BLM perspective, we are still in the process of having our solicitor look at the implications of the data trespassing bill," BLM Wyoming spokeswoman Kristen Lenhardt said. "The preliminary view is that it doesn't change the existing authorizations for access and use of federal public lands."
Ratner is also wary of collecting data because of the lawsuit filed by Karen Budd-Falen on behalf of the 15 ranchers. The suit accuses WWP of trespassing, and asks for damages and legal fees. WWP has spent significant amounts of time and money fighting the lawsuit, which he believes has no merit. He sees it as an effort to silence the organization and make it wary of doing anything that could bring another costly lawsuit.
All of those factors lead Pidot to characterize the lawsuit as a SLAPP suit.
"Since they are seeking punitive damage, they are looking at WWP as a business, and making sure that everyone else is on notice that if you engage in water quality activities monitoring ranching, you may very well end up getting sued," he said.
Ratner characterized the data trespassing laws as "SLAPP legislation."
"The ag industry needed to come up with a solution to avoid any future listing of streams ever again," Ratner said, referring to Wyoming's data trespass law. "The intent is to eliminate the ability of citizens to collect the water quality data necessary to list streams ever again. … It is a perfect way to completely get out from any accountability under the Clean Water Act."
Editor's Note: For more on this topic, see this Capitol Beat post from May 12, at Wyofile. Flickr Creative Commons photos from United States Fish and Wildlife Service, Steve Stevens, and Mia and Steve Mestdagh.]]>
In doing so, he reignited a debate over how to allocate the water of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, which harbors one of the largest swaths of California's remaining wetland habitat and is home to native fish including steelhead, green sturgeon, striped bass and the federally-endangered Delta smelt. The Delta also supports a $500 million agricultural industry and supplies drinking water for two-thirds of the state. The Delta acts as a bridge from California's wetter north to its parched and populated southern half, with pumps moving as much as 7.5 million acre feet a year (less in drought years, like this one). The conflict over who gets how much water, which has been simplistically characterized as "farms versus fish," pitted Central Valley farmers and southern cities against Delta farmers, cities and environmentalists.
The plan for the two Delta tunnels, which was first put forward almost nine years ago, originally included $8 billion dollars of state and federal funds for 100,000 acres of fish and wildlife habitat restoration and protection. The money and work was supposed to spread over five decades, alongside a guarantee of 50 years of water supply for southern California residents.But the state was unable to secure the half-century-long permits, since the project lacked required federal climate planning and species protections. Last month, Gov. Brown announced the state would instead pursue environmental permits lasting 10 years or less, which could become more restrictive as environmental conditions in the Delta change. That means there will be no long-term guarantee that water will continue to flow through the tunnels, which are projected to cost $15 billion.
As a result, the environmental plans have been scaled back and on a shorter timeline as well. The 100,000 acres of promised protection were part of a package involving the 50-year permits, which would have protected downstream consumers from cuts for environmental reasons. Now, Brown's new plan includes just 30,000 acres of habitat to be restored or protected over five years, to the tune of $300 million from state sources. State officials said the reduced plan was more realistic and could be completed using already-secured funds.
The cuts to Delta protections come amidst increased efforts on the part of Brown to stabilize the state's water situation, including severe water conservation restrictions and emergency cuts to river pumping.
His efforts have drawn ire for placing the heaviest burdens on urban residents, who use just 10 percent of the state's supply, rather than water-intensive Central Valley agricultural users. On Tuesday, the State Water Resources Control Board approved a plan that would cut California cities' water use by a quarter while farms have not been ordered to engage in water conservation. (For what it's worth, they may be forced to cut water use, anyway. Central Valley farmers received just a fraction of their normal water allotment and wells have begun to run dry.)
Meanwhile, the drought has also wreaked havoc on California's ecosystems. According to a U.S. Forest Service aerial survey, 12 million trees in the state have died recently thanks to extreme dryness. The water deficits have worsened the status of the already-imperiled Delta smelt. An April survey by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife found just a single Delta smelt, compared with over 130 caught three years ago at the beginning of the drought.In light of the smelt's decline and the overall degradation of the Delta, Brown's reduced plans for restoration have drawn particular outcry from the environmental community.
"They made it clear that they have abandoned restoration of the estuary and abandoned protecting the watershed," said Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla, executive director of Restore the Delta. "They're just going to leave us with piles of tunnel muck. "
She said her organization would continue to put pressure on Gov. Brown to change course, through public organizing. She and other advocacy organizations have said they are prepared to go to court over the plan, if it moves forward.
Kate Schimel is an editorial intern at High Country News. Follow her @kateschimel]]>
The dust and traffic and lights aren't always easy to live with, and sometimes they create tension between local residents and industry. Rarely, however, do we stop to consider what all of this new infrastructure collectively costs us. How much vegetation is being lost to the boom nationwide, and how much does its loss matter? How fragmented is habitat becoming at a regional or continental scale?
Brady Allred, an assistant professor of rangeland ecology at the University of Montana, had the seeds of such questions planted in his mind while living in Oklahoma a few years ago, doing research on plants, fire and grazing. Oil and gas wasn't new to Oklahoma, by any means, but new wells were popping up all over the place. Allred was struck by how much infrastructure and activity came with them. "The pad sizes were bigger, the amount of transportation, the amount of people that were needed," he recalls. "That's because of hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling. It requires a lot of space and equipment to get that done. You'd drive by at night and it looked like a little village out there, all lit up." He moved to Montana and visited neighboring North Dakota's gushing oil fields, and noticed the same things. "I thought, 'I wonder what it would be like if we zoomed out and looked at the bigger picture?' "
He and a few colleagues did just that for the central U.S. — including the intermountain West — and Canada. Their results, published in the journal Science in late April, provide the clearest picture to date of the cumulative ecological impact of the drilling frenzy of the last decade-plus.
The researchers wanted to broadly gauge the ecosystem services lost to oil and gas development — things like the land's ability to produce food and support wildlife. So they decided to quantify changes in "net primary production," essentially a measurement of a landscape's plant growth. By combining a large dataset on new wells drilled throughout the study region between 2000 and 2012 with annual satellite measurements of plant growth, they concluded that some 7.5 million acres had been stripped of vegetation — the equivalent of three Yellowstone National Parks.
Much of the development took place on rangelands and croplands. The vegetation loss on rangeland represented enough forage to support 5 million cows for a month; the acreage of developed cropland was enough to grow 120.2 million bushels of wheat, or about 13 percent of the wheat exported in 2013.
Julia Haggerty, an assistant professor of geography at Montana State University, and a co-author on the paper, says the findings "reinforce for me that we do very little assessment of oil and gas impacts beyond the scale at which most permitting decisions are made."
Big as they seem, the numbers are actually pretty small when considered against the total landmass studied. But if current trends continue for another 10 or 15 years, the loss of vegetation could be much more consequential, significantly reducing the landscape's ability to store carbon, and possibly conflicting with food production, and other land uses. The losses thus far, the researchers note, may be long-term; reclamation typically isn't done until the end of the well's life, and even then, requirements and monitoring are spotty between states and on private land, where 90 percent of the drilling in the study took place.
The point Allred and his colleagues want to make is that these are trade-offs we're making unconsciously. It would be wise, they say, to continue quantifying them and consciously decide how much land and ecosystem services we're willing to cede to oil and gas production. "This is kind of a thief in the night — it's just crept up on us," Allred explains. "Everyone's excited about drilling because it's great for jobs and energy independence. All of those things are important. We just wanted to say, 'This is what we're losing because of it.' We've decided up until now we're OK losing three Yellowstones. At what number are we not OK?"
Remember the Dust Bowl, he cautions. It stemmed from technological advances — combustion engines and tractors — that allowed people to farm almost anything. And they did. "That removed a bunch of natural vegetation and reduced the resilience of the region to drought," Allred says. An accumulation of small disturbances resulted in a big disaster. To be clear, he's not saying that drilling activity has put us at the precipice of a similar catastrophe, just that we need to pay more attention to what the small things add up to. "We have the technology to make sure (the Dust Bowl) doesn't happen again. We have the ability to monitor acre-by-acre. We can look at these cumulative effects."
Cally Carswell is a High Country News contributing editor based in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Follow @callycarswell
Thumbnail image courtesy Flickr user Bryan Jones.]]>
This film (and home page photograph) was produced by Conservation Media and People & Carnivores.]]>
In the works since 2008, the TPP includes 12 countries (including Canada, Mexico, Japan, Vietnam, Australia, New Zealand, Chile, Peru) whose economies encompass nearly 40 percent of global GDP. The partners represent many of the U.S.'s largest export markets; 85 percent of American agricultural exports go to TPP countries. The agreement would expand that robust trade in the Asia Pacific, removing tariffs and investment barriers and facilitating regional supply chains. Notably, the deal could increase exports of liquefied natural gas (LNG).Support and opposition fall along somewhat familiar lines. Big corporations – from Apple and Facebook to Coca Cola, Halliburton and Monsanto – and ag-industry trade groups back the agreement and increased market access from Saigon to Santiago. Labor unions, environmental groups, and small food producers loathe the TPP, saying it will weaken domestic environmental regulations while boosting corporate power. They call the deal "NAFTA on steroids," referring to the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement, which triggered more fuel- and fertilizer-needy agribusiness in place of family and subsistence farms, and contributed to increased deforestation, mining, and oil and gas drilling.
Here are five ways the agreement would play out in the Western United States:
The rundown
Whatever is known about the TPP has mainly come through Wikileaks, which has published draft sections of the pact. The agreement will include an Environment Chapter, addressing illegal logging, overfishing, illegal wildlife trade, and indigenous people's rights in Asia-Pacific countries. Proponents say the text includes the strongest environmental controls ever in a trade deal. Critics, however, say other pacts have set a low bar and that the measures from the draft Environment Chapter fall below U.S. standards for trade deals, and also rely mostly on voluntary protections.
Gas up and go
Since the 2011 Fukushima meltdown, Japan has shut down nearly all of its nuclear power. Instead, the nation now imports more liquefied natural gas than any other country, accounting for 33 percent of global LNG imports. Meanwhile, there's a natural gas glut in the U.S. fueled by shale gas drilling and hydraulic fracturing. Exports for LNG, however, are limited, in part, by a prolonged permitting process through two federal agencies and public opposition to export terminals. Two proposed terminals in Oregon have faced stiff resistance: One planned for Astoria received approval in 2014 after years of controversy, and regulators are reviewing another in Coos Bay.
The opening of Japan's LNG market could pay huge dividends for the West's energy industry. In 2013, Japan announced nearly $11 billion in credit guarantees to fund Japanese investments in U.S. shale gas. More exports would also support an increase in gas drilling and fracking and pipeline construction across Western states.
The TPP could also tilt the scales to approve more export terminals, since it would remove one leg of the permitting process. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission would still have to OK projects. But if the TPP is in place, the Department of Energy's role of assessing whether a project is in the national interest would go away if a terminal is being developed for trade with Japan or other TPP countries.
"Oil and gas, as free-trade goods and services, and every LNG facility, would be de facto approved (by the Energy Department)," says Jake Schmidt, director of the Natural Resources Defense Council's International Program.
No fracking? Sue you
Local bans and moratoria have limited or prohibited fracking – sending chemical-laden water underground to crack formations and reach gas and oil – in communities in Colorado, New Mexico, Texas and California. Those efforts have faced legal challenges from domestic energy companies, and the TPP could bolster industry's stance. The TPP would allow corporations to sue foreign governments over lost profits. Through a similar provision in NAFTA, a U.S. company won its case this March after Nova Scotia denied an open-pit mine and quarry in the Bay of Fundy. The company is seeking $300 million in compensation. In 2013, an American energy company also sued Canada for $250 million because Quebec's fracking moratorium barred oil and gas drilling along the St. Lawrence River.
The TPP could allow international companies to sue over fracking bans in Western states, and if they win in court, receive huge settlements. That wouldn't reverse the anti-fracking measures, but the NRDC's Schmidt says the threat of massive payouts to corporations would have "stifling impacts" on existing and future bans.
Where's the beef…from?
The increased trade with Japan could reap big profits for American farmers and ranchers, says David Salmonsen, senior director of congressional relations for the American Farm Bureau, noting that the U.S. already annually exports $14 billion in meat and crop commodities there. But producers also now face steep tariffs on meats and dairy. Under the TPP, Japan's current 38.5 percent tariff on beef could drop to 9 percent, paying off for ranchers.
But some Western ranchers worry the trade deal would also increase U.S. imports and reduce tariffs on foreign beef from places like Mexico, Australia and Vietnam. That could offset or compete with U.S. exports to Japan. "The United States keeps mounting a horrendous deficit in the trade of live cattle, beef, and processed meats," says Bill Bullard, CEO of R-CALF, a Billings, Montana-based rancher-advocacy group. "If we continue, we will erode the financial viability of our industry."
The TPP could also undermine the U.S.'s country-of-origin labeling (COOL), which ensures packaged beef, pork and lamb is labeled with where it's from. Bullard and others consider COOL and labeled American-raised beef as an important competitive advantage.
Relaxed food-safety rules and inspections, which have occurred under other pacts, also worry Bullard. Most concerning would be imports of live animals – not just beef – into the U.S. That opens domestic herds to risks from foreign parasites, bacteria or other infections that could decimate animals and threaten consumers, Bullard says.
Fast track or rapid demise
Western congressional representatives are deeply involved in the progress of the TPP. Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, and Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Oregon, cosponsored legislation to give President Barack Obama "fast-track" authority to negotiate the agreement. Fast-tracking means Congress agrees to only vote yes or no on the TPP once the nations finalize the pact, and not amend the agreement. Fast-track authority is one of the few things that the president and congressional Republicans agree on, while Democrats are split on the bill. Hoping to slow down the TPP and allow domestic debate over its contents, environmental and labor groups are targeting Dems, including Rep. Jared Polis, D-Colorado, to oppose the deal.
But those efforts may come up short. The Senate Finance Committee and House Ways and Means Committee approved fast-track legislation this week, and both full chambers are expected to vote on the bill within the next few weeks.
Joshua Zaffos is a contributing editor for High Country News. You can follow him on Twitter.]]>
On a bright fall morning in central Washington, a flock of sheep, the off-white of dirty snow, moves across an emerald field of timothy. To the flock's west, Daniel Kinka and Cafer Tepeli scrutinize the sheep through binoculars. Somewhere to the east, obscured by the cloud of livestock, is Sonny.
I ask Kinka how Sonny is doing. Kinka, a Ph.D. candidate at Utah State University's Ecology Center who wears a safari hat and two radios clipped to his belt, rubs his beard thoughtfully. "His social skills need work," he says.
We circumnavigate the sheep, and Sonny — a muscular dog with a long, stiff tail and mottled brown fur — leaps to his feet, barking furiously. He has an intense voice: deep, staccato, explosive. "This dog, he may be good with sheep, but he's afraid of people," murmurs Tepeli, a Turkish veterinarian, from beneath heavy black eyebrows. "I don't like this behavior."
For Kinka and Tepeli, Washington is the final stop on a 1,500-mile (2,400-km) odyssey with an important objective: to find a better livestock guard dog. Throughout the American West, recovering populations of wolves and grizzly bears have crept beyond the boundaries of national parks, clashing with sheep and cattle as they advance. Wolf raids, in particular, have become more commonplace: In 2005, Canis lupus killed 4,400 head of cattle nationwide; by 2010, that number had nearly doubled to 8,100. What's more, the mere threat of predation can prevent domestic animals from grazing comfortably, diminishing their body weight and market value. Little wonder, then, that offending predators are frequently shot by landowners or exterminated by government agents. A good guard dog, however, forestalls conflict by warding off carnivores before they attack. "Ideally the sheep don't die, the wolves don't die, the dogs don't die," Kinka explains. Can a domestic animal truly help restore some of the world's wildest creatures while at the same time saving livestock?
Patrolling America's Rangelands
Humans have been employing dogs to protect livestock since the dawn of animal husbandry. Sheep and domestic canines have been found together in archaeological sites dating back nearly to 4000 B.C.E., and nomadic Sumerian shepherds were accompanied by dogs during their treks from Mesopotamia to modern-day Hungary. A Roman agricultural treatise published in 37 B.C.E. describes the dog as "the guardian of the flock, which needs such a champion to defend it."
Over the centuries, however, Europe eradicated its wolves and bears, sanitizing the continent for livestock and obviating the need for guard dogs. The practice had become rare by 1972, the year the United States banned the use of Compound 1080 — a potent poison that ranchers used to eliminate coyotes, the species responsible for most of the country's predation incidents. Though the ban was later lifted, at the time it pushed ranchers to investigate novel ways of handling coyotes and other predators. Soon, European dog breeds like the akbash, komondor and Great Pyrenees were patrolling America's rangelands in defense of livestock.
The new arrivals worked immediate wonders. In North Dakota, dogs slashed coyote predation rates on sheep ranches by 93 percent. In Colorado, where sheep producers faced not only coyotes but also cougars and black bears, dogs averted nearly US$900,000 in livestock losses in 1993 alone. One study of over a thousand dogs nationwide found that the average guard dog saved its owner US$500 to $600 annually.
As word spread, a menagerie of breeds caught on — or were revived — in other countries. Today, there are maremmas warding off dingoes in Australia, Anatolian shepherd dogs chasing away cheetahs in Namibia, and Spanish mastiffs battling brown bears in Spain's Cantabrian Mountains.
"Farmers are sometimes skeptical at first, but once they see how these dogs work, they're sold," says Tom Gehring, a biologist at Central Michigan University who has studied guard dogs in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. "Many people put them out and never have depredations again."
Not only have dogs saved ranchers money, they've also protected the very carnivores they were recruited to deter. In the United States, unruly fauna is controlled by Wildlife Services, a branch of the U.S. Department of Agriculture that kills millions of animals each year via methods including poisons, traps and aerial gunning. Although birds comprise the vast majority of those killings, over 75,000 coyotes — one every seven minutes — were slain in 2013. By deploying guard dogs and other deterrence techniques such as electric fencing and alarms, however, many ranchers have alleviated their predator problems without resorting to lethal tactics.
"If a producer has a tool that prevents predators from killing their sheep, there's no reason to kill those predators, or to have them killed by a federal agency," says Julie Young, research wildlife biologist at the National Wildlife Research Center, Wildlife Services' scientific arm.
Among the many dog devotees is Lisa Kimsey, a third-generation rancher who grazes sheep with her husband, Mike, in Wyoming's Bighorn Basin. Kimsey's family has used Great Pyrenees and akbash dogs for 20 years, and though the animals haven't thwarted coyotes, cougars and black bears altogether, they've reduced the losses. The dogs even chase off ravens that peck at lambs' eyes.
As advertised, the canines have also allowed Kimsey to keep her livestock safe without putting down carnivores. "We spend our lives trying to keep animals healthy," she says. "I don't think anybody relishes the thought of having to kill another living creature."
Clawing Their Way Back
But while guard dogs — not to mention guard llamas and donkeys — have proved their mettle against mid-size predators, today they face more menacing foes.
Over the past two decades, wolves, aided by federal reintroduction, have recolonized the northern Rocky Mountains. Today, more than 1,700 wolves roam Idaho, Montana and Wyoming, and at least 145 prowl Oregon and Washington. Grizzly bears have clawed their way back, too: In the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, bear numbers have climbed from fewer than 150 in the 1970s to more than 700 today, and another 800 haunt the lands in and around Glacier National Park.
Conservationists have hailed the recovery of apex predators, which stabilize ecosystems, generate tourism revenues and serve as emblems of wildness in a world wracked by extinction. But to the minds of many ranchers, wolves and bears pose an existential threat. Guard dog breeds like the Great Pyrenees, so stalwart against coyotes, suddenly appeared outweighed and outmatched. "We were hearing stories about dogs getting injured or killed," says Young. "In some cases, dogs were beat up enough that they became too scared to guard."
Lisa Kimsey was among the ranchers who lost dogs. When a pack of wolves rolled through the Bighorns a few years back, one of the Kimseys' guard dogs vanished, leaving nary a hair behind. Kimsey believes that the dog fell victim to larger canids.
"A lone wolf typically won't challenge your guard dogs. But if there's more than one wolf, your dogs are in trouble," Kimsey says. "I don't want to put our dogs in a situation where I know they can't win."
Bolder Breeds
That's where Sonny, the powerful brown-and-white dog with the dubious social skills, comes in.
Sonny is a cão de gado transmontano, a mastiff bred to deter wolves in the mountains of northern Portugal. Young has chosen the transmontano and two other obscure breeds — the karakachan, from Bulgaria, and the kangal, from Turkey — to serve as subjects in a new Wildlife Services study. The hypothesis: these larger, bolder breeds will fend off wolves and bears more effectively than common dogs like the Pyrenees and akbash.
"All three breeds are working with wolves in Europe, and some are in areas with brown bears, too," Young says. Before the study's outset she surveyed breeders and scientists and was encouraged by what she heard about the canines' assertive behavior. "If these dogs are attacked, they continue to guard." Kangals, for instance, are renowned for not only fighting off wolves, but for pursuing them. In Turkey, many bear battle scars.
Since 2013, Kinka, who's studying the effectiveness of the new breeds, has provided more than 50 test dogs to ranchers in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Wyoming and Montana. When I meet up with Kinka and Tepeli in central Washington, they're making the rounds, observing the dogs in action and surveying ranchers and herders about their canines' behavior. I ask Tepeli, a guard dog expert who's in the U.S. on a fellowship, for his impressions of the American West. "Parts of Idaho look like Turkey!" he says with a disbelieving grin.
Though publishable data are still two years away, the dogs have garnered plenty of anecdotal praise. Not a single transmontano, kangal or karakachan has been injured by a predator in the line of duty, and some have already rebuffed carnivores. One Montana rancher who had been losing sheep to bears for years hasn't suffered a single casualty since receiving his three kangals.
This winter, Kinka dropped off three karakachan puppies — named Balkan, Boyan and Buntar — with Lisa and Mike Kimsey in Wyoming. So far, the dogs haven't had an opportunity to do any guarding, but Lisa says they've already bonded with the sheep. "They're still so young, but they seem to sense that this is their purpose," she says. "They show every indication of being good protectors."
Even if Wildlife Services can identify a better guard dog, however, the agency faces another challenge: converting science into on-the-ground policy. Though Wildlife Services promotes nonlethal management techniques like guard dogs, electric fencing and fladry, it still racks up eye-catching body counts. In 2013, in addition to the aforementioned tens of thousands of coyotes, the agency also terminated 320 gray wolves, 345 cougars and 419 black bears.
"There's a disconnect between Wildlife Services' research arm and its field operations," cautions Camilla Fox, executive director of Project Coyote, a California group that promotes coexistence between ranchers and predators. "We'll believe this is for real when we see a decrease in the number of native wild animals being killed."
Animal Alchemy
For all their success, guard dogs are still, well, dogs: They've been known to chase cars, chew on sheep and even attack hikers. And while protecting livestock is embedded in their nature, proper nurture can make or break an animal. Most crucial is that a dog's impulse to mind its flock exceeds its desire for human attention. "Producers in Turkey will feed their dog when it comes back to the house. That's wrong," says Tepeli. "You feed when it's in the field."
Ideally, dog and sheep form the active elements in a sort of animal alchemy. As John Shivik puts it in his book The Predator Paradox: "[S]heep see the dog as a herd member, while the dog sees sheep as pack members."
Sonny seems to have the opposite problem: He's bonded to the sheep, but his distrust of Homo sapiens runs too deep. Though that's not a fatal flaw, it's proving problematic at the moment, as Kinka is trying to affix a GPS collar around Sonny's neck. If all goes according to plan, the collar will provide valuable insight about Sonny's movements in relation to both his flock and nearby radio-collared wolves. "We're trying to help people, but we're also trying to understand this novel ecosystem of wild animals, livestock and humans," Kinka says.
First, though, he has to attach the collar. Kinka, Tepeli and a wizened Peruvian shepherd named Geronimo chase Sonny around the pasture like bats after a moth; the dog dodges and weaves, ducking through the legs of his pursuers, growling irritably.
After a 15-minute runaround, the men corner Sonny in a side yard and the transmontano submits. His tongue lolls from his mouth; steam rises from his heaving flanks. Geronimo whispers soothingly in Sonny's floppy ear as Kinka straps on the GPS collar. Finally, Sonny is outfitted for data collection, and the humans back away. The guard dog leaps to his feet and bounds back to his flock.]]>
Establishing a sense of community after relocating to a remote environment has often challenged us, and especially me. Here in The Big Quiet, as I think of it, days go by without us seeing another person. The three-hour round trip drive to town doesn't leave much time to go out after a workday, and the spotty cell phone service makes connecting with friends and neighbors difficult. Sometimes I realize a week has passed and the only person I've spoken to is Sam. It's a good thing we're both people who do well with lots of solitary time. But every once in awhile, we really miss having people closer.
Since we rarely have visitors, it was exciting to have our LLC partners and their families come help gather cows and calves for our first Triangle P branding three weeks ago. Our nearest neighbor, who manages the Mescalero Apache Tribe's cattle operation, also came from an hour away with two of his young sons to help. Once we reached the pens near our house, we sorted off most of the cows––it's easier to rope calves in a pen without cows in the way––and gathered a few calves that had ducked through the fence. There was a scramble of activity as people filled syringes with vaccines and started the fire to heat our branding irons. (Like many ranchers, we also use branding as an opportunity to give our calves their first set of vaccinations to help prevent diseases.) We dug applicators and ear tags—red for steer calves, white for heifers—out of boxes, and lugged jugs of water into the corral so thirsty workers had a drink handy. The riders who were first to rope tightened their cinches and got their horses ready.
New Mexico state law mandates that ranchers brand their cattle for identification purposes, but it's more than just a legal procedure. There's a certain camaraderie that accompanies brandings. Getting together with friends and neighbors is a good way to forget about feeling lonesome. Regardless of political views, age or background, we can all agree on one thing: a job needs to be done. Roping calves horseback to brand is physically demanding work that requires lots of skill, but it's easier on the cattle and crew than other methods of branding, like forcing calves through mechanical squeeze chutes, which necessitates a more lengthy, stressful, separation of mother cows and calves. When we haven't had corrals available close to the herd in the past, we often held up a bunch of cattle outside in the pasture and roped calves out of the herd, their mothers right next to them through the whole process.
Once a roper catches a calf by its hind legs, or "heels" it, and drags it to the fire, the calf is stretched out on its side. Then the ground crew administers vaccines, the hot branding irons, earmarks (a permanent notch in the ear for identification) and castrates the bull calves. We use two separate irons for the "Triangle P" brand, applied like stamps, or a curved running iron, which is drawn across the hide to prevent blotching. With everyone working together, we gathered several pastures and sorted and branded 134 calves in a day and a half.
Since our spring work started, the past few weeks on the ranch have involved more interactions with other people than Sam and I have had in the last five months combined. With our partners' families here, our camp swelled to 16. It was great to catch up with an old neighbor from Luna, New Mexico when he helped us gather our steers and move them south last month. That same week, we squeezed around our tiny camper table with green chile cheeseburgers and swapped tales about rank bulls and good horses with the cowboy who's helping watch the steers in their new pasture.
For our most recent branding last Sunday, two friends who'd driven nearly three hours to help us gather and brand another 80 calves made a round of cold beers on the porch afterwards all the more refreshing. But when the trucks and horse trailers had pulled out and the last cow had paired back up with her newly branded calf, I felt loneliness settle in our camper. How long, I wondered, until we see people again? How long until we get that feeling of community back?
I have to trust that our community is always there, whether it's a familiar face sitting across our campfire or a letter in our post office box. Now our community sprawls all over the state and beyond, a constellation defined by small towns and ranchland. They're people who care, good hands willing to make the long trek out to pitch in, or give us a call to see how we're holding up. We couldn't do our job without the knowledge that these friends and neighbors believe in what we're doing. That makes the long, quiet, in-between times a little easier to handle.]]>
By last Friday, a rag-tag collection of militia, Constitutionalists, Patriots and other Bundyites from as far away as Florida and Oregon had camped themselves on the side of the highway that leads to the Bundy Ranch in Clark County. A large "Info" sign hung on a trailer parked beside a table of schedules, "We Made a Difference at Bundy Ranch" t-shirts and "Bye Bye BLM" stickers. A couple of organizers shuffled about, answering questions and greeting the occasional arrival. An event was brewing.
The three-day "liberty celebration," as the Bundys call it on their Facebook page and in emails, didn't draw the estimated 300-plus supporters that descended last April when BLM-contractors began rounding up Bundy cattle from unpermitted federal rangeland. But over 100 supporters showed up to mark the anniversary of the tentative victory over the feds; Bundy has yet to be charged for grazing his cattle illegally on federal land on and off for decades, nor have his armed defenders been taken to account for aiming weapons at federal agents.
Speakers included Nevada Assemblywoman Michele Fiore, who has introduced a bill with Bundy's support, to transfer federal administration of public lands in Nevada to the state. Former Arizona sheriff and states' rights advocate Richard Mack, militia leaders and members of the Bundy family also spoke to the crowd.
The one-year anniversary event was, on the surface, a celebration of ranchers standing up not only to the government, but also to the other forces that conspire to wipe out this traditional livelihood. But there weren't many ranchers in attendance. Really, it was the one-year birthday of a rekindled anti-federal government movement, one that is gaining strength Westwide. Over three days of milling in the sagebrush expanse between tourist-town Mesquite to the northeast and Las Vegas to the southwest, I met ex-cops, ex-firefighters, ex-military, a real estate agent, roofer, tattoo artist, general contractor, mom-turned Constitutionalist activist, retired San Diego fisherman, and others. Some of Bundy's fellow livestock producers did in fact show up—and maybe more would have, had the county fair and rodeo down the road not have been the same weekend—but the demographics were telling.
When I broached the subject of Bundy with former bull rider and current Clark County commissioner Tom Collins, over the phone, he said "(Bundy's) not real popular except with wing-nuts and gun nuts." Collins is good friends with the Bundys and says they're generous contributors to the local community, but he doesn't support the rancher's beliefs that the federal government has no place in Clark County or anywhere else.
While Bundy's influence has ebbed since he catapulted into the national spotlight, last year's standoff with the BLM, or "stand-down" as supporters call it because the feds backed off, has galvanized a lasting following irate about federal government overreach.Joe O'Shaughnessy, leader of an Arizona militia, told me that last April's events "basically woke people up." O'Shaughnessy drove from Phoenix to the standoff last year as part of a "security detail to protect the Bundy family." Within a week after the BLM released the cattle, he was inundated with 600 applications from people wanting to be active members. In the past year, he claims, Arizona militia email lists and Facebook followers have skyrocketed to tens of thousands of fans: "It's out of control." He's got a growing army of followers now, but many of those are active military and law enforcement, so aren't legally able to participate in militia activities, though they support the group's particular brand of ultra-right politics and stated purpose: defending the U.S. Constitution.
O'Shaughnessy, who was sporting a t-shirt that read, "Hello my name is America," pointed to the progressive advocacy and research organization Southern Poverty Law Center's recent reports that militias—groups likes his, and others attending the liberty celebration—have grown in recent years to be a more urgent domestic threat than Islamic terrorism. And O'Shaughnessy insists he's seen that growth on the ground, in response to the standoff.
A recent Department of Homeland Security report echoed these findings that domestic terrorism and groups like sovereign citizens and Patriots are of utmost concern to law enforcement and the federal government.
Meanwhile, the authorities are tight-lipped as to whether they'll leave Bundy standing. The Bureau of Land Management continues to defer to the Department of Justice on this issue. And the DOJ declines to confirm whether or not there is a case. "I don't know whether they're going to act or not," Bundy said last Saturday. "The question here is who's the criminal. Is Cliven Bundy the criminal or is the federal government and their bureaucrats the criminal?" (Bundy often speaks of himself in the third person.)
On Sunday, after many of the three-percenters, Minutemen, Mountain Minutemen, Oath Keepers, Guardians of the Oath, Agenda-21-ers and others had left to go back to their respective states, Ryan Bundy, son of Cliven, held a Christian service for those who remained. A small flock of birds spiraled and fluttered for several moments behind the stage where Ryan stood, facing his dedicated congregants. They sat in folding chairs in the bright sun, listening for what he was going to say next.
Tay Wiles is the online editor of High Country News.
Follow @taywiles]]>
Associate editor Brian Calvert hosts Soundtable, a collaboration between the High Country News university classroom program and KVNF radio in Paonia, Colorado. Episode 1: "When in (Mega?)drought." With guests:
Now, the Obama administration is trying again — Interior Secretary Sally Jewell has proposed an additional administrative fee of $2.50 per animal unit month (the forage needed to sustain one cow and calf, one horse, or five sheep or goats for a month).
The fee would provide $16.5 million in 2016 for the BLM — a $13.5 million net gain, considering a proposed $3 million decrease in rangeland management funding. Currently the BLM spends over seven times as much money on rangeland management and improvement programs as it collects in grazing fees; that's $89 million versus $12 million. (The rangeland programs include things like permit administration, weed management, water development and vegetation restoration.) Income from the new fee would go toward rangeland health efforts, as well as help address a massive backlog of grazing permit renewals.
Jewell's proposal would bump the feds' income from grazers by 148 percent, but, because it's a separate administrative tax, it doesn't violate the requirement that the baseline grazing fee (for the BLM, $1.69 per AUM this year) can't increase by more than 25 percent annually. The move, which Interior has attempted in similar forms since 2012, appears to be a last resort to get around bitter political resistance to baseline fee increases. But the attempt has been repeatedly thwarted — stripped from Obama's budget before being passed each fall.
If the fee were to pass — an unlikely scenario, since it has to push through committee, including the Natural Resources Committee, chaired by conservative Utah Republican Rob Bishop — it would have a huge effect on Western ranchers. "If expenses for your business go up over 100 percent, that's a big impact," says Utah Cattlemen's Association Executive Vice President Brent Tanner. And in Tanner's state, most ranchers use at least some federal land to graze their cattle, so would be affected by the new fee.
Yet conservationists have long cited the grazing fee as far too low, considering the ecological cost of livestock on public lands. The formula takes into account private land lease rates, beef cattle prices and production costs like gasoline and equipment. Thus, ranchers are supposed to pay more when conditions are good and less when conditions are worse. But that's not what's happened since the fee was implemented with the 1978 Public Rangelands Improvement Act. The rate crested the two-dollar mark just once, in 1981, and was at the legal minimum ($1.35) every year from 2007 to 2014.Grazing fees on public land were always meant to be lower than those on private land because the former often provides poorer quality forage and ranchers usually have to maintain their own fencing and irrigation infrastructure. When grazing fees were established, they were supposed to increase over time, trailing private rates. But the opposite has happened, and the gap between public and private land lease rates has increased over time. "The 2015 fee is just 8 percent of what it would cost to graze livestock on private grazing lands," reads an economic study conducted on behalf of the Center for Biological Diversity. "In 1981, when the federal fee first went into effect, it was 23.79 percent."
So why aren't public land grazing fees naturally going up? That can be traced to how cattle prices and cost of production figure into the fee formula; adding these two elements to the formula did not improve its ability to predict annual forage values, says a 2001 academic paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Society of Range Management. "In fact, adding these two indices ruined the predictive ability of the formula and… grazing fees have fallen further and further behind the private land lease rates through time."
Part of the reason that grazing fees have provoked such fury from politically conservative ranchers is that they're imposed by the federal government. And yet the BLM funnels 12 percent of its income from fees back to the states they came from. (For lands outside of grazing districts, it's 50 percent.) The rest of the income goes to a rangeland betterment fund and the U.S. Treasury. For the Forest Service, 25 percent goes back to the states and 50 percent to rangeland betterment.Some conservationists, like John Horning from WildEarth Guardians, think that working with ranchers to retire grazing permits altogether may be a more realistic way to protect rangeland health than increasing fees, which at the moment, is a political non-starter. "There are two things that have eclipsed (the grazing fee debate)," Horning says, "the public lands movement, which is all about acres of protection; the second is climate change. Grazing is just barely on the radar."
Tay Wiles is the online editor at High Country News. Follow @taywiles]]>


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The popular Vespucci Double Raised Bridle offers excpetional horse comfort with soft padding and a single crown design that reduces pressure on the poll. The attractive double raised styling of the nose and brow create a sophisticated, yet timeless look. Reins sold separately.
The Goode Rider™ Ideal Long Sleeve Show Shirt features an updated zip front with horse bit pull detail. This easy-care riding shirt has an anti-pill finish that keeps it looking new. Long sleeves make it great for riding in cool weather and for sun protection.
The Kerrits® Air Flow Tank is made of a breathable, soft, lightweight fabric that wicks moisture and enhances comfort and performance. Scoop-neck style and seam detail make for a flattering fit.
The Pessoa® Alpine Mid Weight Turnout Blanket keeps your horse warm, dry and looking sharp! This medium-weight horse blanket features a tough 1200 denier Ballistic Weave™ outer, 180 grams of insulation and a moisture-wicking lining.
The Stubben Genesis D Deluxe with Biomex Saddle is designed for rider comfort. Made of durable, grippy, doubled leather, it features an extra-deep seat and a close contact feel. Unique cantle details add a distinctive look.
The Weatherbeeta Freestyle 1200D Detach-a-Neck Medium Pony Turnout helps give your pony protection from the elements. This pony blanket features a 1200 denier outer shell and a 210T oxford lining with 220 grams of poly fill insulation.
The Essex Classics Talent Yarn® Long Sleeve Girls' Competition Shirt combines comfort and performance with a classic look that's just right for showing. This well-tailored girls' show shirt is made of Talent Yarn fabric that wicks moisture, offers UV protection, stretches for freedom of motion and provides antibacterial deodorizing.
The Symphony™ No. 1 Argenta Breech from Tredstep Ireland™ is designed to support your athletic movements. An integrated sock and cuff fits smoothly inside boots or half chaps. This riding breech is made of durable microfiber fabric with NanoSphere® protection against dirt and stains.
The FITS® Claire Silk Touch Show Shirt is made of a lightweight technical fabric that feels whisper soft. This ladies' show shirt wicks moisture, cools, breathes and stretches with your every move for the ultimate riding comfort. It also provides UV protection. The wrap collar snaps closed for a show-ring ready look.
The Vespucci Double Raised Weymouth Bridle offers an attractive look, superior fit and a comfortable design. Crafted of top-quality leather, this full bridle has buckle cheeks, padding in critical areas and comes with a complete set of reins.
Finish Line® Fluid Action® is a liquid joint supplement. Rich in glucosamine, vitamins and minerals, this palatable joint solution for horses is easy to administer. 32 oz. (32-day supply).
The Weatherbeeta Original 1200D Standard Neck Pony Turnout Sheet has a new, better-fitting design for ponies. It has a durable 1200 denier ripstop polyester outer shell that is paired with a smooth lining. No fill. Traditional gussets allow freedom of movement.
Your feet will feel resilient in the Ovation® Aeros™ Zip Paddock Boot. Lined and vapor-permeable, this top quality leather paddock boot has a moisture-wicking footbed cushion with advanced arch support. A Carbosan® inner sock is anti-odor, antibacterial and anti-fungal. Air pockets in the grippy outsole keep the boot lightweight.
The Ariat® Ashley Vest offers everything an equestrian wants in a figure-flattering vest. Pair it with your favorite long-sleeve sweater or shirt to look stylish while staying warm and active on cool days.

subset: commoncrawl


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Book your room at Prinsengracht Studio
Comfort Studio, 1 Double Bed, City ViewMax Occupancy: 2 guests (up to 1 child, 1 infant)
Get an overview of this hotel3-star Amsterdam apartment in Canal Ring, walk to Skinny Bridge
Collect 200 points
Simply enter your Nectar card number when prompted. Your points will be credited 30 days after you return from your trip.*Offers may apply
Located in Canal Ring, this apartment is within a 10-minute walk of Skinny Bridge, Rembrandt Square, and Stopera. Flower Market and Heineken Experience are also within 15 minutes.
Property Features
Dry cleaning, laundry facilities, and express check-in are available at this smoke-free apartment. WiFi in public areas is free. Additionally, express check-out and multilingual staff are onsite.
Room Amenities
All 1 apartments have free WiFi and feature kitchens with refrigerators, stovetops, and microwaves. Digital TV, coffee makers, and hair dryers are among the other amenities available to guests. Weekly housekeeping is available.Information missing or incorrect? Tell us!
Hotel Amenities
Hotel Amenities
Prinsengracht Studio features multilingual staff, laundry facilities, and dry cleaning/laundry services. High-speed wireless Internet access is complimentary. This Amsterdam apartment also offers express check-in and express check-out.
Prinsengracht Studio is a smoke-free property.
- Total number of rooms - 1
- Number of floors - 1
- Dry cleaning/laundry service
- Express check-in
- Express check-out
- Free WiFi
- Laundry facilities
- Multilingual staff
- Smoke-free property
- Number of buildings/towers - 1
Family Friendly Amenities
- Free Wi-Fi
- Kitchen
- Laundry facilities
- Refrigerator
- Microwave
Available in all rooms: Free WiFi
Available in some public areas: Free WiFi
Room Amenities
- Pay movies
- Microwave
- Kitchen
- Refrigerator
- Coffee/tea maker
- Weekly housekeeping provided
- Private bathroom
- Hair dryer
- Shower only
- Digital TV service
- Free WiFi
- Stovetop
Nearby Things to Do
The recreational activities listed below are available either on site or nearby; fees may apply.
- Bicycle rentals on site
To make requests for specific accessibility needs, complete the "Special or Accessibility Requests" section of "Trip Preferences" when you book your hotel.
- Accessible bathroom
Hotel Policies
Check-in time starts at 3 PM
Special check-in instructions:
Check-out time is noon
Payment types
You need to know
Extra-person charges may apply and vary depending on hotel policy.
Government-issued photo identification and a credit card are required at check-in for incidental charges.
Special requests are subject to availability upon check-in and may incur additional charges. Special requests cannot be guaranteed.
- No onsite parking is available. Special cancellation policies or charges may apply for group reservations (more than 8 rooms for the same hotel / stay dates).
No rollaway/extra beds available
No elevators
No pets or service animals allowed
- A 5 percent city/local tax will be charged
- Cleaning fee: EUR 35 per accommodation, per stay
- A pet fee will be charged per accommodation, per stay
We should mention
No pets and no service animals are allowed at this property.
National Rating
This property does not have a Netherlands Tourist Board rating. For the benefit of our customers, we have provided a rating based on our rating system.


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hungryhouse ExpressDelivered in 45 or your next meal free!*
How does it work?
How does it work?
The Curry Centre in Moses Gate
half price on all curries on Tuesdays excluding special dishes
4 5
4 Stars6 ratings
Sorry, online ordering is unavailable
Sorry, The Curry Centre is closed today
We're sorry for any inconvenience this has caused.
Please choose from one of our other restaurants in your area.


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|Found 333 Recipes
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Sicilian Vanilla Ice Creamby faithanne From Saveur Magazine. (Gelato This recipe, adapted from Mary Taylor..
peppermint sundaesby stillakidrn there's a historic inn, milleridge in, in jericho ny, that serves a si..
Berry Blend Ice Creamby lizbuff taken from diseaseproof.com
Creamsicklesby lizbuff (taken from diseaseproof.com)
Srawberry Freezeby lizbuff taken from diseaseproof.com
Margarita Pieby bethany This is from a book DeGrazia and Mexican cookery. This is a great hit ..


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Market Wrap: Stocks Slip on Greece Worries, Tepid Job Data
Stocks closed slightly lower Thursday after the IMF warned Greece that it faces a huge financial hole mixed jobs data dampened the U.S. economic outlook.
Stocks closed slightly lower Thursday after the IMF warned Greece that it faces a huge financial hole mixed jobs data dampened the U.S. economic outlook.
Stocks fell Friday ahead of a summit next week that could decide whether Greece can remain in the eurozone, but major indexes closed higher for the week.
Bill Gates was a genius in building the PC as we know it today. But his track record in energy isn't looking nearly as successful.
Looking to save $100 in a flash? If you're in a bind or just want to stash a little extra cash, here are 18 ideas about how to make your savings grow.
As two telecommunications giants make plans to merge, Internet costs just keep rising. Here are two ways to fight back.
Stocks fell Tuesday as a jump in bond yields weighed on utilities, but optimism that Greece may be close to a deal with its creditors limited losses.
Utility bills are a notorious place for financial bleeding. Keep an eye out for these common ways that you might be overpaying every month.
As you wait for 5G technology to arrive, follow these tips to maximize data while minimizing your cellphone bill.
LEDs cut your spending on electricity by 75 percent to 80 percent. Here's how to choose them to cast the right light for every room.
If you're moving cross-town or across the country, you can save by gathering boxes, doing as much of it as you can and selling all that clutter.
U.S. industrial production fell for a fifth straight month in April, weighed down by declines in mining and utilities output.
AT&T and telecom industry groups ask regulators to immediately block parts of new stricter rules for Internet service providers, citing steep costs.
Elon Musk hopes to park hundreds of millions of solar panel-connected batteries in homes and businesses so the world can disconnect from power plants.
Online and in print, the U.S. publishes thousands of ideas that will help you save money. But there is no free money -- at least, not for everyone.
Stocks on Wall Street ended slightly lower Tuesday, reversing course late in the session as utility shares fell and offset optimism about deal news.
Duke Energy has a plan to save the planet with green power. But before signing on, you'll want to check the math.
The score -- a huge shift from FICO -- will open up credit access to as many as 53 million consumers who do not have credit scores or credit reports.
Utilities are already facing a challenge from solar energy, but a concept called energy storage could change the game entirely.
Internet service is largely unregulated by government, leaving consumers vulnerable to service disruptions because of a lack of redundancy.
A decision to impose tough new rules on companies that provide Internet service to Americans wasn't influenced by politics, an official tells lawmakers.
About 61 percent of Americans use autopay, but it's not perfect. Just ask the guy whose gas was cut off -- and he runs a personal finance site.
You don't need the warehouse club to save on massive quantities of food and gas. Those opportunities are all over: How about a quarter of a steer?
For the first time in six years, a standard seal of approval for energy efficiency has been expanded to include another major household appliance.
Any savings you might achieve by ditching phone or cable, are nearly certain to be undone as your bill for Internet access inexorably creeps up.
Unplug, declutter and tackle those small jobs before they become big ones. Those are just three of the easy ways to save money in your house today.
Save money by learning how to conduct your own home inspections to find budget-draining energy leaks.
Because of the way natural gas and electric utilities are regulated, customers won't likely see the recent drop reflected in their bills right away.
The worse your financial situation becomes, the more the standard rules of bill paying don't apply. Employ these strategies instead.
Gold? No. Oil? No. We're talking a truly vital commodity, one with long-term potential to rise in price. And now, you can easily add it to your portfolio.
U.S. factory output increased for the fifth straight month in June as manufacturers cranked out more aircraft, chemicals and furniture.