Biodiversity Broadcast August 2008

SEND YOUR PICS TO THE RED DESERT PHOTO SHOW!

BCA will host the 5th Annual Red Desert Photo Show and Contest opening Saturday, September 21, 2008 at The Grounds Internet Café in Laramie. If you are a professional or amateur photographer and have some work of which you're proud, help us showcase the Red Desert’s wildlife and landscapes by entering your work in the show.

Deliver your work to the Biodiversity Conservation Alliance office at 215 South 3rd Street, Suite 114, Laramie, Wyoming 82070 by the submission deadline of September 19th.

Professional and amateur divisions are divided into two categories: Landscapes or Flora and Fauna. Photos can be offered for sale with proceeds split between the photographer and BCA’s Red Desert Protection Campaign. All entries should be framed; matting is recommended; there is a fee of $5 per entry to cover the expenses of the show (no fees for photographers under 18!).

Join us in celebrating the beauty of the Red Desert, and advancing conservation efforts there, by sending your favorite photos today!

ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT ENDANGERED

Over 100 organizations throughout the nation including Biodiversity Conservation Alliance have joined ranks with several U.S. Senators, more than 10,000 scientists, and the Endangered Species Coalition in an effort to stop the Bush administration’s eleventh-hour attacks on imperiled wildlife.

The Bush administration is shooting down the Endangered Species Act, firing both barrels at once.

Barrel One is Smokin’
Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne has proposed changes that would destroy wildlife protection laws historically offered in the Endangered Species Act.

At risk of being lost to political whimsy are essential protections for imperiled wildlife ranging from Wyoming’s Prebles meadow jumping mouse to the Arctic’s polar bear. Agencies are actually being told to “consult with themselves” about plans and projects they propose. This classic case of allowing the fox to guard the henhouse cuts the public out of the decision-making process and eliminates procedures that have historically served to protect our wildlife

Barrel Two is Smokin’
Under Bush administration pressure, the Forest Service recently issued an Interim Directive that cripples its own sensitive species program.

The sensitive species program requires diligent monitoring and protection of wildlife species that have low populations and/or those experiencing decreasing population trends. The new Forest Service Interim Directive no longer requires such monitoring or consideration of the negative impacts that forest plans and projects may have on such species, including those already proposed for protection as Threatened or Endangered under the Endangered Species Act.

This Interim Directive is already in effect, but the agency will accept your comments before making it a Permanent Directive.

Please watch for a BCA alert to learn how you can help stop this double-barreled political assault on imperiled wildlife.

BRIMMER REPEATS ROADLESS RULE RUIN
Wyoming's Judge Clarence Brimmer rules (for a second time) against the nation’s most popular conservation legislation in history.

BCA, Wyoming Outdoor Council, The Wilderness Society, and several other conservation organizations are challenging Judge Clarence Brimmer’s August 12th decision to again enjoin (to make ineffective) the Roadless Area Conservation Rule. Brimmer’s decision puts at risk nearly 60 million acres of pristine national forest lands that were protected from road building and logging by the 2001 Roadless Rule.

Brimmer’s decision cynically dismisses a previous 10th Circuit Court ruling that overturned his first decision against the Roadless Rule and ignores the facts that the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule underwent the most intense legal scrutiny and enjoyed the most widespread support of any environmental legislation in our nation's history. An unprecedented 95% of the 1.7 million comments favored the strongest possible protection to roadless areas, representing the most widespread public support in the history of federal rule-making.

BCA is confident that Brimmer’s ruling will again be reversed on appeal and that roadless areas will remain protected from environmental degradation. Legal firm Earthjustice is representing our collective appeal of Brimmer’s decision. BCA is working to ensure that roadless areas continue to be havens for wildlife, sources of pure drinking water, scenic backdrops for communities, and great places for people to recreate.

GOVERNOR ANNOUNCES SAGE GROUSE PLAN

New policy’s loopholes may undercut sage grouse conservation
Last month, Wyoming Governor Freudenthal stepped boldly into the sage grouse conservation debate by issuing a sage grouse conservation policy based on designating core areas around the most populated breeding areas in the state. The core areas encompass about three-quarters of the state's breeding population, and the designation looks at first blush like an important victory for conservation. But the new policy contains major loopholes that undercut its stated intent to conserve and recover this rare bird.

First, breeding and nesting habitats outside designated core areas would get accelerated industrial development including waivers of sage grouse protections. As a result, these populations are likely to disappear as oil and gas drilling moves into these habitats. Up to 25% of the population could be lost in the process, including some of the largest breeding populations in the Powder River Basin, which were gerrymandered out of the core area designations for coalbed methane drilling.

Second, it is far from clear that the Core Areas themselves will maintain their grouse populations under the new plan. The new plan allows "current management and existing land uses," including (for example) a 2,000-well coalbed methane project in the Atlantic Rim core area that the BLM expects to wipe out the grouse populations there. And the plan calls for a "non-regulatory" approach to sage grouse protection in designated core areas. But leaving sage grouse conservation up to the voluntary efforts of the oil and gas industry has been an ecological disaster so far. And wintering habitats, just as important, don't receive added protection under the plan.

The Governor's Executive Order makes clear that his policy has been adopted to prevent the imminent listing of the sage grouse under the Endangered Species Act. The oil and gas industry is cheering the plan since it allows a major acceleration in oil and gas drilling outside core areas and because the core areas were established to exclude many areas they'd like to drill. But if the plan is widely implemented, there is a scenario where the core area populations are able to hold their own but the sage grouse outside core areas are decimated, resulting in an additional major decline in sage grouse over today's already precariously low populations. Thus, the plan could wind up as a blow to sage grouse conservation. Endangered Species listing would be a better solution, both for assuring the recovery of the sage grouse and for reining in oil and gas drilling to a reasonable and sustainable pace.

BCA CELEBRATES 20TH ANNIVERSARY

After twenty years of conservation, BCA will be hosting an anniversary celebration week:

View and have a chance to purchase entries in the Red Desert Photo Show the week of September 20, 2008 at the Grounds Coffee Shop, 171 N. 3rd St., in Laramie.

Please join us for the Badger Ball and annual meeting to be held on Saturday, September 27, 2008 at the Train Depot, 1st and Kearney, in Laramie. Beginning at 3:30pm, BCA will host conservation workshops followed by a cocktail hour and silent auction at 5pm and dinner at 6:30. Nobel Laureate Gabor Vali will be the keynote speaker speaking on Global Climate Change during the dinner hour.

Finally, join BCA Executive Director and Wildlife Biologist Erik Molvar on a Sunday, September 28, 2008 Day Hike to Crater Lake in southeast Wyoming’s Snowy Range Mountains.

Please RSVP Carmi at carmi@voiceforthewild.org to make a reservation for the Badger Ball and/or the hike.

WELCOME WAYNE PRINDLE, JAY LILLEGRAVEN

BCA is proud to introduce two new members to the team: Wayne D. Prindle, formerly of New York is our new Conservation Advocate, and Jason A. Lillegraven, longtime BCA supporter and advocate for conservation, has joined the Board of Directors.

Wayne holds a BS in Conservation Biology from SUNY and a Master’s degree in Environmental Law and Policy from Vermont Law School. Wayne served as George P. Marsh Conservation Fellow through the School’s Environmental Law Center. Wayne’s western experience includes work as a field biologist for the Bridger-Teton National Forest and for the World Wildlife Fund in the American Prairie Reserve in Montana. Wayne is excited to join BCA and tackle public lands issues in Wyoming and beyond. Stop by the BCA office to make his acquaintance when you’re in the neighborhood!

Jay Lillegraven is an American paleobiologist and a structural geologist with a PhD from the University of Kansas and a long and venerable career as a professor and field research scientist. Jay served as Program Director and Proposal-review Panelist for the National Science Foundation, Associate Dean for the University of Wyoming’s College of Arts and Sciences, and President and Honorary Member for the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology. He has also been on several editorial boards for scientific journals and has received numerous honors, accolades and awards. Jay considers his most important success to be his blissful marriage to accomplished western landscape painter, Linda Lillegraven. Jay is honored to be elected to the BCA board.