All of the world's freshwater dolphin species are now threatened with extinction.

With the small gray dolphin moving into the endangered category on the IUCN's latest Red List of Threatened Species, all of the world's freshwaterdolphinspecies are now listed as threatened. Of the 128,918 species included on the updated list, released Thursday, 35,765 are threatened with extinction as of December, according to the conservation organization.

And 31 plant and animal species have gone extinct, including all 17 freshwater fish species found mostly in Lake Lanao and its outlet in the Philippines.

From the lab to your inbox. Get the latest science stories from CNET every week.

There is at least some positive news in this week's report. Europe's largest land mammal, the European bison, has moved from vulnerable to near threatened.

The bison and 25 other species recoveries documented "demonstrate the power of conservation," Bruno Oberle, IUCN director-general, said in a statement. "Yet the growing list of extinct species is a stark reminder that conservation efforts must urgently expand. To tackle global threats such as unsustainable fisheries, land clearing for agriculture, and invasive species, conservation needs to happen around the world and be incorporated into all sectors of the economy."

The European bison population has seen a recovery, thanks to continued conservation efforts.

The small gray dolphin is mostly found in the Amazon river system. Its numbers have been severely depleted by fishing, river damming and water pollution. Eliminating the use of curtains of fishnet called gill nets, which hang in the water, and reducing the number of dams in their various habitats are priorities that should help numbers recover, the IUCN says.

The Chiriqui Harlequin Frog, endemic to Costa Rica and Panama, is now extinct.

Three Central American frog species are also now considered extinct. Additionally, 22 frog species across Central and South America are listed as critically endangered (possibly extinct). The main reason for these extinctions could be chytridiomycosis disease, an infectious disease caused by the chytrid fungus that affects amphibians worldwide.

"As a conservationist, the most emotionally impactful news to present is the confirmation of extinction. The causes range from overexploiting to disease, with some threats easier to mitigate than others," Thomas E Lacher Jr., a professor of wildlife and fisheries sciences at Texas A&M University, said in a statement.

Grevillea caleyi, from the protea family, is now listed as critically endangered.

Animals aren't the only species on the extinct and nearly extinct list. According to the new list, 45% of the protea family of plant species are now considered vulnerable, endangered or critically endangered. These flowering plants grow mainly in the Southern Hemisphere. And three macadamia species have entered the IUCN Red List as threatened with extinction in the wild.

Excerpt from:
Bison recovery offset by 31 animal and plant species declared extinct - CNET

News

You supply the house, you supply the utilities, you supply the septic tank. Mother Nature took care of the rest.

This waterfall isnt quite as dramatic as the one outside Pittsburgh atop which Fallingwater sits, but the 60-foot-high Buttermilk Falls makes for a dramatic enough setting for your own vacation home. Its part of a five-acre lot on White Haven Rd., Bear Creek, Pa. 18702 | Luzerne County Association of Realtors MLS images via Century 21 Smith Horrigan Group

The story of the most famous house in Pennsylvania began when Pittsburgh department-store magnate Edgar Kaufmann took starchitect Frank Lloyd Wright on a tour of the lot in Bear Run where he wanted Wright to design a house for his family.

Wright asked Kaufmann what their favorite spot was on the property. Kaufmann showed him a clearing next to a waterfall where they loved to picnic and watch the stream.

Wright promptly plopped the Kaufmanns house on top of the waterfall. And the rest is history.

Im not suggesting that you even try to duplicate Fallingwater on this Bear Creek lot for sale. But if you are looking for a one-of-a-kind lot on which to build your own vacation retreat, well, here it is.

And to be fair, its current owner wouldnt mind if you did try to one-up Wright on this lot.

Buttermilk Falls at peak water flow

I would hope that if somebody did build on there, they wouldnt pack it out with as many homes as humanly possible, says Victor Juliano. (At least in theory, local zoning would allow you to build up to five houses on this lot if you found the room.) I was always thinking of a Frank Lloyd Wright type of house.

This lot certainly has the Wright stuff. A tributary of Bear Creek runs through its middle, and in the middle of that tributarys passage through this lot is the 60-foot-high waterfall you see at left, known as Buttermilk Falls. The lot is surrounded by conservation lands, which means that your retreat wont be surrounded by subdivisions someday.

This lot has been in private hands for more than a century and in the hands of Julianos family for 80 years. It was assembled by a Northeast Pennsylvania tycoon named Albert Lewis. Lewis, whose work as a timekeeper on the Lehigh Valley Railroad impressed founder Asa Packer so much he put Lewis in charge of the first train to run from the railroads hub in Mauch Chunk (now Jim Thorpe) to White Haven, married into the family that supplied lumber to the railroad and eventually went into the lumber business himself.

What brought Lewis to Bear Creek, however, was ice. He built a dam and a company village on the creek a half-mile upstream from here in 1895 that became the foundation of a prosperous ice-hauling business. The company survived his death in 1923, going out of business finally in 1938. This lot was not part of the ice operation, but it was part of the huge tracts of land Lewis amassed in Luzerne County. Juliano estimates that at his peak, Lewis owned about 100,000 acres in this rural part of the county.

Julianos grandfather eventually acquired this land from Lewis descendants through sheer persistence. When he went camping on the plot, Juliano says, he would ask the owners if they were willing to sell it. And for years and years, they said No, they had no interest in selling it. And one time, he went up there, and they said Yes, and he bought it. This would have been sometime around 1940, 17 years after Lewis death.

The falls in winter

Since then, Julianos family has used it as a getaway and a campground. Their own plans to build on the property never came to fruition, and as a result, he says, they became caretakers of the lot. And the lot became a community trust of sorts. I met a guy who was in his 90s once in Bear Creek Village, he says. And he told me that he used to go there with his father and play in the water. Somebody else told me that was where they proposed to their wife. Its meant a lot to a lot of people.

Juliano, who now lives in South Jersey, no longer visits this place like he used to, nor do his relatives, so they have decided to sell it on the open market for the first time since it was assembled by Lewis in the early 20th century. The stories he tells should make you aware that you are buying not just a lot with a lovely waterfall in it but a piece of Bear Creek Village history. Its yours to do with as you please, but if you decide to restrict access to it while you prepare to build your own vacation dream house on it, be aware that you might want to let your neighbors know respectfully that you plan on making it truly private.

Closeup of the face of the falls

Even though this lot is closer to Wilkes-Barre, a 20-minute drive to the northeast, than to Mt. Pocono, about 35 minutes to the east, its still a good place to build a Poconos vacation home, as several ski resorts, including Big Boulder, Split Rock and Camelback, are a 25- to 35-minute drive from here. And this lot is easier to get to from Philadelphia than many other places in the heart of the Poconos: its about a 10-minute drive from the Wilkes-Barre interchange (Exit 115) of the Pennsylvania Turnpike Northeast Extension. With state game lands even closer to this lot, you can indulge your hunting desires in season as well.

Even though he would love to see a Frank Lloyd Wright type of house on this site, Juliano, who is himself a developer, says he never would have chosen Wright himself to build it had he pursued that vision: He just made the decision and he built what he wanted, he says. He wouldnt be my ideal architect.

Given his personality, temper and monumental ego, he probably wouldnt have been yours either, but I suggest that whoever you do choose should be at the very least attuned to nature and rural environments. You will be giving that person a spectacular canvas on which to create a work of art.

Juliano hopes that whoever buys it at least doesnt clear the land and put a bunch of modular houses on top. And, he adds, You wouldnt want to put a McMansion on top, you know what I mean?

I certainly do. And I hope you do, too. It will be your land, and you can do with it what you will, but whatever you do with it, I think you at least should respect both its history and its setting.

THE FINE PRINT

LOT SIZE:5.05 acres

ZONING:Residential

SALE PRICE:$267,500

OTHER STUFF:Should you decide to build on this lot, you will need to provide your own electricity source, find a suitable source of water and build your own septic system, for this lot lacks public utilities.

White Haven Rd., Bear Creek, Pa. 18702 [Ben Piccillo | Century 21 Smith Horrigan Group]

See more here:
Just Listed in the Poconos: Five-Acre Lot in Bear Creek - Philadelphia magazine

Charles Bolinger, charles.bolinger@edwpub.net

Brewster Companies is blessed to have work so theyre giving back

MARYVILLE Brewster Companies, with land clearing, demolition, site preparation, erosion control and paving divisions, plans to donate 300, 15-pound turkeys to the first 300 drivers who show up at their location Saturday.

Between 9 a.m. and noon, drivers can visit 6321 East Main in Maryville and Brewster employees will put a frozen bird in their trunk, cargo area or on the back seat. Senior vice president Brent Phelps said that breaks down to 1.6 seconds per vehicle.

Phelps said for the past 15 years, the company has thrown employee holiday parties. Since thats impossible this year, they wondered what could they do to give back to the community. Unlike others who are unemployed or struggling to find work, 2020 has been good to Brewster Companies, Phelps said.

We are blessed to have work, he added.

To be charitable, they conceived the idea of giving away turkeys. After the company president approved it, Phelps soon discovered the difficulty in finding 300 turkeys to give away but after overcoming the hurdles, the frozen birds will be delivered in time for the giveaway. He said there are no other items included with the turkeys.

Mother Nature decided to throw a wrench into the plan by adding rain for Friday and Saturday morning. Phelps said adding a tent to the drive-through plan meant adhering to another set of rules.

The tent will be on the crushed rock parking lot in front of the building and Phelps said entrance and exit signs will be posted. Drivers pull in, workers load the turkey and drivers exit to either continue east on East Main or make a U-turn and head west.

They can roll down their windows or not, well put the bird in then tell em, Merry Christmas, Phelps said.

Reach reporter Charles Bolinger at 618-659-5735

Read this article:
Brewster Companies is blessed to have work so theyre giving back - The Edwardsville Intelligencer

Authorities said people were living illegally on the North Portland property for months. An eviction Tuesday morning sparked a protest.

PORTLAND, Ore. Authorities early Tuesday morning made several arrests and cleared people who they said have been trespassing for months at the "Red House on Mississippi," a private property in North Portland.

The Multnomah County Sheriffs Officesaid the alleged trespassers had been ordered to leave the property by court order in September.

Sheriffs deputies and Portland police officers arrived at the home, on North Mississippi Avenue near Skidmore Street, around 5 a.m. Tuesday. Police blocked off streets and sidewalks surrounding the property while they removed people from the area.

The police activity led to a tense confrontation between protesters and police.

Officers took one person who was armed with a gun into custody. The Portland Police Bureau (PPB) announced seven arrests in a press release Tuesday morning.

Police later said protesters tore down fencing around the property and built a barricade blocking North Mississippi Avenue.

Just after 2:30 p.m. on Tuesday, police announced that the barricade must be removed and that continued criminal activity at the scene "may result in arrests including the potential use of force."

Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler announced at about 6 p.m. that he was authorizing the PPB to "use all lawful means to end the illegal occupation" on the property.

A tweet fromRed House's Twitter accountsaid the property is not an autonomous zone but rather "an active eviction blockade on Indigenous land."

According to representatives for the family inside the house, police "violently dismantled the 75+ day "Red House' encampment" on Tuesday morning.

"Along with sweeping the encampment, which supports and surrounds the Red House, officers entered the home itself, destroying its interior, and violently arresting two residentsinjuring at least one," the statement reads.

Portland Police Chief Chuck Lovell on Wednesday called for a "peaceful and safe resolution to the occupation." He later recorded a video about the occupation that was posted to Twitter.

"We are aware of the stockpile of weapons and the presence of firearms," he said in the video. "We are aware of the threat to the community, to media, to police. We've seen the attacks. The Portland police will enforce the law and use force if necessary to restore order to the neighborhood."

Lovell said that can be avoided if those in the encampment "end it peacefully by putting down their weapons and leave the barricade."

Officers have responded to at least 81 calls at the property and surrounding area from Sept. 1 to Nov. 30, according to PPB. The calls included reports of fights, shots fired, burglary, theft, vandalism, noise violations, trespassing and threats. Community members told officers they were threatened and intimidated by people on the property, police said.

The Multnomah County Circuit Court ordered an eviction at the property in February 2020.

The judgment was issued prior to state and federal emergency moratoriums, said a press release from the Multnomah County Sheriffs Office. The eviction moratoriums do not apply to evictions based on post-nonjudicial foreclosures, such as this case.

In September, a group of protesters staged a sit-in at the property, which they said was the home of a Black-Indigenous family. The sheriffs office said housing and food assistance had been provided to people at the property.

Police announced the following arrests on Tuesday:

Read more:
'There will be no autonomous zone in Portland' | Wheeler says encampment at 'Red House' must end - KGW.com

GOULD Stunned by unprecedented megafires, Colorado is embracing logging mowing holes up to 140 acres in beetle-infested lodgepole pines in an effort to revive out-of-balance forests.

This for-profit mechanized tree-cutting, concentrated between the blackened Cameron Peak and East Troublesome burn scars, has been clearing 3,000 acres a year.

And state foresters propose to clear more.

At two cutting sites west of Fort Collins last week, hulking red and yellow tractors equipped with whirling hot saws sliced through 12-inch trunks of the towering pines, then as they thumped to the ground raked them into bunches. De-limbers stripped off branches. Hooked pinchers hoisted the logs into bus-sized loads for diesel-belching trucks. Drivers hauled these along icy mountain roads to sawmills at Saratoga and Parshall, where workers convert logs to lumber as a surging national wood-products market pays record prices.

This large-scale cutting creates fire breaks to give firefighters a place to make a stand and take out the energy from inevitable future record wildfires, Colorado State Forest Service director Mike Lester said.

Andy Cross, The Denver Post

When lodgepoles grow back, the surrounding broader forests will gain age diversity, with different species such as aspens popping up amid pines on newly-sunlit slopes, Lester said.

In lodgepole forests, if you want to mimic what happens to lodgepole naturally, you do clear-cuts, he said. Lodgepole pines naturally regenerate with forest-clearing fires.

Colorado traditionally hasnt had logging on the industrial scale seen in Oregon and other northwestern states, and forest ecologists warn against clear-cuts that accelerate erosion, degrade wildlife habitat and enable increased human incursions.

But state officials now are turning to this large-scale cutting as an alternative to inaction at an especially difficult moment. Across western Colorado, insect attacks on old and drought-enfeebled trees over the past decade have ravaged 5 million acres. Systematic suppression of wildfires, federal land managers priority for a century, has led to unnatural thickening.

For years, ecologists and emergency planners have warned that dying, dry and overly-dense forests would lead to massive, ruinous fires. Climate warming has emerged as the trigger, unleashing flames this year that burned across 700,000 acres, including the three largest fires ever recorded in Colorado: the Cameron Peak fire, at 208,913 acres; the East Troublesome fire, at 193,812 acres; and the Pine Gulch fire, at 139,007 acres.

If we keep doing things as weve been doing, this is going to be what we will see, Lester said.

Andy Cross, The Denver Post

Colorados population growth and development boom, particularly the construction of mountain homes by people compelled to escape cities, complicates the forest imbalance. Houses in woods force progressively more aggressive fire-snuffing, which allows more increased thickening of trees.

A recent state report estimated a $4.2 billion backlog in forest-thinning needed to selectively clear trees and create safety buffers around the most at-risk forest homes. Thats tree removal that state agencies and property owners generally must pay for in contrast to this industrial logging that brings in revenue when market conditions are right.

Last week, state foresters supervising the cutting of a 100-acre patch on Owl Mountain, within a 376-acre parcel controlled mostly by the federal Bureau of Land Management, pointed to the economics revenue of about $200,000 to state and federal agencies from loggers. And even if logging wasnt profitable, every dollar spent removing trees from fire-prone forests would save an estimated $7 in avoided firefighting costs, Steamboat Springs-based forester Carolina Manriquez said.

Andy Cross, The Denver Post

Now we have 200,000-acre fires rolling through. What is 100 acres? Nothing at the landscape scale, Manriquez said. We need to do more of this. I mean, were spending millions to suppress fires.

Colorado forests that increasingly burn, along with millions of acres where beetle-kill leaves trees unusable, might have helped sustain logging companies, said C.J. Pittington, a Walden-based logger running a 40-ton red feller-buncher last week clearing a 140-acre chunk of state land. He can mow through about 5 acres of lodgepole forest in a day and has built up a business his father began in 1973, currently employing a dozen workers, and expressed hope the big fires will lead to greater social acceptance of large-scale logging.

Logging in forests near sprawling mountain municipalities also will help protect people, Pittington said, referring to the East Troublesome fires destruction of 300 homes and other buildings.

If the U.S. Forest Service would have done something like this behind Grand Lake, many homes there would still be standing, Pittington said.

Future expansion of logging in northwestern Colorado will depend on industrial capacity, said John Twitchell, the supervisory state forester overseeing the work, who also serves on the states forest advisory commission.

Our logging industry has been small. We havent had a lot of users of the wood. Our capacity to use wood will dictate how much work we can do on our landscapes, Twitchell said.

We want to re-generate a new, healthy forest. As long as this dead timber is here, inevitably, it is going to fall and in time it will burn, he said. Weve seen the consequences of inaction. If we can have more cuts like this, we can accomplish a lot of goals at once.

Andy Cross, The Denver Post

But forest ecologists raised concerns about the logging. Industrial clear-cuts of 40 acres or more widely have been seen as harmful. Lodgepole forests like those in northwestern Colorado play key roles in nature stabilizing mountainsides that otherwise erode into streams and eventually municipal reservoirs, helping form soil, giving habitat for raptors and other wild animals.

If it is just willy-nilly punching holes in forests, it may not do any good at all and may make things worse, said Greg Aplet, a Denver-based senior scientist for the Wilderness Society.

Forest tree-cutting must be done based on large landscape-scale master plans, connected to broad restoration around the East Troublesome and Cameron Peak burn scars, he said. The risk is that Colorado forest officials, once beetle-killed lodgepole pines are removed from state land, will try to expand cutting on private and federal land by using social concern about fires to grab the social license to conduct more logging without the kind of review and careful ecological analysis that normally would attend large-scale logging, Aplet said.

The Wilderness Society isnt opposed to logging. Were not opposed to forest management. What we are opposed to is bogus science, poorly-planned projects and squandering money that could be spent on treatments that actually improve forest health, he said. There is reason to keep sawmills alive so that we have a destination for the logs that come out of well-planned forest restoration projects.

University of Colorado Denver forest ecologist Diana Tomback said much depends on how much forest thinning is done and where. When westerners began snuffing wildfires a century ago, this obligated some form of logging to replace disturbed natural processes, Tomback said. But large clear-cuts cause erosion and even standing majority-dead forests can be preferable ecologically, she said.

A storm of threats climate warming, megafires, insect outbreaks and drought is converging now to greatly diminish our nations once-magnificent forests, Tomback said, suggesting Gov. Jared Polis should convene a forest science brain trust to develop a strategy.

Andy Cross, The Denver Post

This convergence is new, and we are learning. And the answers may not all be there, she said. But we need a methodical approach. We have to sit down and talk about a new forest management paradigm. We dont want to do things ad hoc.

Federal forest managers at U.S. Forest Service headquarters werent available for comment. A newly-appointed regional director has declined for a month to discuss the overall health of Colorado forests in the face of climate warming, insect infestations and wildfires.

Lester was looking to make that connection. Most of the acres burned this year were in federally-managed forests, he said, urging better shared stewardship.

Polis recently proposed spending $6 million for grants to improve forest health, but the scale of work to save dying forests requires far more, Lester said.

What do we need from the feds? Certainly we need financial resources. And we need to sit down and coordinate what we are going to do. How are we going to get this done?

See original here:
Colorado looks to logging to help re-balance forests in an era of climate-triggered megafires - The Denver Post

Sunshine Holdings Group Managing Director Vish Govindasamy urged the Government to strengthen the backend structure of the local agriculture sector by identifying the key pain points of both public and private institutions and addressing them by actively engaging in discussions with relevant stakeholders of the industry.

Speaking as a panellist at the Sri Lanka Economic Summit Roadmap for Takeoff: Driving a People-Centric Economic Revival, organised by the Ceylon Chamber of Commerce (CCC) recently, Govindasamy said that fortifying this framework would prepare the agriculture sector to leverage numerous post-Covid opportunities, bring prosperity for all parties involved and make the sector resilient for any future disruption.

Covid-19 has brought several opportunities for the Agri sector, and we have ambitious plans on being self-sufficient in agriculture, dairy and fishery.

While we are preparing for that, we need to make sure that all backend processes and the framework which encompasses these processes have to be robust, he said.

Taking the dairy industry as an example, Govindasamy said, The country has a great vision for the local dairy industry intending to make Sri Lanka self-sufficient in milk by 2023. However, the backend framework has to be perfect before we even try to bring a herd.

Also, the animals need to have enough feed, which means that we have to clear land for farmers to grow. This needs to be done through a transparent land clearing process. Furthermore, the industry needs to deploy enough machinery and bring in modern technologies to meet this target. There are so many aspects to be looked at from a backend operations perspective to make front end operations of the dairy industry successful, said Govindasamy.

Read more:
Call to build a resilient agri sector - Sunday Observer

By Eric Trent

The Chronicle

WILLAPA HILLS Its a surprisingly warm 40 degrees outside as I arrive at a house Ive never seen before in Raymond at 5:30 a.m. Friday. A Pacific County native, Im back home to embark on my first-ever hunting trip and have no idea what to expect.

Jeff Boggs is loading gear into his red, lifted Chevy pickup as he greets me when I pull into the driveway. He hands me a pair of camouflage pants and a long sleeve shirt as I slip my boots on and climb into the cab.

We merge onto U.S. Highway 101 as Boggs rolls his window down and says, Theres your picture! as a herd of elk graze in the darkness of early morning just off the road; less than 100 yards from his house.

Unfortunately, these elk are on private property and are illegal to shoot. Instead, we head deep into the heart of the forest in search of one of Washingtons most prized big game animals.

Adult bull (male) Roosevelt elk can weigh up to 1,000 pounds, and average around 600 to 800 pounds. Adult cows (females) weigh in around 500 pounds. With thick bodies, short tails and long legs, adult elk stand 4 to 5 feet high just at the shoulder.

The first elk Boggs harvested two years ago gave him over 200 pounds of meat and lasted him the entire year. He processes everything on his own, from dressing and cleaning to cutting every steak and grinding the burger.

This is the best meat Ive ever eaten, Boggs said. My kid will eat elk and deer over anything. Id rather have an animal Ive killed over store-bought meat any day.

Boggs and I are heading to Game Management Unit 506, also known as the Willapa Hills region, which runs from the Columbia River in Wahkiakum County all the way up north of Route 6, east of Menlo.

General season ended in Western Washington on Nov. 18 for modern firearms and Sept. 24 for archery. Right now, the only hunting that is open in the Willapa Hills is late archery elk, a season that runs from Nov. 25 to Dec. 15, and Boggs is trying to fill his freezer after striking out during early archery.

Boggs, 33, has been hunting since he was 9 years old, getting one pheasant his first year out. He bagged his first deer at just 10 years old, and has harvested a deer every year since then except once. He didnt start hunting elk until four years ago, after he bought his first bow.

When we arrive at the spur of a gated logging road at 6 a.m., its still dark out and were the first hunters to get here. Typically, during hunting season, every timber company gate has a cluster of cars parked in front of it as thousands of hunters descend upon the woods.

In 2019, there were 54,500 elk hunters statewide. In the Willapa Hills alone, there were 1,916 hunters during the general season, many of which pour in from urban areas and cities. This year, 98,000 elk tags were bought statewide since April 1. In the Green Creek area east of Menlo, there were 30-foot fifth-wheel motorhomes parked on the sides of the logging roads.

Boggs and I, reveling in the early-morning solitude at our empty gate, put our camouflage on and began trekking up a winding logging road. Its 7 a.m., still a bit dark out, as we step as lightly as possible on the crunchy gravel.

Boggs holds his bow by the string as he walks. Its a Bowtech Realm SR6, one he bought used earlier this year and set him back $900. In his Bowtech Octane quiver are Easton 6.5mm carbon arrows. A quality entry-level bow for a first-time hunter, he said, would run about $500.

He got into bow hunting for a multitude of reasons, the main one being that archery season runs from Sept. 12-24, during the height of the rut, when horns clash and males vie for female mating partners. Its the easiest time to bag an elk as archers use an assortment of calls, such as a bull elk challenge and a female in heat, to coax the bulls near for a clean shot. Boggs uses Phelps Game Calls, a company located in Pe Ell.

Another advantage for bow hunters is that modern firearm season doesnt begin until Nov. 25, about a month after the rut has ended, meaning a lot less hunters are out during this time. In 2019, there were over 30,000 modern firearm hunters in the state compared to less than 15,000 archery hunters.

After 20 minutes of slowly trudging uphill, Boggs and I reach the first clearing. Its the spot he shot his first elk two years ago. I stand a few feet back, concealed behind a small cluster of bushes, as he surveys the landscape with his Vortex binoculars. We gingerly move along the side of the road that runs parallel to the clearing, looking for any signs of movement or the telltale tan bodies of the giant elk.

Archery hunting is no easy feat, I begin to realize, as Boggs points to a stump off in the distance and asks how far away I think it is. After years of covering high school football games, I felt I have an accurate judgement of yardage. I guess 50 yards. Boggs takes out his rangefinder and says Nope. 100 yards.

Even that stump looks like a tough distance to land a shot, and in reality, its still a bit further than the optimal shooting range of 40 yards with a bow. His maximum range is 80 yards, but even then its a desperation shot.

You have to get so close, and if the wind blows they smell you and youre not going to get your animal, Boggs said. Youve got to hunt the wind. If I have an 80-yard shot and I feel like I can get closer, Im getting closer.

As we continue along the road, the only sound is the crackling gravel under our boots. Every word we exchange is a hushed whisper. We need every advantage we can get to spot these elk before they see, smell and/or hear us.

With a modern firearm, a well-aimed hunter can drop an elk from hundreds of yards away. Still, modern firearm hunters had a lower success rate than archery hunters in the state last year; 9 percent for firearms and 10 percent for archery. Thats mostly due to double the amount of firearm hunters, however. In the Willapa Hills, archery hunters had a bit more luck. Of the 785 archery hunters, 133 successfully harvested an elk, for a 17 percent success rate.

Still, the odds are against us today.

We make our way through multiple spurs, guided by an app that shows the owner for every parcel of land in the area to make sure we dont stumble upon private property. It isnt until about 4 miles in that we find our first spot where elk bedded down the night before. Boggs points to a big circle and a smaller circle in the grass. Thats where a mom and its baby laid down, he said.

Yards away, we find our first fresh elk poop. Boggs guesses its hours old. We follow the poop trail down a branching road a couple hundred yards before it disappears completely. At some point they left the road and went off into the thick blanket of trees and brush, he said. We wont venture into the trees. Not only would our steps be too loud, but the branches are too thick to get off a clean shot even if we did find them.

We continue on, stopping every so often to rest, as Boggs tells hunting stories in a whisper. He tells why he wont elk hunt with a firearm, because of the thousands of people and craziness it brings. He shares a story of his friends dads friend who shot an elk and after locating it was approached by a father and son who claimed it was them who had shot it. There was an argument, and the man was shot and killed by the father and son.

Its just one example of the hyper-competitiveness of elk hunting, and how difficult it can be to get one of your own. Even Boggs had someone try to steal the elk he killed. After landing a shot he was sure would be fatal, Boggs sat on a stump and waited for the elk to die. Chasing after a shot elk is a huge mistake, he said, as they will run for miles and miles if pursued.

When he finally located the elk, a hunter was standing next to it, claiming he had shot it. Boggs showed him his arrows, which matched the arrow in the elk and, luckily, the hunter continued on his way.

Still, the positive encounters far outweigh the negative ones for Boggs. He shoots at least 10 arrows a day, 365 days a year in anticipation for the season. He has targets set up at his house so he can even shoot out of the window of his trophy room.

I dont want to have to think about it, I want to draw it and have it just like a gun, Boggs said. Youve got to build the muscle memory. Its all technique. Once you learn how, its all easy.

We survey a handful of clearings as we make a giant loop on the logging roads back toward Boggs truck. We walk a total of 7 miles and dont see a single elk, though the bedded-down grass and fresh poop let us know we must have just missed them.

As we near the truck, he takes me down a wooded trail that he saw mushrooms growing in earlier this year. We collect a handful of chanterelles and a large, pink coral mushroom before arriving at the gate. Looks like we wont go home empty-handed after all.

For now, its back home for some lunch, then hell head back out for a few more hours until dark. Hell return on Saturday and Sunday, too, chasing the thrill of the hunt.

Jeff Boggs draws back his $900 Bowtech Realm SR6 bow. Boggs harvested his first elk, a cow, two years ago.

See the article here:
Hunters have one final chance to bag an elk - The Daily World

MANILA, Philippines With several residents about to be displaced by the ongoing forest land clearing in the prime tourist destination of Boracay, some of them expressed their regret for paying real property taxes over the years.

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources early this month issued notices to vacate properties in areas categorized as forest lands.

At least nine people including Filipinos and expatriates were arrested in Barangay Balabag and were briefly detained for allegedly occupying or building structures in protected forest lands.

They were also charged for violation of Presidential Decree 705 or the Forestry Reform Code of the Philippines, PD 1067(Philippine Water Code), and the "25+5" or 30-meter beach easement ordinance of Malay, Aklan.

NAMRIA/Released

The ongoing clearing operations arein compliance with President Rodrigo Dutertes Executive Order 53, which also created the Boracay Inter-Agency Task Force tasked to reverse the degradation of the island.

This order follows Proclamation No. 1064 signed by then-President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo in 2006 that classifies the island into 377.68 hectares of reserved forest land for protection purposes and 628.96 hectares of agricultural land as alienable and disposable pursuant to PD 705.

However, several residents who fear the loss of their homes are arguing that they have been residing in the area before the PD was approved.

"It's crazy that people are afraid to speak up about the theft of their ancestral domain land, because they fear their own government, a Boracay resident for 10years, who refused to be named said.

Under the Republic Act No. 8371 or theThe Indigenous Peoples Rights Act of 1997,"ancestral domains "refer to all areas generally belonging toIndigenous Cultural Communities/Indigenous People(ICCs/IPs) comprising lands, inland waters, coastal areas, and natural resources therein, held under a claim of ownership, occupied or possessed by ICCs/IPs."

Section 2 of this law also indicatesthat thestate shall protect the rights of ICCs/IPs to their ancestral domains "to ensure their economic, social and cultural well being and shall recognize the applicability of customary laws governing property rights or relations in determining the ownership and extent of ancestral domain."

The investor added that the residents have followed the governments process, which includes appealing to the CommunityEnvironment and Natural Resources Office, DENR. They also submitted government-issued permits and papers evidencing their tax declarations, but did not get any response.

Will they all get that refunded? 77 years of tax declaration payments, so they can restart their lives, the resident said.

CzarEricNuque, chief of theNational Bureau of InvestigationsEnvironmental Crime Division earlier said that the law still applies to these areas. He stressed that tax declarations are not enough to claim ownership of the land.

Malay Citizens Charter, a guidebook on municipal government frontline services, also indicated this in its chapter IV.

The Tax declaration is issued for taxation purposes only and should not be considered as title to the property, the Malay government said.

According to Nuque, a tenurial instrument will permit an individual to occupy areas categorized as forest land. A tenurial instrument grants an individual a limited period of stay of around 25 up to 50 years.

Asked if the residents will be refunded of their real property tax payments, Nuque said it is not possible.

Anomalous ang pagkaka-issue ng tax declaration. Dapat may clearance muna sa Land Management Bureau na ang lupa nga ay alienable disposable. Hindi puwedeng maging alienable and disposable ang lupa at the same time ay forest land, the NBI official told Philstar.com in a text message.

(The issuance of tax declaration is anomalous. There should be a clearance with the Land Management Bureau first declaring that the land is alienable and disposable. An area cannot be alienable and disposable and at the same time be a forest land)

Nuque said that several persons colluded to issue the tax declaration documents for the forest land.

He added that it is for this reason that the NBI have sued some local government officials for issuing tax declaration illegally.

Good faith is not a defense in a special law like the Forestry Code, Nuque added.

The national government has been questioning the local government unit for allowing establishment of properties in areas declared as forest land in the past.

Interior Secretary Eduardo Ao then said the LGU should be held accountable for the crisis faced by Boracay.

The presence of commercial establishments even beyond the prescribed distance from the coastline would not be possible without building and construction permits issued by the LGU. It is their lookout, the DILG chief said in February 2018.

"Why did the LGU allow establishments to be built in areas classified as forest lands? Why did the Barangay issue the necessary clearances? This we intend to find out and soon," he added.

In May 2018, Environment Secretary Roy Cimatu also issued a warning to LGUs who are violating the law by issuing illegal tax certifications.

A Manila Standard report cited a number of irregularities in the issuance of tax declarations by local government units to individuals who are in open, continuous, exclusive, adverse and notorious possession of parcels of forestland.

The law is clear that no public officer or employee can issue a certificate of real property tax without securing a certification from the Department that the real property to be declared for taxation is alienable and disposable, Cimatu was quoted by the report as saying.

Meanwhile, apart from the concerns on the tax payments, residents and business owners in the affected area also complained about the lack of response from the government.

An investor who also refused to be named said they have received a vacate order from the DENR in April 2018, prior to the islands six-month closure.

Our lawyer responded to that letter and we have not had any official information since, the investor said.

He furthered that around September 2018, the NBI asked them to produce all the documents and permits they had.

Our lawyer wrote a letter along with all the documents and handed it to NBI in manila . They said they will contact us if they need anything else. They never contacted us again, so we assumed it was ok, the investor shared.

The Supreme Court in October 2008 ruled to classify Boracay as both forest and agricultural land that belongs to the state. This decision also junked the ownership claims of several resort owners.

READ:Boracay wholly state-owned 2008 Supreme Court ruling

The next year, the DENR gave residents a powerpoint presentation detailing the guidelines in the issuance of Forest Land Use Agreement for Tourism Purposes (FLAgT) in Boracay forest lands.

FLAgT is defined as a contract between the DENR and a natural or juridical person authorizing the latter to occupy manage develop subject to government share, any forestland of the public domain for tourism purposes and to undertake any authorized activity therein for a period of 25 and renewable for the same period upon mutual agreement by both parties.

One of the slides indicated that there is a timeline of around two weeks to issue the FLAgT.

We applied along with many other people and paid P100,000 but then never heard anything back, the investor said, despite the government's constant reiteration that it has been sending notices and show cause orders.

The investor said they were also not informed of relocation.

CENRO officer Rhodel Lababitin an interview withRadyo Todo Aklan 88.5 FMs Todo Latigo last week said that based on theBoracay Action Plan, the local government unit of Malay and provincial government are in charge of the relocation of residents.

In a press conference last week, Cimatu also reported the operations against establishment occupying protected forest lands.

Appropriate cases have been filed against them. This proves that the rule of law is paramount and law enforcement is crucial and non-negotiable, he said.

Cimatu also said a total of 249 of 339 structures or 73% have complied with the 25+5 meter easement rule.

Letter obtained by Philstar.comdated December 1 showed that Barangay Yapak chief Hector Casidsid wrote to Malay Mayor Frolibar Bautista seeking action plan on the demolition.

Casidsid cited Presidential Commission for Ureban Poor dated Sept. 29, 2020 furnished to them, which mandated prohibition on demolition and eviction during the pandemic.

Please further enlighten these people of your plans and possible remedits to address and lessen their frieds and agonies. I demand for a tangible and concrete resolution from you being the local chief executive on the matters raised," the barangay captain wrote.

The DENR chief last weeksaid the BIATF has yet to discuss the relocation of the affected residents.

While we would would like to see for ourselves the movement on this, we have yet to discuss on what to do with these people who are required to vacate their respective establishments, he said.

Cimatu during the meeting with the BIATF then suggested to delay the demolition, while also citing the pandemic. He said the DENR should first determine where the residents must be relocated.

Excerpt from:
As forest land clearing in Boracay continues, residents lament years of tax payment - Philstar.com

The former Commonwealth attorney-general said Hornsby Shire one of the most at-risk areas for bushfires in the Sydney area had its own thoroughly prepared strategy for dealing with fires that was done in collaboration with the Rural Fire Service and NSW Parks and Wildlife.

Environment Minister Matt Kean.Credit:Nick Moir

"We dont want to see any of that work undermined by essentially random and very often measures that may not have been very properly thought through, that take out substantial vegetation which we think is very special to the bushland shire," he said.

Community activist Ross Walker said he backed Cr Ruddock's position and feared the new policy would have similar impacts to the 10/50 rule, which allows for vegetation clearing in fire-prone areas without approval and has been the subject of local criticism.

"I am concerned about the loss of bushland in the shire. It's the bushland that makes the suburbs," Mr Walker said.

Last month, the NSW Parliament passed amendments to the Rural Fires Act that opened the way for people in fire-prone land to be permitted to clear swaths of bushland 25 metres from their fences to aid in fire protection.

Hornsby Shire Council mayor Philip Ruddock has concerns over the controversial fire protection policy.Credit:Nick Moir

Minister for Police and Emergency Services David Elliott said in October land clearing would be able to occur without "onerous" approvals, and the RFS would also be given "stronger and clearer powers" to audit and address bushfire risks.

This is not only the most landowner friendly legislation, but it is putting public safety above all else," Mr Elliott said at the time.

Boundary clearing was not one of 76 recommendations of the NSW Bushfire Inquiry. Instead, it was the cause of a stoush between some Nationals and Liberals within cabinet, with the former wanting landowners to have more access to national parks for hazard reduction.

The new legislation, though, requires codes to be agreed on before it can be implemented. Cabinet is due to debate those rules, with Mr Kean and Planning Minister Rob Stokes understood to be among those pushing for curbs to avoid the destruction of endangered ecosystems, including koala habitat.

Mr Elliott, who was one of the ministers Hornsby Shire council resolved to write to, declined to comment when contacted by the Herald on Thursday, as did Mr Kean.

However political sources say Mr Kean holds similar environmental concerns over the boundary clearing policy to that of Cr Ruddock. When asked whether he had spoken to Mr Kean on the issue, Cr Ruddock said he did not disclose conversations with other people.

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Nationals Leader John Barilaro also declined to comment.

Independent upper house MP Justin Field said the 25-metre clearing had no scientific or risk management basis.

"The [NSW Bushfire Inquiry] report did recommend more research into effective hazard reduction and to target hazard reduction in proximity to assets. It also called on the NSW government to support local councils to plan and implement locally targeted hazard reduction," Mr Field said.

"This policy fails to consider local council involvement."

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Angus Thompson is an Urban Affairs reporter for The Sydney Morning Herald.

Peter Hannam writes on environment issues for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.

Link:
Government split over bushfire land clearing rules - Sydney Morning Herald

(KMAland) -- As the end of the year approaches, farmers in KMAland are encouraged to stay in touch with their local Farm Service Agency office.

In addition to a number of programs that are available for producers to currently sign up, Pottawattamie County FSA Executive Director Lynette Gruchow says your local office needs to know about any changes to your operation in the past year.

"Changes that may affect the determination include a change in contract share, the addition or deletion of a farm, change in the structure of your farming operation like an individual becoming a corporation or a trust, changes in your contributions or inputs, changes in farming interests or the death of the member of an entity," said Gruchow. "Also, please let us know of any operator changes or buying or selling of land that you've done for the 2020 crop year, so that we can get these updates completed as well."

For those with land enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Program, Gruchow says it's always a good idea to touch base with your local FSA office before making any changes or improvements to the land.

"Contact should be made to the service center prior to any land clearing or drainage projects to ensure compliance," said Gruchow. "Contacting your service center prior to taking any actions can save you time and money later, as these type of violations can be very costly. Along those same lines, if you're going to be farming ground this upcoming year that was CRP in the past and is highly erodible land, you'll want to make sure that there is a conservation plan in place and that you're following that plan."

Additionally, Gruchow reminds producers that they are required to maintain CRP land according to the conservation plan on file with the USDA.

"CRP cover maintenance is the producer's responsibility," said Gruchow. "Participants shall maintain their CRP practices according to their conservation plan. This includes maintaining adequate cover to control erosion for the term of the CRP contract, maintaining compliance with noxious weed laws and controlling undesirable vegetation such as weeds and trees that pose a threat to existing cover or adversely impact other landowners in the area."

For more information or to find the contact information for your local FSA office, fsa.usda.gov.

At KMA, we attempt to be accurate in our reporting. If you see a typo or mistake in a story, please contact us by emailing kmaradio@kmaland.com.

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KMAland farmers encouraged to stay in touch with local FSA offices - KMAland