THE REAL AMERICANWOLFMAN

ED BANGS HAS BECOME SOMETHING OF A SHAPE SHIFTER, CHARMING BUT UNPREDICTABLE. HE KNOWS HOW TO STRADDLE THE DOUBLE-YELLOW LINE. BY TIM FINDLEY

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By day, on such an average sunnyafternoon as this, he seems nomore than just another federalbureaucrat. A little more dedicat-ed to fitness than most, perhaps,

as he leaves his daily noon-hour workout inthe gym, but still just a slim average-lookingman of 50 dressed in a casual shirt and khakis.He is headed back to his modest corner officein the IBM building where the federal govern-ment has rented space, and almost no one inthe consciously upscale neighborhood of cof-fee shops and boutiques in the revised oldbrownstones of downtown Helena, Mont.,takes any particular notice of him.

They don’t know him from the deepwoods of the Northern Rockies or the numb-ingly trackless winter plains of Yellowstone val-leys where his silent patience signals fear. Theyhave never seen him approaching a lonelyranch house in a clearing far back from thetimber where a family has been anxiouslywatching for hours. They are unaware that thisis an amorphous character feared and hated bymany on both sides of the issue of predatoryblood.

“Tim Findley, from RANGE,” Ed Bangsshouted in greeting from the end of the hall asI stepped off the elevator. I had announcedmyself to no one, and though I was on timefor our meeting, it seemed surprising that hewould recognize me well before I could him.

Bangs is full of unintended surprises. Fif-teen years ago, when he was made chief of theU.S. Fish & Wildlife Service gray wolf recoveryprogram, he was the darling of dreaming intel-lectuals who fantasized on romantic wildpacks returning to lurk in almost any moun-tainscape less civilized than Central Park. Nowthose same people fill their websites with vigi-lante calls for outrage against Bangs and his“killing spree.” Hardly five years ago, he wasseen by ranchers as a cold-eyed devil unmovedby the sight of torn and bloody carcasses incalving pens. Now it is he they turn to as anexpert when their need is for retribution.

Ed Bangs has become something of ashape shifter, charming but unpredictable.What else would you expect of a survivalexpert from the wilderness of Alaska whosefavorite pastimes are poetry and moderndance? Don’t get that wrong, Bangs is notlike a Grizzly Adams in tights. He is a hardyoutdoor man and the father of two who isno more afraid of a wolf than he is of anhysterical PETA representative. That is prob-ably why the government saw him as sointellectually suited for a job that seems to

straddle the double-yellow line.“Oh, yeah,” Bangs agrees, “we’re in the

middle. I mean we get run over by peoplefrom both sides all the time. But what I tellthem is that the whole wolf issue has nothingto do with wolves. It has to do with humanvalues. The average mountain lion kills twiceas much big game as a wolf in a year, and lionseven attack humans, unlike wolves. There arethousands of mountain lions and a relativefew wolves, but wolves stir up these powerfulhuman emotions, so it becomes a big politicalknock-down-drag-out issue.”

Raised in a working family in Ventura,Calif., Bangs followed an impulse to earn abachelor’s degree in game management fromUtah State University and then add a master’sin wildlife management from the University ofNevada at Reno, home of (what else?) theWolfpack. For 13 years, he was in what hecalled “the perfect job” as a federal game man-ager on the Kenai Refuge in Alaska, tracking,hunting, teaching bear and gun safety andspending as many hours on skis or in smallplanes as he did in his office. Still, in the spiritof Jack London, he found time to produce twodozen articles on his wildlife experiences. Butin 1988, just about the same time that a packof wolves found their way south of the Cana-dian border and began establishing new densin Montana, Bangs’ wife decided their familyneeded a little more of civilization. Helenawould do.

In Montana, Bangs and wolves soonbecame synonymous. As project leader forwolf recovery in the state, Bangs began thetrapping and monitoring program for U.S.Fish & Wildlife Service, touring the northernregions to encounter angry ranchers, visitinglocal colleges and community centers to offercalming presentations on the presence—andprotection-—of the legendary predators.

“There are all these dark tales and fears,but the truth is that there is no record of a wildwolf having attacked anybody in the UnitedStates,” he says.“We’d even see wolves wander-ing along in the middle of cattle herds, payingno attention to them at all. The wild ones justdidn’t seem to recognize cattle as somethingthey could eat.”

That would change, especially as the newClinton administration and Bruce Babbittbegan to see the wolf as emblematic of theirdesire to restore wilderness, beginning in thepremier park showplace of Yellowstone.

“I met Babbitt a couple of times,” Bangssays, “but whatever he was saying was all Bab-bitt himself. Like all secretaries [of the Interior]

he had his own ideas, and all he ever really saidto me was ‘good job’.”

Bangs had none of the romantic notionsBabbitt expressed of the “green fire” beingrestored in the eyes of wolves once hunted tonear extinction in the lower 48. At Kenai, thejob of game managers before Bangs had beento kill wolves, sometimes even from heli-copters, and elsewhere in Alaska it was com-mon for them to be shot whenever theythreatened livestock or protected wildlife.Wolves, to Bangs, were like big and not partic-ularly smart, dogs—understandable but notoverpowering in either their image or skills.

“Most often we would find them watchingfrom a distance. Just watching,” Bangs says.“That was part of what made them seemfrightening.”

But with the political imprimatur of Bab-bitt, the message was sent out to the public

that wolves would soon return a certainunsuspecting thrill to Yellowstone and a newbalance to nature. Bangs was given the job ofcompleting a Congressionally ordered Envi-ronmental Impact Statement on their re-introduction.

The Interior Secretary had posed andtoyed with drug-calmed captive wolvesbrought from Canada and fed in pens prior torelease. He had never seen a wolf in the wild asBangs had, and he didn’t care whether wolveshad a taste for beef for not. The report to thesecretary affirmed that it would be possible tointroduce wolf packs into Yellowstone, but italso cautioned that the supposedly “endan-gered” predator would quickly reproduce andestablish new territories that would go beyondthe park. Eventually seven packs, or at leastmating pairs, were brought in for release.

With 17 million acres of National Forestnear the park, but less than half of that suitable

Ed Bangs used to be seen by ranchers as a cold-eyeddevil unmoved by the sight of torn and bloodycarcasses in calving pens. Now it is he they turn toas an expert when their need is for retribution.

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to wolves, Bangs predicted that “sooner ratherthan later,” the packs would expand their terri-tories onto private land. He knew he wouldeventually be killing some of the same wolveshe had “saved”in the release program.

“If you look at what we predicted andwhat has happened, you can say we’re donewith wolf recovery now,” Bangs says. “ByDecember we will have met all our recoverygoals. Even now, I spend most of my timethese days working toward delisting [of thewolf from the Endangered Species Act] by see-ing that they stay recovered and that we make

some transition to state management.”That, in Bangs’ view, would include not

only the right of ranchers to protect their cattle(as they can now), but a hunting season onwolves, which Bangs predicts and supports as“the best thing that could happen.” Only thekilling of wolves by humans put the carnivoreson the endangered list to start with. Impossibleas it may be for their friends in the city to take,Bangs believes that only a managed programincluding hunting can keep them off it.

Bruce Babbitt in his cynical way knew aswell as Bangs does that depredation by wolveshas a miniscule impact on the overall cattleindustry, but Bangs was not following a politi-cal agenda as he tracked the rapid expansion ofthe packs into neighboring regions. “It’s noth-ing to the industry,” Bangs says, “but to theindividual family or small rancher, wolf depre-dation can mean disaster. We understand thatand we take it very seriously.”

In his report on the Yellowstone and Idahoreleases, Bangs had predicted that 10 percentof the wolves turned out would eventually

have to be killed because of such attacks. Up tonow, the figure is actually only about five per-cent, but it has caused howls of protest fromfanatical followers of the packs.

Recognizing the public relations value,environmental groups virtually adopted everypack of wolves released under Bangs’ program,and monitored their fate on the Internet as ifkeeping up with backwoods family members.Now they rage about the “dirty work” ofkilling the predators that attack domestic live-stock “in wolf territory.”

However much he may be correct thatwild wolves did not even initially recognizecattle as food, Bangs acknowledges that at leastsome packs have learned better. Weeks nowseldom pass when he is not contacted by arancher seeking a permit to shoot a molestingwolf or when Bangs himself is not called out toinvestigate another claim.

He can find them. He can sometimes evencall them into view, but Bangs will feel no par-ticular emotions about the wolves as eitherromantic legends or rogue killers. His job ismanagement, and he carries it out with almostfearless efficiency.

“We were gun-netting one time and thisNew Zealand guy working with us had a wolfand shouted over to me, ‘Ed, can you hold thisfor a minute!’ I took hold of the wolf by theback of its neck, thinking the Kiwi had tran-quilized it. A couple of minutes later, anotherhelicopter landed nearby to tell me something,and this wolf goes nuts. In an instant I’m hold-ing the animal by its face, not its neck, and‘boom’ he bit into my wrist and I thought Icould hear all the bones breaking. I turnedloose of him and he turned loose of me, andwe just stared at each other.” The wolf wasrecaptured, tagged and released. Bangs laterwent to the emergency room. No bones bro-ken, just puncture wounds.

Of such survived encounters are other leg-ends born. Bangs has surely heard them all.Earlier this year, he was invited to Sweden,where in the dim arctic forests perhaps themost scary stories were first told and stillendure. Wolves had virtually disappeared fromScandinavia as well, until packs appearedrecently from Finland and Russia, touching offdebates among livestock and wildlife managersmuch like that in the United States.

“There is evidence in Sweden that wolvesmay have attacked people even recently,”Bangssays,“but some of those attacks may have beenby hybrid wolf-dogs or rabid wolves.”

And there is where myth and wild realitymay somehow strangely converge. Bangs andnearly all experts agree that the far more dan-

gerous creature, and one even the HumaneSociety agrees should be eliminated, is thehybrid wolf-dog—the ferocious pet someonethought could be born of mating wild anddomestic species.

Apart from Bangs’ territory, in the south-western U.S., hybrids are now suspected ofbeing among Mexican gray wolves being rein-troduced. If so, the hybrids are doomed.

Bangs, however, regards his own job asalmost finished. “His” wolves have expandedtheir territories and packs into and out of Yel-lowstone just as he predicted they would. Anargument goes on that depredation has seri-ously reduced the elk herds in the park, butBangs points to similar calf losses in the lastfew years among elk outside the wolf areas.The Yellowstone packs and those in centralIdaho are established and certain. Their num-bers alone will command consideration fordelisting as among endangered species, andthen it will be up to the states to determinehow best to live with a reestablished legendand a twisted political emblem. Reluctantlyuneasy about taking over a federal headache,Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming are currentlydrafting their own wolf management pro-grams in anticipation of delisting.

“There will still be people who say thereshould be no wolves, but they are a tinyminority. There will be people arguing forwolves everywhere, and that’s a tiny minority.We’re going to have wolves. The question ishow many can we have and what’s a tolerablelevel. Wolves are a very adaptable animal, butit’s us who are going to have to decide wherewe’re going to let them live and where theywon’t be tolerated,” says Bangs, who himselfstill holds that ultimate authority.

He’s divorced now and immensely proudof being a single parent to his two daughters.Urbane and articulate, he is a sort of manabout town in Helena with a uniquely roman-tic job that regularly takes him off into thewilderness he loves. The little office he has inthe IBM building can’t avoid evidence of theexuberance of the federal printing office insplashing wolves across covers of their reports.But strangely, there are no pictures in his officeof Bangs himself in an encounter with thecanines.

We drove out north of Helena into awooded canyon for a picture that might puthim in a more natural setting, and I chose thesite near a small stream.

“Oh yeah, this is fine,” says the Americanwolfman.“In fact, there’s a pack that has a denjust over that mountain there.”

I had to wonder how he could be so sure. ■

Rocky Mountain Wolf Recovery Report

By the end of 2001, estimates were of at least 34 packsof wolves in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming. Federalestimates counted 261 wolves in the Central IdahoRecovery Area, 218 in the Greater Yellowstone Areaand 84 in the Montana Recovery Area. By states, thatwas broken down to 251 wolves in Idaho, 189 inWyoming, and 123 in Montana.

In 2001, 40 cattle, 138 sheep, 6 dogs and 4 llamaswere confirmed as having been taken by wolves; 19were killed and 18 “translocated” in that same period.Total figures between 1987 and 2001 list 188 cattle,494 sheep, and 43 dogs killed by wolves. One hundredseventeen molesting wolves have been moved else-where. One hundred three wolves have been killed,including three legally shot by ranchers.

In December of 2001, there were 563 wolvesknown to be living in the region. In the spring of 2002,at least 150 to 200 wolf pups were born in those packs.

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Just when you think things can’t get anycrazier along comes a fresh example ofthe world turned upside down. Envi-

ronmentalists are suing the federal govern-ment to enforce the Endangered Species Actand the Clean Water Act. Nothing new here,but these environmentalists aren’t suing thegovernment to enforce the acts against ranch-ers, farmers, miners or loggers. They’re suingto force the government to enforce the actagainst itself. This particular lawsuit couldpossibly bring about uniform enforcement of,and even congressional rewriting of, the ESA.

The Potomac River, flowing into Chesa-peake Bay from the Appalachians, is breedingground to the few remaining short-nosedsturgeon. At one time, the sturgeon was sopopulous that no less a figure than GeorgeWashington made a significant income fromharvesting the fish for commercial uses. Thesturgeon are anadromous fish, which meansthey migrate from fresh-water spawninggrounds to the sea and back. The Potomac, anAmerican Heritage River, is also metropolitanD.C.’s source of drinking water.

The National Wilderness Institute (NWI),headquartered in Washington, D.C., is spear-heading an attempt to save the endangeredshort-nosed sturgeon in the Potomac River.NWI Executive Director Rob Gordon says themanner in which D.C. treats its water supplyis unique in all of the United States. “If youwant to find a water treatment facility operat-ing this way you’d have to go to a Third Worldcountry.”

The Army Corps of Engineers operatesthe Washington Aqueduct. Water from themuddy river is diverted into holding basinswhere aluminum sulfate is added. Thechemical attracts solids suspended in thewater and causes them to “clump” togetherand sink to the bottom. The remaining clari-fied water is siphoned off for further treat-ment before finding its way into the city’splumbing. Eventually the solids begin to fill

up the basin and must be removed.Tom Jacobus, manager of the treatment

plant, says this method of treating municipalwater supplies is common. Jacobus, a mandedicated to providing the best water at thebest price to our nation’s capital, says sludge(referred to as “solids” in water treatmentindustry terms) is usually removed by truckand used as landfill or routed to sewage treat-ment plants for further processing. Every daythe Corps dumps the equivalent of 15 dumptrucks of sludge from the Washington Aque-duct into the Potomac River. By some esti-mates that’s 200,000tons annually.Habitat RiverThe Potomac is oneof the major riversflowing into Chesa-peake Bay, itself ahabitat for manyendangered species.According to docu-ments filed in NWI’slawsuit, dischargesfrom the Washing-ton Aqueduct arenot the commonlyallowed 20- to 30-milligrams-per-literstandard for sus-pended solids ad-hered to by similarfacilities in nearbyMaryland and Vir-ginia. The levels inD.C. are even higher, significantly higher,sometimes reaching 44,900 milligrams-per-liter and beyond.

The permit to operate the water treat-ment facility and giving license to the dump-ing of waste into the Potomac was issued bythe Environmental Protection Agency’sregion three, headquartered in Philadelphia.The permit expired in 1994 and the treat-

ment plant has been working under anadministrative extension ever since.

The extension is open-ended and has noset limits for the amount of solids that can beflushed into the river. The only considerationswhen dumping are that the pH balance of theeffluent must be maintained at a requiredlevel and the Potomac must be flowing at aminimum gallons-per-hour rate. There areno regulations applied to the amount ofchromium, lead or arsenic discharged. Gor-don says permit extensions are not unusual.He does say, however, extensions running for

almost a decade are very unusual.“When discharge takes place, there’s a

black plume that shoots out across the river,”says Gordon. “It smells like an outhouse.We’ve seen carcasses of beavers coated in thisviscous slime.” Fishermen in the area reportslim pickings anytime a discharge takes place.Gordon also says this dumping of water treat-ment sludge into the Potomac is nothing

A Third RateRomanceD.C.’S AFFLUENT ARE DEEP IN THEIR OWN EFFLUENT, THANKS TO THE EPA. BY DON A. WRIGHT

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short of bio-fraud in the Beltway.Not so, says Jacobus. “We are operating

under all state and federal laws. And we rec-ognize the need to act responsibly towards theenvironment. We spend a lot of time on engi-neering and safety practices.” He adds thathe’s not in a position to address the broaderpolitical issues.Sounds FamiliarIn a scenario with which many westernerswith federal grazing permits and water rightscan identify, NWI’s pending lawsuit placesJacobus in a bit of a jam. His job is to run theplant to the best of his abilities in accordancewith guidelines set forth by the EPA and othergovernment agencies. At the same time, theWashington Aqueduct treatment plant has topay for itself through the sale of treated waterto the municipalities that contract with it. Itreceives no taxpayer subsidies. The fact thatthe facility is entirely on federal land (includ-ing a national park) and run by the ArmyCorps of Engineers is, in his words, “…anaccident of history.”

What’s not an accident of history is theuneven enforcement of the ESA. An editorialpublished in The Wall Street Journal, January10, 2002 stated, “According to a 1999 reportfrom the House Resources Committee, while543 species were listed in the five Far WestStates, only 39 were listed in the Northeast.” It

went on to say 96 species were found to havecritical habitats in the West. There were onlynine in the East. The Journal opined, “Funnyhow all of those ‘endangered animals’ chooseto live in only one-half the country.”

In testimony to the House ResourcesCommittee on March 20, 2002 Gordon stat-ed,“Those who have seen Draconian enforce-ment of the ESA in their districts maywonder why there is apparently so little con-flict between rare species and human activi-ties in other areas. They may be surprised tolearn that in the government’s own backyard,ESA is simply not enforced the way it is else-where. Here [in the East], the benefit of thedoubt is not given to the endangered species.Here, economic considerations outweighspecies protection. Here, science, or what pur-ports to be science, is employed to providecover so that needed projects can proceedunimpeded by the ESA.”

Sam Hamilton, former U.S. Fish &Wildlife Services’ director in Texas, says, “Theincentives are wrong. If I have a rare metal onmy property, its value goes up. But if a rarebird occupies the land, its value disappears.”

The issue of value has not gone unnoticedby the locals. The Washington Aqueducttreatment plant is in the midst of one ofD.C.’s most affluent neighborhoods. The Pal-isades area is home to senators and ambas-

sadors. Area residents have formed a groupcalled Citizens for Responsible Urban Dispos-al at Dalecarlia (CRUDD). Dalecarlia is one ofthe reservoirs that make up the WashingtonAqueduct facility.NIMBYIt’s a classic case of Not In My Back Yard(NIMBY). The NWI lawsuit cites a letterCRUDD wrote warning D.C.’s then mayor-elect Anthony Williams that elimination ofthe Corps’ discharges would “reduce the qual-ity of the neighborhood and thus the value ofour homes.” The letter told Williams “to becautious when the environmental advisorscome to you advocating the lofty, commend-able goal of stopping ‘environmental releases’into the Potomac.”

The suit also cites a letter written byPatrick Shaughness, a D.C. advisory neigh-borhood commissioner, who wrote, “I amconcerned that the permitting process so farhas not reflected the special consideration theAqueduct has been granted by law. Because ofthe unique nature of [the] Aqueduct and itsDalecarlia Water Treatment Plant, specialprocedures described below are required bylaw in considering the re-issuance of a permitit currently holds to make discharges back

The Potomac flows into Chesapeake Bay from the Appalachians and is breeding ground to the endangeredshort-nosed sturgeon. This “American Heritage River” is also metro D.C.’s source of drinking water. About200,000 tons of sludge are dumped into the river annually—by our government. What say, ESA?

What can I do to help? A question asked throughout the ages. Several quickresponses dangle like cattails with broken stems.Pray. That’s always a good one. Write, phone ande-mail your senator and representative. This pro-vides feedback and raises awareness.

Congressman George Radanovich, a wine-grape grower, understands feedback from con-stituents. His hometown is an unincorporated ruralcommunity in a small county by the same namecalled Mariposa. It’s near the western entrance ofYosemite National Park.

Radanovich has served almost eight years inCongress and you might think that he’s jaded bynow. When asked what can be done to helpstraighten out the ESA to better represent all Ameri-cans he says, “Money.” Nothing new there from anelected official. Except he asked that the money besent to the National Wilderness Institute, not himor his campaign. “The NWI is taking on tremen-dous legal expenses going up against the govern-ment.”

Contact the NWI at <www.nwi.org> or writeto: National Wilderness Institute, 25766 George-town Station, Washington, DC 20007.

Radanovich is sponsoring a bill titled HR 472,an act to change how the ESA is enforced. You canfind it at <www.radanovich.house.gov>. Read itand let the Congressman know what you think.Improving government doesn’t always take morevoices—sometimes it just needs louder voices.

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into the river.”The special procedures Shaughness

referred to are, “If the discharges are nolonger permitted, which amount to approxi-mately 200 wet tons per day of effluent, myneighbors and I will bear the consequences ofthe alternative disposal methods, which mayinclude extensive construction for a ‘solidsrecovery facility’ and trucking in massive 40-ton dump trucks.”

“Boo-hoo” some might say. Federal regu-lations have been tormenting westerners withred tape and declining property values fordecades. This tormenting has also not goneunnoticed by western lawmakers.Notice GivenRepresentative George Radanovich of Cali-fornia, whose district includes YosemiteNational Park, has long recognized the dis-crepancy between the EPA’s enforcement oflaw in the West as opposed to its enforcementof the law in the East.

“In 1997 there was a flood near Sacra-mento, Calif. A levy broke and three peoplewere killed,” says Radanovich. “The wateragency in charge of the levy had waited sixyears for a permit to reinforce the levy. Anywork towards reinforcement was delayedbecause of an endangered beetle. Yet threepeople lost their lives.”

In an editorial published in The Washing-ton Times, February 6, 2001, Radanovichwrote, “Why this indifference to violations?Rural and western communities have longnoticed that laws such as the ESA have beenzealously enforced against them, often withdevastating effects on their communities,while the Act never seems to be applied in theurban East.”

Radanovich points out that a large part ofthe problem was the result of questionablepriorities. “A recent study by the HouseResources Committee found hundreds ofspecies had been proposed or were candidatesfor listing in the West while only five addi-tional species were in the listing pipeline inthe Northeast. A major reason for this absurddisparity is revealed by the staffing decisionsmade by the Fish & Wildlife Service. Thereare several hundred ESA enforcement officialsstationed in the West. The Northeast, by con-trast, had only 31 such employees.”Ludicrous LogicOn Wednesday, June 19, 2002, the fullResources Committee of the House of Repre-sentatives held a hearing about the dumpingof D.C.’s water treatment sludge into thePotomac. The hearing was significant for sev-eral reasons. Interior Secretary Gail Norton’s

office submitted written testimony voicingconcern over the EPA’s science and expresseda desire to terminate the discharges. An inter-nal EPA memo said the dumping of sludge“actually protects the fish in that they are notinclined to bite (and get eaten by humans)but they go ahead with their upstream move-ment and egg laying.”

“This is one of the most frighteningexamples of bureaucratic ineptitude andbackward logic I have ever seen,” saysRadanovich, who is chairman of the subcom-mittee on national parks, recreation and pub-lic lands.“To suggest that toxic sludge is goodfor fish because it prevents them from beingcaught by man is like suggesting that we clubbaby seals to death to prevent them frombeing eaten by sharks. It’s ludicrous.”

The weighing in by the Department ofthe Interior is forcing the light of publicawareness on the EPA and the Army Corps ofEngineers. According to a Capitol Hill staffer,with the exception of the National WildernessInstitute, environmental groups were con-spicuous by their absence. No representativesfrom the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, Save OurStreams or any of the other usual “greens”were present at the hearing. The staffer alsosaid it was telling that while the hearing wascovered by national media, The WashingtonPost hadn’t touched the story yet. The Poto-mac is dredged to allow barge traffic, eventhough this upsets the natural habitat. TheWashington Post’s newsprint is delivered bybarge—a less expensive means of transporta-tion than rail or truck.Final OutcomePrognosticators with a bent towards legalitypredict the lawsuit is a win-win situation. IfNWI loses, legal precedence (allowing mas-sive dumping of effluents) will be set to suchintolerably low standards that an outcry inthe environmental community could triggera congressional rewrite of the ESA.

On the other hand, if NWI wins, theresult for the Washington elites will be 40-tondump trucks hauling unpleasant-smellingsludge through their neighborhood—a smalltaste of the inconvenience rural western com-munities experience day-in-and-day-out. Thehope is lawmakers will see the relationshipbetween water, property values and govern-ment interference. It’s telling that both Gor-don and Jacobus want the lawsuit to mirrorthe pleas of westerners. Says Jacobus, “Theoutcome must be science-based. We need arational process, not a feel good solution.” ■

Don Wright is a freelancer from Clovis, Calif.

to continue work on recovering and protect-ing the land. The South Dakota StockgrowersAssociation is working in conjunction withother groups to try to educate organizationsand individuals who—under the guise of“environmentalism”—are attempting to addthe prolific prairie dog to the endangeredspecies list.

Some in South Dakota and other stateshave mentioned incentive payments forlandowners willing to lose healthy rangelandby allowing prairie dogs to flourish. “First thegovernment tries to get rid of the pests, thenthe next thing you know they want to use ourtax dollars to pay people to raise them,” saysCuny.“It doesn’t make any sense.”

Land inhabited by an established colony ofprairie dogs resembles an area that has beenafflicted with an extreme case of overgrazingcombined with drought. If any livestock pro-ducer treated his land that poorly, he would beout of business in a heartbeat. Especially in adry year. The drought that covered most ofSouth Dakota in the summer of 2002 onlyworsens the problem. Nothing but cactus isgrowing in many areas inhabited by dogs.

“I manage my land to make it as produc-tive as possible,” Cuny says. “If I overgraze orallow my cattle to damage waterways, I onlyhurt myself in the long run. I care for my landso as to maintain or improve the forage andwaterways every year. It’s just common busi-ness sense.”

But prairie dogs don’t share Cuny’s philos-ophy on caring for the range. “They clip offevery blade of grass within their dog town toeliminate protection for predators. Mean-while, the grass dies, the soil blows and washesaway, and even local wildlife such as deer andantelope are forced to look elsewhere for for-age because there is simply nothing left.” ■

Carrie Longwood is executive director of SouthDakota Stockgrowers Association. The SDSGAwas instrumental in blocking a proposed state“prairie dog management plan” which wouldhave drastically interfered with landowners’abilities to manage their own land for productivi-ty. Prairie dogs are in no way “endangered” oreven “threatened.” The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Ser-vice estimates 160,000 acres of active prairie dogcolonies in South Dakota. According to the Mon-tana Shooting Sports Association there are over10 million prairie dogs in 11 western states plus“uncountable” numbers in Mexico and Canada.

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