Leading up to the American Revolution, Great Britain relied heavily on its Royal Navy, and in order to build and maintain this huge fleet of ships, they needed trees. By the late 17^th century, the British had nearly depleted their own timber resources, and so they began harvesting and exporting Eastern white pines from Colonial New England.

Under the Mast Preservation Clause in the Massachusetts Charter in 1691, Britain laid claim to any white pine measuring 24 inches in diameter or greater, and in 1722 a law passed in New Hampshire made it illegal to cut down white pines measuring 12 inches or more. The “mast pines”, as they were named for their suitability as single-stick masts and booms, were identified by a Surveyor of the King’s Woods, and marked with a broad arrow for exporting to England.

The colonists resented the restrictions on the timber they used for their needs and livelihoods, and many continued to harvest the marked trees. The law caused more anger and backlash than the Stamp Act or even the Tea Tax and eventually resulted in the Pine Tree Riot of 1772.

Colonists Protest with Pine Tree Riot

After being fined and refusing to pay for harvesting trees marked with the broad arrow, a New Hampshire mill owner, along with other mill owners and townsmen, assaulted the Sheriff and his Deputy by lashing them with tree switches, cutting off their horses’ ears, manes and tails, and forcing them out of town through a jeering crowd.

Occurring almost two years prior to the more well-known Boston Tea Party, the Pine Tree Riot was one of the first acts of forceful resistance against British royal authority by the American colonists, and among the disputes that culminated in the American Revolution.

"A key focus for The Rewilding Institute is to be a portal for people to step through, so they go from watching nature shows on TV to getting outside and involved to help rewild nature.” – Dave Foreman

Rewilding shows us that we don’t have to put up with the continued crash of wildlife species and exploitation of wild places, that not everything is collapsing. We can advance continental-scale actions that are bigger, better, and wilder.

Dave Foreman never saw conservation as a partisan issue. He taught us to sit across the table from anyone willing to protect nature. Listening to him was a masterclass in how bipartisan support can get big things done, from wilderness bills and national park creation to endangered species protections.

While we aren’t naive about the current political temperature, we are optimistic that wilderness restoration can transcend politics.

In the weeks, months, and years to come, we will dig in our claws to relentlessly protect wildlife and wild ways, carnivores and connectivity. And we will continue to foster a bold, hopeful vision for the future. - Rewilding Institute

The old wolf was in a bad way. Eating that porcupine was a big mistake, but there were even bigger troubles just ahead. Mike Taras shows us a wolf at the intersection of wildlife mortality investigations and wolf research in Alaska in Alaska Fish and Wildlife News

Join a team of wildlife researchers as they stalk and catch a Steller sea lion in Prince William Sound - see how they do it and why.

It’s a tough, warm, floating, bug-resistant coat that changes with the seasons. There’s air in the hair – and more. Jen Curl offers insights into the moose’s fabulous fur coat in the latest "Ask a Wildlife Biologist." - Riley Woodford riley.woodford@alaska.gov

An auction will be held that could desecrate the pristine wilderness of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge with oil wells. It's going to be the fight of a lifetime to keep this place safe for polar bears, caribou, Arctic foxes and the many other animals who live there. Thanks to a generous champion of the Arctic, your gift will be matched. The last time an auction like this was held, just days before Trump left office in 2021, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge was sold off for only $25 an acre.

In addition to the 2021 lease sale, the 2017 Tax Act passed under Trump mandates a second auction for oil leases in the refuge. That sale will be happening Jan. 9. And the fight is only going to ramp up. It will be up to the Trump administration to oversee any subsequent permitting, exploration and development. The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is the last place that should be plundered by greedy corporate interests and ruined with oil wells.

The Center for Biological Diversity will be on the ground in Alaska to defend and hold the line against private profiteers. We're already in court fighting the Willow project, which would turn Alaska's Western Arctic Reserve — one of the largest, most intact wild places in the world — into an oilfield. The majestic Arctic landscape has to be protected to avoid worsening the extinction and climate crises. - Center for Biological Diversity

Rachael Carson was a great person. She had personal power. Some call it the power-of-one. Carson expressed her power in a book called Silent Spring. Because of her work, we still have the beauty of songbirds in our lives.

Silent Spring began with a “fable for tomorrow” – a true story using a composite of examples drawn from many real communities where the use of DDT had caused damage to wildlife, birds, bees, agricultural animals, domestic pets, and even humans. Carson used it as an introduction to a very scientifically complicated and already controversial subject. This “fable” made an indelible impression on readers and was used by critics to charge that Carson was a fiction writer and not a scientist.

Carson’s passionate concern in Silent Spring is with the future of the planet and all life on Earth. She calls for humans to act responsibly, carefully, and as stewards of the living earth.

Silent Spring suggested a needed change in how democracies and liberal societies operated so that individuals and groups could question what their governments allowed others to put into the environment. Far from calling for sweeping changes in government policy, Carson believed the federal government was part of the problem. She admonished her readers and audiences to ask, “Who Speaks, And Why?” and therein to set the seeds of social revolution. She identified human hubris and financial self-interest as the crux of the problem and asked if we could master ourselves and our appetites to live as though we humans are an equal part of the earth’s systems and not the master of them.

Carson expected criticism, but she did not expect to be personally vilified by the chemical industry and its allies in and out of government. She spent her last year's courageously defending the truth of her conclusions until her untimely death in 1964.

Dead pool on the Colorado River is defined as the level of Lake Powell behind Glen Canyon Dam when the lowest tunnels on the dam allowing water to be released into the Grand Canyon would be above the reservoir level and part of the reservoir would remain, a stagnant pool. No water could be released, and this would threaten endangered species in the Grand Canyon, affect the industry of river recreation there, and impact the lives of millions of people who rely on Colorado River water in Nevada, Arizona, California, and northwest Mexico. Lake Powell would still reach one hundred miles upstream, and billions of gallons of water would be trapped in the reservoir. Glen Canyon would stay at least partially drowned.

The American Southwest is in the grip of a prolonged drought, called the Millennium Drought, that has lowered the level of Lake Powell to a level close to dead pool, an unimaginable situation to those who originally conceived and constructed the dam in a relatively moist Colorado River watershed period. The story of Colorado River exploitation is an oft told and familiar one, its history reviewed in a chapter titled “This Dam is Your Dam.” The story told in Life After Dead Pool is that of a Glen Canyon emerging from Lake Powell as inflows shrink, water levels drop, silt deposition continues, and parts of the flooded canyon are revealed.

In this book, he takes the reader on many journeys to the receding Lake Powell, explaining what he is experiencing in the changing Glen Canyon National Recreation Area (GCNRA). Between 2000 and 2021, Lake Powell’s surface area shrank to just over a third of its original size, exposing over one hundred thousand acres of land. Podmore visits some of this restored land, joining scientists studying what is emerging and folks like the Moab-based Returning Rapids Project, who see Glen Canyon and a portion of the Colorado River returning to some of their former beauties. He is among those who hope, without removing the dam, the river and Canyon can be restored, a remarkable place that should have become a national park seventy years ago. - Read Full Article

The Payette Land Trust and Wilderness Land Trust recently partnered to protect a 94-acre private inholding within Idaho’s Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness.

At 2.3 million acres, the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness is the largest wilderness area in the lower 48 states and is home to over 180 miles of the free-flowing Salmon River. Its large, connected habitats are rich in biodiversity with over 280 species of mammals, fish, birds, reptiles, and amphibians.

The Annie Creek property is located near the western edge of the wilderness area, approximately 40 miles from McCall, Idaho. Surrounded by the steep, forested terrain characteristic of the wilderness area, the Annie Creek property includes gentler slopes and flat potential building sites, which along with its proximity to a well-maintained road made it particularly vulnerable to development. Private inholdings within designated wilderness, such as Annie Creek, carry none of the protections of the surrounding lands, and can be subject to further development. The property was purchased from a private owner by the two land trusts with the goal of permanent protection from development and was made possible by generous support from the Leuthold Foundation.

Annie Creek is the 12th property protected by the Wilderness Land Trust in Idaho, totaling over 1,300 acres.

Reimagining Conservation: Shifting Focus and the Importance of Natural Capital

In this episode of the Rewilding Earth podcast, Jack interviews Paul Ehrlich, a passionate advocate for rewilding and conservation. Paul discusses the need to shift conservation focus from species extinction to population extermination and the importance of natural capital. He delves into various topics, including the historical impacts on biodiversity, the importance of reducing the human enterprise’s scale, and the role universities should play in promoting sustainable practices. Throughout, Paul emphasizes the urgency of addressing environmental challenges and highlights the necessity for greater public awareness and action. - Episode 137: Saving Nature's Populations and Ourselves

Paul Ehrlich is the Bing Professor of Population Studies, Emeritus, and founder of the Center for Conservation Biology at Stanford. He has carried out field, laboratory, and theoretical research on the dynamics and genetics of insect populations, the evolutionary interactions of plants and herbivores, the behavioral ecology of birds and reef fishes, the effects of crowding on human beings, human cultural evolution, and health problems related to industrialization. He is the author and co-author of more than 1,100 scientific papers and articles and over 40 books. Ehrlich is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, and a Foreign Member of the Royal Society. He has appeared on over 1,000 TV and radio programs and was a correspondent for NBC News.

On the Thunder Basin National Grassland of northeastern Wyoming, the livestock industry has been pursuing an aggressive campaign to expand poisoning and shooting of prairie dogs. And in 2020, the Forest Service gave them a plan amendment that radically expanded prairie dog killing, and eliminated a special designation of a Black-footed Ferret Reintroduction Area to boot. Yesterday, the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals sided with Western Watersheds Project, Rocky Mountain Wild and WildEarth Guardians, and struck down the Forest Plan amendment.

Unfortunately, the court punted on the substantive claim, that the Forest Service is violating the Endangered Species Act and only ruled on the NEPA claims. So the Forest Service just needs to start the process over again. - Read More

"I had a friend at the University of Michigan who was an ichthyologist and a paleontologist, Jerry Smith, who found and studied cutthroat trout fossils in fossil beds in the west. The cutthroat trout lineage is 3 to 16 million years old and predated the Sierra Nevada uplift, and when the climate became drier and as the lakes shrank these trout continued to live and spawn in the remnants of the lakes and in the former tributaries to Lake Lahontan. Genetically they became diverse, but most of the original Lahontan cutthroat trout populations have been eliminated from these streams.

Cutthroat trout survived all the massive vagaries of climate and habitat changes over millions of years, but in the 1870s cattle were moved into the Great Basin Desert. Lahontan cutthroat trout had diverged into a highly distinct form, and its numbers were already declining in the lakes and rivers due to heavy fishing pressure, but the destruction of their spawning sites in mountain streams and creeks was the death knell.

In 1800, more than 7400 miles of stream habitat was occupied or had the potential to be occupied by LCT (USFWS 2009). LCT now officially occupy 12% of their original range, an overestimation because some populations are entirely hatchery fish, augmented regularly. (USFWS 2022 page 7). In 2010 the United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) estimated that LCT occupied 8.6% of their historic range. (USFWS 2010)

LCT were listed as a Threatened Species under the ESA in 1975 and entitled to Priority Habitat which was never designated; they are also the State Fish of Nevada. (USFWS 1995) Priority Habitats are those with unique or significant value to a large number of species or to listed species. However, there are no enforced protections for Priority Habitat – any protections are at the discretion of the land agencies." - Karen Klitz - Read More

For all those in service to ATWA and the Sun. We congregate through the Man of Sun.

This was spoken and not recorded, so her words are paraphrased to best of ability.

“Prison kills you. Serving long terms incarcerated, real sentences of 20, 30 years and more - kill the body. It's essentially impossible and of great difficulty to counteract. Almost all the time of your day is confined to a closet made of concrete and metal. It's almost impossible to exercise in it, there's only really room to sit or lay. You have to actively think of ways to get your body moving so it doesn't deplete, without getting bored. The environment inside a prison is clinical and sterile. They are mandated and instructed to overuse multiple harsh, toxic, chemical cleansers and disinfectants to mop floors and wash walls daily. Nothing exists. Pesticides kill what insects the cleaning agents didn't. The disinfectants and bleach kill all the bacteria, and all your food options are a choice of one processed package food or the other... there's no nutrition... and everything is heated and radiated in microwaves. No one dies of old age or natural causes in prison. There's nothing natural about it. Your body cannot live without bacteria. Your digestive system is dependent on beneficial bacteria in order to live. You die without it. The prisons are so sanitized that no bacteria can exist. You can feel it inside you. It's no surprise at all that his stomach and intestines are corroded. It is remarkable that he survived and avoided it this long! Your only options are to order some yogurt when it’s available, trade for it or to order a probiotic supplement when it's available; but that wasn't popular yet when I was in jail and wasn't available like it is now.”

“Go to your medicine cabinet. And look at all the things in your medicine cabinet that says “we kill 99% of the germs” – And realize that you are a germ. And what all those chemicals are doing that you’re passing out, they’re selling you to pass all those chemicals out because Proctor and Gamble has been trying to destroy all of you all the way down the line. We’re all the way back to the beginning of the ending, for each time it ended it began again. And no one wanted to accept the fact that, this is the Inner Sanctum. We’re standing a hundred years ago, looking into your gas chamber.”

Yule, Christmas, etc. has always been a time of warmth and neighborly charity throughout human history. We can honor that thought by doing a charitable act for those imprisoned around the world. Whether individually on a personal level or supporting actions for the betterment of inmate conditions and treatment. Regardless of the circumstances – the people in the jails and prisons of the world deserve humane treatment and regard. This subject is heavy on the hearts of those in the thought of ATWA. Charles Manson essentially served his life incarcerated. Lynette Fromme served 34 years in federal imprisonment. Bobby Beausoleil has been in prison for 48 years. Patricia Krenwinkle, Leslie Van Houten and Tex Watson have served 47 years. Bruce Davis served roughly 47 year. Susan Atkins died in 2009 serving nearly 40 years. Steve Grogan was paroled after 14 years. Sandra Good was imprisoned for 10 years. Mary Brunner served 6 years. Catherine Share served 5.

May our spirits be lifted and love one another. CM is alive in our love and on the wings of the birds. He brought us all here together today; as Brother and Sister of ATWA, under the Sun.

This week another gap in Colorado’s Collegiate Peaks Wilderness was mended as The Wilderness Land Trust transferred the 19-acre Panama Principal Lode to be added to the wilderness area.

With the transfer completed, the threat of development has been removed from the property, and the wilderness area has been made more whole. The Collegiate Peaks Wilderness is located between Leadville, Aspen, and Crested Butte, and is a prime example of sensitive alpine habitat. With eight 14,000’+ peaks within it, it has the highest average elevation of any designated wilderness in the lower 48 states and includes 40 miles of the Continental Divide. Dwarfed krummholz trees dot the landscape, growing in twisted shapes, sheltered from the wind by surrounding rocks, showing how extreme the environment is within this high alpine terrain. Only

the hardiest animals make this landscape their home. In fact, in 2009 a male wolverine was spotted in the Collegiate Peaks, the first confirmed sighting in the state since 1919.

The 19-acre Panama Principal Lode property adjoins and builds off the success of two other Trust projects: the Grandview Lode which was added to the wilderness in 2019, and Spotted Tail Lode which is awaiting transfer. While they are all relatively small properties, their cumulative impact grows as we eliminate more and more inholdings throughout the Collegiate Peaks and nearby wilderness areas. Protection of the Panama Principal Lode also benefits recreation in this popular area, with public access now ensured on the Green Mountain Trail, which runs through the property. The property is also within the viewshed of the scenic Hwy 82 as it climbs to Independence Pass.

This is the 14th property in the Collegiate Peaks Wilderness that the Trust has protected.

Under a legal agreement secured by the Center for Biological Diversity and allies, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has proposed to protect 1.9 million acres of critical habitat for Florida manatees and about 78,000 for Antillean manatees in Puerto Rico.

These laid-back sea mammals’ critical habitat has been the same size since 1976 — and we’ve been fighting to fix that since 2008, when we petitioned the Service to revise the protected area. The agency found in 2010 that revisions were needed but failed to act, even as manatees started dying in record numbers. So in 2022 we sued to challenge the delay.

“Officials recently resorted to emergency feeding to try to keep these animals from starving to death from seagrass declines,” said the Center’s Ragan Whitlock, based in Florida. “Truly protecting manatees’ home is the most important step on their road to recovery.”

On Tuesday the Center for Biological Diversity and allies sued the Fish and Wildlife Service for missing its deadline to respond to our 2022 petition to protect hippopotamuses under the Endangered Species Act.

Wild hippos are in a precarious position because of habitat loss, drought, poaching, and the international trade in their body parts — from teeth, skulls, and ivory to skins and meat — mainly driven by U.S. demand. Federal protection would help shield them from U.S.-fueled exploitation.

Malathion is a neurotoxin — part of a dangerous class of pesticides that have also been used in chemical warfare. And yet, the Fish and Wildlife Service decided two years ago, it doesn’t pose an extinction risk to a single protected U.S. species.

So the Center for Biological Diversity just sued over the Service’s failure to protect more than 1,500 species of wildlife and plants from malathion.

“Vulnerable animals and plants keep being harmed by one of the worst neurotoxic pesticides on the market — and that includes nearly every endangered butterfly, beetle, and dragonfly,” said the Center’s Lori Ann Burd.

For those of you not in Montana, you may not be familiar with the editorials of George Ochenski. He was an environmental and tribal lobbyist at the Montana legislature for 22 years and wrote, funded and passed many of the significant environmental bills in Montana during those decades. He is Montana's longest-running columnist and a longtime environmental activist, concerned with keeping Montana's natural beauty clean and safe. He writes from Helena and appears in the Daily Montanan weekly. - Daily Montanan

Biodiversity sustains human life and underpins our societies. Yet every indicator that tracks the state of nature
on a global scale shows a decline.

Over the past 50 years (1970–2020), the average size of monitored wildlife populations has shrunk by 73%,
as measured by the Living Planet Index (LPI). This is based on almost 35,000 population trends and 5,495
species of amphibians, birds, fish, mammals and reptiles. Freshwater populations have suffered the heaviest
declines, falling by 85%, followed by terrestrial (69%) and marine populations (56%).

At a regional level, the fastest declines have been seen in Latin America and the Caribbean – a concerning
95% decline – followed by Africa (76%) and the Asia and the Pacific (60%).

Declines have been less dramatic in Europe and Central Asia (35%) and North America (39%), but this reflects the fact that large-scale impacts
on nature were already apparent before 1970 in these regions: some populations have stabilized or increased thanks to conservation efforts and species reintroductions. Habitat degradation and loss, driven primarily by our food system, is the most reported threat in each region, followed by overexploitation, invasive species
and disease.

News from the Center for Biological Diversity: We have successfully raised $2 million to build wildlife crossings in red wolf territory.

In May, an anonymous donor issued a $2 million match challenge to build wildlife crossings across U.S. 64, a highway that runs through the heart of red wolf country. For the past eight months, the Center for Biological Diversity, Wildlands Network, and the Save Red Wolves coalition have been fundraising to meet the match. On December 17, we achieved the $2 million goal. More than 13,000 individual donors contributed to the wildlife crossings campaign. In addition, several major donors provided incredibly generous gifts, including the Okavango Foundation, the Wildlife Crossings Fund, and The Volgenau Foundation and many others.

There’s better news: the $4 million raised through the match challenge just enabled North Carolina to receive a $25 million federal grant to build 13 wildlife crossings in red wolf territory. These wildlife crossings will protect endangered red wolves and dozens of other species, including river otters, bobcats, white-tailed deer, spotted turtles and black bears.

Save Red Wolves is an alliance of the Tuscarora Nation of North Carolina. The Tuscarora Nation of North Carolina is comprised of three autonomous bands who act together as one nation. Our three communities of Maxton Longhouse, Prospect Longhouse and Saddletree are spread across Robeson County, NC. We are the treaty-holding descendants of the chiefs, clan mothers, warriors and general population of the Tuscarora Nation from Indian Woods Reservation and the traditional Tuscarora strongholds of northeastern and eastern NC. We are older than America. - Save Red Wolves

The Day Wolf Turned Red - Long ago, the red wolf was colored grey like their distant cousins, the coyotes. Their color blended with the forest, and this made it easy for them to be able to hide in the wild, which made them proficient hunters. The wolves easily hid from the rabbits, birds, deer and other delicious foods, but when the wolf is hungry, he is a clever animal and none of the animal people are able to outsmart him.

One hot North Carolina day, a molting wild turkey was eating muscadines at the edge of the forest. Like the Tuscarora, the wolves think the turkey is delicious food! Because it was so hot and turkey had lost so many feathers, wolf crept up closer because he was hungry and turkey looked plump, but pitiful without all her feathers for her to fly away. Wolf jumped over a bush and told her: “You’ve no feathers for you to fly away and now I’m going to eat you!” Turkey was scared because she did not have enough feathers to fly far away to escape wolf, but she stood still.

After thinking for a moment, turkey said “It is true that I can’t fly without all my feathers and surely you will eat me, but before you do, you should give me one last wish.” Wolf said “Well, you didn’t run away, so what is your wish?” Turkey replied “Sing to me! I have heard that your voice is the most beautiful among the animal people and I would love to hear it.” “Ooohh,” Wolf replied and his eyes fluttered, “They have said this and finally you will hear my beautiful voice.” Wolf closed his eyes, lifted his head to the sky and began to sing a beautiful song that echoed throughout the forest and could be heard very far.

As wolf sang, he did not notice that turkey used her sharp talons to climb the tall pine tree she was standing beside. Laughing as she climbed higher and higher, she did what nobody had ever done before – she tricked the wolf! In an instant, wolf realized that he was a fool for singing so that his supper could get away. This made him so mad his gall was bursting! He was on fire he was so mad! First his eyes turned red, then his head burst into flames and then his body was on fire for a moment. When the fire went out, the wolf had become red all over, except the tip of his tail had burnt and became black. As a reminder to all to not be vain, when you hear the turkey gobble, it is said that they are still laughing at the red wolf.

Many cultures name full moons to mark time. In the northern hemisphere, December's full moon is called the Cold Moon or the Long Night Moon, reflecting its proximity to the winter solstice—the year's longest night.

Trees and forests have long formed part of Solstice celebrations around the world, so the winter solstice event is an occasion to connect with some of the organizations in the Northeast working to study and conserve forests. Here in New England, we are blessed with spectacular forests. But what if our forests were only a fraction of what they could be? The more we learn about our forests, the more we realize how extraordinary they are, but also how much we don’t know.

Jamison Ervin, Vermont resident and international forest conservation specialist, says “Paul Winter’s haunting song, ‘The Well-Tempered Wood Thrush,’ evokes the very voice of New England forests — a melody born of old trees, unbroken glades, and quiet sanctuaries. Through his music, Winter invites us to pause and reflect on the natural world: what we’ve lost, what remains, and the beauty we stand to restore by safeguarding these irreplaceable old forests.” - Song

Each and every solstice, as our hemisphere gradually tilts back towards the light, we celebrate and honor the sun’s rebirth, and the incredible resilience of life on our home planet. - Zack Porter, Executive Director of Standing Trees. Today, we give special thanks for the resilience of Vermont’s forests against incredible odds, and redouble our commitment to their health and wellbeing, so that future generations may know a forest that we can only imagine. For more information on Vermont’s forests, and what you can do to help them grow old, contact: Zack Porter, Standing Trees, zp*****@st***********.org.

Standing Trees: To overcome the climate and extinction crises, Standing Trees envisions a future where New England’s federal and state public lands are managed to restore the natural, old-growth forests that evolved over millennia alongside the region’s indigenous people. Founded in 2020, Standing Trees is a community of forest lovers and wildlands advocates who are dedicated to advancing policy and legal solutions that protect and restore New England’s native forests. Standing Trees serves as a watchdog for state and federal agencies and ensures that land managers and policymakers follow the latest climate and biodiversity science. Visit www.standingtrees.org to learn more.

Vermont River Conservancy: Vermont River Conservancy protects and restores rivers for people and wildlife. The Vermont River Conservancy protects floodplains, wetlands, and headwater forests, allowing rivers to flow freely on undeveloped land, storing water during times of droughts and floods, and maximizing carbon storage. The Vermont River Conservancy restores rivers’ connectivity through floodplain restorations and dam removals, creating space for rivers to regularly flood, slow, and filter pollutants, and supporting a rich mosaic of connected habitats for fish and wildlife. The Vermont River Conservancy works with communities to secure access to rivers for swimming, paddling, fishing, and walking, helping to close nature gaps and achieve more equitable access to rivers. Learn more at www.vermontriverconservancy.org.

Northeast Wilderness Trust: Northeast Wilderness Trust conserves forever-wild landscapes and it envisions a landscape of connected, resilient wildlands shared by a human culture that recognizes the benefits of wild places. It accomplishes this work by acquiring land and holding forever-wild conservation easements on properties owned by other organizations or individuals. Northeast Wilderness Trust also champions the wilderness idea in the public sphere. Across New England and New York, the Wilderness Trust secures wild places where Nature can thrive, wildlife can wander, and people can find beauty and quiet. Today, Northeast Wilderness Trust safeguards 80,000 forever-wild acres, including over 22,000 right here in Vermont. Learn more at www.newildernesstrust.org.

Keeping Track: Keeping Track is a non-profit organization founded in 1994 by Susan C. Morse, a nationally known naturalist, out of her concern that development in all its forms often unwittingly harms, isolates, and even eliminates habitat critical to local biodiversity and broad-scale ecological health. Compounding the problem, many of those responsible for protecting habitat lack the resources needed to “keep track” of the status of wildlife and habitat in their assigned areas. Keeping Track is founded on the belief that more “boots on the ground” field research is essential to successfully conserve an appropriate matrix of core and connective habitats. Adult and youth training programs are designed to both inspire community volunteers as well as turn them into practitioners of a science-based field study methodology. Learn more at www.keepingtrack.org.

Find a Dark Sky Place — there are over 160,000 square kilometers of protected land and night skies in 22 countries on 6 continents. - International Dark Sky Map

"Experiencing a truly dark sky is often the first step in realizing what’s been lost. By certifying dark sky locations, we protect these pristine nightscapes for all to enjoy. This year, we achieved a significant milestone by certifying a record amount of land, including Oregon Outback—the largest International Dark Sky Place to date. Protecting existing dark skies alone is not enough. That’s why we’ve launched new DarkSky codes and statutes—policy templates cities and regions can implement to reduce light pollution." - Dark Sky

I remember in the late 1990's there was one organization in Wyoming that was founded as a kick ass organization [that I will have remain unnamed], willing to make enemies. The founder and a long line of Executive Directors did fierce battle to protect our public lands in Wyoming but starting in the mid 1990's the approach started to change with the influx of funding from the big foundations. Out were the days of fierce battles and in was 'collaboration' and an anthropocentric view.

Over the years since I have seen kick ass organizations get transformed into anthropocentric 'collaborators' all over the west, with only a few kick ass organizations remaining. Some say 'you have to keep up with the times' and 'people don't care about conservation/preservation except as it affects their recreation.

For one hundred years a network of lovers of wild places has fought to save wild things for their own sake, and has worked to set aside National Parks, Wilderness Areas, and other protected areas as the strongest tools to save wild things. But now, warns renowned environmentalist Dave Foreman, this old network of wilderness and wildlife conservationists is being undermined and weakened by "environ-resourcists" -- those who say conservation is about people, not wild things. In the second in the "For the Wild Things" series, Dave Foreman shows those who love wild things why and how they need to TAKE BACK CONSERVATION. You can order form here.

Dave Foreman tells the story of the increasingly harsh and bitter fight between two warring conservation movements, vying over the fate of the last wild things in North America during the Twentieth Century. He lays out our hard choice between a Twenty-first Century world wholly dominated by Man or one where we not only save the last wild things but also build upon growing rewilding efforts and networks. You can order here.

Now at well over eight billion and counting, renowned visionary conservationist and global thinker Dave Foreman helps us understand that only by stabilizing and reducing human population can we stop wrecking our home – Earth. And it is being driven by one species – Us. Read Man Swarm, and you will know the truths about overpopulation and population growth.

The first edition, Man Swarm and the Killing of Wildlife reached the conservationist community; in this new and updated edition, Man Swarm: How Overpopulation is Killing the Wild World, Dave Foreman and editor Laura Carroll expand the readership, from those in their reproductive years to educators, governors, Congresspersons, and even world leaders.

Are you a lover of the Earth's natural world? Man Swarm shows why you need to be very concerned about overpopulation, gives you tangible ways to be part of the solution, and will inspire you to take action. You can order here.

Update from Anne Shaffer PhD of the Coastal Watershed Institute on tracking Elwha nearshore ecosystem restoration post-dam removal.

We begin our holiday season with the publication of our work restoring the east Elwha delta. The work reveals that, when present, armoring deters nearshore ecosystem recovery even in the face of large-scale dam removals; when armoring is removed ecosystems respond quickly, and that, when done properly, ecosystem processes are restored not only on the shoreline where the work occurs but also up to six kilometers away. It also is the latest testament to the connectivity of our nearshore world, and the importance to, foremost, conserve and protect intact coastal ecosystems. See the report here.

Captain Watson was arrested by Danish police upon arrival in Nuuk, Greenland, onboard the M/Y John Paul DeJoria in July. Danish authorities claim that the arrest was made due to an international arrest warrant issued by Japan, related to his anti-whaling campaigns in the Antarctic more than a decade ago. He faces the possibility of extradition to Japan, where he could spend the rest of his life in prison.

Episode 136: How to Save Greater Yellowstone from Runaway Sprawl - Todd and Leon join the Rewilding Earth podcast to discuss the critical importance of the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem, an area revered as America’s wildlife conservation cradle. They explore the extensive federal and private lands comprising this 24-million-acre habitat, the diverse wildlife and their migration patterns, and the looming threat of urban sprawl. The stark consequences of habitat fragmentation due to population growth and development are highlighted, with in-depth analysis provided through a recent study conducted by NumbersUSA. The conversation underscores the necessity for a cohesive bioregional plan, better land use zoning, and sustainable growth management strategies. They call for unified action among conservationists and local communities to protect this natural treasure.

Leon Kolankiewicz is Scientific Director of NumbersUSA and Vice-President of Scientists and Environmentalists for Population Stabilization. His career as a wildlife/fisheries biologist and environmental scientist spans more than 30 years, 40 states, and three countries. He has worked for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation, Alaska Department Fish and Game, Orange County (California) Environmental Management Agency, as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Honduras, and as an environmental consultant preparing environmental impact statements under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) for more than 10 federal agencies. He is also the author of Where Salmon Come to Die: An Autumn on Alaska’s Raincoast, which New York Times outdoor columnist Nelson Bryant called “a celebration of wilderness.”

Todd Wilkinson is an American journalist and author of several books, including Science Under Siege: The Politicians’ War on Nature and Truth and more recently, Ripple Effects: How to Save Yellowstone and America’s Most Iconic Wildlife Ecosystem, Last Stand: Ted Turner’s Quest to Save a Troubled Planet and Grizzlies of Pilgrim Creek: An Intimate Portrait of 399, the Most Famous Bear of Greater Yellowstone that features 150 photographs. Recently, his longstanding syndicated column, “The New West,” was named best column in the country by the National Newspaper Association.

And check out Yellowstonian, founded by Todd Wilkinson, which has lots of coverage about Greater Yellowstone.

CALIFORNIA — U.S. wildlife officials are scaling up efforts to kill thousands of barred owls in California and much of the West Coast, but it's a controversial program.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service plan includes using trained shooters to target the raptors in the Golden State, Oregon and Washington, with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service goal of killing up to 452,000 barred owls over 30 years.

The mass kill-off is a bid to save native owls — namely northern spotted owls and California spotted owls — whose numbers are declining due to the barred owl's takeover of their habitat, according to wildlife officials.

This week, the U.S. Department of the Interior announced a $4.5 million grant for the Hoopa Valley Tribe in Northern California to help prevent "the extinction of northern spotted owls through barred owl management."

The tribe's program includes removing "invasive barred owls across National Forests and state parks in northwestern California to benefit northern spotted owls. The project will eradicate approximately 1,500 barred owls over four years" by creating large areas with fewer of the "invasive" birds.

According to officials, the clearing out is designed to provide time and habitat for spotted owl populations to recover.

Killing one bird species to save others, however, has led to passionate debate. Earlier this fall, two environmental groups, Animal Wellness Action and the Center for a Humane Economy, filed a lawsuit challenging the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's plan to kill off barred owls. The eradication would be among the largest such effort to date involving birds of prey, researchers and wildlife advocates said.

"This inhumane, unworkable barred owl kill-plan is the largest-ever scheme to slaughter raptors in any nation by a country mile," said Wayne Pacelle, president of the two Washington, D.C.-based environmental groups. "It has a zero percent chance of success, but it will produce an unheard-of body count of a long-protected owl species native only to North America."

Barred owls were historically residents of the eastern U.S., southern Canada, and parts of south-central Mexico. The birds expanded into western North America and are now found in the habitat of the native northern spotted owl and California spotted owl.

Pacelle argues that barred owls are protected by the Migratory Bird Treaty Act and the plan by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is a violation. The federal agency contends it has leeway to issue special permits for habitat management.

But Pacelle said, "We cannot start wiping out native species for range expansion that is likely a derivative of human actions."

Barred owls were first detected in California in 1976, but large numbers were not found until the 1990s and 2000s.

"Barred owls are larger, more aggressive, and have a broader suite of prey and habitat preferences than spotted owls," according to the California Department of Fish and Wildlife. "Given the level of decline of Northern Spotted Owl associated with the presence of Barred Owl and the impending threat Barred Owl expansion poses to California Spotted Owls, management actions (e.g. removal of Barred Owl, targeted forest management) should be considered in order to stem the ongoing declines."

In an October letter to U.S. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, the welfare organizations headed by Pacelle raised several objections to the federal kill-off plan, including the risk that hunters could kill the wrong owls and spent lead casings would litter forest lands.

The plan's scale makes it unworkable, according to the organizations, which said the barred owl has been displaced by human activity, and its range expansion should be considered normal.

"Range expansion is a naturally occurring ecological phenomena, and it is a core characteristic of many species of birds and mammals," according to the organizations. "Indeed, it is the process by which so many species have come to occupy their current ranges. Just like there is no end to history, there is no end to species movements." - The Patch

Indigenous leaders are calling on the President to designate three new national monuments to protect habitat and safeguard historic cultural resources.

The proposed Sáttítla National Monument, sacred to the Pit River Tribe, would encompass a stunning landscape of forests and waterways in the Medicine Lake Highlands of Northern California — including volcanically formed aquifers providing clean water to Pacific fishers, northern spotted owls, and millions of people too.

In the Southern California desert, the Fort Yuma Quechan Indian Tribe seeks protection of its ancestral lands as Kw’tsán National Monument, habitat for sensitive species like desert tortoises, Yuma kingsnakes, and desert kit foxes.

And right next to the Kw’tsan lies what could soon be Chuckwalla National Monument, the Iviatim, Nüwü, Pipa Aha Macav, Kwatsáan, and Maara’yam peoples — and home to wildlife like bighorn sheep and the monument’s namesake Chuckwalla lizards.

This Native American Heritage Month, we ask you to support the fight to protect public lands from energy development, mining, and other threats. Sign our Indigenous allies' petitions to designate the Sáttítla, Kw’tsán, and Chuckwalla national monuments.

The majority of European rivers are in poor health, with only a few truly wild stretches remaining. Since the beginning of the twentieth century, most have become polluted, channelised, and fragmented by dams and weirs. The result has been a huge reduction in biodiversity and water quality, accompanied by a widespread deepening of riverbeds and a massive loss of floodplains and wetlands.

In many cases, European rivers have been altered so much that we no longer know what wild water looks like. We urgently need a new relationship with water – accepting it into our landscapes again, and rewilding it where we can. - DamBusters Trailer

Today, thanks to man’s desire to govern and harness nature, European waterways are choked with countless dams and other barriers. Many of these structures, some hundreds of years old, provide irrigation, energy, and other benefits. Many others are abandoned and obsolete. Regardless of their usefulness, the presence of these barriers has a hugely negative impact on fish, other wildlife, and people.

The removal of dams has already proven to be one of the most efficient and cost-effective ways of restoring rivers. Complementing river restoration work in our own landscapes, Rewilding Europe is a member of Dam Removal Europe, a burgeoning, European-wide coalition of organizations working to restore European rivers by removing old and obsolete dams and weirs.

Five Eurasian eagle owls have been released in the Danube Delta rewilding landscape in Ukraine, as part of an ongoing reintroduction programme supporting the comeback of this iconic and ecologically important species. This is the largest single-batch release of eagle owls since the programme kicked off in 2019.

The reintroduction programme, which is overseen by the Rewilding Ukraine team and funded by the Endangered Landscapes & Seascapes Programme. The aim is to re-establish a viable population of the owls – which are apex predators – in the landscape. Fifteen owls have now been released, with further releases in the pipeline. The first ten birds were released between 2019 and 2021. - Eagle Owls Take Flight

Located in Rewilding Europe’s Swedish Lapland rewilding landscape, the Abramsån River is a tributary of the 210-kilometre long Råne River – Europe’s longest undammed forest river. It is typical of many waterways in the northern Sweden damaged by historical logging.

In 2023, the Rewilding Sweden team kicked off efforts to rewild stretches of the Abramsån by restoring the natural shape and flow of the river. These actions are part of the team’s “waterscape” approach, which aims to enhance blue-green corridors for nature and wildlife by restoring the free flow of water, and enhancing the connection between healthy rivers and surrounding landscapes. In September this year – the second year of restoration on the Abramsån – the team organized a helicopter drop of 150 tonnes of sand and gravel into the restored stretch of the river.

In the early twentieth century, the Abramsån was heavily impacted by Sweden’s industrial-scale forestry industry. To facilitate the transportation of logs, large boulders and stones were removed from the river bed and piled up at the river’s edge, while a wooden floor made up of individual tree trunks was laid down in parts of the river. The river channel was also straightened out and narrowed, to further enhance the timber floating process.

This channelisation increased the flow of water in the river, which in turn washed away almost all of the fine-grained sediment that would, under natural conditions, be found in pockets and backwaters around larger stones on the riverbed. It was pretty much all flushed downstream. Without this sediment, many bottom-dwelling insect larvae (or benthic fauna) were deprived of habitat, so their populations declined and disappeared. Additionally, the spawning grounds of fish and habitat for freshwater pearl mussels disappeared too.

The recent efforts of the Rewilding Sweden team have reversed the channelization on the Abramsån, and have helped to restore the natural flow of water. But the fine-grained sediment is still missing, and it would take centuries for it to build up again naturally. By reintroducing sand and gravel, the aim is to accelerate the recovery of a range of benthic fauna species, boost the reproduction of fish such as trout and salmon, and enhance mussel populations.

Four more cinereous vultures have been released in the Iberian Highlands rewilding landscape in Spain, as the latest stage in an ongoing reintroduction programme. Having been sourced from wildlife recovery centers across the Castilla-La Mancha region, the birds were housed in a specially built adaptation aviary located in the Alto Tajo Natural Park for several months prior to being set free. The return of this majestic keystone species to the Iberian Highlands will contribute to the realization of a wilder and healthier Iberian Highland landscape.

The cinereous vulture reintroduction programme, which began in 2020, is run by the Castilla-La Mancha regional government and the Alto Tajo Natural Park, with work on the ground carried out by Rewilding Spain and Spanish NGO Terra Naturalis. With the latest release, 21 cinereous vultures have now been set free through the programme, which aims to restore a resident, breeding population of the birds in the Alto Tajo and Serranía de Cuenca regions. A total of between 40 and 50 birds will eventually be released.

After over a century, the story of Chief Crazy Horse's life has been shrouded in mystery. Now, the True story has been kept and is told by his descendants - his most immediate blood relatives - for the first time. They tell the story from Crazy Horse's eyes about the beginning of the Great Sioux War and what his people had to deal with. This story never left the family before for fear of government persecution... until now. Using vintage photographs and recreated historical scenes making this biography very entertaining and educational. Interviews with the family as well as excellent graphics of the family tree allows the viewer to easily understand the complicated family tree of Crazy Horse.

The legends of the Native American nations come to life in this epic new miniseries, as two generations--a century-old storyteller and his grandson, a troubled 17-year-old boy--embark on a cross-country journey toward self-discovery. - Dream Keeper Movie

Impressive capture by Yukon Wildlife Cams of a lynx ruling its territory. - Lynx Trail Cam Footage

Recently, a pair of Mexican wolves were discovered in excellent habitat with abundant prey northwest of Flagstaff, north of I-40. As part of their plan to return the wolves to the government-designated recovery area, the Arizona Game and Fish Department and U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service trapped and collared one of the wolves (given the name Hope by school children) and left her in place as a “Judas” wolf to help find and relocate the other wolf or wolves that were part of her family. Hope is now dead from a cause yet to be disclosed. Conservationists were advocating for leaving Hope and her companion, Mystery, in the location they decided to call home. Hope was found dead on November 7. The cause of her death is under investigation. She was wearing a radio collar with bright red tape. If she was shot (a likely cause), an excuse of mistaken identity will lack credibility. I-40 was established as a politically motivated boundary, north of which Mexican wolves are not legally allowed to live. Independent scientists have identified habitats north of I-40 as critical to their recovery and survival, and conservations continue to argue for removal of the boundary. The saga of the Lobos of the Southwest continues. —David Parsons, Carnivore Conservation Biologist.

Photo of the Cypress Island netpen catastrophic failure that released over 300,000 disease-ridden non-native salmon into Puget Sound on 19 August 2017. (Photo © Wild Steelhead Coalition)

In November 2022, Commissioner Franz announced a new executive order prohibiting commercial net pen aquaculture on state aquatic lands of Washington state. The current order/ban is only valid while Franz is in office. She leaves in January, and there is no guarantee the next commissioner will hold the line. The public is still VERY much in favor of the ban on net pens on public lands, and the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) has persevered in the fierce legal battles voiding and not renewing their leases—but the corporate politics have been fierce. There is a rule-making process to codify the ban into permanent state law. It’s a three-step process. Commissioner Franz and DNR have initiated this rulemaking process to adopt this order formally into statute.

The rule-making process is two-thirds complete. The Board of Natural Resources (BNR) will make a final decision at the January 7th, 2025 meeting in Olympia. We know Cooke Aquaculture and allies will be packing the room, so we need as many people present as possible with this urgent decision on the line to show the broad public support for banning this industry permanently.

Here are links to three of the latest science news—including the first one, which is published in the journal Science.

It’s time for our unstoppable movement to come together under the banner of Our Sound, Our Salmon one final time to preserve all we’ve accomplished together and to protect the health of Puget Sound for generations to come. - Take Action!

Shared from a post by Dr. Anne Shaffer - Dr. Shaffer is the Executive Director and Lead Scientist of the Coastal Watershed Institute (CWI), a small, place-based environmental non-profit formed in 1996 that is dedicated to understanding, protecting, and restoring coastal ecosystems thru community-led scientific partnerships. Shaffer and her team conduct world-class ecosystem science and restoration with very modest resources and from a remote base of operations.

Thanks to a lawsuit by the Center for Biological Diversity, NRDC, and Friends of Minnesota Scientific and Natural Areas, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service just proposed to protect 1.6 million acres of critical habitat for rusty patched bumblebees.

After the Service made strenuous efforts to deny them critical habitat — and after our legal victory — the agency has now proposed protecting habitat in 33 counties in Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Virginia, West Virginia, and Wisconsin, mostly on private lands in the urban areas where agricultural pesticides haven’t wiped them out. The final critical habitat decision will rest with the Trump administration, so we’ll keep fighting to ensure that rusty patched bumblebees get the protections they need to dodge extinction.

The national wildlife refuge system in the United States is the world's largest, most diverse network of lands dedicated to preserving habitat for plants and animals. These refuges provide desperately needed sanctuaries for more than 280 protected species, as well as pollinators like bees and butterflies.

Yet federal officials routinely let private operators grow commercial crops in these precious places, dumping hundreds of thousands of pounds of dangerous agricultural poisons on them every year. We need your help to protect declining wildlife species, biodiversity, soil health, and the refuges' other unique natural resources.

Join us in calling on the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to phase out toxic pesticides for private agricultural purposes in national wildlife refuges. - Center for Biological Diversity

In the heart of the land where the red rocks meet the sky, we honor the people whose ancestors lived on the earth.

Gratitude to Mother Earth, sailing through night and day-- and to her soil: rich, rare and sweet in our minds so be it. Gratitude to Plants, the sun-facing, light-changing leaf and fine root-hairs; standing still through wind and rain; their dance is in the flowering spiral grain in our minds so be it. Gratitude to Air, bearing the soaring Swift and silent... Owl at dawn. Breath of our song clear spirit breeze in our minds so be it. Gratitude to Wild Beings, our brothers, teaching secrets, freedoms, and ways; who share with us their milk; self-complete, brave and aware in our minds so be it. Gratitude to Water: clouds, lakes, rivers, glaciers; holding or releasing; streaming through all our bodies salty seas in our minds so be it. Gratitude to the Sun: blinding pulsing light through trunks of trees, through mists, warming caves where bears and snakes sleep— he who wakes us— in our minds so be it. Gratitude to the Great Sky who holds billions of stars— and goes yet beyond that—beyond all powers, and thoughts and yet is within us- Grandfather Space. The Mind is his Wife. So be it.

All living life forms who are intelligent, use your brains. All living life forms who want to survive on Earth, use your minds. All authority that is authority, that is righteous in truth in the wisdom of all that is God, and God being great, as God is in all living life forms, live NOW. All The Way Alive. In this moment we all find serenity and bliss, and righteousness and truth. We accept life completely as forever. There is no beginning or end to it. We just are, man.

ATWA
Air Trees Water Animals/All The Way Alive.
"...You come to me with your love for me. That love was in you and had nothing to do with me / my love for you was in me. Your love for me changes with the Air you take in and out / without the Air there is no there or where, remember or forgets, it's LOVE 4 the Air. Forget to remember, remember to forget; knowing needs no remembering or forgetting, for LOVE IS knowing your LOVE, and you or me means LESS than nothing and more than all, knowing we are ONE ATWA and I am all ATWA. Remembering what I'll do and forgetting what I did, taking all in knowing Love is Air, here, now, then, all, everything and everywhere. Air my Sun god, god Sun Air, sweet love of life I am love you everywhere my air; it's yours. Air, Air, everywhere there is a there."

"So what you're doing is you're reaching your hand in the grave and you're saying, 'Come on all you righteous people who want to survive on earth. Come on you real deal. If you want to breathe air, and [have clean] water, and live in harmony, get with it.' Hail Mary, full of grace, The Lord is with thee, blessed is thy Life on Earth / ATWA. You see it? Then it's a part of you and you're a part of it. And you are the order of ATWA. ...It's not the question 'Why did you crucify Christ?' You search the books, you search the scholars, you go through all the high minds of the world and say 'Why did you crucify Christ?' and you're not going to get an answer because it is the wrong question. The question is / are you ready? Why are you crucifying Christ? Why are you crucifying Christ every day? Every day you're killing Christ's air. Every day you're taking Christ's life. Every day you're
poisoning Christ's water. If you really truly love Christ, then get with ATWA. The ATWA is the righteous order of the planet.... It started with George Washington, the Sons of Liberty. The Sons of Liberty gave their life. We cannot live without liberty. Liberty is the thing that gives us 'human'..."

Their mission is to be a catalyst for advancing beaver management and watershed restoration, training mitigation professionals, supporting scientific research, and increasing the public’s appreciation of the beaver’s critical role in creating climate resilient ecosystems.

Their goal is to resolve all beaver-human conflicts in a science-based manner in order to maximize the many benefits that beavers contribute to the environment.

As the only national beaver non-profit, they work locally across North America through varied programs, empowering individuals and organizations to succeed in beaver management, coexistence, communication, education, and scientific research.

Beavers are the subject of at least two new books, Eager by Ben Goldfarb and Beaverland by Leila Philip. BeaverCON is among the biggest conservation conferences in the country.

In this episode, Michael rejoins the podcast to discuss an ambitious project: the establishment of 100 new national parks in the United States. The conversation covers the extensive research and groundwork done over 15 years to identify these areas, the existing public lands that could be transformed, and the benefits of increased protected areas for climate stabilization, biodiversity, and public health. - The Growing Movement Towards 100 National Parks

Michael Kellett, the co-founder and Executive Director of RESTORE: The North Woods, has over 35 years of experience in the land conservation movement. In 1994, he wrote the first white paper proposing a 3.2 million-acre Maine Woods National Park & Preserve and has been actively involved in efforts to restore the endangered wildlife such as the eastern wolf, Atlantic salmon, and Canada lynx; to protect federal and state public lands from unsustainable logging and development; and to revive the national parks movement. From 1986 to 1992, he was the Northeast Director and Michigan Representative of The Wilderness Society, where he helped to pass national forest wilderness and national recreation area legislation and developed a proposal for a Maine Woods National Reserve. Michael has served on the board of American Lands Alliance, Thoreau Country Conservation Alliance, Thoreau Farm Trust, and Walden Forever Wild. He has visited 258 National Park System units across America. He lives in Lincoln, Massachusetts.

Coyote Voicings: Howls, Yips, Barks, & More | Coyote Yipps - Information and stories about San Francisco coyotes: behavior & personality, coexistence & outreach, by Janet Kessler: Unveiling first-hand just how savvy, social, sentient and singular coyotes really are! - https://coyoteyipps.com/coyote-voicings/

The Gallatin Range south of Bozeman is the last major unprotected landscape in the northern Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. A minimum of 250,000 acres of the Gallatin Range as advocated by the Gallatin Yellowstone Wilderness Alliance should be designated wilderness under the 1964 Wilderness Act.

The Gallatin Range is a key area for wildlife, and home to grizzlies, wolves, elk, moose, bighorn sheep, wolverine and a host of other wildlife. It could be a significant area for recolonizing Yellowstone bison moving north out of the park.

Its reputation as a significant wildlife sanctuary started in 1910, when Gifford Pinchot, the first chief of the Forest Service, advocated making the southern part of the Gallatin Range a wildlife refuge.

In recognition of the Gallatin Range's fabulous wildlife habitat values, the Montana Fish, Wildlife, and Parks created a wildlife management area (WMA) primarily in the Buffalohorn and Porcupine drainages in the southern Gallatin Range.

In 1977, Senator Lee Metcalf sponsored the Montana Wilderness Study Act legislation (S.393), which created nine wilderness study areas in Montana, including in the Gallatin Range known as the 155,000-acre Hyalite-Porcupine-Buffalohorn WSA.

The legislation says, “The wilderness study areas designated by this Act shall, until Congress determines otherwise, be administered by the Secretary of Agriculture to maintain their presently existing wilderness character and potential for inclusion in the National Wilderness Preservation System.

In the 1980s, the Gallatin Range was initially included in the legislation creating the Lee Metcalf Wilderness in the Madison Range. However, during the legislative debate, the Gallatin Range was removed due to a legacy of railroad checkerboard alternative sections of land that some felt would complicate wilderness protections.

In the 1990s, several legislative efforts led to the removal of railroad checkboards with the express purpose that the roadless lands would eventually be designated wilderness.
Biologist Lance Craighead did a biological assessment of the Gallatin Range noting it’s importance for wildlife.

Wilderness is the “Gold Standard” for conservation. Protecting the area as wilderness is the best way to preserve and ensure the ecological integrity of the Gallatin Range and, by extension, the northern Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.

The Gallatin Range wilderness effort must be viewed within the context of preserving the entire Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. An expanded Greater Yellowstone National Park that included the Gallatin north to Bozeman with a wilderness overlap would be the best option for maintaining the ecological and evolutionary processes.

Some powerful thoughts from Charlie to do our part to keep the words of the soul in motion, honoring his rebirth with the rising sun on his birthday, and paying tribute to all veterans like him who have served to protect life on Earth.

"When your PA (Program Administrator) says no to me you are doing nothing. If I reflect or try to explain you think it's me personally, and it's not me as a person, it's me as a world court. I've been a judge in the convicts' court ever since the 1940's, it's called the MAC, named after the Scotland's rights Mason and high orders of church in my world, my life, my right. When the system's men were raising me I thought you PAs, AWs, wardens were my dads. Family. I only knew what you all taught me. You on one foot and the old cons on the other. Now that I've grown up the people now days don't like me because I've grown up and know I am a man now. You won't let me be a man. When you say no to me you are saying no to all the men who raised me. I told you I broke no law. That's your law, your rights. Right, honor, court, money, your world, family, self, state, country. You told me before I retired you the 6th time that not knowing the law is no excuse. Now after 45 years I say to you: Each lie I've been told and each day I've been held will balance itself in my ghost, shadow, life, world, my CIA, my government, my grandad's grave, my cross, my church.

I don't like to tell you what's coming because you may think that's what I'm projecting. I may think the sun came out but I'm not burning it, and if I say looks like rain I'm not making it rain. The people who been using me and my life to hold their fears and keep me as their reality in order to feel sure -- I say, nothing in God's law goes unseen." - CM

"I don't want to be obnoxious here, but you got millions and millions and millions of people with the same and with variations of difference and saying the same thing. I say just simply this: Heal the mind. And then work for the air, the trees, the water and the animals. And the people? Tough shit. If you want to live in my world, come and go through what I went through to live in my world. You don't just come get in my world. You have to do something to earn my world. I wouldn't let a lot of those people in my world if I had the say so about it. I don't have to destroy them like Adolf did, all I have to do is just say no. I don't want that in my world. I don't want that confusion in my world. You don't have to let those people in your mind. You let the people in your mind that are helping your mind. And your mind is the only mind. You are the mind. You are ATWA, you are the earth, you are the trees, you are the animals, you are everything. You are the child of god. That's the truth. Period." -CM

"We tried to bring ATWA into minds play for survival of life but the people sold it out for greed and money systems and destroyed their worlds. They will end up with no soul, no trees, no wildlife, no air or water. It's just a dream and god is the mind or the way we see, hear, taste, and feel. Try to understand all is one and only one can fix earth. Is your way of life worth all the water and air? Without water and air everyone will die, so why are you killing everyone with lies?...

Life feeds from the breast of life and the water of earth starts with mother earth, not mama schoolbook book brain...

There's a universal consciousness that's always been held down by a bunch of educated idiots who call themselves teachers and schools. Uncle Jess wouldn't let me go to school. Do you know what having your own mind is in a world of programmed patterned robots? Having your own mind is total freedom, that's insanity...

I am beyond the minds that have no soul, beyond what you're told, bought or sold...

You were a generation of children trying to get your humanity back, trying to get your honor back, trying to redeem your planet, trying to get your life back on earth and I was a convict trying to help you...

We have been redeeming what was wrong before our grandmothers were born.... (The swastika) is sun god symbol, symbol of sun as god, not a dead man on a stick, not a woman, but the energy we live in and beyond the energy we live in.

As I woke up I brought everybody at that ranch into the thought of one world, one mind, one peace on earth.... We were on a metaphysical level at ranch...

"Forever is forever and anyone who wants to see into and put their mind and thoughts into forever can. You see a rock and understand the rock is not forever. You can see into the sky and all its stars and say that is forever. Cars, money, things are moving. The pillars or God's word symbols that thought travels on and with thoughts in the will of God is forever the mind. Something true is true forever even if we don't know what it is. We go through life and come to thoughts in sky's mind that are and have always been. Soul is forever. Life and death are games. Forever is no game. If you give your words into forever and sell them out by dropping them for reasons you justify then your mind and heart is not in forever. Your life keeps on but when it ends and you must face your own knowing you know, and that won't let your soul into itself. The wheels of thought are held in forever.

Your mind's brains can become aware of them and you can come in and out of the temple of forever. It's not a judge. Our own thoughts do that. We alone effect our self. There is no one, no us, no we, unless we make it, redeem it, and come back in grace with truth. As I say, I don't judge it, it just is in nothing as nothing is forever as nothing is soul. The beyond, the Ansome. But one lie is like a wall. Like a space movie one lie and a force field goes up and forever and truth goes on and on without you. A real witch knows no one can catch her lying. No one but herself. Everything is perfection. Monks who are in forever say no women can hold points of view in forever because they have no soul, that their fear turns them to lie and hide from the real. I've just drove up on forever and feel it started with me so I'm just here. (Swastika)" - CM

Before he and his wife Lucinda began rewilding work on the Pitchfork Ranch 20 years ago, A Thomas Cole spent thirty-two years as a small-town lawyer in Casa Grande, Arizona, successfully defended two death-penalty murder cases, a dozen homicide cases, co-counseled the largest jury verdict in Arizona history, Chaired the Casa Grande Town Hall, Arizona Humanities Council and banned from Walmart for life.

Rewilding On the Ground: Restoration Success at Pitchfork Ranch

In this episode, we explore Pitchfork Ranch, located between the Sonoran and Chihuahuan Deserts, and how its owner has been dedicated to ecological restoration for the past 20 years. The ranch covers 11,000 acres, including BLM state-leased and deeded land, and features a significant Cienega—a threatened type of wetland. The discussion delves into the history of the land, the extensive restoration work funded by government grants, the diverse wildlife populations, and the impact of climate change on water resources. The owner’s efforts in securing a new Cienega National Monument and future plans for the ranch’s ecological sustainability are also highlighted. Despite facing significant challenges, especially due to climate change, the owner maintains hope and continues advocating for land restoration and carbon capture. - Rewilding Pitchfork Ranch

The overarching goals for this ranch are habitat repair and carbon sequestration, using “flood-n-flow” based restoration practices and accompanying sediment deposition to nudge the ciénaga and surrounding land toward its pre-settlement condition — to get the water back. Ongoing installation of grade-control structures is helping the ciénaga and surrounding land reclaim itself and reconnect surface and groundwater. Goals are to: refurbish the headquarters while retaining its historic character, monitor photo points and piezometers, perform water and soil data collection and mapping, raise the ciénaga bed, sequester a portion of the legacy load of atmospheric carbon, restore traditional and uplands, improve infiltration rates, fix roads, rebuild the cattle herd, provide science, research and education opportunities, protect the archaeology, improve habitat for wildlife and imperiled plants and animals, restore low-intensity fire and prevent range land fragmentation. - Read more about Pitchfork Ranch…

"Last month marked the 60th anniversary of the Wilderness Act signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson, and the establishment of our nation’s Wilderness Preservation System. This landmark conservation bill was designed to permanently protect wild, untrammeled landscapes for future generations to discover, explore, and experience the profound beauty and solitude of nature. Upon passage in 1964, the Wilderness Act originally designated 9.1 million acres in 13 states. Today, that number has grown to more than 111 million acres of designated wilderness in 44 states and Puerto Rico.

While this may sound like a lot, it is important to remember only 5% of the entire United States is permanently protected as wilderness. To make matters worse, one-third of these wilderness areas contain private inholdings within their boundaries that were grandfathered in upon designation. These inholdings are gaping holes in the fabric of the landscape that don’t carry the same protections as the surrounding wilderness: roads can be built, minerals can be extracted, old-growth timber can be cut, and residential homes and lodges can be constructed. Those are the threats facing these properties today, but who can say what new threats they will face 60 years from now as technology continues to advance exponentially?

One of the greatest strengths of the Wilderness Act is how it is written to endure. Rather than list out specific prohibited uses, it draws a line in the sand at ‘mechanized’. While the Act’s authors likely couldn’t have anticipated how widespread recreational drones would become, the set of protections they crafted still apply to them. Just as the Wilderness Act endures, we need solutions for the threats still facing wilderness that endure. Our model of protecting inholdings by acquiring and transferring them to be added to the wilderness has been successful since 1992. Over the course of our 32-year history, the Trust has permanently protected over 58,000 acres via the transfer of 592 properties in 120 wilderness areas, and helped complete 17 wilderness areas by removing the last remaining inholding."

In the latest pamphlet from The Wilderness Land Trust, see how newly protected lands, community efforts, and strategic conservation are preserving our wild spaces. Each page tells the story of people and nature coming together to protect wilderness for future generations. Take a look and get inspired! - Promise of Wilderness

Southern California-based hiker, photographer, tracker and trail cam enthusiast Johanna Turner of Cougarmagic has done more for Mountain Lion conservation than 150 years of conservation.

“There are more things to alarm us than to harm us, and we suffer more in apprehension than in reality." My name is Johanna Turner and I hope these photos promote conservation for predator species. Los Angeles has proven that 18 million of the least outdoorsy people on the planet can safely share habitat with wildlife."

One of the most frightening things on the planet are the chemical laden mass-produced food products that we feed to ourselves and our children every day. Most of the population is unaware of contents of these ‘food products’ and have no idea of their environmental impact and their bodies. It is not entirely out of ignorance that people are blind to these facts. Millions of dollars are spent by the US agriculture corporations to make sure that you don’t find out the horrible truth. Let’s take a look at the popular Halloween treat, candy corn, and see what ghoulish truths we can uncover.

Candy corn is a waste food. It contains no nutritional benefits and is primarily composed of sugar, confectioners glaze (shellac), gelatin (made from animal collagen by boiling bones, skins and hides in a giant death soup), pigment colors, dyes, and wax. Sounds delicious, right? Yet over 35 MILLION pounds of it are produced every year. Ironically candy corn does contain a corn product (although a highly toxic one) as its main ingredient: corn syrup.

Corn syrup, also known as HFCS (high fructose corn syrup), is a man-made sweetener made from high starch dent corn. Dent corn is naturally inedible to humans, so it goes through a lot of processes and engineering to get the HFCS from it. The corn itself is a Frankenstein monster of genetic engineering and mad science against nature. It is cheaper to produce HFCS than natural cane sugars because of government farming subsidies. This means that companies can increase the sugar content of their products with minimal cost concerns, thus making their food products more addicting and toxic to consumers. The energy requirements alone to plant the corn seed, harvest it, transport it, and manufacture HFCS contribute a huge percentage to carbon emissions, global warming and air pollution from the amounts of petro fuels used to produce it. Not to mention the wasted energy then used to produce and transport the candy corn in addition.

HFCS has been shown in studies to accelerate the growth of cancer cells, especially in pancreatic cancer, and is now being regarded as a toxic substance since it plagues those who consume it with obesity, diabetes and other chronic diseases. High fructose doses have been proven to punch holes in the intestinal walls that filter out pathogens in our food, which causes severe problems in the body by allowing bacteria and partially digested food to enter the blood stream.

Creating HFCS requires a vast amount of corn. Millions of acres of land are used to produce corn that is just used for HFCS production. The amount of fuel, water and resources used to plant and harvest the crop is detrimental to every ecosystem on the planet. We are all aware of the air pollution that fossil fuels cause, but the most harmful in corn production are the nitrogen fertilizers used to grow it. Corn seed has been modified to require the nitrogen fertilizer, as a catalyst for it to grow. In other words, one must use the fertilizer to grow the corn. Ironically the same company that produces the seeds also own the companies that produce the fertilizers and pesticides used on the crops. They are making profits from selling you poison.

Nitrogen fertilizers render soil useless, except for growing nitrogen requiring corn crops. It kills insects that are vital to healthy soil, and displaces the birds, which feed on those insects. This begins the chain of ecosystem loss. The fertilizers impoverish the soil of other nutrients and minerals such as calcium, magnesium and potassium, which causes the soil to be unfertile, dead and packed with nitrogen, which washes into the ground water and eventually into the oceans. On average over 80 million tons of nitrogen fertilizer are spread onto the ground of which only 17 million of those tons are actually absorbed by the crops, the rest is in our water.

The process of denitrification is the Earths method of converting free nitrogen back to gas to be recycled by bacteria and fungi that feed on it, but the planet cannot keep up with the amounts that humankind are pumping into its water. The rivers and oceans have become so saturated and polluted with nitrogen that they are unable to denitrify the water, and oxygen depleted areas known as ‘dead zones’ have been appearing more and more frequently. The over fertilization causes over blooms of red algae which thrive off the nitrogen, but deplete the oxygen in the water, which is devastating complete ecosystems and killing vast amounts of marine life.

In short, HFCS is wasteful of energy all around. It requires petro energy to plant, harvest, transport and manufacture HFCS. It also requires millions of gallons of water to be wasted and thousands of tons of nitrate fertilizer (which is also derived from petroleum) to be used to grow the corn. Nitrogen fertilizers are polluting water supplies and destroying aquatic ecosystems around the world.

So, the real scary things about Halloween are the same frightening demons that the scare us year-round; the dark and sinister products that corporations market to us which poison our bodies, destroy our planet and kills the innocent animals that don’t deserve to die, so we may eat dyed toxic sugar. Give out an organic apple or carrot and help save the lives of millions instead.

We are in the age of information. Must we continuously reciprocate this gross misunderstanding of diplomacy?

We're here telling you that you need more checks and balances. This is a check and a balance on behalf of our nations being upset at the federal government, the executive branch, both the legislative branch and the judicial branch - for when you fail us we have to prove to you that you failed us in your own court setting.

We have been at the forefront of every environmental crisis on reservations since 1876! We have been filing lawsuits against your corporations, against your agencies since the creation of them. And we're here to tell you that and remind you of that.

Tell your president to tell your advisers in your cabinet that we are tired of this. And we will continuously come to your door and knock on your door, as the Constitution guarantees us the right to do so, to remind you of those failures so we can have those successions for the future generations.

In recent years, there has been a disturbing increase in the persecution of wild predators across the globe. This rise in hostility towards species such as wolves, big cats, and bears is driven by a combination of factors including human-wildlife conflict, agricultural interests, and cultural beliefs. The consequences of this persecution are severe, threatening biodiversity, disrupting ecosystems, and endangering species that play critical roles in their habitats.

Find out why now is the time to speak up for stronger protections for wolves and healthier ecosystems.

FEATURING: Suzanne Asha Stone from IWCN, James Holt from the Nez Perce tribe, and Coyote Peterson from Brave Wilderness - Biden MIA from States' War on Wolves

The International Wildlife Coexistence Network exists to foster the conversation on human-wildlife coexistence. Through our community of experts, projects on the ground, webinars, free resource library, and international conferences, we are working to create a better world for all life.

Through discussions with voices in our community and other luminaries, we will share the story of coexistence with more people than ever. In each episode we’ll highlight featured guest, who are helping us all to live in “right relationship” with Nature.

Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) is a deadly neurological disease that affects hooved mammals such as deer, elk, and moose— species that are crucial to North American ecosystems. CWD can spread directly from animal to animal and indirectly through the environment, meaning animals can contract it from soil, water, and food. Despite being first detected in 1967, much remains unknown about CWD. This disease is caused by prions, abnormal proteins that damage the brain and lymphatic system. Once an animal is affected by CWD, it may live for a few years, but the disease will kill it. Prions can linger in the environment for two or more years, potentially infecting other animals. At present, there is no effective vaccine for CWD.

As Chronic Wasting Disease continues to spread across North America, it is crucial to implement effective management strategies. Many government agencies are exploring expensive techniques to limit the spread; However, a natural “deterrent” of CWD already exists. Researchers have proven that wolves limit the spread of CWD at a rate that could help prevent transmission (Wild, 2011). The remarkable thing about wolves is that they already naturally exist in many areas where officials have detected CWD.

Wolves are selective predators, meaning they tend to prey on injured and diseased animals, including those with chronic wasting disease. A study indicates that selective predators, like wolves, are much more likely to kill CWD-infected deer than hunters (Krumm, 2009).

Another benefit of wolves is that they cannot be infected by CWD. This means that when wolves consume infected animals, they consume the prions without increasing the infection rate. Although their feces still carry the infected prions, research suggests that these prions may begin to break down in a predator’s digestive tract, aiding in their removal. The most important thing wolves do is remove infected species that directly affect one another, which is crucial for elk and some deer that live in herds where direct infection could be high. Effective removal of infected animals from herds may decrease the transmission rate and increase the survival of deer, elk, and other CWD-susceptible species.

By affecting their prey’s behavior, wolves may indirectly affect the spread of CWD. Some studies suggest that the presence of wolves changes the behavior of deer and elk in a way that reduces their likelihood of becoming infected with CWD through indirect environmental exposure (Waldner, 2016).

For wolves to play an effective role in reducing Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD), there needs to be a stable wolf population. Many western states where CWD and wolves are present have passed anti-wolf legislation.

Wolves could help decrease this number. Instead of promoting a healthy wolf population, Wyoming has classified wolves as ‘predatory animals,’ allowing them to be killed without a license at any time of the year.

In states like Idaho, where CWD has not been widely detected, wolves could play a crucial role in limiting the spread. However, Idaho has implemented some of the harshest wolf legislation yet. Senate Bill 1211 permits a reduction to 150 wolves, which is about a 90% reduction of Idaho’s wolf population.

Rather than treating wolves as enemies, we should work with them to mitigate CWD transmission. - Wildlife Coexistence

The climate and ecological emergency became even more pressing when in April 2020, The Times newspaper reported that 750,000 Oak saplings we to be burnt. The UK Government had reneged on its promise of a huge national planting scheme. Save The Oaks Campaign was created following unprecedented response from groups and individuals who have pledged to buy and plant these Oaks throughout the UK. This project honours 95% of all native ash trees dying or killed by dieback and the trees destroyed for HS2. We plant as an act of love, we rewild. - Save The Oaks Uk

'There are trees that flower and fruit directly from the trunk. Bizarre kapoks forty feet around with branches that run from spiky to shiny to smooth, all from the same trunk. Myrtles scattered throughout the forest that all flower on a single day. Bertholletia that grow piñata cannonballs filled with nuts. Trees that make rain, that tell time, that predict the weather. Seeds in obscene shapes and colors. Pods like daggers and scimitars. Stilt roots and snaking roots and buttresses like sculpture and roots that breathe air. Solutions run amok. The biomass is mad.' - 'The Understory' by Richard Powers

When the great oak fell in the woods
the valley shuddered and we felt
the aftershock in our feet for weeks.
When the great oak fell, fifty families
of mice fled, and the pairs of woodpeckers.

Nuthatches went into exile, and a hundred
thousand insects. The heron and winter’s
white egrets no longer have a lookout
over the minnow brook; no perch
for summer’s turtle doves. Last week

a thousand bees hummed in its canopy;
this winter, the jays will scavenge for
five thousand fewer acorns. The valley
is a wound. The valley is a mouth with
a missing front tooth. The valley is Munch’s

mouth, open and forever a silent scream.
When we walk where the oak was we too
are now silent. The great oak fell; the valley
shuddered; we feel its echoes still.

Here are some of the latest research and rewilding projects, ideas, and notable stories in the media about protecting and restoring wild Nature.

“As the woodlands of New England face a hotter future, UVM researchers are exploring the promise and peril of ‘assisted migration.’”

“Summary: An international team of scientists has recently found that non-native species are expanding their ranges many orders of magnitude faster than native ones, in large part due to inadvertent human help. Even seemingly sedentary non-native plants are moving at three times the speed of their native counterparts in a race where, because of the rapid pace of climate change and its effect on habitat, speed matters. To survive, plants and animals need to be shifting their ranges by 3.25 kilometers per year just to keep up with the increasing temperatures and associated climactic shifts — a speed that native species cannot manage without human help.”

“Conservation groups scored a victory in the courtroom in July after the U.S. Forest Service announced its decision to withdraw a logging permit that would have impacted at least 147,000 acres within the Ashley National Forest in Utah.”

4. If you use Facebook, we recommend that you follow Chris Bolgiano—an uncommonly funny, as well as wise, advocate for and practitioner of rewilding: https://www.facebook.com/ChrisBolgianoNatureWriter

“How can rewilding help reduce desertification and its effects? This was the question set by the UN University in Bonn, Germany, in its assessment of seven ‘new’ land and water management approaches, of which rewilding was one. That the Global Rewilding Alliance took part in the process is a clear indication that rewilding as a relatively new perspective for the future management of land and water is receiving increasing attention outside the narrower conservation and wildlife community.

6. The Global Rewilding Alliance has created the Global Rewilding Volunteer Talent Pool. Check it out if you’d like to sign up to be a volunteer or if you have an organization looking for volunteers!

“Abandoned farmlands in Europe — which make up nearly 25 percent of the continent’s landscape — have the potential to be rewilded, according to a new study published in Current Biology.”

“Douglas and Kristine Tompkins were the world’s most eminent land conservationists, investing $350 million of their own money. Kris talks to Lisa Grainger about continuing her husband’s legacy.”

“The sites fight climate change and can help with another global crisis: the collapse of nature. But so far, efforts to nurture wildlife habitat have been spotty."

Proposition 127: Prohibit Bobcat, Lynx, and Mountain Lion Hunting

A YES vote on Proposition 127 will prohibit bobcat, lynx, and mountain lion hunting and trapping in Colorado. It will allow on a permit basis the killing of these animals under certain circumstances such as livestock depredation.

Wildlife in Colorado is managed to benefit the visitors and residents of Colorado

The Colorado Parks and Wildlife Commission Policy states that Colorado wildlife are managed for the use, benefit, and enjoyment of Colorado visitors and residents.

Every wildlife species has a set of biological and ecological factors they are dependent upon for a healthy population. Every wildlife management plan should support these factors as the primary goal of the plan. The current goal for mountain lion and bobcat management is simply maintaining a population that can be hunted and trapped. But if the act of hunting and trapping mountain lions and bobcats does not improve the welfare of these species, then the activity must be called into question. As of October 2024, Colorado Parks and Wildlife doesn’t have a bobcat management plan, has no idea how many bobcats are in the state, and yet allows each hunter and trapper to kill as many bobcats as they want. From a wildlife management perspective, this is completely unacceptable.

One of the most important biological factors that determines the health of these wild feline populations is kitten survival. Each year, mountain lion kittens are orphaned because a female mountain lion was killed by a hunter. Colorado Parks and Wildlife does not count these kittens that starve to death because they aren’t of breeding age. Respected mountain lion biologists and researchers will tell you that if you are going to hunt mountain lions, no more than 22% of the harvest should be female lions of breeding age. In Colorado, 46% of the mountain lions killed by hunters each year are female lions.

Violating the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation

The North American Model of Wildlife Conservation (NAM) is often cited as the gold standard of wildlife conservation by hunters, trappers, fishermen, and outfitters. NAM was a response to the market hunting that was decimating wildlife in North America.

This was put in place to prevent the selling of any part of an animal for profit. The trapping and hunting of bobcats and selling their pelts is a clear violation of this tenet.

Fair Chase Rules Violated by Mountain Lion and Bobcat Hunting and Trapping

Fair chase is a term used by hunters to describe an ethical approach to hunting big game animals. It refers to the pursuit and taking of any free-ranging wild game animal in a manner that does not give the hunter an improper or unfair advantage over the game animals.

The use of any of the following methods in the killing of a game animal is considered Unfair Chase. The bold items indicate how Fair Chase is violated in Colorado.

The price of a bobcat pelt in China or Russia determines how many bobcats are killed each year. During the 2023-2024 season, a total of 955 bobcats were killed by hunters and trappers, and during that same time, only 10 bobcats were killed because of livestock conflicts.

Bobcats, along with mountain lions and lynx, do not need to be hunted or trapped to “control” their populations. This has been proven in national parks and other areas where hunting and trapping are not allowed. Neither of these species spiraled out of control due to lack of hunting and trapping. - David Neils

"Nature is the only environment that is constantly striving for harmony. We are wise to understand its rhythms, connections and incredible healing power for all living things. There is a deep strand of our DNA that longs to be in this flow. We support activating that strand through workshops, presentations, hikes and other events." - Wild Nature Media

Confronting pollution caused by the Oil & Gas Industry - Leak of the Week: Oct. 15th & Oct. 22nd

The oil and gas industry claims it’s clean and responsible, but in New Mexico, where oil production is growing faster than any other state in the U.S., the industry spills an average of four times every single day.

Every week, we are highlighting oil and gas spills with Leak of the Week. Follow @wildearthguardians on social media to tune in each week!

Federal court decision held that the permit for Denver Water’s project by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers violated the Clean Water Act and the National Environmental Policy Act.

On October 17, 2024, a federal court handed WildEarth Guardians and partners—Save the Colorado, The Environmental Group, Living Rivers, Waterkeeper Alliance, and Sierra Club—a major win in their legal challenge to a Clean Water Act permit needed for the ongoing expansion of the Moffat Collection System and Gross Dam in Colorado. Yesterday’s federal court decision held that the issuance of the dredge and fill permit for Denver Water’s project by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers violated the Clean Water Act and the National Environmental Policy Act. The Court has directed the parties to confer regarding appropriate remedies to address the Corps’ legal violations. - Read More

"We’re mourning the loss of grizzly 399, dubbed “the most famous grizzly in the world,” who died on Tuesday night after being struck by a vehicle in Snake River Canyon in Wyoming. At 28 years of age, she was the oldest reproducing female grizzly and a mascot of Grand Teton National Park, near Yellowstone.

“She was an iconic matriarch with more than 20 cubs and grandcubs, and the grizzly bear population will surely suffer from her loss,” said the Center’s Andrea Zaccardi. “Tragedies like this highlight why we need to maintain federal protection for bears and do more to ensure their safety from cars and other threats.”

"Yet another species has been discovered to use individual names — this time, ridiculously cute marmoset monkeys, who live in South American rainforests. According to a new study published in Science, they identify each other through vocalizations called “phee calls.”

“Marmosets live in small monogamous family groups and take care of their young together, much like humans do,” said David Omer, one of the study’s authors. “These similarities suggest that they faced comparable evolutionary social challenges to our early pre-linguistic ancestors, which might have led them to develop similar communicating methods.”

That means the learning mechanisms involved in marmoset communication may help shed light on human evolutionary history too."

The USDA’s Wildlife Services program is a holdover from the 1930s, when Congress gave the federal government broad authority to kill wildlife at the request of private landowners. In that era, government-sponsored extermination programs for native wild animals, like wolves and grizzly bears, were common.

After the Endangered Species Act was passed in 1973, federal agencies were required to change course and start helping some of those wild animal populations recover. But today, Wildlife Services employees still kill hundreds of thousands of noninvasive animals a year, data from the agency shows. Even species considered threatened under the Endangered Species Act, like grizzly bears, are not exempt. So long as livestock or human life are threatened, federal rules allow Wildlife Services to kill those animals, too. -

NPR recently featured a major story exposing the USDA's killing of wild animals. Shared with 12 million listeners across the country, this is the largest media spotlight on the government’s practice of choosing cows over wildlife to date. - How A Federal Program Kills Wildlife

Birthday salutations! In the spirit of red, may your year be filled with vibrant life and transformation, celebrating the strength of your heart and the journey ahead.

The Exmoor horses at Saksfjed Vildmark are helping to enhance the diversity of both habitats and wildlife

Natural grazing by large, free-roaming wild and semi-wild herbivores such as deer, European bison, and horses, is critical to the health and functionality of many European landscapes. It can boost biodiversity by opening up landscapes and preventing encroachment by shrubs, reduce the risk of catastrophic fire, and enhance carbon storage and climate change resilience. Returning iconic grazers such as European bison to landscapes can also support the growth of nature-based economies, generating jobs and a new pride in local nature.

In late 2023, Rewilding Europe launched its Natural Grazing Facility as a tool for scaling up the adoption of natural grazing across Europe. The facility works by connecting demand and supply of herbivores among organizations dedicated to Rewilding Europe’s rewilding principles.

The combined impact of different herbivores on the landscape helps to create diverse habitats and improve the health and functionality of ecosystems.

In exciting news, the first translocation of animals through the Natural Grazing Facility took place in the late spring, with a herd of 23 Exmoor horses transferred to the Saksfjed Vildmark (“Saksfjed Wilderness”) – an ambitious, Denmark-based rewilding initiative managed by Danish philanthropic organization the Hempel Foundation. The horses were sold by Grazelands Rewilding (formerly the Taurus Foundation), a Dutch organization working to enhance natural grazing in the Netherlands and across Europe. To supplement these animals, Rewilding Europe donated a further 17 horses that were living at the Kempen-Broek rewilding initiative.

The 40 horses, which were released into two large enclosures of 300 and 450 hectares at Saksfjed, have acclimatized well to their new home. In the 450-hectare enclosure they joined an existing herd of 10 Exmoor horses, with three foals already born to this group since their arrival. The horses share their enclosures with a total of around 150 Galloway cattle.

Sand pits created by the horses are good news for the germination of wildflowers and offer opportunities for ground-dwelling insects.

The dung of semi-wild natural grazers is an essential link in the circle of life for many plants and insects.

The Saksfjed Vildmark initiative, which joined Rewilding Europe’s European Rewilding Network earlier this year, is located at the southern tip of the Danish island of Lolland. The 800-hectare site, a coastal area comprising meadows, wetlands and woodlands, was mostly used for agriculture in the past. Starting in January 2023, the Hempel Foundation has been working to actively rewild nature here, based on the restoration of natural processes that is aligned with ecological science and practical experience.

Moving forwards, Saksfjed Vildmark will be allowed to develop into a wilder area of grassland with scattered vegetation, open forests, and wetlands – all grazed by bovines and horses. The more than 200 horses and bovines that are now at the site have already had a significantly positive impact on the landscape, enhancing the diversity of both habitats and wildlife.

“Numerous sand pits have been created in the enclosures by the animals through their digging and scraping and rolling around, which has exposed a lot of sand,” says Thor Hjarsen, who is head of Saksfjed Wilderness as a senior biologist with the Hempel Foundation. “This is good for the germination of new wildflowers and has also generated opportunities for soil-dwelling insects. We have identified a lot of new bee and beetle species, for example.

“The horses and bovines have also helped to open up the forested areas on the site, which were previously very dense. This will allow flowering plants to grow, benefitting insects such as butterflies. We expect the beneficial impact of the animals to increase moving into next year.”

Endangered Ocelot Appears on Trail Camera in New Arizona Location

Ocelots, like jaguars, belong in Arizona. They are one of the missing species, appearing only occasionally. Six ocelots have been recorded in Arizona since 2009; only two are currently known to be living in the state. With incredible new footage released by the Center for Biological Diversity, we see an ocelot who was first photographed earlier this year by researchers with the Phoenix Zoo, believed to be a young adult.

These cats are showing us how important connectivity is within their range. The new ocelot moved quite a distance between detections and across an interstate, an incredible feat. Threats to the surrounding Sky Island mountains where this pint-sized cat roams include two proposed mines and the bisecting of habitat by U.S.-Mexico border wall, disastrous for all manner of wildlife.

Over in Texas, the ocelot population is larger but has also shrunk to fewer than 100 remaining in the wild. Earlier this month, the Caesar Kleberg Wildlife Research Institute held a groundbreaking ceremony for its upcoming Ocelot Conservation Facility to begin a captive breeding program. While the team is still a few years from having ocelots released, this is a huge step to increase numbers of South Texas’ wild cat. It also charts a path we can learn from for both ocelots and jaguars further west.

“Moments like this remind me that the world is alive and magic is afoot,” Center for Biological Diversity’s Russ McSpadden.

The Center for Biological Diversity released stunning new video footage of a rare wild ocelot in a Sky Island Mountain range in Arizona, within the ancestral homelands of the Tohono O’odham Nation.

The footage, captured on a trail camera on July 24, 2024, is from a location where ocelots have not recently been detected. For the safety of the cat the Center is not specifying the location.

“I shouted with joy when I realized what I was seeing on the trail cam. This incredible footage shows us that ocelots belong in our Sky Islands, despite all the threats they face,” said Russ McSpadden, a Southwest conservation advocate at the Center for Biological Diversity. “These elegant, elusive, and fiercely resilient felines are an important part of what makes southern Arizona so special. Capturing footage of this cat in the wild gives me hope for their survival.”

Protected under the Endangered Species Act since 1982, ocelots are known for their striking, chain-like rosettes and spots, which allow researchers to identify individual animals, much like human fingerprints. These distinctive markings also provide excellent camouflage in the dense forests, rugged terrain, and thornscrub that make up their habitat.

After analysis and consultation with several experts — including Carmina Gutiérrez González, Ph.D., research coordinator for the Northern Jaguar Project — the Center confirmed the latest detection was the same ocelot detected on June 12, 2024, in the Atascosa Highlands west of Nogales by researchers at the Phoenix Zoo. The ocelot traveled at least 30 miles between detections.

Sometime in June or July the ocelot crossed the Santa Cruz River, in a stretch proposed to become a national wildlife refuge, crossed I-19, and moved into an area with several Sky Island Mountain ranges.

“The Sky Island Mountains are not just beautiful landscapes; they are living parts of our culture and identity. Seeing the return of an ocelot to these ancestral lands reaffirms our sacred connection to this place and reminds us of our duty to protect these lands and the creatures that depend on them,” said Chairman Austin Nunez of the San Xavier District of the Tohono O’odham Nation. “The ocelot’s survival is intertwined with ours, and we must ensure that this species endures for future generations.”

Ocelots rely on the intact, interconnected wildlands of the Sky Islands. The fragmentation of their habitat due to roads, urban sprawl, mines, and border barriers is a serious challenge to their survival. In Sonora, Mexico, ongoing construction of a freight railway between Imurís and Nogales is ripping through crucial ocelot breeding habitat, posing another threat to the imperiled species.

Fewer than 100 ocelots are thought to remain in the U.S., with the majority residing in southern Texas. Arizona is home to a small but crucial population, which exists at the northernmost part of the species’ range.

The Sky Islands are a series of isolated mountain ranges that rise dramatically from the desert floor, stretching from northern Mexico to southern Arizona. These ranges are biologically rich, creating unique ecosystems that support an incredible diversity of plants and animals. The Sky Islands serve as vital habitat corridors for species like the ocelot, jaguar, and black bear, enabling them to move between different mountain ranges in search of food, mates, and safe shelter.

“Every ocelot and jaguar sighting is a chance to celebrate these incredible creatures and reflect on how we can help their safe return to the Southwestern U.S.,” said McSpadden. “I hope this beautiful ocelot reminds us all of the critical work ahead to make sure these cats’ habitat remains unfragmented and protected for future generations.” - Center for Biological Diversity

A Message from Captain Paul Watson inside Nuuk Prison

“Justice Delayed is Justice Denied”
Written by Captain Paul Watson inside Nuuk Prison
October 2, 2024

Today is my 73rd day of incarceration in Nuuk prison and it was my 4th appearance in the Greenland court. It was what I expected, the judge refused documentation and arguments from my defense team and ordered me detained for an additional 28 days. That means 91 days on a bogus accusation on a very minor offense from 14 years ago for something I did not participate in.

The court has all the evidence, they have all the information needed to make a decision. It is clearly quite political.

The judge sat the bench like a stone
Evidence he denied to be shown
The prosecutor scowled
With contempt for the crowd
Her bias reflected in her tone

And so my friends it’s back to my cell with a view, where I can see the icebergs in the fjord and the occasional breach of a humpback whale to remind me why I am here.

I can endure the time for however long it takes. My only concern, my only regret is separation from my wife and our two little boys. I am not here because I am a criminal. I am here for opposing a criminal enterprise with the most deadly of weapons – a camera.

With our cameras we exposed the crimes of the Japanese whaling industry and in so doing, we embarrassed the proud nation of Japan, bringing their unlawful activities into the living rooms of millions of people around the world with our Animal Planet television show “Whale Wars.”

Japanese whaling is not a criminal enterprise because I say so. It is a criminal operation for violating the 1986 International Whaling Commission’s Global Moratorium on Commercial Whaling. Japan’s argument of it being a research effort and non-commercial was shut down in 2014 by the world’s highest court, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the Hague. This ruled that slaughtering whales in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary was not research. It is commercial.

The whalers went to sea you see,
To see how many whales to kill, you see
We caught them in the act
An indisputable fact
And drove them from the sea, you see

In addition, the Japanese whalers deliberately rammed and destroyed a two million (US) dollar catamaran, broke the rib of an Animal Planet cameraman, pitching 6 crewmembers into the frigid waters of the Southern Ocean, refusing to rescue them. In the face of the documented violence, the whalers suffered no consequences. When the Greenlandic prosecutor claims that a single Japanese whaler suffered a blister on his cheek, from the chemical pepper spray from his own crew, something she describes as a crime of severity, it illustrates the almost comical absurdity of the charges.

What she claims is trespassing is captured on film showing Pete Bethune politely knocking on the wheelhouse door of the Shonan Maru, the door opens, he hands the Japanese captain a letter of complaint and a request for compensation for the ship they deliberately destroyed. The Japanese response was to kidnap Captain Bethune and to transport him to Japan to charge him with trespassing, obstruction of business, and assault. He was interrogated daily until he confessed to the charges although he refused to confess to assault.

It was only after a coerced confession that he was brought before a judge where a deal was made. A suspended sentence in exchange for a statement that I ordered him to take these actions. He was then released and allowed to return home and a warrant was issued against me for conspiracy.

After his release, Pete Bethune signed an affidavit stating he lied in exchange for the suspended sentence. His accusation was the sole evidence that Japan used against me, but despite the retraction by Captain Bethune, the Japanese prosecutor refused to drop the charges against me.

The whalers sliced his boat in two
Our cameras have proved this true
Pete Bethune was kidnapped
The evidence was scrapped
By the criminal whaling crew

What makes my incarceration bearable is the tremendous worldwide support I am receiving. Hundreds of thousands of names signing petitions for my release. So many demonstrations in hundreds of places around the globe, thousands of calls to the Danish Embassies and Consulates, the support of world leaders like President Macron of France and President Lula of Brazil, numerous celebrities, concerts held on my behalf. Such an incredible outpouring of love and support all brought together by our collective love and respect for whales and dolphins, diversity and interdependence of all life in the sea and on land.

The enemy has been clearly identified
Five thousand people from many a state
Protesting with actions, petitions and art
All united in opposing cetacide
It’s compassion we seek to instigate
Fired by courage born deep in the heart.

I am so very grateful for the 2,300 letters I have received in prison from over 30 countries. I am especially grateful and very much touched by the hundreds of letters from children, many accompanied with drawings of whales or poems.

Every poem, every drawing of a whale
Sent by children from around the Ocean
Delivered here behind this prison wall
Provides a storm of hope to fill my soul
Unleashing a tsunami of emotion
From across the blue shroud I hear them call.

I am in this prison cell for another four weeks, so please continue to raise your voices. It means a great deal and it is effective. Please continue to contact Danish Embassies and Consulates. And please continue to send me your letters, drawings, and poems. The prison guards tell me they have never seen anyone receive so much mail and your letters very much reflect the level of support. It also keeps me busy because I read every piece of mail. I try to answer as many as I can although it has been difficult because I am still recovering from the handcuff injury to my writing hand (my left hand). However, when I am released, I will answer every letter with a certificate of appreciation for your support. You all give me strength.

A very special thank you to Lamya Essemlali, the President of Sea Shepherd France, to Elodie, and Christelle for making the numerous trips from France to Nuuk, Greenland. They have been with me for every court appearance. Thank you also to Nathalie Gil, the President of Sea Shepherd Brazil, who made the long trip from Brazil to attend one of my appearances. Thank you to Rod Marining, who along with myself was a co-founder of Greenpeace. He journeyed all the way from Vancouver to visit me. Thanks also for the visits from Omar Todd, Kylie Herd, and Rob Read from the Captain Paul Watson Foundation for making the long trip to visit me. Thanks to Locky MacLean and Dior for visiting me and the crew of the John Paul DeJoria for attending my first court appearance. Thanks to Vakita from France, Nat Geo from the USA, and other film crews from Denmark, France, and the UK for visiting and interviewing me in this prison.

My Nordic jail cell has an amazing view,
Of the wild wide fjord that lies before me
Studded with jagged bergy bits of ice
Where great whales breach upon the Ocean blue
Happy and free in the Greenlandic sea
A wondrous site worthy of sacrifice.

Endangered Species Act to List Bethany Beach Firefly

Responding to a petition from the Xerces Society and Center for Biological Diversity, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has proposed to list the Bethany Beach firefly as a threatened species under the U.S. Endangered Species Act. This marks the first time a firefly has been proposed for listing in the U.S. - Endangered Species Act

Exciting Finds from the 2024 Bumble Bee Atlas

This summer, over 900 volunteers spread out across the United States to look for native bumble bees. They made some incredible finds, including the first yellow-banded bumble bee sighting in South Dakota in 70 years! - Exciting Finds from 2024

Xerxes Society Webinars & Events

All About Arachnids: Halloween’s Eight-Legged Wonders

Oct 31 - 10:00 AM - 11:00 AM PT / 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM MT / 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM CT / 1:00 PM - 2:00 PM ET

Zoom - Join us for this special Q&A session with Dr. Sebastian Echeverri, spider scientist, wildlife photographer, and science communicator.

In the Life of Extraordinary Dragonflies

Nov 7 - 10:00 AM - 11:00 AM PT / 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM MT / 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM CT / 1:00 PM - 2:00 PM ET

Zoom - Join Dr. Jessica Ware from the American Museum of Natural History as she explores the world of dragonflies and damselflies. Dr. Jessica Ware is a Full Curator and the current Division Chair in the Division of Invertebrate Zoology at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. Jessica’s research focuses on the evolution of behavioral and physiological adaptations in insects, with an emphasis on how these occur in dragonflies and their close relatives, damselflies. Her research group uses genetics to study the evolutionary relationships between species and uses these tools to inform their work on reproductive, social, and flight behaviors in insects.

2024 Colorado Pollinator Summit: New Terrain for Pollinator Conservation

Denver Botanic Gardens, 1007 York Street, Denver, CO 80206 - The 9th annual Colorado Pollinator Summit will gather Colorado’s pollinator conservation community for a day of learning, sharing, and networking. This year’s Summit—New Terrain for Pollinator Conservation—will include talks by keynote speaker Eric Lee-Mader on How to Eat for the Bees: The Next Stage in Pollinator Conservation Begins in Your Kitchen, presentations by elementary students on climate actions for pollinators, talks about habitat for biodiversity, and updates on community science projects increasing what we know about Colorado's pollinators.

In this episode of the Rewilding Earth Podcast, Jessica shares her journey from an organismal biologist to making significant contributions on the ground with Biohabitats. She discusses rewilding, ecological restoration, and the importance of landscape connectivity. Jessica explains her transition from working on tropical ecosystems to engaging with urban and peri-urban restoration projects. She highlights the significance of bridging academic, federal, and local efforts in conservation and the evolving roles of conservation professionals. Jessica also reflects on her philosophical perspective gained through various roles, emphasizing the need for adaptability and seizing unexpected opportunities for small to large-scale ecological changes. - Rewilding Our World

Dr. Jessica Hardesty Norris is a biologist with over 20 years of experience in ecological planning and research, program development, strategic planning and community outreach for natural resource conservation. She has demonstrated success in proposal writing, partnership building, and project management. Her recent project work includes park planning for Charleston County and leading Biohabitats’ engagement in a 100-mile greenway along the Chattahoochee, often with a focus on writing and communication. Her areas of technical expertise include bird conservation, urban ecology, nutrient cycling, sustainable fisheries, and community outreach and engagement. She has presented and published papers on topics related to conservation biology, tropical ecology, and ornithology. Jessica currently serves on the Boards of Audubon South Carolina and College of Charleston’s Sustainability Institute, and as Natural Resources Chair of the Charleston League of Women Voters.

In this podcast author George Stimson discusses the events around August 1969 - All Is None Episode 13

Richard Metzger: What is your purpose in putting Access Manson on the World Wide Web in the first place and when did the site go up?

George Stimson: Access Manson went on-line on January 26, 1996, the 25th anniversary of Manson's illegal conviction for murder. The purpose of the site is stated on the home page, to tell the world the truth about Charles Manson and to get him his rights by showing how those rights were taken. This has not been possible through over 25 years of dealing with the mainstream media. They are only interested in presenting the same old story that still sells so well. Only through the technology of the World Wide Web, and by our ability to use that technology to put out exactly what we want, can we achieve our purposes.

Stimson: [Manson] has said that 50 million people have to go, but I don't see where that would be enough.

RM: Why do you consider it important for the world to hear the philosophy of a man considered by some to be one of the most evil men alive?

GS: The world is in a lot of trouble from a lot of different directions, but most of the serious problems are grounded in overpopulation and its resultant ill effects, like pollution. Manson can restore mankind to its proper place in the natural order. It is the only real chance humans have for survival. That is important to us. As for people who think Manson is "one of the most evil men alive" -- we're not necessarily trying to reach them.

RM: "Manson can restore mankind to its proper place in the natural order." What do you mean by that?

GS: Mankind has been making a great effort over many centuries to separate itself from nature rather than admitting that it is a part of nature. As a result of this attitude man has placed himself in an adversarial role with everything that allows him to live. Instead of realizing his part in nature and working in harmony with it, man has viewed the natural world as something to be confronted, conquered, and used (sold). This has created an imbalance that threatens the survival of this planet. The solution to this problem is not really difficult to understand. But it means that people are going to have to make some real decisions, some hard choices. Manson has the mind to determine and implement those choices.

RM: Has Manson discussed with you what his plans are to deal with overpopulation?

GS: Well, he has said that 50 million people have to go, but I don't see where that would be enough. As to how they go, we've had some discussions on that, but not real specific planning. We haven't started figuring logistics or anything.

RM: What are Manson's feelings about having the uncensored direct access to the public that the WWW affords him?

CHARLES MANSON: That's like someone saying, 'How do you feel that you have access to the mind?' The mind. Am I so persecuted and condemned that I don't even have access to the mind? That I can't even use the language anymore? What am I, on language restriction? In other words, I'm persecuted by everybody who feels like they want to get away with doing something to me, because I don't have any rights, but then when everybody wakes up that it's their rights, and then they're not going to have any rights. And they can't exist without rights. I can. Because I've never had any rights anyway. I was born on the wrong side of the law. So therefore, the world of darkness is mine. And then they're telling me that they don't want any darkness. There's no light without the darkness, because you've got to have both to have one.

The United States of America was based on my right to have access to the public. The bottom line is, I am the public. They sold the public, the public sold themselves. So as far as the public, I am the goddamn public. I'm the king of the public. I'm the leader of this whole damn world. I have a one world government that's in my mind. I have a one world mind that's in my soul. Everybody in the public is dead, unless they live in my grace. They're already dead. They're killing themselves in all kinds of ways.

As for having access to the web, the web is my mind. I brought the web into play. The web is my church.

RM: Do you feel that if the word on his political thought gets out to enough people through Access Manson perhaps the public will come to regard him as a sort of philosopher king or as a messianic figure?

GS: We hope that if we demonstrate intelligence, intelligence will respond. Much of the public already regards Manson as a philosopher king or messianic figure. I think Manson is held, in large part, because of his beliefs. And I think that the powers-that-be fear that he would be a threat to them if he was released. They might have good reason to be afraid. Manson can be pretty powerful when he wants to be, and they know it. They're already so afraid of him that they won't let him do anything. Anything he wants to do; they make a rule against it. Why are they afraid? They know the karma they've pushed out and they know what they have coming back.

RM: Under what circumstances can you envision the world's population actually welcoming the political leadership of Charles Manson?

GS: The way things are going I think it's inevitable and I think it's getting closer every day. Haven't you noticed how quickly things happen these days?

RM: Yeah, but don't you think things would really, really have to get out of hand for THAT to happen? Come on...

RM: Well, I guess I can't disagree with that! Is Charles Manson actually interested in assuming political power or would he prefer to be seen as a wise old sage who world leaders would come to for advice?

CHARLES MANSON: The brotherhood of the gun rules the world. I don't give a fuck about votes or getting elected into being a politician. And I don't give a fuck about playing no wise holy man. All I want is order. I want order in the perspective of the numbers. And if you give me order in the numbers, fuck the personality of it. I don't care about the personality of it. Get with the program or be destroyed. That's all that is."

GS: Overall, the site is about Charles Manson, and he is Charles Manson, so he has a lot of input just by existing. A lot of the content is his thought, and he did have a lot of input on that even if he didn't send the thought out with the web site specifically in mind. He did want the statement about his guitars on the site.

Since his last parole hearing he's been getting more specific about some things to do with the site. He's sent out thought about conditions in the prison that he'd like the world to know about. He wants me to put up more images. We may have to revamp the system to do the things he's talking about.

RM: Does Manson have any kind of web access in prison? He's seen your site, right?

GS: No, he doesn't have web access, but he has seen printed versions of Access Manson.

GS: I had written him two letters over the years that I did not really expect him to answer, and he didn't. Then I met some people who regularly corresponded with him, and they enclosed one of my letters with theirs, sort of like a personal introduction. He responded and we began corresponding fairly regularly after that.

GS: I hadn't really considered meeting him until Sandra Good [eds. note: Ms. Good is an alleged former member of Manson's "Family"] suggested that I begin visiting him. After trying to study the man for over fifteen years it seemed like a logical progression to meet him.

GS: I was anxious, but that was mostly due to the maximum-security setting. Manson put me at ease pretty quickly. I've never been nervous around him.

Stimson: Kids are fine. The people who were with Manson in 1969 were mostly kids.

GS: Well, I've only seen Charlie in the visiting room at Corcoran, so I only know what he is like in that situation. He's a convict, that's for sure. But he's also so much more than that. If I said he was like the universe, that might be too general. I get along with him very well.

GS: We talk about current events, things we've done, things we are doing, things we want to do. We talk about what's going on in our lives, about people we both know. We talk about the moment. We play a lot of cards, and chess.

RM: What has the public's reaction been so far? Do you get a lot of fan mail or is it just hate mail?

GS: Reaction has been overwhelmingly positive, like 90%. And little of the negative mail has showed much mind beyond just saying we're crazy. Positive responses have ranged from many-paged messages expressing empathy and a willingness to help, to messages that simply say "thank you".

GS: A lot of different kinds of people from different walks of life have contacted us. We've heard from students, lawyers, blue collar people, people who are still affected by the counterculture, all kinds. And yes, we hear from a lot of young people, many who are not familiar with Manson and his case from their own memory of the time. Kids are fine. The people who were with Manson in 1969 were mostly kids.

RM: What sort of help do they offer? Working on the site? Monetary support? Forming a guerrilla army to bust him out of prison?

GS: Mostly they offer to do "anything I can". We've had a few offers to help with the site. We have several projects in the works right now, and if these projects go where we want them to we will have plenty of things for people to do. We're keeping a list of the people who have offered to help, and when the time comes, we will be getting in touch with them.

On a remote and beautiful ranch in western Colorado, Mary Conover and Kenyon Fields are attempting to restore a portion of the Little Delores River and Pinion Mesa. The husband and wife team is working with NGOs as well as state and federal agencies to restore native grasses and sages to pastures and aspen trees to uplands. Along the Little Dolores River the two, with the help of volunteers and the Youth Conservation Corps, are removing invasive Russian Olive and replanting native willow and cottonwood.

The river has been slowed down and therefore deepened so as to slowly flood nearby fields. Beavers have returned to the Little Dolores Valley and are helping improve the already-begun damming, further enhancing the new wetlands.

This inspiring and instructive film is a “how to” for land owners and agencies to restore and repair working lands after a century of grazing cattle and sheep. The changing climate and prolonged drought that the ranch is experiencing are slowing down the restoration of Mountain Island Ranch, but slowly and certainly the private and public lands on Pinion Meas are recovering.

Before and after images of the work being done at Mountain Island Ranch demonstrate the direction and the degree to which their hard work has succeeded. This film should be viewed and studied by conservationists everywhere who are faced with degraded and invaded landscapes from past archaic practices. - Jason Kahn

Check out the virtual show of CM art at - http://goodbyehelterskelter.com/ - Gratitude goes to Michael for saving some of the pieces in this exhibit from a fire. Feedback on how easy it is to navigate the website and your thoughts on its presentation are appreciated. Spread the word about this treasure from the Golden Soul!

The National Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, US Fish and Wildlife Service and National Park Service have all been directed to find ways to engage tribal people in co-management of federal lands (or in some cases such as California in state parks and other state lands). These co-management agreements are being implemented at all federal agencies frequently without any public review.

Maybe the reason no one is allowed to see the Suislaw-tribal co-management agreement is because the tribes called for much greater logging, including of old growth for “economic development” and of course a requirement that some jobs go to tribal members. Other co-management agreements have been made at Big Cypress National Preserve in Florida, and Point Reyes National Seashore in California.

If you aren’t alarmed by this sort of reverse discrimination, you should be. The track record of tribal people on environmental issues where they “control” the land, resources, or outcome is not very good. Who controls the outcome is critical. In areas where they do not have a vested interest, particularly a financial one, they may appear “environmentally” allied. But where there is a significant potential for financial gain, you see a different story. - The Wilderness News

“Mount Shasta, situated near the northern extremity of the Sierra Nevada, rises in solitary grandeur from a lightly sculptured lava plain, and maintains a far more impressive and commanding individuality than any other mountain within the limits of California.

The crisp icy sky was without a cloud, and the stars lighted us on our way. Deep silence brooded the mountain, broken only by the night wind and an occasional rock falling from crumbling buttresses to the snow slopes below.

The wild beauty of the morning stirred our pulses in glad exhilaration, and we strode rapidly onward, seldom stopping to take a breath—over the broad red apron of lava that descends from the west side of the smaller of the two cone summits, across the gorge that divides them, up the majestic snow curves sweeping to the top of the ancient crater, around the broad icy fountains of the Whitney glacier, past the hissing fumaroles.

The slight weariness of the ascent was soon rested away. The sky was of the thinnest, purest azure; spiritual life filled every pore of rock and cloud; and we reveled in the marvelous abundance and beauty of the landscapes by which we were encircled.

A vigorous bumble-bee zigzagged around our heads, filling the air with a summery hay-field drone, as if wholly unconscious of the fact that the nearest honey flower was a mile beneath him.

The creative sun shone gloriously upon the white expanse, and rare cloud-lands, hill and dale, mountain and valley, rose responsive to his rays, and steadily developed to higher beauty and individuality.

Storm clouds on the mountains—how truly beautiful they are!—floating fountains bearing water for every well; the angels of streams and lakes; brooding in the deep pure azure, or sweeping along the ground, over ridge and dome, over meadow, over forest, over garden and grove; lingering with cooling shadows, refreshing every flower, and soothing rugged rock brows with a gentleness of touch and gesture no human hand can equal!

Weather of spring and summer throughout the middle region of the Sierra is usually well flecked with rain-storms and light dustings of snow, most of which are far too obviously joyous and life-giving to be regarded as storms.

Presently a vigorous thunder-bolt crashes through the crisp sunny air, ringing like steel on steel, its startling detonation breaking into a spray of echoes among the rocky canons below. Then down comes the cataract of rain to the wild gardens and groves. The big crystal drops tingle the pine needles, plash and spatter on granite pavements, and pour adown the sides of ridges and domes in a net-work of gray bubbling rills. In a few minutes the firm storm cloud withers to a mesh of dim filaments and disappears, leaving the sky more sunful than before. Every bird and plant is invigorated, a steam of fragrance rises from the ground, and the storm is finished—one cloud, one lightning flash, one dash of rain.

Thin fibrous cloud films began to blow directly over the summit of the cone from north to south, drawn out in long fairy webs, like carded wool, forming and dissolving as if by magic. The wind twisted them into ringlets and whirled them in a succession of graceful convolutions, like the outside sprays of Yosemite falls; then sailing out in the pure azure over the precipitous brink of the cone, they were drifted together in light gray rolls, like foam wreaths on a river.

Hail gave place to snow, and darkness came on like night. The wind rising to the highest pitch of violence, boomed and surged like breakers on a rocky coast. The lightnings flashed amid the desolate crags in terrible accord, their tremendous muffled detonations unrelieved by a single echo, and seeming to come thudding passionately forth from out the very heart of the storm.

The snow fell with unabated lavishness until an hour or two after the coming on of what appeared to be the natural darkness of night. The whole quantity would probably measure about two feet. Up to the time the storm first fell upon the mountain, its development was gentle in the extreme—the deliberate growth of cumulus clouds beneath, the weaving of translucent tissue above, then the roar of the wind, the crash of thunder, and the darkening flight of snow flowers. Its decay was not less sudden—the clouds broke and vanished, not a snow-flake was left in the sky, and the stars shone out with pure and tranquil radiance.”

“Whoever you are, wherever your interest lies, whatever you’ve fallen in love with, get out of bed every morning and do something. Act, step into the fray—fight for a human society in balance with the natural world.” — Kristine Tompkins

Kris Tompkins is the president and co-founder of Tompkins Conservation, an American conservationist, and former CEO of Patagonia, Inc. For three decades, she has committed to protecting and restoring wild beauty and biodiversity by creating national parks, restoring wildlife, inspiring activism, and fostering economic vitality as a result of conservation. Kristine and her late husband Douglas Tompkins have protected approximately 15 million acres of parklands in Chile and Argentina through Tompkins Conservation and its partners, making them among the most successful national park-oriented philanthropists in history. Kristine served as Patron for Protected Areas for the UN Environmental Programme from 2018-2022. The recipient of numerous honors, she was the first conservationist to be awarded the Carnegie Medal of Philanthropy.

In this episode of the Rewilding Earth podcast, Kris Tompkins discusses her visionary efforts in rewilding South America, particularly focusing on the Southern Cone’s ecological reconnection. Kris reflects on various projects, including reintroducing large predators like jaguars and restoring ecosystems across vast territories in Argentina and Chile. (Almost 15 million acres in total. That’s 5 million acres larger than Switzerland!) Kris knows how to think BIG. She shares insights on conservation strategies, the importance of thinking on a continental scale, and the role of local communities and the new generation in these initiatives. With a drive to reconnect ecosystems from Chile to Colombia and beyond, Kris emphasizes the significance of working with natural systems and engaging local populations to ensure success. - Thinking Really Big

“National parks are the gold standard of conservation in these days of severe ecological crisis.” - Douglas Tompkins

The thought of justice as being Jesus Christ dying on the cross; this thought has been released from the subconscious minds and the Christian thought is nearing completion. No one believes that Jesus Christ will ever return. Only through self can you find what you call Christian justice. Yours is justice. Do back what has been done to you, but harm no one who has harmed no one. Humble men sometimes do brave things, but it is unlikely that a brave man is capable of humbling himself. - Charles Manson

Bug letter -

To write I must slow my mind down. I'm not human in my ways of thought and I don't want to be programmed by schools of thought. what man is or what man is not, woman etc. "Nature" has a balance. I want it like a hunger. I learn a universe in a look, a flash. I could slow down and spell the word over and over until it hangs in my thought pattern and holds little bits and pieces of power. I try to clear all patterns out of my mind to where I can become a tree or woods, a mountain, a world, a universe. Sparks in my mind become the only pattern I crave.

Suffering is -- is not. Could be or a balance of is. Little thoughts A woman suffers at childbirth and gives to it. It's just an experience. Ying and Yangs of personal playing people. You accept and reject whatever is best for whatever point you are on. Some minds may go through great big balances for deep thought and others wave a hand and say it backwards. Shiva does it in a dance.

I lived with a bug for 17 years. Everyone hated this bug and said it was no good and bad. It had no eyes, no ears and lived its life on feeling, alone in the dark, no help, no claws, no fangs, no defenses A helpless little bug. I watched it and thought how can this life form find any joy, why would life want to live. No one teaches it, they don't play 'watch momma and learn'. It's all go for what you feel. Everyone and everything is out to destroy you -- spiders and other bugs will eat you and humans are at war on you. I learned more from that bug than I did from my whole life before.

I fell in love with another fife form. That bug could feel what I thought. I set for years with no books, no TV, no radio -- nothing but a candle and making things with strings and toilet paper. So, I've had a lot of time to spend with this bug doing just what it does.

For 5 years I couldn't think why I did some of the things it does. Then I began to see into its world. We have a word for God. The bug is all he knows he is. All from where that bug thinks. Leaves grow on trees,,, shellfish, are born and grass grows, and snails are, we think we think from our brains. In my sleep -- half sleep, I'll pick a spider off my face, roll it up perfect and set it on the floor and wake up to see it unhurt. If I tried to do it thinking, I would have broken its legs. The night I had the fight with the guy who said he whipped 7 cops, and I put him in the barrel without a thought -- I've transcended the heads of earth people for 5,000,000 years. I've touched down in places with thoughts never before. I am in a lot of bodies doing lots of things and I never had any real control over or under much.

Look you well, I try to be what I want, and I got everyone that wants me to be a killer. They torment me to be that. Each time I get a chance to kill someone and don't, all the others say quack quack duck. He ain't shit. They want blood, they want death. They are locked to the T.V. A guy went to the visiting room picked a baby up and knocked its head off. The parents told him they forgive him and that they were sorry and he's outside now killing whoever he wants. I should have gone with Green and Yellow and after they killed whoever they wanted; I should not have let anyone touch the bodies. All they (public) wanted to do was feed on the dead bodies. I should have left them for the flies.

People who are doing the killing, if they write rat notes, they are given their own police force to boss in some little town and they get a new name and new game. It's the people who try to be and do right that suffer because they need them for show. Tex may wake up that their people he works for in church will keep him all his life because they feel free to buy and sell the fear he makes for the blood sale.

I've seen some people who were on the row for killing, get out and kill again, come back for killing get out and come back. I said they sure must be killing the right people.

When you deal with people who won't pay you your dues, they will lie and cheat and give the ass (sex) of your children to their fears. The only thought created in my head is they want you to be a killer and kill them. If you are a good and real servant, you will give them what they want. Someone says to you "Dont hit me!" You say "I wasn't thinking of hitting you " and they say, "You're going to kill me!" and you say; "No, I don't want to kill you." Upon that they hit you and knock you down and say, "Yes you are a killer". Someone puts a knife in your hand and says, "Kill him or we will kill you" and he says, "Do it and you throw the knife down and they yell, "See we made him put the knife down. I'm Manson's man and he's a bitch and I made him put the knife down." You say "You didnt make make me do nothing, I put it down because I hold thought circles and chambers far beyond you, me, I, them, and they. I hold the dispensation of life and death in truth and all the people who took life can live in me because I took no life. So they take my stuff and lie some more and take my guitar and it keeps falling on me to kill. I'm the mirror and I don't want to reflect but they think I'm their out. Out to them is to die and they want out.

I can't find anyone with half a brain about anything. I get more from a deaf, and dumb bug than the whole state of California. The U.S. Prisons were retired service personnel and a lot of them were at the least part of life. Here it is worse than the nut wards. They make crazy and madness up.

Check this hard. If I never leave the cell, this is the thought the C.D.C is creating. Because the world needs killers. I've set in thoughts so deep and strained out with sweat and millions of people running through my mind dying and being born; the fear so thick others can't even walk past my cell. If everything you seen was gone tomorrow, no one would notice. It was only as big as our minds. If World War I was a tear out of one eye and World War II, a tear out of the other eye and I was all the pyramids and all the Pharoah's, Greeks, and the peak of China at its best, it wouldn't touch just what pollution is created by jets. To stop oil, money, lumber, and put 5O hundred million people in line with a new lifestyle with no waste in the air or water.... In the 1960's I was reacting to a world I seen so little of. I learned that one little misunderstanding about 1776 or one thought you believed that came from some other center can put your ship on the rocks. You must be 100% reborn and believe nothing. That's not easy to do just within the inner self much less deal with the world and OVER ALL money and overall heads that ever were in ALL time -- all graves.

The only thing that some people got going is to down anyone who got anything going. They will play big trying to make others little. They will pull everyone down to make themself look big. Others will step on, bash, kick, bite -- anything it takes to save a job. They would lose their life before they would lose their job because without the job they are nothing as dead. Others would do much the same if not more to save their face with wedding rings and jobs and lose their TREES AND WATER, AIR AND LAND. It's like the phony Christian says, "You must do all I say before god will accept you, you must do all we say before you can live". You can try to explain it is their life also and they say, "Are you threatening me?" So, I just go on and threaten them out front because anything I say or do has become a threat to lies and a threat to anyone who wants to die. Check it, If you say do this or do that and you will die, they stick their faces out and run to it. In San Quentin there was a saying that if you killed everyone on one shift and laid their bodies in the parking lot, the next shift would climb over their bodies coming to work.

No, there is a lot of people got to die and when I say lot -- lot is not a big enough word. Hitler was a saint, an angel in comparison. I don't want this job.

I'm put in the box woman kept me in for 20 years for the unsure yesterdays, plays, books, mean looks, etc.

True, we think the world but so do the people who left behind what they created like sidewalks, lampposts telephone poles, cement, schools, armies, governments and lots of people dead but still walking and having an effect on earth and on others if there is such a thing it is truly in the mind- not my mind or your mind but THE mind and that is in forever's Chamber. They are not thinking in forever, they are playing for one life time because one needs to be in and out of prison a few times to see behind the faces of life and death.

What the brain wants and needs to thank in it's patterns is not always right and true in the real but it may fit what we want to call or be right and true. You may see death and suffering as real and to your ego, it is the realest real. Then after you suffer it all and die a few times you realize; thats only stages that roll wagon wheels or levels of brick to build a Circle within the endless. A thought can last 2000 years, 5000 years that's maybe right for the people who played live and die within that time stage, but one thought can melt it like butter and in 2 days can be another thought. It is always changing. At times a little thing will go by, and I'll say nothing and later it's a big thing.

One little thought can change billions of thoughts. Christ spent 3 days on his cross. You spent 10 years on ours. I realize that no one knows all the whys and ins and outs of the whole thing and paper words won't hold it.

All I can say is keep faith and it will balance out. It may be another 10 or 100 years and we only got 25 but it was the only chance. You gave your love and life to a cause.

Born into a puzzle -- a piece at a time and few ever seen the whole thing and how can you tell or yell to 3 corners of the universe from one corner saying "Hey! There are 4 corners to this wheel and because of people's loss of faith and I only got 3 when I had 4."

Do you see that youse were the hearts I was dreaming in the 1950's and 40's. Beatniks and how they turned to hippy and how hippy turned to yippy etc. Can you see the wheel of humans? Some die and others go to prison but the motions and what you see stays on all sides.

Ask yourself what do you do when someone is holding you with a gun and they are not obeying the rules or laws. At what point does the outlaw become the law to survive?

I've looked for home. I must be in truth to be at home. You can be true when you do anything for ATWA. If I say something and they don't like what I say they try to prove me wrong. Proving me wrong don't stop the cold wind. We seen it coming in the long ago. But they worry more about money than rain or tides, sunshine or the balance of the day. I got 62 years in one day. Charles MacManson

While many conservation groups are promoting the movie Crown Jewels, few are willing to address its flawed premises.

What we need is more wildland preserves like parks and wilderness areas where logging or other human manipulation is banned. If you watch Crown Jewels, take the good message about old-growth forests, which are ecologically critical to the forest ecosystem. However, beware of any implication that human management somehow “benefits” forests. Forest ecosystems have persisted for millions of years without any human intervention. They didn’t need human management then, and they don’t need it now. - Crown Jewels Video

Colorado wolf family captured; one wolf dead, survivors taken into captivity -

Colorado's wolves have been dealt a devastating setback. In late August and September, in response to conflicts with a few livestock owners, the entire Copper Creek Wolf Pack was captured by the Colorado Parks and Wildlife Department as part of a relocation effort.

This effort resulted in the death of the male wolf father, who fathered the first four wild-born pups from the state’s reintroduction effort.

It is unknown when or where the pack will be released, but our work to create a Colorado willing to coexist with wolves is more important now than ever.

The next step in Colorado’s wolf reintroduction: Up to 15 wolves set to come to Colorado from Canada!

While the wolf reintroduction effort in Colorado hasn’t been without its obstacles, we’ll leave you with some hopeful news:

The Colorado Parks and Wildlife Department has announced an agreement with the British Columbia Ministry of Water, Lands, and Resource Stewardship to get 15 wolves this winter. They’re expected to be on the ground in Colorado between December 2024 and March 2025. - Wild Earth Guardians

Wolves are often portrayed as a threat to humans, particularly little girls. Here is a true story that brings that portrayal into question.

It was Christmas Eve, 1923, when the incident took place. It was back on our farm in Orange, Pennsylvania. I was a 7-year-old girl then.

“We need more firewood!” I can again hear my mother saying to my father. "In a week it will be Christmas Eve. When you're sitting there smoking your pipe in front of our fire with no more logs to bum, you’ll get angry at me.”

My father bundled himself up, took his rifle, walked to the barn for his ax and saw, and hitched up the horse to the sled. “Can I come along?” I shyly asked. “Ah, my Tessie, my sweet Tessie, yes, come along if you wish.”

The horse pulled the sled through the snow-covered forest. My father knew where a few fallen trees were located. He found the dried logs under the snow and quickly went to work. Suddenly there was a stillness. I no longer heard my father chopping or sawing firewood. When I looked up, I saw him standing motionless and silently staring. I followed the direction of his eyes. At first, I thought that figure might be a dog, but from my father’s seriousness, I knew it must be something more. Then my father broke his stillness and went to the sled for his rifle. I looked at the gray- orange animal standing in the clearing, staring at my father and me. It was not moving, but not afraid. I said to my father, “What is it, daddy?”

“It’s a wolf, honey. They’ve been gone from this area for 50 years, but there it stands.”

I watched as my father got into position arid raised his rifle. I walked beside him and palled on his jacket. “Honey, don’t do that!”

“But daddy, I said, “Why are you shooting it? Why are you shooting the pretty dog?” “It’s not a dog, honey, it’s a wolf.”

I gazed at the wolf. It was still standing there, strangely, almost mystically staring. “You’re lucky, wolf, for Tess was here today to protect you.” The wolf boldly took a last look at my father and me, then scampered away into the deep forest. My father finished his work and we rode home.

On Christmas Eve, relatives started arriving; there was kissing and hugging, and gifts exchanged. Yet I was getting bored with all the commotion. What I wanted to do was open my gifts which were under the tree, but mother said I had to wait. I asked, “Mommy, can I go our and play for a while?” She was occupied with other matters. "All right, but stay around the house. Your father says a storm's coming.” I was quickly out in the Christmas Eve snow. I wandered toward the woods. Before I realized it night was nearly upon me. It was a silent twilight, then suddenly the storm hit. One second the forest was calm, and the next the wind was blowing the heavily falling snow in my face, blinding me. It was getting colder and darker. I started immediately for home, but every step was a struggle. I kept walking for what seemed like hours, and finally in desperation I started shouting. "Mommy! Daddy! Help me!

I don’t know how long I walked around that night, but finally, exhausted, I stumbled under a pine tree's branches and closed my eyes. I was still was still too young to understand such concepts as death, so I didn’t know I was slowly freezing to death. Suddenly; 1felt a strange weight upon me, and a welcome warmth. It was an effort to open my eyes, but when I did, I thought someone had covered me with some sort of gray-orange blanket. But then I saw it wasn’t a blanket, but the dog my father and I had seen the week before — the dog my father had called a wolf. Strangely, I wasn’t frightened, but relieved that I wasn’t alone anymore. The heat the animal gave off started to warm me when the cruel Pennsylvania blizzard blew. On that Christmas Eve, I was rocked gently to sleep by the heartbeat of the animal my father almost shot. The next time I opened my eyes, I heard my father’s voice calling, “Tessie! Tessie!” It was light out.The wind was no longer blowing and the snow had stopped. Then I saw the wolf. It was standing near me, shaking the snow off its back. Its ears shot straight up as my father’s voice called out again. The wolf took one last glance at me, then quickly disappeared. “Daddy,” I said weakly, “here.” I saw my father’s face staring down at me. He was crying. He said, “Thank God, she’s still alive.”

When I opened my eyes again I was in my own bed, warm at last. My mother was sitting at the side of the bed; my father was standing by her, and he said, “It’s a miracle she’s alive. By all practical reasoning, the should have frozen out there.”

“The dog, daddy,” I said weakly. “The dog we saw in the woods. When you were chopping and sawing, daddy. The dog was with me. The dog kept me warm all through the night”

“She’s saying a wolf kept her alive! The day we went wood cutting and she came along, she stopped me from shooting a wolf. I think she is saying the wolf kept her warm through the night.”

There’s only one way to find out,” my father replied. “I’m going back to the place where I found her.”

When he returned, he confirmed my story Indeed, he had found a wolf’s tracks there.

I’ve never forgotten that Christmas Eve, with the wolf warming me and rocking me gently to sleep in that bitter blizzard, giving me the greatest Christmas gift of all — life.

I continuously see articles in the media about "good fire, " defined as frequent and low--severity. In other words, such fire seldom kills mature trees.

These fires, we are told, mimic "historical" conditions, creating "healthy" ecosystems by clearing away fuels without killing mature trees. A "good fire" by happy coincidence reduces high-severity blazes or so we are told.

"Bad fires" are those that char extensive acreage. At least some blazes burn at high severity, meaning they kill the mature trees and, by inference, were not a historical component of forest ecosystems.

When I was first attending college, the idea that any fire was "good" was an anomaly, and the scientists who advocated for fire on the landscape could be counted on one or two hands. Since then, most scientists, agency folks and conservationists have adopted the idea that at least some fire-if not too hot, too expansive, and too "destructive" is good. Hence, the good fire-bad fire dichotomy.

A recent example of this perspective (and I could present dozens of examples of this narrative) is the following:

"Also known as "prescribed burns" or "cultural fires," these intentionally started, controlled fires have received growing attention in recent years as a way to clear dry undergrowth that can build up and fuel huge wildfires. One 2024 review suggests that prescribed burning can reduce the severity of wildfires between 62% and 72% relative to untreated areas. However, the idea of prescribed burns is not new. Indigenous communities have long used "cultural fires" to remove old grass and support new growth. In addition, controlled fires may also help create a healthy ecosystem for cranes and other species by creating open habitats."

Nearly everything in the above paragraph is false or exaggerated, lacking context.

For instance, few fires actually encounter a prescribed burn when they might effectively influence fire spread and severity. Some estimates put fire encounters with burned areas at less than 1%. Whether these fires reduce fire severity can only occur if fires encounter such burned landscapes.

The qualifier about "when burns are effective" is critical. Within a few years, sometimes as short as two years, vegetation regrowth can negatively affect any fuel reduction. In some cases, a prescribed fire can stimulate the growth of "fine fuels" like grasses, which are more flammable than the vegetation that existed on a site before a burn.

Most ecosystems were naturally characterized by long fire rotations, so burning frequently does not emulate any natural or historical fire condition and is entirely inappropriate for most western plant communities.

The plant communities with long fire rotations (time between major fires) include mixed conifer forest, aspen, all fir forests, old-growth Douglas fir forests, sagebrush, chaparral, lodgepole pine, and numerous other plant communities. Some grasslands, like native bunchgrasses, cannot tolerate frequent fire and need up to 10 years to recover from a burn. Burn these grasses too frequently, and you encourage growth of annuals like cheatgrass.

Prescribed burns do not preclude "huge fires," such as blazes, typically characterized as "bad" fires, which are part of most ecosystems' natural fire systems and not some kind of aberration. Indeed, they are a critical part of "healthy" ecosystems. Precluding such blazes degrades many ecosystems. - Read More

Fears for the safety of our children in wolf country may be put in perspective by this true story.

A commercial traveler from St. Cloud, was in the city yesterday coming straight from St. Joseph, a small town in Stearns County, where he said the people were all talking about a most extraordinary case of a lost child, who after two days of constant search in the woods was found unharmed at a wolf’s burrow in the dense forest of Brockway Township.

The child was Margaret, aged 4, the daughter of Nick Schweitzer, a well-to-do farmer in Brockway Township. The little girl was lost Sunday forenoon, while all the adults of the family were attending church. Accompanied by her ten-year-old brother, and eight-year-old sister, and some children from the neighborhood, who were spending the day at the Schweitzer home, the little girl strayed away in search of nuts.

The children roamed through the forest for a few hours, when they noticed that the smallest member of the party was lost. Fearing punishment, the children did not return to tell their parents until they had searched for several hours through the woods. About three o’clock in the afternoon the alarm was spread through the neighborhood that all of the children were lost.

A searching party of about 20 farmers was at once organized to scour the woods, and all night the forest resounded with the cries of the searchers. The next day, a party of ditch workers who were employed in the vicinity joined in the hunt, and it was not until Tuesday forenoon that one of the scouts came to a small hill, covered with pine and thick underbrush. He found a path leading in through the thicket, and by the side of the trail was lying a small blue sunbonnet.

The man followed the trail and had to go on all fours. He soon reached the wolf’s lair. In the cleared space around it were strewn picked bones, feathers, and parts of sheep pelts. An awful suspicion of the child’s fate flared across the mind of the searcher, and he was about to leave when he noticed the girl at the mouth of the den.

He expected to find her half dead with hunger and cold, but little Margaret rose to greet the visitor and told him that she had just been playing with some “nice little doggies,” which ran away when the man arrived.

The girl was none too willing to go with her rescuer. She said that she had not been cold at all, and that she had eaten nuts when she was hungry. Although it may sound incredible, it is believed by the people of Brockway that the child had been playing with the wolf cubs, and that she had been adopted by the savage animals, which every season make inroads on the livestock of the Brockway farmers. The child was none the worse for her outing, and she said that she had had a good time, playing with the “nice little doggies.” She explained that she strayed from her companions and reached the wolf den accidentally. - Wolf Stories 4

“We do not want those whose first impulse is to compromise. We want no straddlers, for, in the past, they have surrendered too much good wilderness and primeval areas which should never have been lost.” – Bob Marshall on the founding of the Wilderness Society

There is an unfortunate tendency on the part of conservationists to forget or ignore history. A greater appreciation of past conservation victories as well as defeats can inform current efforts. In far too many cases, there is a tendency to believe that it is necessary to appease local interests typically by agreeing to weakened protections or resource giveaways to garner the required political support for a successful conservation designation. However, this fails to consider that in nearly all cases where effective protective measures are enacted, it has been done over almost uniform local opposition.

In those instances where local opposition to a conservation measure is mild or does not exist, it probably means the proposal will be ineffective or worse—even set real conservation backward.

Nevertheless, many environmentalists now believe that due to regional parochialism and lack of historical context, significant compromises are necessary to win approval for new conservation initiatives.

England Lays Claim to White Pines

Colonists Protest with Pine Tree Riot

Rewilding On the Ground: Restoration Success at Pitchfork Ranch

Proposition 127: Prohibit Bobcat, Lynx, and Mountain Lion Hunting

Wildlife in Colorado is managed to benefit the visitors and residents of Colorado

Violating the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation

Fair Chase Rules Violated by Mountain Lion and Bobcat Hunting and Trapping