Rally for the Environment!

Even More Bison Bills!

Here's this week's round up.

SB 174 SENATE Fish and Game Committee Tuesday, February 1, Room 422, 3 PM
Primary sponsor is Senator Gene Vuckovich is a Democrat from Anaconda: mt.sd43@gmail.com. Prohibit spending Montana tax dollars "to relocate or transplant wild buffalo or bison" on Spotted Dog Wildlife Management Area, near Avon, west of Helena. According to Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks: "The primary goal of Montana's Wildlife Management Areas is to maintain vital wildlife habitat for the protection of species and the enjoyment of the public." All too often cattle are grazed on these habitats purchased by all Montanans for their wildlife habitat values.

SB 184 SENATE Fish and Game Committee Tuesday, February 1, Room 422, 3 PM
Primary sponsor is Senator Kendall Van Dyk a Democrat from Billings: kvandyk@mt.gov. Changes current law to permit "the use of bows and arrows" to hunt wild buffalo in Montana.

HB 214 HOUSE Fish, Wildlife and Parks Committee Tuesday, February 1, Room 152, 3 PM
Primary sponsor is Rep. Bill Harris is a Republican from Mosby: bharris@midrivers.com. Legally reclassifies all wild buffalo or bison in the state not in captivity, and not owned by a person as livestock. "Shall" meaning requires the Dept. of Livestock inspectors to capture, quarantine, test, slaughter, take by special hunt, or transfer to Tribes said "estrayed" buffalo "in a manner that does not jeopardize compliance with a state-administered or federally administered livestock disease control program." Based on previous statements by Montana's state veterinarian, this latter statement means that Tribes would only be eligible to take neutered or spayed buffalo. Two provisions of honorable mention in HB 214 would repeal 81-2-120 (Management of wild buffalo for disease control giving Montana Dept. of Livestock authority for all migratory populations) and 87-1-216 (Montana's hunt of wild buffalo or bison for disease control). HB 214 also repeals 81-2-121 the taking of public buffalo on private property, and the prohibition on intentional feeding "game animals in a manner that results in artificial concentration of game animals that may potentially contribute to the transmission of disease." The Dept. of Livestock is exempt from this prohibition on feeding wildlife.

If you can't attend these critical hearings, please call and contact Montana legislators via this number: (406) 444-4800

All committee member emails are located at the bottom of this page:
http://www.buffalofieldcampaign.org/legislative/montanalegislature2011.html

Upcoming Buffalo Hearings

Dear Friends of the Buffalo,

Please attend and testify at these hearings in support of keeping the legal status and treatment of wild buffalo as wildlife (SB 207 and SB 212), for restoring wild free ranging buffalo in Montana (HB 318, SB 212 and SB 207), and keeping livestock inspectors from trespassing on private property where wild buffalo are valued and welcomed in our neighborhoods and communities (SB 148).  All of these bills need to be opposed and defeated.

PUBLIC HEARINGS SCHEDULED THIS WEEK ON BUFFALO BILLS IN HELENA, MONTANA CAPITOL BUILDING

SB 148 Hearing scheduled SENATE Agriculture, Livestock and Irrigation Committee Tuesday, January 25, Room 335, 3 PM

SB 207 Hearing scheduled SENATE Agriculture, Livestock and Irrigation Committee Thursday, January 27, Room 335, 3 PM

SB 212 Hearing scheduled SENATE Fish and Game Committee Thursday, January 27, Room 422, 3 PM

HB 318 Hearing scheduled HOUSE Agriculture Committee Thursday, January 27, Room 472, 3 PM

If you can't attend these hearings, please call and contact Montana legislators via this number: (406) 444-4800.

Please get involved and spread the word to save America's last wild buffalo herd!  Make contact with your Montana legislators through this link (click on the area where you reside): http://nris.mt.gov/gis/legislat/2011/

To submit written testimony, contact the secretary of the respective committee.  Address your testimony to the Chair and members of the committee, and ask that your testimony be entered into the hearing record.

House committee members (and secretaries) can be found and contacted through this link:  http://leg.mt.gov/css/House/house-committees-2011.asp

Senate committee members (and secretaries) can be found and contacted through this link: http://leg.mt.gov/css/Senate/senate%20committees-2011.asp

SB 148 online:  http://data.opi.mt.gov/bills/2011/billhtml/SB0148.htm

The primary sponsor Sen. Art Wittich is a Republican from Bozeman:  senatorwittich@montana.com. SB 148's exemptions for entry essentially guts the provision of notifying and obtaining approval from landowners PRIOR to Dept. of Livestock inspectors coming onto private property to force buffalo to flee said property.  Current law 81-2-120 does not permit livestock inspectors to trespass on private lands to harass and harm wild buffalo where they are welcomed and valued. There is no "public health and safety" threat where buffalo are permitted by landowners to be on their property. The logic of SB 148 begs the question:  will elk become a "public health and safety" threat too?

http://laws.leg.mt.gov/laws11/LAW0210W$BSIV.ActionQuery?P_BILL_NO1=148&P_BLTP_BILL_TYP_CD=SB&Z_ACTION=Find

SB 207 online: http://data.opi.mt.gov/bills/2011/billhtml/SB0207.htm

The primary sponsor Sen. Frederick "Eric" Moore  is a Republican from Miles City: mail@senatorericmoore.com. SB 207 reclassifies ALL buffalo as livestock in Montana. The Dept. of Livestock is required to impose a permit and inspection system for buffalo coming into/out of any county, or into/out of state. "A person who purposely or knowingly transports wild or domestic buffalo or bison in violation of rules adopted pursuant to this section is guilty of a misdemeanor and shall be fined not more than $1,000 or be imprisoned in the county jail for not more than 6 months, or both." Prohibits buffalo to "run at large" and makes owners of said buffalo liable with penalties for trespass onto private property. SB 207 classifies any wild buffalo, including those from Yellowstone as "estrayed," permitting the Dept. of Livestock to take them.

http://laws.leg.mt.gov/laws11/LAW0210w$BSIV.ActionQuery?P_BILL_DFT_NO5=LC1050&Z_ACTION=Find

SB 212 online:  http://data.opi.mt.gov/bills/2011/billhtml/SB0212.htm

The primary sponsor Sen. Rick Ripley is a Republican from Wolf Creek. SB 212 requires Fish, Wildlife & Parks to adopt a plan BEFORE any wild buffalo can be released onto private or public lands in Montana. The plan MUST include: animal identification, tracking and containment measures (fencing and removal methods) in "designated areas" and makes Fish, Wildlife & Parks liable for any costs incurred for damages to private property. Fish, Wildlife & Parks "may not release or transplant wild buffalo or bison on state or federal land in Montana if the relocation or transplantation would negatively affect any existing multiple use of the land, including livestock grazing."

http://laws.leg.mt.gov/laws11/LAW0210w$BSIV.ActionQuery?P_BILL_DFT_NO5=LC1052&Z_ACTION=Find#spon_table

HB 318 online:  http://data.opi.mt.gov/bills/2011/billhtml/HB0318.htm

The primary sponsor Rep. Wendy Warburton is a Republican from Havre:  wendywarburton@gmail.com. HB 318 requires the approval of County Commissioners BEFORE the Dept. of Livestock or Fish, Wildlife & Parks may permit wild buffalo or buffalo certified brucellosis free to be relocated in Montana in the counties affected.

http://laws.leg.mt.gov/laws11/LAW0210w$BSIV.ActionQuery?P_BILL_DFT_NO5=LC1049&Z_ACTION=Find

Thank you for taking action to protect America's last wild buffalo and their descendants as a valued wildlife species freely roaming Montana.

For the Buffalo,

Daniel Brister, Executive Director

Buffalo Field Campaign

Buffalo Field Campaign is the only group working in the field

and in the policy arena to protect America's last wild buffalo.

Letter to MDOL on SB 207

SB 207 Managing Bison as Livestock

My name is Julia Vincent.  I live in Helena, Montana.  My grandparents were Montana homesteaders.  My mother's family homesteaded in Daniels County.  My father's parents homesteaded along the north fork of the Flathead river.  My grandfather, Ray Vincent, was acting superintendent of Glacier National Park.  My father, John D. Vincent, was a foreman and a ranger in The Park.

In the 1800's, the Department of the Interior was complaining that Indians and Buffalo are taking grassland away from cattle.  This mentality remains in control to this day.  The attacks on genetically pure bison are fueled by fear, not by reality.  Taxpayers' money continues to be misused to fund an archaic, racist war.  Giving Yellowstone Bison to Ted Turner while refusing to give them to local indigenous nations was borne out of the livestock industry's fear that Indians are going to bring back the Buffalo. Now you are attempting to eradicate them by re-labeling the last remnant of genetically pure bison as livestock. Livestock are animals your ancestors brought to the western hemisphere when they emigrated to this foreign land. Genetically pure bison are indigenous wildlife, sacred to the First Nations.

And, as you already know, there is not even one documented case of bison giving brucellosis back to the cattle who brought it here to begin with.  More taxpayers' money being spent on a lie.

Tatanka is not livestock!  Let the genetically pure buffalo roam.

Cowboy's Commission Meeting

The meeting yesterday was the typical lack of respect and responsibility by Fish Wildlife & Parks and ranchers and the strong supportiveness of individuals and environmental groups.

There were about 40 people there with only 6 or 7 who were against relocating buffalo onto wildlife management areas (WMA's). A few of the supporting groups were Buffalo Field Campaign, Western Watersheds Project, Gallatin Wildlife Association, Yellowstone Buffalo Foundation, World Wildlife Fund, Natural Resource Defense Council, and Helena Hunters and Anglers. One Native from Fort Peck and one from Fort Belknap were there inaddition to the InterTribal Bison Cooperative's lawyer. The opposing groups were obviously, Stockgrowers and Cattlemen's Association plus at least one rancher and 2 individuals who live near Spotted Dog Wilderness Area (the proposed relocation site).

At present there is a lawsuit filed by Western Watersheds Project, Gallatin Wildlife Association, Buffalo Field Campaign, and Yellowstone Buffalo Foundation against FWP over FWP giving Ted Turner Yellowstone bison which is nothing more than the privatization of the Yellowstone bison. This lawsuit has become an excuse for FWP to deny the tribes buffalo. FWP Director Joe Maurier said, "If we give them [buffalo] to another nation, it could be seen as the ultimate in privatization. So, until we can resolve that issue, I will not be able to do much. But it's still under consideration." Maurier has also said, "If the suit continues, we will fight it all the way. If the suit goes away we will continue to talk with our tribal friends. It's my understanding that we did make some promises and some tribes did what they said they would do with fencing. We need to get this little issue resolved and we are ready to go."

Mike Fox, Fort Belknap tribal council member has said, "If they go to the tribes it's not privatization because we have a government-to-government relationship. We are ready and willing to help with this project."

At the end of the meeting yesterday Maurier again restated to the tribes that buffalo cannot go on their land until the plaintiffs drop the lawsuit. He said when this happens they can move forward.

Mike Mease, co-founder of Buffalo Field Campaign, filmed this entire meeting. When the video is available I will post it.

The one thing that was lacking in the meeting was knowledge. FWP has alot of facts about the relative, but lacks knowledge--Vedic Science, the knowledge of Natural Law--how the universe works and organizes itself in perfect harmony. The tribes have this knowledge, making them more than capable of taking care of buffalo. When the knowledge of how nature works becomes the basis of all FWP's and the Department Of Interior's and Bureau of Land Management's decisions, then balance will be restored to Montana's environment.

Help Us Get 3,000 Signatures in 3 Days!

Montana Trap-Free Public Lands I-160

Last Chance To Sign the Petition!

Deadline Friday, June 18

Come to the Medical Arts Building

On Last Chance Gulch,

Across from the Parrot

Wednesday 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.

Thursday 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.

Friday 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Help make our public lands safe for people, pets and wildlife, restore our waters, rebuild Montana’s habitat.

Signature Gathering in Helena for I-160

For the past week I've been helping Montana Trap Free Public Lands gather signatures in Helena for their ballot initiative, I-160. The initiative would prohibit the commercial and recreational trapping of wild animals on public lands in Montana. Yes, this old cruel sport still continues...
This initiative has been approved not only by the Attorney General's Office, but by FWP's lawyer.

Trapping not only hurts wildlife, but has killed many many peoples' dogs and even people have stepped in these traps not knowing they were there because it's NOT a law to mark traps. The laws for trapping are extremely lax.

Trappers make up only a few thousand people in the state. Less than .5 of 1% of the population in MT traps. Yet, there are literally 10's of thousands of traps on public lands--which make up only 35% of the state.

Gathering signatures has surprisingly been easy. There are always 1 or 2 people on a given day who are upset with the initiative for many reasons:

• Trapping is someones livelihood.
• Public land is open to ALL forms of recreation.
• If adults, kids, or pets get caught in a trap the adults or parents are "idiots" and irresponsible for not watching where they go, keeping an eye on their kids or putting their dog on a leash.

I've met lots of people who know someone whose dog has been caught in a trap. I've also met people who don't even know trapping is legal.

There are ALOT of people who dislike trapping as this public opinion poll in the Bozeman Daily Chronicle shows.

The public doesn't want trapping to continue on public lands. Why should a few thousand people in this state have TOTAL control over them? This is why America has provided its citizens with the power to change old out-dated laws.

Signature Gathering

Yesterday I volunteered with Montana Trap-Free Public Lands. The weather was windy, cold and about to rain. We were gathering signatures on I-60, an initiative to end trapping on public lands, "except as allowed for scientific and propagation purposes or for the actions of government in protecting the safety and health of citizens."

We set up an info. table downtown on the St. Patrick's Day parade route. Here we spread out to gather signatures. Being in Montana, most of the responses were, "No thanks." Others were more in opposition like, "People have a right to set up traps on public land." (yeah, and is it also your right to abuse other citizens, pets, and wildlife?)

In one hour I got a whopping 7, yes, that's right, 7 signatures! The others had gathered 13 each. By now it had been raining for a half hour, so we called it quits.

MTFPL needs 25,000 signatures by June. Currently they have only 5,000. If you're registered to vote in the state of MT please sign their petition here.

Urban Deer Task Force

Well, it's winter and once again Helena is wanting to kill 150 urban deer.
I was reading through FWP's Deer Environmental Assessment. Here are highlights.

In 2007 there was an estimated 82 deer per square mile. However this exceeds the city's ideal of 25. This is equivilant to 350 deer total in the city limits. The city can hold more deer, but the "social tolerance" for urban deer has "been exceeded." Meaning too many flowers are being eaten, too many car collisions, and too many pet-deer conflicts.

So, as is the case with the ignorance in this state, the solution to every wildlife issue is kill it.

Helena Police will be setting clover traps (see video below) on private property, bait them at night, come back the next morning and kill the deer with a bolt gun. "After the carcass is removed the site would be cleaned with water or other means to maintain aesthetic values of the site." FWP will store the carcass after field dressing and when there are 5 the carcasses will be taken to meat processing and given to food banks. Once again the slaughtered animals are given to the poor.

You can help by sending an email to Fish Wildlife Park and tell them what you think of their EA.
urbandeer@mt.gov

New Deer Killing Tactics

For information on the city commission meeting last night, there is an article by the HelenaIR. I'll sum up what it says. KILL the DEER! That's it.

O.K. I'll give more info.

The city commissioners, FWP (Forget Wildlife Protection), and the police dept. will continue killing deer, but are also looking at non-lethal ways including: birth control vaccines, hazing through teaching residents how to shoot deer w/paintball guns (Helena is on it's way to becoming Yellowstone. RUN!) hunting, & public education on living peacefully w/deer (yeh right :P)

This summer the city will create a new urban wildlife task force (UWTF) (I don't know what was wrong with the last 1) while collaborating with FWP to "develop a long-term programmatic environmental assessment." In short-how many deer live in the city and how many will the city be allowed to kill each year. The city is also wanting grant funding from FWP.

The city is even recruiting people to join the UWTF. GREAT! Now, get the public involved in hazing. A city Task Force is probably cheaper to run than hiring the DOL.

If you'd like to contact Montana's FWP & remind them the deer are in the city b/c the city is chopping down and building inside the forests and if you'd like to tell them how inhumane and flat out stupid they are here's the link.

Urban Deer Control Tactics

Well tonight there will be a city commission discussion on the next round of trapping and killing of deer in Helena. Since September the Urban Wildlife Task Force killed 200 bucks and does. Details of this can be found in a previous post.

There will also be discussion of creating an Urban Wildlife Task Force advisory council to make decisions on how many deer to kill each year. Currently it costs $2000 to kill a deer!!

There is a deer friendly blog that goes into more detail about this issue.
Also you can check out New West News for more info.

The city has around 40,000 people and it acts like a big city that doesn't have ANY room left!

I won't be attending the meeting because no matter what anyone says, if it isn't what the city wants you'll be ignored.

In addition to MT killing off ALL wildlife, they are currently battling a pine beetle infestation that began in 2004. Currently over 1.1million acres of trees in Northern Idaho and MT have been destroyed.

What I think of all this. The forests are being destroyed because nature is experiencing tooo much stress from all the wildlife being killed. I wouldn't be surprised if all the trees died and Montana became a wasteland.

Montana Votes for Horse Slaughter

This isn't about wildlife, but it is about the slaughtering of animals, so I wanted to write on it.

Again with the ranchers....
The MT house of representatives endorsed a bill to allow a slaughter house to open.

Why? Ranchers complain it's too expensive to euthanize a horse and need a way to deal with all the abandoned/ill horses.
A sponsor of the bill not surprizingly is, Republican Rep. Ed Butcher who says slaughter is "a humane way to address the problem.”

What's wrong with this logic?
1) Currently all ill horses are shipped to Canada or Mexico for slaughter. How is this cheaper than euthanizing?

2) Slaughter is in NO WAY "humane". These same people who see a slaughter house as economical would never even think to dump off their 20 year old pickup into a junk yard.

The last slaughter house was closed in 2007.

Montana has NEVER been able to live with animals wild or domestic. They just want to slaughter them.

http://www.miamiherald.com/business/breaking-news/story/920508.html

Deer Removal in Helena,MT

In 2007 Helena decided to trap and kill deer within city limits. Why? The deer have moved into the city. The forests are being logged and new houses built up in the highest areas possible. People are moving into the deers' home, so the deer are moving into theirs.



To deal with this influx of deer, Helena created the "Urban Wildlife Task Force" (hahaha..the name is ludicrous.) They are under the authority of Fish Wildlife & Parks. This is the 2nd year the "Task Force" has been operating. This year FWP created the Draft Environmental Assessment City of Helena Deer Reduction Program Pilot Project Phase II December 2008. Here's a snippet "Findings of the Task Force confirmed that the predominate urban wildlife problem was an overpopulation of mule deer due to the ample forage, water and general habitat condition." Wow! Look at that. The environment is suitable for deer. How many thousands $ did it take FWP to figure this one out.

Last year 50 deer were "removed". This year FWP is looking at 150.

How the deer are "removed" is by the Task Force setting traps in parks and on private land w/owners consent. The trap is hanging food. When the deer pulls on it a box trap springs up enclosing the deer, then pushes the deer down to hold them in place. Next morning the Task Force revisits the traps and puts a bullet in the deer's head. But, don't worry the meat is not wasted. It is given to Food banks and public schools for lunch. (yuck!)