00:00:10
Speaker 1: From Meat Eaters World News headquarters in Bozeman, Montana. This is Cow’s Week in Review with Ryan cow Calahan. Here’s Cow.
00:00:21
Speaker 2: Last week we brought you news about rats in New York City, maybe more news than you wanted. This week we’re going bigger with rodent news from the Big Apple. Bigger and most definitely better. On Thursday, a visitor to the Hudson River Park in Manhattan filmed a beaver climbing up out of the water onto the pier. Castor Canadensis is, of course, the largest road in North America and second in the world only to the Cape Bera. This was the first time of beaver had ever been cited in Hudson River Park’s Wildlife Sanctuary, a four mile long protected title estuary, estuary, of course, being where fresh and saltwater mixes where the river meets the ocean. Beaver sidings are rare in New York City, but the big cheers are essential to the city’s identity. The official Seal of New York shows not one, but two beavers, paying homage to the history of the city as a key trading post for beaver pelts in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Rumors are that this beaver actually showed up to watch the next play in the NBA Finals, where the cheap seats were going for seventy five hundred bucks and two tickets sold for a million in a charity auction. I think the city should have let this furbaro sit courtside just for old times sake. This week we’ve got legislation, Arctic lee sales, ohvs, and so much more of it. First, I’m going to tell you about my week, and my week has been busy. We were gearing up for another new edition here at the house. We got another yellow dog on the way. Most people when they hear this say, oh my god, you’re crazy. A newborn and a puppy. Well, this is a special puppy as it Snort’s sisters last litter, and having been around labs my whole life, Snort is a special one. So having the opportunity to have a puppy so closely related was too good to pass up. Same breeder, which is Riverstone Kennels over there in Wisconsin. And in case you’re wondering, the Wisconi accent does go away relatively quickly. I do think that this will be a bit of a trial in parenting, both in the fact that a puppy and a newborn are both a pain in the butt, but also the dog and the kid will be the same age, and if all goes well, the dog is going to pass away long before the wee babe does. That’s just part of what we set ourselves up for in dog ownership. Succession planning on retriever power is a must, and I suppose sore life lessons on the kid front. In other news, ol Mike Lee slid it in an amendment on the Wildfire Prevention Act that will fully rescind the two thousand and one Roadless Rule if it were to pass. Perfect job of bypassing the American public Mike Lee. As I have said many times, this is not about timber. It’s about opening the door to large scale, not selective, resource extraction on America’s public lands. The roadless Rule removes certain high risk environments from new road building potential, but preserves the ability to build temporary roads to address wildfire mitigation and habitat work. There are three hundred and eighty thousand miles of roads on the US Forest Service System, more than the Interstate Highway system, and The rule came about once folks, many of whom were fiscally conservative Republicans, realized how much we the taxpayer spend on forest road maintenance. Over six hundred public meetings and bringing all the user groups to the table resulted in the two thousand and one roadless Rule, and Mike Lee, because he is the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Chair, was able to insert this amendment and get it through committee in spite of overwhelming public opposition to roadless decision. Members of the Senate NR voted on party lines to advance the amendment, mostly using the idea that the Wildlife Prevention Act is necessary and the amendment can be struck outside of committee as cover here. In the home state, the roadless rule is extremely popular. Steve Danes, our senior and lame duck senator on the committee, voted to rescind as well. Most urgently, we’ve been receiving reports of infrastructure destruction and illegal off road vehicle use from multiple forest districts. We need to police ourselves. And yes, Trump did rescind long standing OHV orders, but he did not rescind forest travel management plans, which are the law meaning that you cannot drive wherever the hell you want, and no big surprise here. You cannot rip out gates and signs, and for your information, we all, all of us, the taxpayers, pay for those gates and signs as well the roads you are literally stealing from us all and yourself to those who play in the motorized community. I know this stuff is embarrassing and you don’t want illegal use representing what you love to do on your weekends, So please spread the word. Travel management plans are still in effect. You need to get a motor vehicle use map for your forest before you go that way you know you’ll be legal. Additionally, I’ve been getting reports from big Timber company who do not like this OHV order. Turns out they’re paying their fair share to maintain a lot of roads in order to do the timber extraction that this is supposedly based off of, and increased traffic, especially destructive traffic like we just talked about, is just costing them more money. As I’ve talked about many times before, and sadly I kind of like wish the days of Dose who were still around because Mike Lee Hageman, who have both tried to jam in this non public way of rescinding the roadless rule have not presented any ability to pay for newly opened roads, nor any ability to pay for the noxious weeds that come with them, the increased fires that come with them, the replacement of culverts, drainage devices, grading, general maintenance. You get the drift, and neither did any funding come with the OHV recision. No matter what side of the aisle you’re on, is shooting herself in the foot. Moving on to the legislative desk. First up out in Hawaii, the state legislature passed HB one three three four, which exempts donated wild game from certain inspection and transportation codes. Standards that are applied to farm raised meat can get in the way of hunter donations, making it to hungry people. The measure also removes another barrier to hunting non native access deer on Hawaii. The state has declared an access deer state of emergency since twenty twenty two, and recent population estimates put deer numbers as high as one hundred and sixty seven thousand, with an estimated twenty percent growth rate per year. The result has been rampant crop damage, soil erosion, and even airport runway disruptions, Hawaii has pulled out all the stops to control access deer, including sponsoring trapping operations and encouraging pet and human food companies to use the resulting meat. Eliminating the food donation requirements will mean even more progress. But this bill has stalled on the Governor’s desk since May eighth. If it’s not signed by July eleventh, it’ll die and have to be redrafted next session. So Aloha staters call Governor Josh Green and ask him to get busy signing HB one three three four. Next up in Michigan, House bills five eight zero one and five eight zero two would expand commercial fishing of walleye yellow perch and lake trout, including allowing the use of gillnets. This would impact recreational fishing in the Wolverine state, and gil NEETs in particular are well known to increase bycatch, that is, they kill species other than the ones you’re going for. According to the Congressional Sportsman’s Foundation, recreational fishing in Michigan generates approximately three point nine billion dollars in economic activity annually, while commercial fishing industry brings in just around five point four million these bills have been heard in the House Committee on Natural Resources and Tourism, and let’s make sure they die there, Michiganders. Call your House reps and ask them to kill HB five eight zero one and HB five eight zero two. Next up is an interesting bill out of Louisiana that could become a model for other states where certain hunts generate big controversy. Governor Jeff Landry recently signed House Bill eleven seventy seven into law which exempts the personal information of hunters from public records requests during the application period and season of hunts run by lottery in Louisiana. Black bear and alligator are lottery hunts, and of course black bear hunting can drive anti hunters absolutely berserk. The law would mean that no one could access the name, address, or other identifying information of hunters until the season was over, thereby reventing harassment. Once the season wraps up, information will become available again to follow the state’s sunshine laws. Interesting side note here a lot of outfitters who specialize in draw tag hunts also access this information so they can reach out to you and see if you want to go guide it. Although Louisiana isn’t known for its rabid anti hunting community. Similar bills might make sense in places like Florida and New Jersey. I, for one, haven’t heard of people using public records request or harass hunters, but hey, there’s no limit to what I don’t know. If you’ve seen this happen, If you have a take on laws to temporarily remove hunter info from public records, right in to ask cal at the meat eater dot com or call and leave a message at four h six two two zero six four four one. Finally, at the federal level, a good bill that died has been born again. The quote unquote Public Lands Integrity Act or PLIA was attached to the recent Senate budget reconciliation vote, and it would have prevented public lands from being sold as part of budget reconciliation, which lawmakers like to use because measures can be passed by a simple majority vote rather than having to get sixty votes. You might remember that three million acres minimum was almost sold off in budget reconciliation over the summer in twenty twenty five. Well, the most recent reconciliation vote came and went, and the PLIA never became an amendment. But now the Public LANs Caucus in the House has introduced the same measure as a standalone bill. Although this one has a long way to go, it’s a great showing by the bipartisan Public Lance Caucus. Bipartisan of course, meaning there are Democrats and Republicans pushing this and it’s much better to have this one debated and voted on out in the open instead of being slipped through behind the scenes. Start calling your member of Congress right now and say public lands are important. At minimum they should have a sixty vote threshold minimum. If it were up to me, we’d put a moratorium on selling off our public lands. We’re not making any more of it, you know, with the exception of like those little bits that I’ve talked about in the past that like lie within municipal airports or have become a parking lot, don’t provide that ecological value that we enjoy.
00:11:02
Speaker 3: North to Alaska going off the rest of his big samlesiattle in the year of nine to two, and he landed in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge where a lease sale was going on for energy development.
00:11:17
Speaker 2: And the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is about nineteen million acres of protected habitat along the north slope of Alaska. It is one of the most important ecosystems in the world and a critical migration corridor for cariboo and hundreds of bird species. Makes other countries drool with envy, and we have to remember it’s a place all of us can go to. Yeah, it takes a little doing, but anyone can visit the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge paddle backpack hunting fish, iconic bucketless species, muskoks, cariboo, wolves, grizzlies, shefish, char grailing, unbelievable bird species. It is bad ass and I can’t wait to go back. Underneath all that habitat, however, are pockets of oil, and getting to it would first mean driving huge trucks over the permafrost and sending seismic waves down to detect deposits. University of Alaska scientists have concluded that this would permanently damage the permafrost, and that would just be the beginning. The battle to drill in this spot has been raging since nineteen seventy seven, when a geologist test fed in Congress about oil in the area. The refuge was created in nineteen eighty in response, but in nineteen eighty nine the Senate approved drilling leases. Less than ten days later, however, the Exxon Valdez tanker wrecked off the coast of southern Alaska, spilling more than ten million gallons of oil in creating lots of images of seals and seagulls struggling through the black sludge. That stalled energy development of the refuge for a bit, but efforts to drill there have come up every few years since then. In twenty seventeen, the first Trump administration finally passed a measure to allow drilling there, but in twenty twenty one, Biden reversed that decision, and in twenty twenty three he canceled all existing leases. On Trump’s first day in office, in twenty twenty five, he once again declared the refuge open for drilling. But now in the midst of all this controversy, we’re seeing the difference between the existence of oil and the willingness of companies to actually go up there and get them. Since the first least auction in twenty twenty one, very few companies have actually bid. In fact, in a twenty twenty five auction there wasn’t a single bidder. The auction this week drew bids on only eleven percent of the offered six hundred and eighty nine thousand acres, and the winner on three offerings was in fact the state of Alaska, for a total of one and a half million dollars. So why so little interest if there’s so much black gold up there. Well, many oil companies are worried that a change in administration would cancel another round of leases. Further, the Republicans opened the Refuge this time around by using the Congressional Review Act to invalidate the Management Resource Plan for the Refuge, which we’ve covered many times. It’s kind of like a nuclear option, But the CRA likely also invalidates every other management Resource plan all the way back to nineteen ninety six when the CRA was first passed. That means that all the resource extraction permits that the government has already issued maybe invalid. All that has spooked oil companies from rushing into new leases. Even though the administration cleared the way for the possibility of drilling for oil, they may have actually ruined the chances of getting it. If in fact you could get to it and make it profitable, unbelievable expense in order to develop in the refuge. It’s a special place for a reason, real hard to get to. Some speculate that there could be a pipeline built from Prudeo Bay, which is a massive area of development on the western side of the refuge and actually in the National Petroleum Reserve, and if the prices of oil due to such things as the war in Iran continued to climb, that could incentivize the development of the leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. However, it would take a long time to develop, and wars eventually end right. Moving on to a topic we hit at the top ohv Off Highway vehicle.
00:15:25
Speaker 1: On Friday May twenty ninth, President Trump issued an executive order that could have serious and wide ranging impacts on outdoorsmen.
00:15:33
Speaker 2: The order is dubbed quote Removing Unnecessary and counterproductive restrictions on access to Federal Lands. It’s not an incredibly creative title, and it’s definitely not an accurate description of the action. The order actually rescinds two other executive orders, one signed by former President Nixon in nineteen seventy two. Oddly enough, I’ve compared Trump and Nixon in the past, because in Trump won a lot of this en that we got done in the name of conservation was incredibly beneficial and many people did not see it coming, which makes it very, very similar to all the awesome environmental reforms that were done under Richard Nixon, which similarly nobody saw coming. It also rescinds another executive order by Jimmy Carter back in nineteen seventy seven that simply clarified parts of the first one. Essentially, those two orders allowed federal agencies to manage how and where off road vehicles could travel on public lands. As the text of the nineteen seventy two executive order reads, it was meant to quote, establish policies and provide for procedures that will ensure that the use of off highway off road vehicles on public lands will be controlled and directed so as to protect the resources of those lands, to promote the safety of all users of those lands, and to minimize conflicts among the various users of those lands. The Trump administration, however, says that these criteria were sub objective and difficult for agencies to operationalize in practice because they were so vague. A press release states that doing so will provide more access and timber production. We need to take those claims with a hefty grain of salt. While increasing access might sound like a good thing, that’s not actually what this does. Our public lands are founded on the doctrine of multi use, and for this to work there needs to be balance. Regulations are important, said up many times, we would not be hunting and fishing in America today if we didn’t say, Holy cow, we need to regulate ourselves, our catch limits, our kill limits. There’s just not enough game to kill it all every season. Imagine that not everything is allowed everywhere, and this is a good thing. Some areas have extensive trails FORHV users, which are awesome, while others prioritize different types of recreation or commercialization, like grazing, and for important reasons Motori Trails are known to impact wildlife species such as elk, which often stay well away from roads and can be particularly vulnerable to disruptions during calving season and where they overwinter. Of course, elk and deer crossroads, they just don’t like to bed and have babies next to them, with the exception of some notably bad mothers. Anyway, ultimately, Trump’s order and energy development in previously non motorized areas would hurt just about everyone except for the folks lining their own pockets. If we look back north to Ambler Road, the two hundred and eleven mile industrial gravel road in northwestern Alaska that is being developed for private commercial use in one of the most pristine environments in North America and beyond. Trump’s recent order is of the same ilk, as is his approval to develop the road. What by all means appears to be a death by a thousand cuts approach to dismantling remote places. Hard to get two places where you go, man, I worked really hard and it was worth it. Those types of public land protections are fading fast across the country. You better get to the table. To be clear, it doesn’t automatically open the floodgates on back country spots. But as I mentioned in the top of the in the segment here, every group hunters, golfers, OHV users, We got folks who liked to color outside the lines. Bad actors. You give them an inch, they take a mile. And that’s what’s happening right now. According to the professionals on the ground, we’re seeing gates, ripped out signs, ripped out and rampant off road vehicle use literally off the roads through sensitive areas. The whole darn system works because we regulate ourselves. Gang, trust me when I say backcountry hunters and anglers will be at the table, as will a coalition of conservation groups and timber industry representatives and motorsports rep presentatives. So should you call your senators, call your congressmen and women, And if you’ve got more thoughts or questions on the issue, give me a shout at askcl at the meaeater dot com and go ahead and just sign up for a membership.
00:20:15
Speaker 3: Will you?
00:20:17
Speaker 2: Moving on to some better news on the policy desk. On May twenty six, the US Department of Interior announced plans to expand hunting and fishing opportunities at national wildlife refuges across the country. The agency is billing it as the quote the largest in history of the US Fish and Wildlife Service. Ultimately, the move will increase hook and bullet access at one hundred and seven National Wildlife refuges and four fish hatcheries. Some of the changes are relatively small scale, increasing the timeframe and or zones of existing opportunities, while others are larger. Fourteen refuges in three hatcheries will have their first ever hunting or sport fishing opportunities. The proposed rule also revises the complexity of some regulations in the refuge system, which is all the better after it’s implemented. It would make over ninety five percent of national refuge system lands open to hunting, which is a darn good thing. We do pay for him by your duck stamp. The only caveat here is a little disingenuous the way this thing was pitched. Some of the changes that were reported as opening up access, we’re actually taking existing hunting opportunities on refuges that already existed and making them conform to the state regulations. So I think that was like a clerical error. Let’s call it a typo makes it sound a lot better than it is, because it’s not adding actually new opportunities and acres. With the exception of right, if the refuge regulation said you can only shoot five ducks here and the state said you can shoot seven ducks anywhere else in the state, that would technically be expanded opportunity, but the implication in the public is that it never existed before. You couldn’t hunt here, now you can, whereas the reality is you could hunt there. Now you can. And it’s more simple because it conforms to state regulations, which I’m all for. But you know it’s got to be accurate, right Gang. There’s a public comment period on this one. You can give the FEDS your perspective on changes over at www dot regulations dot gov. That’s all I got for you this week. Thank you so much for listening, and remember to write into ask c Al that’s Ascal at the Meat eater dot com. Let me know what’s going on in your neck of the woods. You know we appreciate you.
00:22:42
Speaker 3: Thanks again. We’ll talk to you next week.
Read the full article here