From The New West Blog

“Wilderness Renaissance” Could Protect 2 Million Acres

By Kaylee Porter, 6-16-08

	Caption: The view from the air of parts of Owyhee County, Idaho, with a mountain range beyond. Under the Owyhee Initiative, parts of the county will be designated federal wilderness, while other public lands will be sold or traded to ranchers. Photo by Mark Thomson, The Christian Science Monitor

In May, Congress gave more than 106,000 acres of mountains and old-growth forests with salmon-filled streams the strictest level of federal protection.

The newly created Wild Sky Wilderness area in western Washington is a part of Congress’ recent push to protect as many as a dozen pristine areas around the country. By the end of the year, the Washington Post reports, 12 bipartisan wilderness bills are expected to pass and as much as 2 million acres of unspoiled land could be under federal control, a total that would rival the wilderness acreage set aside by Congress over the previous five years.

In recent weeks the House has passed six wilderness bills, including Wild Sky, that would protect more than 500,000 acres.

“A confluence of factors is driving this wilderness renaissance,” Juliet Eilperin writes. “The shift in Congress from Republican to Democratic control; environmentalists' decision to take a more pragmatic approach in which they enlist local support for their proposals by making concessions to opposing interests; and some communities' recognition that intact ecosystems can often offer a greater economic payoff than extractive industries.”

The shift is also due largely to the fact that former House Resources Committee chairman Richard Pombo (R-Calif.)—a fierce opponent of designating new wilderness areas—lost his seat in 2006.

Many of the new bills include concessions to traditional conservation opponents such as loggers and off-road-vehicle riders.

	Wilderness areas that would be protected under some of the bills pending in Congress. Click the graphic for a larger version from the Washington Post

The Wild Sky bill, for example, compromised with church groups, the Boy Scouts and float-plane operators in order to forge an agreement. “The lawmakers removed a few thousand acres from the plan to placate snowmobilers, clarified that existing float-plane use could continue and ensured that church groups and the Boy Scouts could still get access to their camping grounds,” Eilperin writes.

These kinds of concessions make it possible for Congress to create wilderness areas that benefit the local community. Residents of Index Wash., a town northeast of Seattle, see the Wild Sky Wilderness as a way to promote the recreational activities that help drive the local economy now that logging has died out.

To see a map of the current wilderness bills click here. Proposed wilderness areas are in Oregon, Washington, California, Idaho, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, Michigan and West Virginia. [End of article]

Ok so you guys get all these new wilderness areas then what?

Are you happy ?

Wilderness advocates are never happy with what they have they always want more.

I makes me sick. I am sorry I am not like you new westers. I do evil things like snowmobile and snowboard and dirt bike and mountain bike. Thing you hate. Things you have no idea what its like to be proficient at.

Walking bores the crap out of me. I dont hate it it just bores me I dont have much interest in it.

Jimmy,

It's not "you guys" that get new wilderness areas. It is all of humanity, for generations to come. It would be kind of sad to pave over the last of it, just cause it bores one fella named Jimmy.

Can you not be proud to live in a country that, while the rest of the world is destroying wildlife and wild lands, chooses to preserve the last of the last? That you live in a country where one day, your grandchildren- who may not be as bored as you are with walking, who may even love silence and clear waters and birds, or love a place to hunt like men and women have been doing since the dawning of time- will have a place to go and marvel at the handiwork of the Creator?

Well, if you can't be proud of these things, be super happy that you live in a country where the land area, in the lower 48 anyway, is over 98% open to motorized travel. Raise hell, dude! rip it up! Over 98% is not boring! What more could you really want? The last 2%? Really?

Jimmy,

You can do a lot more than just walk in wilderness areas. You can hunt, fish, swim, cross country ski, snowshoe, ride horses, kayak, canoe. In other words, you can do things that do indeed require skill and proficiency and something you apparently do not have...an attention span. The ritilan generation could use some time in nature.

Jimmy, obviously you are a better snowmobiler than reader, because the article notes this includes set asides for snowmobilers and other groups and they were involved in the process.
I consider myself an environmentalist and I've been snowboarding in a number of wilderness areas. I also mountain bike and used to motocross but found it boring.
There are plenty of places to do all this stuff, and the places getting restricted are due to people acting like jerks, like the 'necks that illegally ride the trails by my house and almost run over my wife and dog. Criminals like these ruin it for you dude.

Jimmy - maybe if you did your math and history of America; you'd see that IF ALL the Wilderness request by US were designated; it would amount to ONLY 3% of all the Federal lands.
Are you so SELFISH that you're NOT satisfied with 97% ?? Also, where do you get idea that WE hate: snowboarding, mtn biking and so forth? As for walking - too bad that you don't like it. After all, it is the original form of upright Transportation, as designed by NATURE!!

Jimmy,

I, too, am an avid snowboarder, skiier, and mountain biker, and I'm totally in favor of much more wilderness.

What, then, differentiates the two of us? I believe it's Leopold's "Land Ethic". I seem to have it, while you perhaps lack it.

It's never too late to gain this valuable insight. I highly suggest you read Aldo Leopold. You'll never look back, I guarantee it!

Seriously, before flaming what I've typed, please try reading his works. At least a little bit.

Jay...the Feds have a third of the country. Add the 200 mile limit, and take away the 3 miles the states might claim, and it is a lot more. Somehow, I don't see the purpose of the State, the Government, controlling one out of three acres of land. I don't see the purpose of "wilderness", either. The very designation is the perpetuation of a lie, and is a brick in the genocide path that stripped the aboriginals of their land. There was never any land that was un-used. That is a fiction. The whole of the country was criss-crossed by tens of thousands of trails leading from place to place where resources were exploited in the name of making a living on the land. This untrammeled by the hand of man BS is just that: BS. Academic lies. Unfounded urban myth. Wilderness is an elite land grab, bought and paid for by wealthy donors assuaging a stained conscience. You keep on designating them, and the USFS will keep on incinerating them. In another decade, the public lands of the West are going to look like Russia in 1942----and that might be the goal. Who knows? The whole process is pink at the least, and green bleeds into red real well when the philosophy is dissected. Watermelon politics of the New West.

bear bait,

Normally I just disagree, but this time you have made yourself look like an idiot. Equating designation of wilderness with genocide is insane. The land was taken from the indians because whites did not feel like they were making "wise use" of the land. You nature haters and anti environmentalists say the same thing about wilderness. Some say us wilderness advocates are never satisfied. But it's the "wise use" crew that is never satisfied. Nothing is sacred. No species, no wildlife refuge, no prehistoric site. If there is gold, timber,grass for cattle, or oil there, destroy it.

I don't snowboard or that kind of thing; but, I do strongly support more designated wilderness. What I don't and can't is understand how the "very designation (of wilderness?) is the perpetuation of a lie, and is a brick in the genocide path that stripped the aboriginals of their land" and how that allegation is somehow related to the assertion that there "was never any land that was unused" or that the "whole of the country was criss-crossed by tens of thousands of trails..." Today's designated wilderness areas are not unused; I use the one behind my place for my cattle and to hunt and to fish and to hike and to gather wood and other stuff. I use the place just like my ancestors and other "aboriginals" have always used it (I like how rightwing WASP cracker hypocrites refer to us as "aboriginals" and pretend that they are anguished about how their ancestors treated us and that now they only want to do what is right for us, as long as it doesn't include a settlement of the trust case. Thank you for your concern, Bear Bait, sir.). Again, those ancient "aboriginals" pretty much used wilderness just like I and other modern "aboriginals" use designated wilderness areas today, which is without motorized tools or vehicles and without leaving permanent improvements. The truth is that the last thing we "aboriginals" of today want is a bunch of uneducated and unemployable losers with dozers coming in to clearcut or mine what is left of our "aboriginal" heritage, a heritage that you seem to care so much about. Yeah, go ahead; it's all too predictable; go ahead and argue about your right to leave a teepee ring or a medicine wheel. Be my guest; look even more ridiculous if you feel the need.

Pew and it's wholly owned "Green" subsidiaries controlled the media message on this release. Excluded is the largest (26 million roadless acres) bill of all before Congress, HR 1975. With more cosponsors than all other "wilderness" bills pending in Congress, The Northern Rockies Ecosystem Act doesn't get a mention because it is Pew-free and won't pander to subsidized industrial interests and their lobbyists.

Kaylee,

It looks like you are getting good at generating comments. Must mean your writing is worthwhile.

Sam

James Baker laments that he was part of the strategy to use our National Parks and federally protected areas as colateral for our national debt. I don't think this federal protected designation is for preserving wilderness. Future generations will wonder why we gave it all away.

The Northern Rockies Eocosystem Act, HR 1975 is a frightening and onerous piece of legislation, together with its Biological Connecting Corridors under two types of restrictions on the inter- connecting lands between the vast array of proposed wilderness areas. Add to this the usurpation of the water rights under federal control, which are and have been under state jurisdiction for eons.

You are pretty much right on Bear Bait it is a land grab and much more! I do however think some wilderness areas are needed but between the new Forest Service Roadless Rule fixing to make defacto wilderness out of a much bigger portion of public lands and the above 26 million Northern Rockies Ecosystem Act, I think the lock up of our natural resource is almost complete. That is what the eco-socialist crowd wants. No logging, no grazing, no mining, no hunting, no consumptive use.

Matt, "wise use" is exactly what it says. Conservation and wise use go hand in hand. Preservation is definitely not the cure all for our landscape.

Why can't we have a happy medium with a mix of natural resources and their uses, wether it be wilderness, logging, grazing, off-roading etc. and etc.

I don't know of any National Forests that are allowing any more road building and there darned sure aren't any buildings, improvements or development projects going on on the public lands. We just need a balance but that isn't good enough for the radical preservationists.

To Tom K. - "Wise Use" is a euphamism for resource exploitation; as has been seen in several areas with 'over" logged sections of Fderal Land - the idea "sounds" good, BUT it is abused and creates MOREproblems for the land and the people around those lands! If the private sector really wants a Free market economy; let them BUY the lands out right and do ALL the infrasucture themselves. This has been proposed several times, but BIG Business expect Coporate welfare!!
Maybe YOU don't know of any Federal Lands (national forests) that are building any more roads and such, but my friends "I" do - these roads/trails and such are built ILLEGALLY by logging companies and motorized users - who then complain that THEY wanted the road there - the Fed's were too slow to bilud them - so THEY did it; NOW it makes NO sense to destroy them. I've seen this happen Many times here in S.E. WYO!!
As stated MANY times here in these posts; this is PUBLIC land and ALL Americans have a SAY in their use - NOT just the $$$$

Tom,

Hunting is allowed in wilderness areas, in fact it is some of the best hunting in the USA. It's one place where you can hunt without some rancher yelling that you are endangering his cows on our land.

Wise use? You mean like overgrazing native grasses and then seeding with non natives? Conservation? You mean like exterminating all the predators and stocking the rivers with non native sportfish?

As for roads, we have over 300,000 miles of roads in our National Forests. In fact, there is only one spot anywhere in the lower 48 where one can be more than 22 miles from a road, deep inside Yellowstone NP. The whole idea that we need more roads is of course a lie.

Tom Klumker,

Designated wilderness comprises a little over 2% of the federal lands in the lower 48.

Yes, we can all get along. Yes, we can have balance. But what antiwilderness citizens are saying is madness. We cannot all get along if having 2% of federal lands protected as wilderness is seen by some as a balance, or even as too much protection.

That is not a compromise. It is tyranny. And in this case, it is tyranny over generations of Americans who are as yet unborn. If that is what you want, no, sir, we cannot get along.

Matt,

Nobody said we need more roads, and yes I know you can hunt in the wilderness which is where I hunt but the wolves are taking our elk herds down at an ever increasing rate and our license numbers are going down accordingly. The Mexican Gray Wolf program is being used, and very effectively I might add, to get rid of the ranchers first and the hunting industry is in the cross hairs. It is all about who controls the natural resource and all I am saying is that the public land is not being raped as folks like you seem to imagine. What we need is common sense management and yes we do need some wilderness, just not the whole dammed thing turned into one big wilderness area. The Wildlands Project set up by Dave Foreman and Reed Noss has those designs and they want to ban all human activity in the main wilderness areas with only limited human use in the corridor areas. Is that what you want? By the way there is still some livestock grazing being utilized in wilderness areas as authorized in the original wilderness bill, but most of that grazing has been forced out one way or the other. The people here have been devastated by the endangered species program starting with the spotted owl, then the spike dace and loach minnow, then the willow fly catcher, then the leopard spotted frog, then the goshawk and now the wolf and their ace in the hole is the grizzly. We are fighting not only for our custom, culture and economic survival but the chance to live in a free society. The free society we live in today is in real peril when private property is under direct attack, and our natural resources are being locked up.

horse manure

The Horseman knew her? hummph.

Hal: Real wilderness or de facto wilderness, what the hell is the difference? If we are burning it, by benign neglect, by the millions of acres, why should I care if one more acre becomes wilderness? What is special, worth saving, when the notified, announced, intent is to let any and all that might burn, burn?

There is some pretty idiotic policy being presented as science in all of this, and quite frankly, as abused as science has been in the name of forests and forest dwellers in the last 30 years, science is probably the last thing many of us would trust as a reason to make any major adjustment in land use or status.

Do we know who the Barred Owl shooters are to be, or will they be from a special black ops part of USFWS?

Just for chips and grins, how many wolves has the USFWS killed in the last 12 months, and how many have been shot by the gun happy public?

More old growth trees have been burned than would have been logged in the last two decades. In perhaps all but California, the Western states put out more greenhouse gases in the form of wildland fire smoke than all other human sources contribute each year, and the Feds in the person of the National Wildland Fire folks want to increase that many fold. Get on the same page, people. Are greenhouse gases bad or good? All the ethanol corn land is underwater, with corn now approaching $10 a bushel, and greenies want to burn forests and make people burn ethanol to "save the planet." That is the old joke about the third world firing squad, where 6 shooters stand west of the victim and 6 shooter stand east of the victim, and all fire on command.

You can't find a parking place at a trail head today, so what would you believe the outcome to be if the wilderness was increased by a zillion times? The wilderness becomes "overused" and then people are limited to entry. People cannot use the wilderness unless they win the wilderness lottery. All the wild and scenic river use is controlled and limited. Many wilderness areas limit the number of people in them at any one time. And all this at a time when trails don't get maintained, and no new ones are built. All that is by design. The elitist protectors of all things wild and wonderful don't want any of it despoiled by YOUR presence. Or anybody else but them.

You can put lipstick on that pig any way you want, and it will still be a pig in the morning. A big wilderness expansion is no more than a big people limiting mechanism. It is a grand design to keep out people, and nothing more. And a fine place to not fight another fire. The intent is always wonderful, but the administrative rules, printed in the Congressional Record, always seem to not be what was intended. As Bill told Hillary last week, "Close, but no cigar."

Bear Bait; IF your trying to make a pt. - it looks like you made the wrong one; your last post just shows how immature you are, how you have NO debate skills, don't know a fact if it bit you and you go off on totally irrelevant tangents!!
I want to THANK you for help your opponents! Keep it UP!!

Jay: I know I made your point. Wilderness is about protecting land for the few and from the many. Off limits. Forbidden. Today's Oregonian goes on and on about how the 4 Democrat congresspeople from Oregon, and Oregon's Democrat Senator, are filing all sorts of special little wilderness proposals, and getting a good reception. My, oh my, how productive they are according to their PR hacks!!! But these same 5 wonder kids cannot, have not, been able to find stable funding for the most basic governmental services for counties with the majority of their lands in Federal ownership (which, for you people in New Jersey, means no way to tax them or gain any local government income from those lands ), or from those lands taken from a former out of compliance railroad, awarded to the counties, who in turn entered into a management agreement with Interior which was to provide a sustained, stable timber income to those 18 O&C;counties. The timber became off limits to protect spotted owls during the Democrat Clinton administration, and the US Govt for a while paid "In Lieu of Taxes" payments--PILT--, but that went away with the Bush administration, so say the Democrats. Now they are in control, and it is wilderness they are pushing, and the counties are still holding an empty bag.

Charles Barkley says it the best about Democrats: Poor people have been voting for Democrats for 50 years, and they are still poor."

The way people got to buy Resolution Trust properties was by finding the money to leverage a purchase, and then went out and sold what they bought, what they had title to, for more than they paid for it. One guy told me he used a loan against his NFL pension, and they maxed his wife's credit card, picked up a chunk of land in LA, and turned it in a month for over a million in profit. They now had a nest egg, and new connections, knew the paths through the bureaucracy, and became very successful. It is about risk, and taking risks. The greater the risk, the greater the reward. Cajones. Guts. Call it what you like. And those opportunities will be here sooner than later. And farm land will be added to the foreclosure lists when Australia and South America have normal grain crops once again.

Corn hitting $10 a bushel will happen, and then it all will fall to below profitability because the costs to produce and transport a crop to market have risen too high, too fast, and the wilderness protection expanders won't quit the ethanol folly until it is too late. Tax forgiveness, tax credits, low interest loans, all aimed at producing ethanol will drive a process to an ugly end. Once again, ill conceived public policy from the left will do great harm to basic life support, the farms that grow our food. And Baucus will find more tax relief for Plum Creek and Weyerhaeuser while he beats the drum for ethanol, spending other people's money like a poster boy Democrat.

And greenhouse gases? Your official sponsors of "let it burn", on public lands, will contribute more to greenhouse gases than all the cars, industry, and homes in the West, except for California and only if they have a normal or less than normal fire season. If they have a big one, they come close to meeting the greenhouse gas contributions of humans and their industry, too.

Jay, I hear your criticism, but no answers, just insults of a personal nature. Your idea of a debate is escapes my notice. And you are right, if it is about process, about Rules of Engagement, I don't know much. So all I can do is parrot facts.

bear bait,

If by the few you mean hunters that woudl rather use real skill rather than buzz around on an atv, if you mean people that enjoy the sights, sounds, and smells of nature rather than running over it in some gas powered machine, if you mean people that want to connect with the land rather than exploiting it then I am proud to say I am one of the few. The fact that the many have limited attention spans, expanding waistlines, and care more more technology and money says something negative about the anti wilderness crowd.

Bear Bait; wish I had the time to counter pt. you, but, again, You don't know what a FACT is!! Conspiracy theories with: Black Op's and other nonsense of Racial deprivation isn't going to WASH with people who know reliable sources of information - THAT and the FACT that "I" can see reality in my own backyard!!
STOP embarrassing yourself and those of your ILK!!
Happy Solstice to ALL on Friday!!

Jay, you are missing Bear's point completely. You haven't made the connection and until you do, you'll stay lost in the wilderness.
Wilderness as posited here is an artificial, political construct. In historical terms, true wilderness are the rock-and-ice landscapes that provided no living to either indigenes or evil post-Columbian modernists. Period. Since the last glacial period, every habitable landscape has been deeply altered by human alteration. Whether the instrument was induced fire, or power tools, there is alteration of a profound and systemic manner from a state of "Nature."
The FACT remains that eurodisease and guns and technology pogromized the Indian population...depending on who you talk to, from 70 percent to 90 percent of all Indians fell to diseases such as smallpox brought over from Europe. The historic record is FULL of references.
You want an example, just watch what sylvatic plague (an exotic) does to prairie dogs. ZAP.
Imagine your home town if 70 percent died in one month. Would you still have the cultural knowledge base you need for societal function? Imagine the intellectual loss.
Now, imagine if the die-off happens fifty to a hundred years before "settlement." What would people assume about your town, especially when you consider how collectively clueless we are as a society -- and I'll bet you that you DO feel that way sometimes about your fellow citizens.
Bottom line is, the vast majority of the Western Hemisphere was a managed landscape up until the time of the big kill. The basic paradigms of that management were sound enough that the ecosystem kept enough of its intended function without human stewardship for the ghost period that there was still beaucoup game and berries and "alternative landscape products" for the settlers to be favorably impressed with the "pristine" -- "natural" world they claimed.
As for letting it go back to "nature" and having a good result --
I heard about a month ago from an ex supervisor of the Payette that over 55 percent of it burnt in the last six years. Added to the fires before "global warming" and since 1950, it's more on the order of 75 percent.
Now, if those trees had been LOGGED, there would be hordes of dreadlockians chaining themselves to the gates. Instead, they have been smoked dead. And that's "good." I think it stinks. Why?
Guess what, the very same wood, dead by whatever means, isn't performing the desired ecosystem function endlessly advocated by various and sundry. That's an inescapable reality.
Finally, all you elitist real hunters riffing here...another reality you need to get your head around is: Indians built and maintained their society upon game management. They wanted lots of game, and they wanted it "easy" -- meaning fewest calories lost for most calories acquired. Easy means effective. Their hunting methods were not sporting, but they were certainly REAL.
So "get" real, people.

Amen Bearbait and Skinner!

It totally amazes me how the preservationist eco crowd's heads are screwed on, i.e. Jay J, Matt, mike and Herring. I would bet the farm that Bearbait and Skinner have more compassion and respect fo the environment than you so called environmentalists.

Klumker - I'll take that Bet! What kind of farm do you have, where is it, what acreage and so forth??
What do YOU mean by compassion and respect for the environment, exactly? If your FREE society that you're fighting for is anything like some of the other societies that have died out here in N. Am. - then so be it; they need to DIE. Those cultures and customs have put us where we are today; the door step of Total human extinction!!

It amazes me that the anti wilderness idiots can look upon a beautiful landscape and see nothing but economic oppurtunity, and also completley ignore the lessons of the past. They carry with them the puritan mentality that nature is the enemy and should be subdued. Wolves are evil and should be killed. Native fish should make way for non native sportfish because they are more fun to catch. Bison should make way for cattle because Americans don't have enough heart disease or obesity as is. Trees should be logged so we can all have brand new furniture every few years instead of enjoying what we already have. Natural habitat should be cleared to make way for even bigger houses because the ones we have are not big enough. There is no room for nature in their minds unless it can be shot or provide a dollar.

With regard to the question of betting the farm on anything, it is my understanding, based on what I have been told and please correct my if I'm wrong, that Klumker is still wandering around pontificating rightwing trash-talk and guiding dilettante hunters, that Skinner works for or with a foreign mining company that tries to get in on American public lands, and that bearbait does have a farm, although only forty acres of berries. So, I guess, giving him the benefit of the doubt, bearbait wins the "yeah, I got a farm" bet and gets to have an opinion and we have to wrestle with him. The others are just others...

To keep things honest, I have ranches and graze public lands, although certainly not in quite the same way or even with the same kind of cattle as most ranchers, public lands ranchers or otherwise. I don't believe that a few cows ruin public lands and I do believe in holding the permits and the leases to keep more rapacious operators out. However, I also believe in making my money through my own education and by working in my profession and not by hanging out at the bars all the time with whiny rightwing hustler friends and then counting on overgrazing to make up the difference; so, I keep my stocking levels light and go after a better class of product. I support wilderness because I can't stand to see what these other guys do to land and flora and fauna that isn't formally preserved. They're lazy and that makes them greedy to compensate by taking all of whatever they can get off the land.

Mike - that was the BEST comeback I've ever heard or read!! My hat is off to you! Hold those permits and keep the rif-raf OUT!!

Wilderness as a format to protect land is akin to putting a carton of cottage cheese in the refrigerator. What you end up with down the road is not what you intended.

Burning wilderness, and that is the plan today, no matter what kind of blather you want to project as to greedy so-in-so's, or who has the best hunting record in the far reaches of far away. The US Federal Government plan is to allow it to burn because after it is burned, there will be less to burn the next time, and the time after. If you like what the outskirts of Los Angeles look like, greasewood for a decade or less, and then another fire cleared black landscape, a watershed that now has the ocean acidic along the coast, then wilderness designation is the plan for you.

Protecting and preserving are two entirely different projects, and seldom are seen on the same path. Wilderness protects the land from human intervention. Preservation keeps the land in a state that is productive for life, for the values the protectionists really value. That they cannot see historical connection between humans, landscapes, and preservation by proactive management decisions. So they opt for protection by edict, and end up with a fire managed brush patch.

Trees grow, and the decadent, closed, ladder fueled forest of today is not a candidate for preservation because protection by wilderness designation only ensures that the land will be incinerated, in a stand removal fire. Nothing of the pre-wilderness designation values will be left except geologic forms. The water quality will be altered and degraded, the soil will be changed, and minus the organics that provided the diversity. The animals change. If your idea of wildlife is a lot of woodpeckers and fly catchers, then incineration is just a dandy outcome. But the one fact you have to understand is that the whole of the landscape, from timberline to the ocean, supported many millions of people before European and Asian diseases landed here with the first explorers or castaways, wrecked ships and their livestock of pigs, cats, dogs, rats, chickens, horses, cattle and people washed ashore. With those people and their living larder, came pestilence and disease for which the indigenous population had no immunities for, and the tens of millions were reduced to a few million in a short order by the new pandemics. Landscape management suffered, and what was found by the 19th century pilgrims was a shadow of the former landscape expressed in very large trees, well scattered through the newer growth, and plains and prairies being overtaken by young forests.

It is unfortunate that few oral histories, and no written language were found to detail the lives of people here before the Europeans. All we know is being added to all the time, and none of it supports the idea of designated wilderness as being a path to making or keeping the type of landscape found here early on. But, the unwashed masses, and the middle literates who believe in the big W wilderness have all the answers, all the knowledge, and not only are they right, they are damned right. I will watch their dream lands burn, and burn, and burn. All the heritage forests, the forests with the big old trees, are burning every year, and those trees now declared "old growth" by a silly diameter limit of 20" or larger, or 120 years old, are no more than a description of the ingrowth that is going to be the fuel to take the whole of it down. Enjoy those lands before they become Big W wilderness, because after their designation is approved by Congress, nothing can help them. They are toast. Lost forever. There will a pockets of trees in protected, wet north slope areas, in sharp canyons that fire finds it hard to penetrate, but the south slopes of the same ridges will be treeless snag patches and buck brush thickets that will burn time and again, and take any new trees trying to make a living on the hot, dry south slopes. But if that is what the voting public wants, then they shall have it. At that time, what will the NGOs and the whining class do with their time?

I think I had a brief glimpse of the future today while watching Iowa and Mississippi River flood destruction. The talking head said it all happened because there is not grassland there to absorb all the rain. And the wetlands have been drained and wet fields have drain tiles (my life experience is that there are no functioning back flow devices on the drain tiles, and the flooding works in reverse, going up the tile and into the ground when the river floods.) And monoculture, raising just corn, soybeans, cattle and hogs.

Hold it, Knute!!! The corn is going to make ethanol to save the earth from green house gases and global warming. The soybeans are a substitute for oil in making many things. The cattle and hogs are much better there than on the range in the West. The list goes on. Bitch if they hung 'em with new rope!!! NGOs are just the national Crabby Appletons about all things they hope to make SOMEONE ELSE do, sacrifice, or lose. Wilderness is today's cause, and tomorrow it will be Bush and his not being prepared to help the midwest avoid floods because he has us at war and not conserving fuel. yadda yadda yadda...does it ever end? In a word, NO!

mike,

I walk the walk and have farm land, had grazing permits, was the president of the Gila grazing permittees for several years and with the pressure being put on forest grazing permits decided outfitting and recreation had a brighter future than running cattle on the forest.

You talk about light stocking rates, well just about all of the grazing permits here have been cut, some of them cut entirely out, and over all the health and the productivity of the range is in very good shape. This country has year long grazing permits and some of the best cow calf country in the west. The Forest Service has a firm handle on stocking rates and pasture management and with todays range management science vastly improved, we have seen just about all of the bad managers either put out of business or they had to start complying with good range management practices.

I am a wilderness advocate to a large degree but just don't want the whole resource locked up like some would have it.

Bearbait is pretty much right on in regards to the fire situation as several of the fires in the Gila Wilderness and even out in the spotted owl, once logged lands of the forest, we have seen some very devastating fires the last few years, with The Bear, Cub Mountain and Mogollon fires causing extreme erosion and scorched earth which will take many decades to ever come back to any use.

mike, my pontificating right wing trash talk and guiding dilittante hunters may be how you view it, but my family, my rancher friends and neighbors, small business owners and friends have a vital stake in getting the true story out to the world of what is actually happening on the federally managed lands here, and we are battling on a daily basis with all of the anti-resource people wanting us out. Our collective oxes are being gored and we are fighting back.

In the greater Gila National Forest with the Aldo Leopold Wilderness, the Gila Wilderness and the Blue Range Wilderness it amounts to almost 23% of the total acres in wilderness, i.e. 750,000 acres wilderness out of 3.3 million total. Thats a pretty fair percentage being in wilderness I think.

Matt, what a warped mind set. Most of us here on the land want to take good care of the it and the wildlife, and yes even maybe have a few wolves. We enjoy going into our wilderness areas. The resource users I know bear no resemblance to the crazy picture you try to paint. Let the buffalo roam, but I for one am still going to eat beef and I sure don't know many obese beef eaters.

There are countries where land is woned mostly by the government and where folks have to have permission of thsoe in charge to sue it. The problem wiht wilderness designations is that land is locked up by the federal government for use by only those who have the time and ability to walk into the fishing hole. One of the most interestingly things is the fact the enviros who want more and more land off limits to the commoners also seem to have no problem with the huge hippie gatherings every year of 10-20,000 people who camp and use their particular area for free, and leave a huge impact as one can imagine on the area. They are supposedly gathering to "pray for the earth".

Well Marion - I was wondering when YOUR distorted views were going to enter into this one! As usual - you couldn't be more WRONG.
First OF ALL - as one of those enviro's you talk about; I personally helped STOP such a gathering in my local area - when the group couldn't prove they could take care of the damage they KNEW would happen - or even mitigate it to a minimal level!!
Secondly - if you're too:old,fat, lazy, busy or smoked out, to WALK to fishing hole; mtn. summit, canyon view or whatever else , TOO BAD!
You had your chance to do so when you were: 12, 18, 25, 40 or whatever and nature gave you the body to do so. If you just got to old or abused yourself with smoking/drinking/eating or so; that WAS YOUR CHOICE!! If you just got too old - that is JUST the WAY it is and I refuse to alter the world to Suit you or your ilk!!
The children of this country have a RIGHT to see this land as it was and to test themselves with a TRUE natural Challenge!!
Get some verifiable FACTS to use in your post AND you STOP BEING SO SELFISH!!

JJ,
You are a real champ. I have the feeling you will be up to your misanthropic eyebrows in regret and resentment by the time you are old. That is, if you don't self-induce a stroke or end up in the rubber room with your delusions.
The fact that these threads always end up in acrimony makes it clear that the issue of wilderness is, at least on one side, an ideological and emotional phenomenon. For want of a better analogy, it strikes me as being one of individuals seeking a god manifested physically, almost deliberately in a non-humanized landscape. It's paganistic, yet still religious...and we all know what it's like to deal with theological zealots of all stripes.
Those who don't worship as zealots inevitably demand are infidels to be converted or destroyed. It's that simple.
Hope you find your gods, kids. But yours will never be mine.

Jay, I am so sorry that you have such hatred in your heart for your fellow man. No smoke, drinking, fat, but age yes, and many, many years working at hard work. Regrets about what I have missed? NONE! I raised a family that I am proud of, provided health care to the remote and poor, helped new life into the world. I have been truly blessed.
But I watch young families with both parents struggling to make ends meet and having only 1 day off together, and they can't access old fishing places becasue it has had the roads removed and been turned into wilderness for the elite among us. My concern is for them, will the kids grow up watching tv becasue so much land is off limits to vehicles?
I doubt that you had much influence on the Rainbows. It seems the Boy Scouts have had a work project in the works for that area and set up 4 years ago. The hippies in essence told them the the Secty of the Interior to go to h***. they are already digging water lines , putting in kitchens, etc.
I hope the NFS sets up a law wnforcement area dn turns back anyone without a camping permit, and makes them take out all of their "improvements", and clean up the place.

http://www.casperstartribune.net/articles/2008/06/20/news/wyoming/f1657ed41234b0778725746e00108f9f.txt

Marion,

Either you are not educated on the facts or you choose to ignore them. There are more than 300,000 miles of roads in our public lands. I lament the fact that when I go bowhunting I can't walk more than half a mile without coming across another road. My hunting is disrupted by guys on ATVs who are too fat and lazy to walk!

No placeto fish? Give me a break. The rivers in this country are either too shallow or dried up because the water is stored behind damns to provide recreational oppurtunities to other fisherman, jet skiers, etc. I hate fishing in resovoirs because it seems so unnatural to fish in fake lakes for non native fish, but the fishing in most rivers has been ruined because the water is diverted elsewhere.

If by elite, you mean people that are not so fat that they hate hiking, then you should be aware that being physically fit is the normal state, and being fat is not. Just because most people are fat and sedentary does not make it normal.

Putting in kitchens in the forest? For God's sake. They are Boy Scouts. They are supposed to learn how to cook without a kitchen, and it is supposed to be fun. As for water lines, we already hasve them.They are called rivers, creeks, and streams.

This whole argument that disabled or old people can't access wild places because of lack of roads is nuts. We have plenty of roads. Should we build an elevator to the top of Everest? afterall not everyone can climb it.

Marion - AGAIN - you don't know what you are talking about; the Gathering in SE WYO was stopped by co-operation between locals and their organizers. NO so called improvements have been put here; legal or otherwise have been put here; except the illegal shelters/party holes by Snowmobilers - which my friends and "I" dismantled and hauled out the trash/debri.
I'm glad you made your choices and are happy with them - NOW let others make theirs!! There are MORE than enough trails and roads all over the National Forest system - no matter what you SAY -so anyone who wants to hike/fish/climb/hunt or recreate CAN - with very little effort, to alot of effort; THEIR CHOICE!!

Jay, which gathering, which year?
Matt, read the articcle again, the Rainbow is digging kitchens, not the scouts.
Both of you are sure hung up on fat.....are you what you hate?

Human overpopulation (with global annual growth of 77 million; 3 million in the U.S.) is the root cause of wilderness destruction.

The whole concept of endless economic growth is impossible on a FINITE planet, yet people refuse to acknowledge physical limits to resource takings. The typical angle is that it's just about politics and apportioning land equitably. But these conflicts will never be solved until people stop over-breeding, pillaging and superficially mitigating the side-effects of growthism.