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Conserving the Desert
The author hopes that your trips to the desert, both the real
ones and the ones at this site, turn you into a rabid desert
lover. He also hopes that you occasionally devote some of your
time to working on behalf of desert conservation. This section
has an overview of the key desert conservation issues, some maps
of Idaho desert wilderness study areas, and a directory of some
of the desert conservation groups you might be interested in.
Oh yes, this is even more than usual a soapbox for the author:
be warned!
The author recommends that you read the section on
Grazing before plunging
into this area...
Wilderness
The Forest Service began creating Wilderness and Primitive
Areas as early as 1924, when the GLO was still trying to sell
or homestead vacant desert lands. Although the BLM was created
with the goal of better managing the public lands, the agency
had no multiple-use mission until the 1960's, and especially
until 1976's Federal Land Policy and Managemetn Act (FLPMA).
Wilderness and recreation were not accepted as part of its mission.
The BLM had a few Primitive Areas in other states,
but this meagre level of protection and management couldn't save
it from the humiliation of seeing its best areas stolen by the
National Park Service. This was especially true in Utah, where
Canyonlands, Arches, and Capitol Reef National Parks were carved
from BLM lands during the 60's and 70's. (The author camped in
the early Canyonlands Park when, during the transition from BLM
management, cows were still allowed to graze .)
FLPMA mandated a study of all BLM lands for wilderness
suitability. Areas would fall into two classes: "normal"
backcountry areas over 5000 acres, and especially deserving areas
of less than 5000 acres. A key feature of the early BLM wilderness
studies was how roads were defined. "Ways" were routes
maintained solely by the passage of vehicles; "roads"
received regular maintenance by mechanical means. An area
with ways could receive a BLM recommendation as wilderness; roads
would disqualify or divide areas.
Conservationists lost the early rounds of BLM wilderness
studies. They simply didn't know the ground as well as the ranchers,
and they faced a BLM whose staff ranged from favorable to indifferent
to downright hostile. Rob Hellie of Shoshone stands out in the
author's memory as an outstanding BLM staffer who worked to convince
his bosses that wilderness was a good idea. In contrast, the
entire Burley District turned in no Wilderness Study Areas, a
stupid decision that ignored the Jim Sage Hills, the Deep Creek
Range, and Petticoat Peak.
At last, in 1991, the BLM issued its Idaho Wilderness
Recommendations to Congress. This was a dismal report, utterly
lacking in imagination or inspiration (and especially painful
to compare to Oregon's equivalent effort). Out of the BLM's 12
million acres in Idaho, over 11 million acres started in wilderness
study. This number was whittled down to 1.8 million acres in
formal Wilderness Study Areas (WSA's). At last, the BLM recommended
972,239 acres as wilderness; and almost half of this was new
lava.
The good news is that, until Congress acts on Idaho's
BLM wilderness, all 1.8 million WSA acres are protected from
wilderness-destroying activities--except from the Air Force.
The Committee for Idaho's High Desert is currently working on
a much-needed conservationist wilderness proposal.
Grazing
The author's past seventeen years of desert conservation work
have left him with a profound sadness. He well remembers the
words of Thucydides: "Of all man's miseries, the worst is
this: to know so much, yet to be impotent to act."
In the early 1980's, it was possible to have hope
for the desert ecosystems. Several wet years had left improved
range conditions (drought was to follow). FLPMA was still new,
and it mandated multiple-use management by the BLM. Above all,
even though all BLM managers came from a range management background,
there were many young, sympathetic "FLPMA babies" throughout
the agency: surely things would change when this new generation
came to power.
However, the first major post-FLPMA grazing plans
were disastrous. For most plans, the BLM developed four alternatives:
increase grazing to 150% of present levels, increase grazing
to 135%, reduce grazing to 65%, or take no action at all. The
agency refused to develop any kind of moderate approach; and
in plan after plan, it adopted the alternative to increase grazing--even
though cheatgrass and other nasty weeds were invading rangelands
where native vegetation was weakened by overgrazing.
One of the worst plans was the Monument Grazing E.I.S.
It called for the large increases in grazing, even though 95%
of the area was in only poor or fair range condition. It included
every grazing allotment's exact increases in cattle numbers,
but wildlife got short shrift. The E.I.S. said the BLM would
write an Antelope Habitat Management Plan later.
Today, fifteen years later, there is still no such
plan. Worse, the area has repeatedly burned, destroying the shrubs
and forbs that antelope need for survival. The area's antelope
population has collapsed...
The author is saddened that Idaho's overall desert
environment has deteriorated constantly over his seventeen years
of desert activism. The sad part is that this mismanagement of
the resource didn't happen in the 1880's when everyone thought
the resources were limitless; they didn't happen in the 1920's
and 30's when poverty was the rule and transients frustrated
range management; they didn't happen in the 1950's when "scientific"
range managers seeded millions of acres with crested wheatgrass;
they happened in the 1980's and 90's, when "professional
range managers", who should have and did know better, made
one bad decision after the next, and earned high salaries without
ever being held accountable for their failures.
What You Can Do
Live a good life. Try to conserve, and consume less. Enjoy
the desert, and take the time to learn it and see it for yourself
before you do or say anything. Join good groups, send in your
dues, and read the newsletters. One day, your chance, your cause,
your issue will come. The author hopes that at that moment, you
are ready to step up and do the right thing.
Here are URL's for some groups doing desert conservation
work in Idaho:
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