DENVER, CO: On Tuesday, January 20th, Advocates for the West filed suit against the US Fish and Wildlife Service on behalf of WildEarth Guardians and retired state biologist Dr. Clait Braun, seeking endangered species protections for the rare Gunnison sage-grouse. Despite clear ongoing threats to the bird’s survival, in November 2014, the agency designated Gunnison sage-grouse as a ‘threatened’ species, rather than the […]
Boise, ID: In response to our lawsuit, the Bureau of Land Management backed down from its decision to allow the Idaho Predator Hunting Derby on 3.1 million acres of our public lands surrounding Salmon, Idaho. Advocates for the West’s Director of Litigation Laird Lucas and Staff Attorney Bryan Hurlbutt represent Defenders of Wildlife in this case, filed […]
Advocates for the West filed a complaint on November 13, 2014 against the U.S. Bureau of Land Management’s action authorizing an “Idaho Predator Hunt Derby” on public lands surrounding the town of Salmon. Event organizers were granted a 5-year permit for an annual 3-day event which would include up to 500 participants. Entrants would be encouraged […]
On September 8, 2014, Advocates for the West filed a notice of intent to sue the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Wildlife Services program over its large-scale, often secretive killing of wild animals in Idaho, on behalf of four conservation organizations. The program kills millions of animals nationwide every year, and in 2013 killed more than 3,000 […]
A recent article in the Las Vegas Review-Journal details Nevada’s Spring Valley Wind energy facility’s belated steps to curtail wind turbine operations to reduce the deaths of bats at the facility, which have been far higher than the developer and BLM predicted. The initial number predicted and allowable death limit was 169 for 2013, but the […]
By Advocates for the West Board Member Linwood Laughy: Two recent developments have dealt another blow to the Port of Lewiston, which has launched an aggressive promotional and legal campaign to open Highway 12 to megaloads and thus attract incoming traffic to its newly extended $2.8 million container dock. Normal traffic over this dock has […]
UPDATE – 5/29/14 We are elated to announce that the agencies have backed down, and no ravens will be poisoned or crushed this spring. Fish and Game representative Jeff Gould claims the agencies will execute this project next spring, once a supplemental environmental assessment has been completed, but Advocates for the West and our clients are here to […]
On Monday, March 17th – 2014, Advocates for the West’s Senior Attorney Laurie Rule appeared in court as an intervenor on behalf of the US Forest Service. We backed the agency’s decision to restrict domestic sheep grazing on much of the Payette National Forest due to the likelihood of domestic and bighorn interaction. Such interactions lead to bighorn contracting a fatal […]
An ongoing saga of the wandering mega-load By Linwood Laughy February 11: Day 70 on the Tortoise Trail… Today General Electric’s giant water evaporator evades the rigors of a Montana winter in a warehouse in Bonner, 11 miles east of Missoula, while being “reconfigured” to meet Canadian transport requirements. Omega Morgan transporter will likely depart […]
As most of us are painfully aware, wolf hunting in Idaho is an increasingly worrisome concern to those of us who understand the intrinsic value of maintaining a healthy population of wolves in the Rocky Mountain wilderness. Idaho in particular has received some glaringly bad press for its treatment of this issue, as highlighted in […]