Cartoon by Dave Vamos
REPORTS
new "common ground" group called SWEAT has formed in Elko, writes
Don King. It stands for Soil and Water Enhancement Action Team. Ranchers,
environmentalists, miners, wise use activists and county and federal officials
all got together to identify restoration projects they could cooperate on.
They're rolling up their sleeves this summer along Dorsey Creek and in Lamoille
Canyon. At their first meeting, Spencer Hegstad, a county commissioner from
Beaverhead, MT, told SWEAT that they were on the right track. He said his
county, which has 9,000 people and 10,000 elk, figured it could hire attorneys
and go to court to try to buck federal land managers. But with 55 county employees
and 150 federal employees in Beaverhead, it was not reasonable to assume county
employees could replace federal workers. His county did not want control of
the federal lands, he said. In fact, they didn't have the expertise or employees
to do the job. The county decided to meet with the agencies instead. The BLM
and Forest Service agreed to help the county hire a planner. The agency heads
meet with county officials once a month. They've held public forums on elk
hunting and grazing allotments. Everyone came in angry, said Hegstad, but
when they left they understood the process and were satisfied. For more information,
contact SWEAT at 702/738-4221.
pronghorn
antelope is on Jim Yoakum's calling card. The Verdi, Nev., resident has
been studying pronghorn for 40 years. He stopped by the other day to tell
us how they are doing. He was practically breathless with excitement about
the vast cattle free experiment now going on at the Hart Mountain and Charles
Sheldon National Wildlife Refuges. The Sheldon takes up a good chunk of
the far northeastern corner of Nevada. Hart Mountain is just across the
border in Oregon. The refuges were established to protect the pronghorn.
In recent years, cows have been taken off the refuges. They will be gone
for at least 15 years while refuge managers try to restore the grasslands
to some semblance of the way it used to be by returning fire to the steppes.
The plan has survived protests from ranchers. But the shouting is not over.
Now the refuge managers want to shoot coyotes to protect pronghorn fawns.
Yoakum thinks that unnecessary. For anything you ever wanted to know about
antelope, contact Yoakum at P.O. Box 369, Verdi, NV 89439, 702/345-0114.
he Nevada
Weed Manage-ment Association has declared war on invasive weeds, writes
James Young, the foremost expert on Great Basin rangelands. Isn't "invasive
weeds" a bit pejorative? "Invasive refers to their ability to
spread without conscious aid of humans," says Young. "Weed because
they reduce biological diversity, cause economic losses, and further degrade
the environment. The only thing good one can say about invasive range weeds,
is that agreement on their control brings together diverse groups concerned
with the management of Great Basin rangelands." On the most unwanted
list: cheatgrass, russian thistle, whitetop, Russian knapweed, salt cedar,
yellow star thistle. For information, contact Young at the Agricultural
Research Service, 920 Valley Road, Reno, NV 89512, 702/784-6057.
ne of
the least inviting landscapes in the days before motor vehicles, the Black
Rock Desert is quickly joining the league of public lands that are in danger
of being loved too much.Victoria Roberts of Gardnerville, Nev., wrote to
tell us that the Burning Man will be sharing the Black Rock this summer
with rocketeers and rocket cars. There are three proposals from groups that
want to set up racetracks on the playa this summer to try to set new land
speed records. The record is currently held by Project Thrust of England
which raced a high speed vehicle to 633 miles per hour on the playa in 1983.
Many visitors who first experience the playa at raucous, crowded, noisy
events, return later to try to experience the space, solitude and silence
that make the Black Rock Desert truly feel like another world. But the Bureau
of Land Management is worried those qualities may soon be in short supply.
For information contact Lynn Clemons, Outdoor Recreation Planner, Bureau
of Land Management, 705 East 4th Street, Winnemucca, NV 89445, 702/623-4500.
Photo by Barbara Traub
tah's
centennial is this year. The annual July 24th "Days of 47" parade
in Salt Lake City, which marks the anniversary of the arrival of Brigham
Young's party in the valley in 1847, is said to be the third largest parade
in the country, after the Rose Bowl and the Macy's Day parade. Last year,
we took the kids and had a blast. One giant float featured two astronauts
floating away from the space shuttle in plain brown suits, white shirts
and narrow black ties. In their outstretched hands they each held the Book
of Mormon. For information about this and other centennial events, contact
the Salt Lake Visitors Bureau at 801/521-2822.
or
a mind-blowing counterpoint to narrow views of Mormondom, there is nothing
more stimulating than the annual Sunstone Symposium, which convenes August
14-17 in Salt Lake City. Last year's symposium featured discussions of Mormon
militias, the holy role of women in the church, how fiction can threaten
faith, and the new paths being taken by young, liberal Mormons. Sunstone
explores Mormon experience, scholarship, issues and art from more perspectives
that you ever imagined possible, in the symposium and in the journal,
Sunstone. If you can't make the symposium, check out the program and
order some tapes or a sample of the journal. Sunstone, 311 South Rio Grande
Street, Suite 206, Salt Lake City, UT 84101-1136, 801/3565-5926.
al
Cannon wears many hats: director of the Western Folklife Center and the Cowboy
Poetry Gathering in Elko, Nev., folklorist, organizer, promoter, and a performer
of traditional Western music. He sings and plays guitar, accordion and other
instruments in two bands. Actually, they're the same band, but they have two
names. It's not the the country western you hear on the radio. You can't get
much more rootsy than this. The Bunkhouse Orchestra's Roll on, Little Dogies:
Songs and Activities for Young Cowpokes, is a cassette with an accompanying
book that has lyrics, music and history. Hal's other group, The Deseret String
Band, produced a CD and video of a centennial concert earlier this year. Utah:
Songs of Statehood features the songs of early pioneers. Contact: Okehdokee
Records, 712 East 100 South, Salt Lake City, UT 84102 (801/322-4682).