Fatal attraction - Cattle water troughs deadly for songbirds

By Emily Jones, Journal Writer

MALAD - Biologist Miriam Austin's voice shakes when she talks about the hundreds of dead birds and chipmunks she has documented at the Pleasantview grazing allotment this summer near Malad.

"It's heart-rending and sickening. It's the worst thing I have ever had to document."

Austin has done field work on the Bureau of Land Management-owned grazing allotment for three years at the request of the Western Watersheds Project, a ranching watchdog group.

She has visited the allotment several times this summer, and each time she has found animals that drowned after falling into the trough while searching for water.

Bird ladders, designed to give birds and small mammals a way out of the water, help but they are rarely found in the allotment's troughs.

After visiting the allotment last month, Austin sent an angry letter to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and other environmental groups.

In the letter, Austin reported that "One trough alone, little more than a stinking coffin to the sky, held the carcasses of at least 49 migratory birds drowned in recent days and weeks."

"It's such an easy thing to fix," Austin said. "It's such a preventable thing. I got nasty this time because we have waited too long for something to happen."

Bird ladders, already in use in many areas, are designed to help birds and small animals get out of the trough, Austin said.

A few of the troughs had bird ladders that weren't very effective, said BLM rangeland management specialist Matt Rendace.

By this week, Rendace said, new bird ladders will be put in the troughs. The older ladders were made of PVC pipe and sometimes sank, he said, and were free-floating in the water, making it hard for birds to crawl up.

Rendace said the new ladders will be in an "A" shape, and will be fixed against an edge so they won't float away.

"We learned something," Rendace said. "Once we get a complaint, we jump right on it. You can't go get bird ladders at the five and dime."

Austin isn't convinced the BLM will act. She said she has heard promises before, but nothing has been done.

"The public has been begging them for five years. I don't know why they don't do something about this," Austin said.

Austin could get some relief from another federal agency.

According to Craig Tabor, a law enforcement officer with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service based in Boise, his agency is aware of the situation and is looking into it.

"I'm in the process of consulting with the BLM to see what they're doing to take care of the situation," Tabor said last week. "Obviously, this (adding improvements to the troughs to allow birds to escape) costs money, and the BLM and the grazers find it hard to dig deep to make the improvements to help the birds. But I want to see compliance with the Migratory Bird Treaty Act - I'm trying to get this situation resolved without asking the impossible from anyone involved."

Dave Edwards, president of the Pleasantview Grazing Association and a full-time rancher, doesn't want to see the birds die either.

In the mornings, he said, he sees dozens of birds sitting on the bird ladders left in a large water tank on the allotment, but there are still some floating dead in the water. Edwards hopes the new bird ladders will work.

"Nobody wants to see a bird die like that," he said. "There couldn't be a more horrible way to die."

Edwards believes ranchers and conservation advocates can work together to make the bird problem and other issues better.

For him, it's a matter of preserving his livelihood.

A way of life for some, an

environmental disaster for others

Edwards has run cattle on the Pleasantview allotment for some 60 years. Area ranching families have maintained herds on the land since the early 1900s.

Today, Edwards said, there are about half as many cattle on the allotment as there were when he was younger.

The change was good, Edwards said.

Before the herds were cut, calves coming off the range weighed about 400 pounds, he said. Now they weigh about 600.

"It's helped the health of the cattle. It's helped the health of the mountain for sure," he said.

In 1997, cattle herds were cut by 36 percent to prevent overgrazing.

In 2001, Western Watersheds Project sued BLM to challenge its grazing plan. The lawsuit resulted in a settlement where the herds were cut by 19 percent. Riparian areas will also be grazed less often.

Ranchers, BLM and environmental groups are currently working on another grazing plan scheduled for completion in the fall, Rendace said.

Grazing on the allotment has also changed to a system where four of the six pastures that inhabit the 70,000-acre allotment are in use, while two pastures are always at rest.

Traveling through one of the pastures in use earlier this month, Austin shakes her head at the bare ground located in the canyon bottoms.

"There's always going to be an impact. What's acceptable and what's not varies from person to person. This," she said, pointing to the dust, "is not acceptable at all."

While she knows cattle will make some impact, Austin said it is important to take them off of the pasture while there is still grass left.

Failure to do so hurts not only the earth, but the cattle as well, she said. Without grass to eat, Austin fears cattle will resort to eating noxious weeds and potentially toxic plants.

"That's not livestock management. That's pure ignorance," she said.

On many successful ranches, including the one Austin's family owns, cattle spend little time on public rangeland, and are quickly moved to private land where they are given feed when the land becomes too dry.

"You can do responsible ranching. You can," she said.

In arid lands like the Pleasantview allotment, however, where less than 12 inches of rain fall in a year, ranching is often difficult, Austin said.

Wetter lands are more forgiving, and more able to recover, she said. Dry land can't take the abuse.

"We're expecting it to produce for an impact that was never meant to be there," she said.

Rancher Lloyd Briggs' family has ranched on the allotment for as long as he can remember. Until his recent death, Briggs' father, 86, was a full-time rancher who maintained the family's 150 head of cattle.

Today, Briggs and his son manage the livestock.

"We're trying to be responsible stewards of the land," he said. "No one wants to ruin the land. If you don't take good care of it, it won't take good care of you."

The environment on the Pleasantview allotment has gotten better over the years, Briggs said, and he is willing to make more improvements.

"The forage is there, the improvements are being made, and we're learning more every day," he said. "It never seems to be enough for the Jon Marvels or the Miriam Austins of the world."

Jon Marvel, executive director of Western Watersheds Project, readily repeats his ongoing claim that recent improvements aren't enough.

Ranching, he said, has never been appropriate in the West, where the landscape is dry, slopes are steep and there is little forage and water for livestock.

The land is made for wildlife, he said.

"Livestock pollute the water. They pollute the streams. They trample the bottoms and make a mess of things," Marvel said.

Marvel complains ranching is subsidized by the federal government. Hundreds of thousands of dollars have been spent on the allotment, Marvel said, and it is still a marginal business.

The question Marvel wants answered is why the federal government continues to support ranching on public lands with taxpayer money.

"It's a money-losing proposition," Marvel said. "The only answer is that it's a way of life. Lord knows there are lots of ways of life that aren't around anymore."

The public asking for responsible ranching is not something new, Austin said. The Taylor Grazing Act, a 1934 act regulating ranching, includes provisions for environmentally-sound grazing, she said.

"It's not just Jon Marvel alone. People have been crying out for 100 years," she said.

Briggs believes it is still possible to make a living as a rancher in the arid landscape of southeast Idaho, although he said people like Marvel make it more difficult.

Briggs works as an agricultural loan officer while his son ranches full time, and he said he knows plenty of ranchers who still depend on cattle to earn their livelihood.

For Briggs, ranching is a way of life he wants to pass on.

"I guess, unfortunately, I want my children and grandchildren to enjoy the same things I did," he said. "We're doing what we can. We're certainly willing to listen to their story. I wish they would listen to ours."

Briggs and Edwards both believe environmental groups and ranchers can work together.

"It's hard to teach an old dog new tricks," he said, "If we're going to stay in business, we're all going to have to bend a little."

In the last 20 years of ranching on the allotment pastures have improved tremendously, Rendace said.

"It's improved. That's what people don't understand. That whole mountain was annihilated in the 1950s," he said.

Resting the land

Austin's attitude toward the allotment improved while she traveled through the two pastures that are resting. Young aspen trees are growing, and the grasses are about 3-feet tall.

Recently, Austin saw deer and moose in the area.

"It feels different here. Nature tries to heal itself," she said. "It's exciting because it shows what we can have."

Still, Austin can't completely forget the scenes of birds floating in water troughs, and many troughs that are completely dry.

With most of the water being pumped into the troughs, and little water left in nearby streams and springs, wildlife and cattle alike depend on the troughs for survival, Austin said.

Keeping a ready supply of water is one of the biggest problems facing ranchers on the allotment, Edwards said. The land is plagued by drought, and hauling water drives up the cost of maintaining the cattle.

In the past, springs have dried up, but they have returned, Edwards said.

"We're just hoping the springs come back. They always do," he said.

Austin is not sure the springs will come back. Over the years, the land has begun to see less moisture, she said.

"I don't know if it's going to come back," she said. "People are going to have to learn to do things without water."

Emily Jones covers Bingham County, Fort Hall and the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory for the Journal. She can be reached at 239-3175 or by e-mail at ejones@journalnet.com.

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