On May 18, Western Watersheds Project and Willow Creek Ecology finalized a memorandum of understanding to combine forces in our efforts to retire grazing from public lands and restore watersheds habitat.

Like WWP, Willow Creek Ecology, which I founded in 1996, exists to accelerate efforts for grazing reform on public lands. Our target is Utah.

While Willow Creek Ecology will continue to manage existing projects, new efforts in Utah are being launched under the aegis of WWP.

The qualifications I bring to the watersheds cause include a doctorate degree in ecology and 20 years overseeing an environmental consulting business in Utah. I've also spent the past 10 years using my background to fight the misapplication of science by federal agencies in the management of public lands.

Last year, my frustration with the lack of response from the U.S. Forest Service to scientific input, coupled with devastating evidence of public-lands abuse by livestock and wholesale denials and obfuscation by the USFS, compelled the Earthjustice Legal Defense Fund to take on one of my cases. This was a so­called "forest health" case in the T.W. Daniel Experimental Forest in northern Utah.

The USFS allowed that the forest was in a declining state - a condition in which sustainability and resiliency were threatened by decades of logging, livestock grazing and fire suppression. But the agency failed to address the issues of livestock grazing and fire suppression in its solution to the problem.

Instead, the USFS proposed a 2,000-acre logging project as a "forest health" treatment to cure the problem. These are the kinds of decisions that motivate me.

Since May 18, our WWP operation in Utah has filed protests against grazing permit renewals for 35 allotments on BLM lands in northern Utah totaling over 750,000 acres. These allotments currently endure a total of 10,000 cattle and 32,000 sheep.

In its environmental assessments, BLM has consistently failed to address issues of air quality, water quality, wildlife, soils and vegetation. Assisted by Brandon and Julie Chard of Castilleja Consulting, and Miriam Austin of Red Willow Research, I've surveyed many of these allotments and supplied detailed reports and analyses to the BLM.

These reports are also being forwarded to appropriate state agencies and political representatives in an effort to call attention to the flagrant betrayal of the public trust on these lands.

My noble assistants are my akitas. Each fall, Kiesha, Toqui and Niki, each carrying 25 pounds of equipment and food, take me into the Uintah Wilderness in Utah to survey watersheds and collect data on streams, soils and vegetation. The scientific evidence is used to show the USFS the intolerable level of degradation livestock are inflicting on this beautiful wilderness.

In the course of our field work, ungrazed watersheds are also surveyed. In these places we linger longest, hoping to see a lynx, bighorn sheep, wolverine or mountain lion - or maybe even one of the wolves that are rumored to be in the area now.

With grazing permits, dewatered streams, and forest plan after forest plan competing against watersheds and wildlife on 34,000,000 acres of public land in Utah, there is no shortage of work to be done. And there are miles to go before we sleep.