After much hard work WWP Wins TRO on Spruce Mountain. The victory is particularly important for many reasons.
BLM claims the project is necessary to prevent catastrophic fire. It follows that this would be the reason front and center – considering fire is where the funds are at. The Spruce Mountain Project is home to healthy habitat which includes Pinyons from 200 – 400 years old. Fires are part of healthy ecosystems and Spruce Mountain, being distant from any significant human structures or developement, is an illustrative example of just that. Those ancient trees have survived and thrived for generations providing native habitat for numerous wildlife without BLM’s ‘helpful hand’.
Additionally, the claim is that these Pinyon-Junipers are crowding out the grasses necessary for wildlife forage. As Ralph Maughan points out these areas of established habitat with old growth trees are not the smaller trees that become invasive and wildlife do just fine on sagebrush and other natives. Their problem is that where Pinyons and sagebrush grow, other forage that cattle eat won’t grow. If only BLM could eradicate every plant that doesn’t serve the livestock interest.
That project would cost tax-payers a lot of money to turn our native land into something else.
