Online Messenger #200
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Friends,
On February 28, 2011 Chief Judge B. Lynn Winmill of the United States District Court for Idaho agreed with Western Watersheds Project and reimposed an injunction stopping livestock grazing on 17 grazing allotments covering over 450,000 acres of public land in the Jarbidge Field Office of the Bureau of Land Management in southern Idaho.
The allotments closed under this injunction contain some of the most important remaining habitat for sage grouse, desert bighorn sheep, the threatened plant species slickspot peppergrass as well as native redband trout, pygmy rabbits and pronghorn antelope.
Western Watersheds Project welcomes this Court Order (pdf) and looks forward to the Bureau of Land Management finally reforming its illegal actions that have led to this outcome.
Western Watersheds Project sends thanks to our excellent legal counsel in this matter Todd Tucci of Advocates For The West in Boise and to WWP Biodiversity Director Katie Fite for years of hard and often unrewarded work in the Jarbidge Field Office.
Thank you !
Here is Western Watersheds Project's News Release on this important victory:
Western Watersheds Project Wins A Federal Court Injunction Stopping Livestock Grazing on over 450,000 Acres of Public Land in Southern Idaho
Greater sage grouse, pygmy rabbit and Slickspot peppergrass have won a reprieve from livestock grazing which has decimated their populations and destroyed their habitat. Late yesterday, Chief Judge B. Lynn Winmill of the federal District for Idaho held BLM, various Simplot corporate entities, and other corporate ranching operations to the terms of an earlier agreement, and again enjoined livestock grazing on 17 livestock grazing allotments in southern Idaho.