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May 11, 2018
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Opinion
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Carl Sampson
opinions@capitalpress.com Online: www.capitalpress.com/opinion
Washington’s Fish and
Wildlife Commission
needs to be fixed
O ur V iew
By TONY DELGADO
Larisa Bogardus/BLM
A gather of wild horses from the Beaty Butte Management Area, adjacent to the Hart Mountain National Wildlife Refuge in south-
ern Oregon. The Bureau of Land Management has come up with four options for managing wild horses.
Time has come for solving
wild horse problem
T
restrictions — and damage to range out of control. The cost of keeping
he concept of wild horses
horses in BLM holding facilities
land.
running as free as the wind
is estimated at $1 billion for their
But there’s an even darker side
across the open spaces of the
lifetime.
to leaving wild horses unmanaged
West is admittedly appealing. The
The BLM has come up with a
in the West. Just last week in
horses, which over the centuries
Arizona, more than 100 wild horses plan — actually, four options — for
have become a part of the Western
reducing the wild horse population
landscape, offer a glimpse of the old died, the victims of the drought
to 26,715, which they figure is a
that has stricken parts of the state.
days.
manageable and sustainable number.
More horses will die of thirst and
But the difference between the
The plans include a variety of
starvation as the drought continues
concept of wild horses and the
tactics, including the sale of horses
and the land cannot sustain them.
reality is vast.
without restriction,
The reality is the
adoption, contraception
population of invasive
The
estimated
wild
horse
and sterilization. One even
wild horses is so far
out of control that
population has grown to 86,000 suggests giving as much
as $1,000 to anyone who
they damage the land,
and ranchers say it could as
adopts a horse.
streams and rivers,
causing harm to the
much as double every four years. Because Congress has
the ultimate say on how
habitat of native species
the BLM will proceed,
such as greater sage
Elsewhere, officials with the U.S. it’s difficult to tell which option —
grouse, pronghorn, deer, elk, fish
or combination of options — will
Bureau of Land Management have
and bighorn sheep. By destroying
be used.
struggled with the overwhelming
range land and stream banks, the
We urge Congress to approve an
horses reverse any progress that has number of horses. The estimated
effective combination that will help
wild horse population has grown
been made by land managers and
BLM managers get the wild horse
to 86,000 and ranchers say it could
ranchers aimed at restoring habitat.
problem under control as quickly
as much as double every four
Ranchers say the wild horses
as possible. Clearly, something
years. BLM has rounded up tens
have forced federal land managers
new needs to be done with the wild
of thousands of horses but without
to curtail livestock grazing in some
horses, because what’s already been
birth control and other efforts the
areas. They fear the spiraling horse
done hasn’t worked.
population will continue to grow
population will only mean more
For the Capital Press
Guest
comment
O
Tony Delgado
ver 70 percent of all
wildlife is born and
raised on agricultural
land, yet farmers do not have
any voice in the management
of these game animals that
cause untold millions of dol-
lars in damage to their crops
and livestock.
Whitetail deer, elk, bea-
ver, black bear — not to
mention wolves — can ac-
tually drive farmers out of
business, and it doesn’t mat-
ter if you are a cattleman,
hay grower, orchardist, pro-
duce farmer or even a timber
grower.
For example, Stevens
County, Wash., where I live,
is typically deer habitat,
which is acknowledged by
any wildlife biologist, and
not typical elk habitat. How-
ever, several years ago a state
wildlife biologist wanted to
double the small existing elk
herd that we have that was
already doing a lot of dam-
age to local hay growers. To
add insult to injury, he insist-
ed that the elk would winter
on private land instead of
public land. This is a terrible
insult to even suggest such a
venture.
A former hay grower I
know well who farms 100
acres of irrigated alfalfa 9
miles north of Colville stated
at a meeting that after he irri-
gated, fertilized and sprayed,
the 150 deer ate one-third of
his net profit. He asked the
audience of a large group of
hunters and wildlife person-
nel: What businessman can
lose a third of his net profit
and still remain in business?
This is one of many cases.
So what is the remedy?
Agriculture must have a
strong voice on the Wash-
ington State Fish and Wild-
life Commission. At pres-
ent, there are nine members
that make up the state Fish
and Wildlife Commission
that are sportsmen and are
appointed by the governor.
Sometimes a farmer will be
appointed to the commission
but will always be out-voted
by the sportsmen members,
or ridiculed.
Several years ago, a lady
from the Audubon Society
was appointed to the com-
mission by the governor, and
I immediately wrote a letter
to the governor. Does she
fish? Doe she hunt? Did she
ever trap? Does she know
anything about wildlife
management? She finally re-
signed.
This very same issue ex-
isted in my home state of
New Jersey, where I grew
up on a produce farm in the
early 1940s, until the farmers
said enough is enough.
And so, agriculture went
to the legislature and an en-
tirely new law was enacted.
The existing regulations are
as follows:
• The Fish and Game
Commission shall consist of
11 members, each of whom
shall be chosen with regard
to his knowledge of and in-
terest in the conservation of
fish and wildlife.
• Each member of the
commission shall be ap-
pointed by the governor with
the advice and consent of the
Senate.
• Three of such members
shall be farmers, recom-
mended to the governor for
appointment to the commis-
sion by the agricultural con-
vention held pursuant to arti-
cle 2 of chapter 1 of title 4 of
the revised statutes.
• Six members shall be
sportsmen recommended to
the governor for appointment
to the commission by the
New Jersey State Federation
of Sportsmen Clubs.
• Two members shall be
commercial fishermen.
Also, the state allows an
owner of a farm and his fam-
ily members to hunt and fish
on their own land without
being licensed. However, this
does not allow a non-family
member or worker the same
privileges.
I threw my hat in the ring
in September of 1969 and at
the agricultural convention in
Trenton I was voted in for a
four-year term to be the next
farmer commissioner from
the seven southern coun-
ties of the state and was ap-
pointed by Gov. William T.
Cahill and confirmed by the
Senate.
After serving six years as
a farmer representative on the
state Fish and Game Com-
mission, I can honestly say
that three of us farmers and
the two commercial fisher-
men, who called themselves
“farmers of the sea,” and one
or two sportsmen always held
the majority in making fair
and just decisions.
If any agricultural orga-
nization would like to take
on the status of the make-up
of our present structure of
the WDFW, I would be most
happy to help, as I strongly
know how it could pass, and
how it could fail in the legis-
lature.
Tony Delgado is a former
Stevens County commission-
er and former New Jersey
state fish and game commis-
sioner.
Readers’ views
Climate assertions
questioned
Continuing the discussion on
climate change, I dispute that “97
percent of the world’s climate scien-
tists who are regularly published and
peer-reviewed” have expressed “real
concerns about accumulating green-
house gases in our atmosphere.”
I did not and don’t dispute that
there is global warming and has
been periodic global warming and
cooling, but there is huge uncer-
tainty about its amount, causes and
periodicity. The 97 percent figure
comes from a dated study by John
Cook, which has been discredited
for overinclusion, and discredited
by many scientists who dispute its
assertion. The argument, how many
Bishops/Scientists assert some-
thing, is an argument from author-
ity, not from reason, evidence and
science. But even assuming that it
were true (that global warming is
man-caused to some extent), the
question remains whether its effects
are harmful, beneficial, or mixed,
and whether proposed remedies are
real or beneficial.
In prior warming periods, the Vi-
kings settled Greenland and north-
ern climates were very mild. In prior
cold periods, glaciers covered much
of Europe, Asia, and North America:
all before man-caused effects. And
polar bears survived them all. The
letter writer chides me for referring
to, but not citing, “hard science.”
I thought I did so by making firm
assertions, which are based on reli-
able sources: polar bear populations
are doing well; Arctic and Antarctic
ice are doing well; sea levels are not
rising significantly; temperatures
are not rising significantly and have
stagnated (the pause) in the last 25
years. The major cities and islands of
the world are not underwater (except
economically). There are factual as-
sertions, supported by evidence and
reliable studies/sources, not mere
quibbles about whether to bow to
“authorities.”
I am pleased that the letter writer
shares my distrust of government
wisdom, regulation, and overreach,
for examples of which we need not
search farther than the daily head-
lines, and of which I provided ex-
amples in my prior letter (e.g. Alar
and Round-Up scares). I believe we
should rely upon good science, but
not accept all that purports to be
science. “Scientists” and politicians
such as Al Gore and the UN Climate
people, have been predicting differ-
ent kinds of disaster since at least
the 1970s, global cooling, glob-
al warming (changed to “climate
change”), overpopulation and star-
vation, that cities would be under-
water, that we would have millions
of “climate refugees,” and their pre-
dictions have proven, over and over
again, false.
Google “scientists’ climate pre-
dictions” for many articles listing
failed predictions (e.g. Alex New-
man, 8-12-2014, The New Amer-
ican). They have been wrong over
and over and over again. When the
prophets are wrong, especially “97
percent” of them, their warnings are
not to be taken seriously. According
to them, the world should have long
since ended in apocalyptic disaster.
We were also supposed to run out of
fossil fuels, of which we now have
centuries of surplus.
We have very real man-caused
environmental problems, including
habitat destruction, competition for
scarce water, over-fishing, dumping
into the oceans, deforestation and
exhaustion of the capacity of envi-
ronments (as in Haiti by deforesta-
tion and overpopulation), exacerbat-
ed by politics and war. Our attention
is better fixed on real problems.
Alan L. Gallagher
Canby, Ore.
An alternative view
on climate change,
carbon fees
Thank you, Adrian Arp, for pro-
viding insight into your resistance to
action on climate change. I appreci-
ate your passion on the issue.
I am a widely published and high-
ly cited climate scientist and a con-
tributor to three Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change reports.
As a former editor-in-chief of the
Journal of Geophysical Research —
Atmospheres, I am well aware of the
scientific consensus on the human
role in recent climate change. The
estimate of 97 percent consensus
of climate scientists is consistently
found in studies of 928 abstracts by
Oreskes in 2004, of 12,000 peer-re-
viewed climate abstracts by Cook,
and 2,134 climate abstracts rated by
1,200 climate scientists. Very few
of the 31,000 scientists who signed
onto the dissenting statement you
cite are actually climate scientists.
I agree that carbon dioxide
should not be called a pollutant, as
it is necessary for plants to grow,
and at current concentrations is not
directly harmful to people. But that
doesn’t mean that doubling its atmo-
spheric concentration won’t warm
the planet. The ice cores tell us
otherwise.
I agree that some people have hi-
jacked climate change as an excuse
to increase government and control
human behavior. But we don’t need
to do that to prevent climate change.
We simply need a national price on
fossil carbon that accounts for costs
that consumers are not paying, in-
cluding health impacts from partic-
ulates and the military cost of ensur-
ing access to Middle East oil, as well
as the impacts of rising sea level,
depleted mountain snowpack, and
more severe weather, all of which
are already observed.
The revenue from such a carbon
fee can be returned to the economy
as an equal dividend to every resi-
dent, and trade can be protected with
tariffs on countries without a price
on carbon.
Steve Ghan
Citizens’ Climate Lobby
Richland, Wash.