Sampler Platter: 07.03.2009

by: JayinPortland

Fri Jul 03, 2009 at 16:53:25 PM PDT

• So how long until Monsanto or Dow seek to patent all goats?  From state highway departments to vineyards to city governments, an increase is being seen nationwide in using goats and sheep to control invasives, maintain lawns and clear fire-prone grasses.  Maybe Matt Damon was onto something when he told Robin Williams, "I wanna be a shepherd."  So do I, man.  So do I...

• From Indian Country Today, here's a piece on the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation's resource management plan that puts First Foods at the center of their conservation efforts.

  "We're using this to develop curriculum for the tribe's community school and also using it as a framework for developing a diabetes prevention program for the tribe's clinic," [Eric] Quaempts, [director of the CTUIR Department of Natural Resources] said. "The first foods themselves are healthy. The act of going out and acquiring them is healthy."

• At last count (1990) there were over 200,000 Pacific Walruses.  There is some controversy over last week's estimate, but either way it seems their numbers have diminished significantly.  Maybe to as low as 15,164.  As Brendan Cummings, spokesman for the Center for Biological Diversity, says - "You don't need to know if there are 500 passenger or 1,000 passengers on the Titanic. When it hits an iceberg, they're all endangered ".  The final assessment is due in January.

• Are wolverines establishing themselves further south than thought?  Researchers have now caught pictures of a second wolverine on Mount Adams in Southwest Washington, from where the last known wolverine populations were wiped out by trapping in the 1800s.

• A piece from NPR looks at the City of Seattle's decision to stop using soybean-based biofuels for its vehicle fleet.  Also, The Oregonian brings us a piece on how Southern Oregon's Klamath County is adapting for a changing future.

• The feedlot fight is still on in Eastern Washington, where environmental groups and family farmers are suing to prevent a proposed new 30,000-head cattle feedlot from taking advantage of a state law that would allow the operation to draw unlimited water from wells in one of the driest regions of America.