Free Republic

A bird native to Arizona and other western states could be listed as a threatened species by the federal government. The Yellow-billed Cuckoo lives along the Verde, Colorado and San Pedro Rivers in Arizona. It also can be found at the Gila River and Rio Grande in New Mexico and the Sacramento and Kern Rivers in California. Federal officials said the bird’s habitat is shrinking because of dams and other construction projects on the rivers, plus cattle grazing.

Federal authorities moved last week to restrict access to a huge swath of federal land in northeast Clark County as they prepare to round up what they are calling “trespass cattle” in the region. The Bureau of Land Management’s temporary closure of roughly 288,000 acres took effect on Thursday, March 27. The restricted land takes in all of the Mormon Mesa south of I-15 and includes everything on the eastern bench of the lower Moapa Valley, directly east of Logandale and Overton.

The Forest Service says it's trying to protect resources by ordering a 30 percent reduction in cattle grazing on grasslands in southwestern North Dakota. Some ranchers were surprised by the order. Doug Pope is the president of the Little Missouri Grazing Association. He says the Medora District has had more than 4 inches of rain this spring. He says a lot of people thought Forest Service letter ordering the cuts was unwarranted. The Forest Service manages grazing on about 1 million public acres on the National Grasslands. Ron Jablonski is the Forest Service ranger for the Medora District. He says...