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ALPINE, AZ (3TV/CBS 5) – The US Forest Services will be collecting ‘feral’ horses in the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest in Alpine starting Mar. 21st. The removal of the horses comes after the Center for Biological Diversity, a nonprofit group based out of Tucson, filed a lawsuit against the Forest Service for violating the Endangered Species Act. The group claims the Forest Service fails to control feral animals’ damage to the meadows and streams, which are the New Mexico Jumping Mouse’s federally protected habitat. “Since the early 2000s, feral horses have been causing severe damage to the habitat of threatened and...

(CNSNews.com) – At a House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Public Lands and Environmental Regulation on Thursday, ranchers from Western states testified that they are routinely threatened and bullied by federal land management officials, including the Bureau of Land Management, the Forest Service and Fish and Wildlife. “I sit before you today to let you know what’s going on up there, and I hope that we can come to some kind of agreement on what needs to be done and move forward on it, because enough is enough when it comes to bullying people that have been on this land for...

Last month, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service listed the meadow jumping mouse as an endangered species. Now, the U.S. Forest Service, which oversees the Santa Fe National Forest, is considering erecting a series of 8-foot high fences to protect the mouse’s habitat. The Luceros, members of the San Diego Cattleman’s Association and holders of grazing permits with the federal government, say the fences will lock out their cattle — as well as those of other permit holders — from ever returning to the meadow where the livestock graze for 20 days in the spring and up to 40 days...

In what some are calling a replay of the standoff with Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, a New Mexico county board agreed Monday to instruct the sheriff to remove the Forest Service gates blocking thirsty cattle from reaching water, setting up a clash with federal agents over state water rights and endangered species. The Otero County Commission voted 2-0, with one commissioner absent, to “immediately take steps to remove or open gates that are unlawfully denying citizens access to their private property rights.” Ranchers became alarmed earlier this year when Forest Service officials refused to open gates allowing cattle in the...

Forest Service says it's mouse habitatThe Obama administration’s crackdown on Western land use has sparked a furor over the Forest Service’s decision to fence off a creek used by thirsty cattle in drought-stricken Otero County, New Mexico. The Otero County Commission is scheduled to meet Monday to discuss whether to order the sheriff to open the gates against the wishes of Forest Service officials, who have argued that the fence is needed to protect the Agua Chiquita riparian area and habitat for the New Mexico meadow jumping mouse. Otero County Sheriff Benny House said he worries that the increasingly tense...

A recent court ruling on wolves in the northern Rockies should help guide another judge who will decide on federal protection for a mouse species in Colorado and Wyoming, environmental groups argue. A cattlemen's group says the judge should decide for himself about the Preble's meadow jumping mouse, a critter about the size of other mice but with a 6-inch tail and the ability to leap up to 3 feet to escape predators...There is no surprise in environmentalists linking the mouse and wolf cases, said Jim Magagna, executive vice president of the Wyoming Stock Growers Association.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service today announced it has removed the Preble's meadow jumping mouse populations in Wyoming from protection under the Endangered Species Act. The service said it is also amended the listing for Preble's to indicate the subspecies remains threatened in the Colorado portion of its range. "For Colorado basically nothing changes," A new management plant with a new critical habitat map will be developed by 2010... The determination is based on a better understanding of the distribution of and threats to Preble's meadow jumping mouse populations in Wyoming and Colorado

WASHINGTON - An acrobatic mouse is threatening Bush administration efforts to give Western developers an upper hand over endangered species. The Preble's meadow jumping mouse is, in fact, a distinct creature, according to a U.S. Geological Survey study presented Wednesday to senior Interior Department officials. That finding contradicts research touted by Interior Secretary Gale Norton last February when she proposed removing the mouse from the government's endangered species list. Critics say it also undercuts the administration's claim that it uses the best science available in promoting fewer protections for imperiled wildlife. The previous study, which was done by a biologist...

Jumping Mouse Loses Federal Protection Sat Jan 29,12:44 AM ET By JOHN HEILPRIN, Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON - The Preble's meadow jumping mouse, once seen as a costly impediment to development, is now viewed by the government as a critter that never really existed — and is no longer in need of federal protection under the Endangered Species Act. AP Photo The Interior Department said Friday that new DNA research shows the 9-inch mouse, which can launch itself a foot and a half into the air and switch direction in mid-flight, is probably identical to another variety of mouse common...