Free Republic

A federal judge this week denied a temporary restraining order sought by environmental groups that would block grazing in six eastern Oregon pastures. The Capital Press reports U.S. District Judge Michael Simon said the plaintiffs haven’t shown that turning cattle out on the pastures will cause irreparable harm to sage grouse or to rangeland research. He said continued grazing isn’t likely to irreparably harm the ability of environmental plaintiffs to enjoy undisturbed sagebrush grassland, since the pastures have long been grazed and are rested on a rotating basis. The case was filed against the U.S. Bureau of Land Management by...

WARNING: PICTURES ARE GRAPHIC. Wolves have killed another cow in Jackson County. Here’s Travis Duncan with Colorado Parks and Wildlife. ... Steamboat Radio was told of the most recent wolf depredation incident today by Adam VanValkenburg, President of the North Park Stockgrowers Association. He said the wolf kill happened sometime Monday night, as confirmed by CPW. He says another suspected kill from the pack was of six elk on another neighboring property in Jackson County. Here’s his opinion on the recent incident in Jackson County. ... “In my opinion and in consulting with other experts, they are teaching their pups...

A question must seriously be asked whether Jared Polis is interested in governing all of Colorado, or just the narrow strip that contains the vast majority of the state’s population. Polis has repeatedly angered the small band of hardy farmers and ranchers that make up Colorado’s second-largest industry by his insensitive slights and tone-deaf insults. It’s as if the governor pays lip service to agriculture one day and then slaps it in the face the next. Case in point: In February Polis ignored the recommendations of his own Department of Agriculture and appointed yet another animal welfare extremist to a...

The Bureau of Animal Protection has a new director, selected from a pool of candidates that included two animal rights attorneys and a wolf introduction and “humane food choice proponent.” The final choice to lead the bureau, announced today by Colorado Commissioner of Agriculture Kate Greenberg, is Dr. Rebecca (Becky) Niemiec (pronounced “Knee-Mick”) an assistant professor in the Human Dimensions of Natural Resources Department at Colorado State University and the director of the Conservation Action Lab. ... The BAP falls under the umbrella of the Colorado Department of Agriculture, but open records requests by The Fence Post indicate governor Jared...

Animal rights activist Ellen Kessler, a gubernatorial appointee to the State Board of Veterinary Medicine, submitted her resignation from the board at 3:26 p.m. Monday. Kessler's letter, released by the governor's office, said her resignation would be effective at the close of business on Feb. 11. "I realize that some of my actions have caused anger and discomfort and that I was unprofessional in my judgment," Kessler wrote. "I apologize to you and the citizens of our great state and wish you the best of luck as you continue to make Colorado the best in the nation." Kessler, appointed to...

Attacks on cattle and dogs by wolves that migrated into northwest Colorado from Wyoming have stoked a rancher-wolf controversy sooner than expected. Don Gittleson woke up Wednesday morning to a sight that’s starting to feel common on his North Park ranch: a cow torn up by wolves, the third attack on his livestock since a few days before Christmas. If this were Montana, Wyoming or Idaho, Gittleson could pull out a gun and shoot the predator dead. But this is Colorado. Wolves in Colorado are protected under state law. Killing them – no matter how many cows or sheep or...

Controversial appointee accuses ranchers of ‘scam’ in recent wolf kills.. For a day and a half, county officials, policy experts and politicians discussed the challenges unique to rural Colorado, but the most satisfying moment for most attendees came at the very end. The annual Voices of Rural Colorado Conference returned after a one-year COVID-19 hiatus, hosted by the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce. The conference is a joint effort by Action 22, Pro 15 and Club 20, organizations that represent the interests of 59 of Colorado’s 64 counties. The 2022 conference covered such things as affordable housing, higher education, energy...

A confirmed wolf kill was discovered near Walden, Colo., the home of one of Colorado’s wolf packs. An approximately 500 pound purebred replacement heifer was found dead after being attacked and eaten by this pack of wolves. This is the first confirmed wolf kill of livestock in Colorado in over 70 years. In early 2021, Colorado Parks and Wildlife confirmed the existence of this pack in north central Colorado; however, individual wolves have been sited in the area previous to the pack confirmation. Colorado Parks and Wildlife officials are working closely with the livestock producer to learn as much from...

French actress Brigitte Bardot was fined to the tune of €20,000 — approximately $23,100 — for calling native Indian Ocean islanders “savages.” In 2019, Bardot, who is known for her acting in French projects, wrote a letter referring to the Reunionese — who inhabit the island La Reunion — as “natives who still have savage genes” in response to how they treat animals. According to the Telegraph, she specifically spoke about the Hindu Tamil population, criticizing them for “sacrificing goats” and using the “cannibalism of past centuries.”

On Thursday morning, a collared female mountain lion named P-54 was near Calabasas, California, with two of her cubs. Born in October, the two young mountain lions were at an age when they're learning to hunt on their own in preparation for taking care of themselves and becoming adults. On that morning, though, one of the young lions set its sights on a 5-year-old boy playing in his front yard, and it attacked. "On Aug 26, 2021, approximately 10:45 a.m., a 65-lb. mountain lion attacked the boy in his front yard, inflicting wounds to his head, neck and upper torso,"...

Animal rescue systems in Kabul raised questions of whether they should be prioritized as much or more than people. In the last days of the Western twenty-year war in Afghanistan, a small controversy erupted. It turned out that some western charities and westerners had been involved in supporting animals in Afghanistan. They had tried to replicate the animal rescue and animal support systems that are more common in the United States or UK, where pets, rescue dogs and other types of animals are highly prized. Surveys show that in some western countries animals are considered equal to, or even more...

Ian Botham is leading a formidable alliance of opponents to new laws recognising that animals have feelings, with the former cricketer joining forces with Tory donors and farming leaders to lobby against the proposed legislation. The Animal Welfare (Sentience) Bill would enshrine in law the principle that animals are sentient and would create an animal sentience committee to scrutinise whether Ministers had paid due regard to their policies' 'adverse effect on the welfare of animals'. But Lord Botham, a country sports enthusiast who was ennobled by Boris Johnson last year as a crossbench peer, has described it as 'bizarre' that...

An animal rights attorney in Colorado who hosts her own show on Facebook pleaded guilty to a slew of felonies in connection with an alleged plot to have her estranged husband’s girlfriend killed, the Brighton, Colo. Standard Blade reported this week. In addition to the murder-for-hire plot, Jennifer Reba Emmi, 43, who is also known as Jennifer Reba Edwards, had been accused of holding a knife to her husband’s throat, strangling her child, and threatening to drive her car into a tractor trailer with the couple’s children in the vehicle. According to the Standard Blade, Emmi pleaded guilty to solicitation...

Highlights-On June 3, the Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation (CSF) submitted comments to the Oregon Secretary of State challenging the ballot title language of Initiative Petition 13 (IP 13), which seeks to end all hunting, fishing, and trapping in Oregon. -IP 13, if passed, would prohibit the injuring or killing of all mammals, fish, reptiles, and amphibians, unless it occurs as an act of self-defense. In addition to prohibiting hunting and fishing, this sweeping initiative would impact common animal breeding practices, research, and education. -Once the final ballot title language is certified, initiative proponents can begin gathering the 112,020 signatures required to...

A cyberattack on JBS SA, the largest meat producer globally, has forced the shutdown of some of world’s largest slaughterhouses, and there are signs that the closures are spreading. JBS’s five biggest beef plants in the U.S. -- which altogether handle 22,500 cattle a day -- have halted processing following a weekend attack on the company’s computer networks, according to JBS posts on Facebook, labor unions and employees. Those outages alone have wiped out nearly a fifth of America’s production. Slaughter operations across Australia were also down, according to a trade group. One of Canada’s largest beef plants was idled...

It appears some mountain lions appear quite comfortable at a home in Rapid City, South Dakota. According to Annie Mueller, who lives at the home, the mountain lions visited at approximately 6 a.m., 8 p.m. and 11 p.m. on Tuesday, and returned at 7 a.m. on Wednesday. Security camera video from Tuesday morning even shows one of the cougars checking out Mueller’s front door before climbing up on a bench. Historically, mountain lions have lived throughout South Dakota, with many located in the Black Hills, according to the state’s Game, Fish and Parks department. Their population declined in the 1900s...

U.S.A. –-(AmmoLand.com)- On the afternoon of 15 April 2021, Carl Mock was attacked by a grizzly bear near Baker’s Hole Campground in Gallatin County, Montana. The campground is a few miles from the town of West Yellowstone, near an entrance to Yellowstone Park. Mock was able to dial 911. Several agencies responded to the call at about 3:42 p.m. The first responders were able to find Mock after about 50 minutes of searching.Mock had “sustained significant scalp and facial injuries” according to the Gallatin County Sheriff Search and Rescue Facebook page. Localnews8.com gave more details of the injuries:Authorities say the...

GOP rallies around meat industry in response to attack by Colorado's Jared Polis... The red meat wars have hit America. Republican governors representing heartland states are uniting in support of the cattle industry in response to calls from Jared Polis, the Democratic governor of Colorado, to move his state away from eating meat. The herd of Republican governors of Nebraska, Iowa, Wyoming, and Montana has taken issue with Polis's call for Saturday, March 20, to be observed as "MeatOut Day," during which residents are asked to replace meat with a plant-based alternative. All four Republican governors issued proclamations in response,...

The presidential election of 1912 reflected a time of party division and booming progressivism in partisan politics, as former President Theodore Roosevelt led a robust movement of Republicans who opposed reflexive conservatism. Roosevelt, who served as president of the United States from 1901 to 1909, dove into a vigorous presidential campaign for the Progressive Party, or Bull Moose Party, advocating against President William Howard Taft and his leadership. Taft’s presidency triggered Republican party division, prompting Roosevelt to form the Bull Moose Party, a political faction within the Republican party, and made Roosevelt become a prominent third-party candidate on the presidential...

Cape Lejeune Marine Corps Base on the North Carolina coast has issued a safety alert after multiple people reported being attacked at the military facility by coyotes. At least four attacks have occurred recently on the eastern side of the base, near the Wallace Creek area, officials said in a Facebook post. Investigators did not give details of the injuries, but noted all victims “were running after dark in the vicinity.” The latest attack occurred at 4 a.m. Sept. 23. All the victims reported being near offices of the II Marine Expeditionary Force Information Group Command when attacked, officials said....