2008 Woodie Awards
Letters to the Editor
Issue date: 9/19/07 Section: Life
- Page 1 of 1
Terrific Tailgate III
Dear Editor,
The terrific tailgate III party was great and the University should do it more often. The only problem was that no announcement of who the winners are took place during the football game as advertised by the judges. The announcement for each category has yet to be announced to the public either via the newspaper or email, even a phone call. In conclusion, I believe the tailgate party was a success and many people spent a lot of time to prepare their entry and would appreciate some acknowledgement of there efforts.
Thank you,
Mark Stubblefield
Welfare Grazing on Public Lands
Dear Editor,
One week, Idaho Governor Butch Otter blames wild fires on the under-grazing of public lands by livestock. The next week he's blaming the cheat grass, an invasive species. Everybody knows cheat grass invades an area after overgrazing by livestock. What's Otter really after? That's easy…Otter derived his millions through his relationship with Simplot, who has over 2 million acres of grazing leases. Otter: Working so hard for so few.
Cattle ranching is not a dominant agricultural activity in the West. As per the USDA, federal lands grazing provides about 26.5% of livestock forage and only 0.29% of all Idaho income but only 0.04% of the income for all 11 western states. That is $4 earned from public lands grazing for every $1,000,000 earned from all other sources. This is totally insignificant to the economy, yet public perception is distorted.
Truth is, livestock devastates the areas grazed, eating grasses down to the dirt, facilitating the spread of invasive plant species. Livestock trample springs, creeks and any water source they can find and then crap in it. They devour feed meant for wildgame which leads to damage payments when game feeds on private land. If everybody owns the public land, why do a fraction of a percent of the owners have the authority to trash it?
Public lands grazing occurs at the expense of other important economic resources such as fisheries, wildlife, water quality, recreation, biodiversity and ecological processes-all having tremendous economic value. Let's focus our energies on these resources, Butch, and the public.
Mark D. Reaney, Jr.
Dear Editor,
The terrific tailgate III party was great and the University should do it more often. The only problem was that no announcement of who the winners are took place during the football game as advertised by the judges. The announcement for each category has yet to be announced to the public either via the newspaper or email, even a phone call. In conclusion, I believe the tailgate party was a success and many people spent a lot of time to prepare their entry and would appreciate some acknowledgement of there efforts.
Thank you,
Mark Stubblefield
Welfare Grazing on Public Lands
Dear Editor,
One week, Idaho Governor Butch Otter blames wild fires on the under-grazing of public lands by livestock. The next week he's blaming the cheat grass, an invasive species. Everybody knows cheat grass invades an area after overgrazing by livestock. What's Otter really after? That's easy…Otter derived his millions through his relationship with Simplot, who has over 2 million acres of grazing leases. Otter: Working so hard for so few.
Cattle ranching is not a dominant agricultural activity in the West. As per the USDA, federal lands grazing provides about 26.5% of livestock forage and only 0.29% of all Idaho income but only 0.04% of the income for all 11 western states. That is $4 earned from public lands grazing for every $1,000,000 earned from all other sources. This is totally insignificant to the economy, yet public perception is distorted.
Truth is, livestock devastates the areas grazed, eating grasses down to the dirt, facilitating the spread of invasive plant species. Livestock trample springs, creeks and any water source they can find and then crap in it. They devour feed meant for wildgame which leads to damage payments when game feeds on private land. If everybody owns the public land, why do a fraction of a percent of the owners have the authority to trash it?
Public lands grazing occurs at the expense of other important economic resources such as fisheries, wildlife, water quality, recreation, biodiversity and ecological processes-all having tremendous economic value. Let's focus our energies on these resources, Butch, and the public.
Mark D. Reaney, Jr.
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