I think the idea of a "watershed alliance" is a good one. If this local group here had done anything toward recruiting ranchers, miners and farmers it would have my respect. They didn't. I think they should have stuck with their old name, "Friends of the Gila" which much more aptly describes them. By using the "watershed alliance" badge they are just scamming everybody, including the large environmental "banks", the govt, and even Jane Fonda. But going this route was the only way they could get any grant money, which they have recieved. But instead of pursueing water quality issues, controlling erosion through micro dams or the like, they have just linked themselves up with the far-left human exclusionaries.
The millions of dollars raked in by these large environmental groups is outrageous. Especially now that their motives are suspect.
Political correctness and popular environmentalism have gotten out of hand, and these mega environmental groups have become a real danger to the future of recreation and public access to public lands.
People don't realize the "Dark side" of these organizations and their monetary motivation. Little groups like this local one have gotten on the bandwagon, or the gravy train, if you will.
It's good to hear that watershed alliances work where you are. I think they could work here too, but it would have to be a true alliance and not just a name.

 

We have a park here in Boise called Camelback. It is for walkers and bicycle riders only. Further up the canyon is a place called the 8th street extension. Horses, ATV's and M/C's along with hikers and Bikers are allowed on this area. Which area do you think has the most erosion problems? Camelback does. Every year they send out notices for help to repair the erosion damage and to fill in the ruts made by the bike tires as they skid down the hill because they lock up the wheels. The 8th street extension on the other hand, which is just as steep had water bars put in by the ATVers and M/C people. The erosion in this area is minimal. Yet the enviro's want close areas to motorized recreation and still allow non-motorized. They refuse to look at teh evidence that is right in front of them and only look at the hooligans that cause the damage.

I realize that if we don't police our own someone else will and we will not like the results. But if we don't we will wind up like the famous Ben Franklin quote. " If we don't hang together, we will surely hang separately"

 

You guys all have very good points, Fourlix, I especially agree with your longest post. I was talking to someone else here recently from back east a ways concerning this same type of topic. Seems there definately IS a huge difference between the environmentalists back there, and the pure ECO-***** out here. Here in Washington state, we see a great majority of all the crap these guys throw out. Hell, in my home town the grandaddy of them all-the Nature Conservancy, came in and prevented us from putting in a stop light at a much needed intersection. There have been hundreds of collisions and wrecks in this particular area for a long time. The city finally came in with a plan to install a stoplight, to prevent some of the accidents. Winter time is especially bad, as these idiots don't know how to drive anyway, then when 1" of snow falls, all hell breaks loose. Anyway, that's beside the point. The Columbia river flows maybe 100 yards away, maybe more in this one location. So, the N.C. comes in, does a little research, shutting down the streets for a couple weeks for their "data analysis" and gathering, then says "NO, You cannot put in a stoplight here". Reason? Salmon USED to run in that river, and spawn upstream. They may return here someday, and we fear that by installing a stop light here, the vibrations from the engines in the cars, with traffic backed up at a red light, will vibrate through the ground, down to the river, and into the water. These sound waves will then cause a confusing signal to the possible salmon that may return someday, and possibly ruin their spawning patter, confusing them on which direction to go. As a result, because they said no, we don't have a light. And, I honestly can't count how many wrecks have occured at that particular intersection since that study was done. Thanks to the N.C., there will always continue to be accidents in that area, as we are not allowed a damn stop light, all because of some salmon that may return someday. Problem they don't look at is Hanford has already killed off most of the fish in that area, there won't ever be anything there ever again, the whole area is lifeless.

Care for another? I ran into a forest service gal a couple months back at the forest service station up near my elk camp. She had come to town for her once-every-3-month visit, to get mail, supplies and catch up on what is happening. The N.C. had a thing for the "spotted owl" here, in a big way. Most of the logging industry was either stopped, or severly cut short due to the spotted owl. This lady is paid around $95,000 a year to live in a specially designed tree house for 3 months at a time, and do nothing but count spotted owls. She has a total of 3 birds in her area, of which I forget how many square miles it is. Anyway, the entire area is shut down to any kind of traffic, except on foot. Any idea how many people in Washington State lost their jobs because of this????

Then we can get into the indian tribe over on the coast who wanted to start whaling again, but was shut down because of the N.C. They are now allowed 1 whale per year, which has turned out to be a huge festival now for that particular tribe. The list is basically endless of how the N.C., or other groups has affected this area.

Now, for the REAL kicker. I was riding up on PUBLIC land over in Moscow Idaho area, up near Moscow mountain. One of the key contributors to the N.C. lives up there on top of the mountain. The entire rest of the mountain is public range land, open to any and all activities. There are tons of miles of open land to ride and enjoy. A buddy of mine runs cattle up there-well, he used too. Last year, this eco-**** poisoned about 35 head of his cows. He shot 20-25 more. Reason? Because cows are not native to the area, they shouldn't be there. The police were brought in, as well as the sheriff and the state-nothing was done, they won't touch him. This guy has his own D4 Cat, he goes around building dirt piles behind the forest service gates, to prevent trucks from getting into the various places. He's been doing this for a couple years now from what I hear. Well, one of the roads he closed off, happened to be an area the forest service was logging. Now, they couldn't get in to their own equipment because of this road block he had built. So, they bring in a bigger cat, move all this dirt to HIS driveway, blocking off the entire thing, then opening up all the rest of the areas that are supposed to be open anyway. Kind of funny actuall, good one for the forest service....

Well, this particular day, I had 4-5 other guys riding with me on other machines. This eco-**** jumps out in front of the two girls on the last quad, making them turn sharp to avoid hitting him. he made them flip, one girl seriously injured her arm. he started yelling at them, then proceeded up the line of atv's to me, who was leading the pack. This s.o.b. starts screaming at me that I have no right to be there, this was private property. I said I'm sorry, i didn't see any signs. I knew full well who he was, and what he was trying to do, and I also knew full well I was on PUBLIC land, not private, he had no right to talk to me this way. He yells at me to leave the area immediately, that I have no right to be there, he will call the police. I said well, I'm sorry, I didn't see any "no tresspassing" signs, or anything of that nature. He says I don't have to put signs up, you _ssholes take them down. I said well, let me get my maps out, this is actually public land. He says no, it is owned by the Nature conservancy, they own it, it's just not on the maps yet, you can't be here. I said well, thank you for your time, we'll be moving on down this direction now, you can kindly step aside, I'd appreciate you calling the police to settle this if you feel that strongly about it. At that point, he attempts to actually PUSH me off my 'Cat! This guy gets physically threatening to me. Problem is, this ol' boy don't get pushed around by nobody! I threw him back off of me, then stepped of my 'Cat expecting him to come in to tackle me or something. I was both right and wrong. He came at me alright, but not in tackle form, he came with an 8" buck knife to my throat! Problem for him was I'm not only a big bastard who doesn't get pushed around, but I also carry a Smith 686 stainless .357 Mag for such occasions, and bear/cougar protection. Now, sorry, but you pull a knife on me, you better make damn sure you kill me, cause I sure as hell don't get pushed around in this type of circumstance. You loose, I win, end of story. Now, with my 686 on his forehead I said OK, here's how I see this deal. You just threatened me and made an attempt to not only assault me, but an attempt to kill me by pulling your knife. Problem is, I now have a gun, you have two choices-either get out of my way, go back to your home and call the police up here right now, or take your chances and see just how good you are with that knife. He turned and ran, thank god. I re-holstered my firearm, told everybody in our group to turn around and get the hell out of here right now. We left, went back to the truck, loaded up and headed home. I stopped by the local police station on the way, had words with them. Apparhently this guy had been "dormat" for a month or so, they were thinking he'd given up hope. But, as we had a run-in with him, he attempted to threaten or kill with his knife, the local authorities were now going to do something about it. Apparhently he has actually set up on a hillside and shot at people before in that area. Because he'd been dormat for about a month, they weren't going to do anything till he did something else. Now, some way to look at things here from their standpoint-what if I didn't have my gun??? I'd have been sliced up laying on the mountain side somewhere till who knows who would have come looking for me. When the police found him, he was set up on the hillside with his highpowered rifle. What happened, I don't know, I haven't been back since.

Now, when Fourlix states that we need to watch out for these "ECONAZIS", I couldn't agree more. Like I said, or as you could gather from my post, things don't appear to be the same way back east, so I assume you guys have no idea that any of this goes on. The problem is, it does, and it happens regularly. You really have to watch your back in some area's, these eco-****'s will do anything to stop you, whether legal or not. Now, I tend to get a bad attitude about things like this, because when push comes to shove, you loose. These eco-***** have the same attitude about taking everything away from everybody, and that is exactly what we need to stop.

Yes, I do agree that we need some form of conservation and to protect the land and environment, along with all the wildlife, so I do agree with JBurgland's post as well. The problem is, we cannot let these eco-***** take over the way they are-there has to be some law, there has to be some reasoning, and there has to be some in-between, or compromise between both groups. They are too far off in left field, don't care what it takes, who they hurt, or what is effected in the long term, so long as they get their goal accomplished "right now". Like Fourlix said, they don't look at what will happen 5, 10, or more years down the road, they don't look at who will be effected in what ways, all they care about is the here and now, that is it, it's there way or the highway. We cannot stand for that. If it is there way, we will be stuck with our quads and our guns locked up in our garage, all arguing over a case of beer about who's quad used to be the best, or who's gun used to kill the most game during hunting seasons over the life of that gun. At the same time, like Minehunter said, all these trails that are closed to foot traffic and bicycles only, will be erroding away, causing more problems, needing to be repaired more frequently.

I can't think of but a handful of places we have to ride here that is basically unrestriced. There are tons of areas however open to foot traffic and or horses, containing hundreds of miles of trails, all of which are hardly ever used. The atv trails consist of 15-20 if you're lucky, and are basically gravel roads now. It's ugly, it's pathetic and we need to put a stop to it.

Sorry for such a long, wasted post here, but I honestly don't think some of the guys know just how serious these eco guys can be. Yes, they are extremists, and cannot be trusted. They are in it for the money, or for their own cause. You do have to watch your back, nothing can be taken lightly anymore. While as long and boring as this post may be, and though I probably shouldn't have responded anyway, I see exactly where Fourlix is coming from, and I hope some of the other guys can see now that there are places where this is a serious issue. As Hunters, ATVers, others who just love the outdoors, we stand to loose a huge amount of land, and our freedoms if this issue passes.

Best of Luck guys, I hope I didn't offend anyone, just hope to explain that things do appear to be different across the various states, and what goes on within each state.

Happy Trails, to those that we still have anyway,

Mike

 

Sounds like you guys have problems out west that we don't. I would agree to some extent that the large environmental groups have caused problems - but it almost sounds like you have a few radicals who are acting in the name of the larger groups. I'm sure the Nature Conservancy would have a serious problem with a person pulling a knife on ATV riders - just as the Pro-Life movement has a problem with those who bomb abortion clinics. (But that is a WHOLE different topic that should not be discussed here! I was only using it to illustrate my point.) I find our PA State Agencies to be more difficult to work with than anything the Nature Conservancy, Sierra Club, etc... could throw at us.

An example (I can't give any specifics because of privacy issues with my client)- I am working with a company designing a new road. There are large grassland areas (over 2,000 acres) that were farmed and then strip mined previously. This is the best route for the road, because nobody lives in the grasslands, so impacts to communities will be less. A certain animal (again - I can't give details) that uses grasslands for hunting has moved into the area. This animal is not usually found in this area, and is not endangered or treatened within the U.S. The animal uses natural grasslands, which we have few of in PA. Problem is, one of our state agencies (can't say which one) decided that the animal was treatened in the state, because it was found in very small numbers in these grassland areas. It does not even belong here anyway! If not for the human disturbance to the land (farming and mining) the animal would not be found at all in the state. So now my client is trying to find a new route to avoid the grasslands, and may have to take out more homes, more businesses, and have impacts on forest areas, where we have animals that are supposed to be here in the first place!

All the large environmental groups haven't said a word about any of this. I guess they figure that everything is pretty well shot out east (its not though), and they can get more bang for their buck out west with you guys. I know that if some guy pulls a knife on me in the woods, there's gonna be a problem. Out where I live, we have several farms around us, and we all ride on eachothers property, as well as hunt, hike, etc. It amounts to about 400 acres, and is mostly open fields, but it works for us.

Again, sorry to hear about what you guys out west are dealing with.

How would you feel about setting up nice, long, ATV trails on public land in your area that all ATVers could use - on one condition - that no more trails would be created on other public land.
Sort of bring all the ATV use together to some concentrated areas. I would think that some reasonable group would accept that. But it sounds like there is not much reasonable thought out there from the environmental groups. Good luck.

 

jburglund....good point about both sides of the arguement.

However, the roadless rule/law does nothing for atvers but shut down riding areas. Nothing about designing more "environmentally friendly" trails or areas for atv related people. No compromise. Most areas already have roads that are to-be shut down. When these access roads are shut down, realistically, no-one will have access to these areas.

This was a cowardly act cast on the table as the Clinton administration was leaving office (among many others). Probably a favor for a major financial backer.

If this does pass, shame on everyone that is involved. Then, environmantalists can pat themselves on the back, drive their polluting automobile to the excavated location where their home is located. Of course, the home is built with the trees that used to stand on the forest floor. This is pathetic.

There are some atvers that give atving a bad name. THis is true, but should not be a shock. As long as people have options, their will always be people that made the wrong decision. This is true with most things in life.

 

jburglund, sounds like you have a coyote problem that you didn't have in the past. If they're endangered in Pa you can always come out here to Idaho and get a few. I know we won't miss them, unless we're varmit hunting. I know the sheep ranchers will give you all you can handle.

 

Nope - not coyote. Wish it was that simple. We have plenty of those around here. I swear they will live anywhere. They tear up my garbage cans all the time.