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Join FVTU on Feb.
16 at 7 pm
at the Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks
conference room, 490 N. Meridian in Kalispell
for our regular monthly meeting.
This month FVTU presents
our own
Dan Paschke with a program on
Fishing the Blackfoot River Valley. If
you fish the Blackfoot and tribs, this is a
program you can't afford to miss.
Don't forget to join FVTU at the
Great Rockies Sports Show
March 12-14 at the Flathead County Fairgrounds.
See you there. |
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02/08/2010 -
Wyoming wind energy rules drafted. The
Wyoming State Lands and Investments Board has
drafted new rules regarding wind energy
development on state lands and is seeking public
comments... Billings Gazette |
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02/08/2010 -
CO water districts voice interest in proposed
pipeline. Two Larimer County water districts
have said they are interested in receiving water
from the Regional Watershed Supply Project,
entrepreneur Aaron Million's proposed
560-mile-long pipeline that would bring water
from southwest Wyoming to the Front Range...
Ft. Collins Coloradoan |
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02/07/2010 -
Columbia River salmon runs plentiful now, but
don't count on the trend continuing. Record
numbers of coho have returned to the Columbia
River in recent years, and this year forecasters
predict the same for spring chinook. But it's
not time to pop the champagne corks and declare
victory in the nation's most expensive wildlife
restoration venture... OregonLive |
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02/07/2010 -
Carp talks may miss bigger lake challenge.
The focus of Monday's White House Asian carp
summit is to stop the giant, ecosystem-ravaging
fish from slipping in the Great Lakes' back door
- the Chicago canal system that links the Great
Lakes and the Gulf of Mexico... Milwaukee
Journal-Sentinel |
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02/07/2010 -
Arctic climate changing fast. Climate change
is transforming the Arctic environment faster
than expected and accelerating the disappearance
of sea ice, scientists said on Friday...
Environmental News Network |
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02/07/2010 -
Company sees 'very large' gold and
silver resource near Rock Creek.
An Atlanta-based gold mining company is eyeing
what it calls "a very large open-ended gold and
silver system" within two miles of Rock Creek in
Granite County... Montana Standard |
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02/07/2010 -
Water at core of climate change impacts-UN
experts.
The main impact of
climate change will be on water supplies and the
world needs to learn from past cooperation such
as over the Indus or Mekong Rivers to help avert
future conflicts, experts said on Sunday...
Reuters |
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02/06/2010 -
Big Hole River rift.
A local conservation group is reconsidering
whether to support ending "citizen days" along
the Big Hole River that bar nonresident anglers
from boat fishing on certain days... Montana
Standard |
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02/06/2010 -
Idaho expects large spring run of chinook
salmon. Fisheries managers in Idaho are
predicting a return of 180,000 spring chinook
above Lower Granite Dam, 35 miles west of
Lewiston. Of that, about 25,000 will be wild
chinook... Lewiston News Tribune |
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02/06/2010 -
California's global-warming law Under Attack.
Republican politicians and conservative
activists are launching a ballot campaign to
suspend California's landmark global-warming
law, in what they hope will serve as a showcase
for a national backlash against climate
regulations... Environmenta News Network |
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02/06/2010 -
Tester Makes Some Changes to Wilderness Bill,
Refuses Others. Sen. Jon Tester today
announced that he hopes to make revisions to his
Forest Jobs and Recreation Act, legislation that
has drawn widespread support, criticism and
suggestions from Montanans—some of which Tester
said he’d insert into the legislation... New
West |
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02/06/2010 -
Enthusiasts flock to Great Rockies Sport Show.
The sounds of bugling elk, honking geese and
howling coyotes echoed through Montana ExpoPark
on Friday afternoon as the annual Great Rockies
Sport Show kicked off in Great Falls...
Great Falls Tribune |
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02/06/2010 -
Barbless hook rule adopted for lower,
mid-Columbia River. Washington salmon and
steelhead anglers will be required to use
barbless hooks in the lower and mid-Columbia
River beginning in January 2011... The
Columbian |
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02/05/2010 -
1 day left, 0 bidders for Otter Creek coal.
Only one business day remains for coal companies
to bid on developing the state’s 570 million
tons of Otter Creek coal in southeastern Montana
— and not one company has submitted a bid yet,
state officials said Friday... Billings
Gazette |
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02/05/2010 -
Opportunity Spawned: New Proposal Protects Bull
Trout and Water. Protecting and restoring
bull trout habitat will help this threatened
species recover. It will also improve water
quality throughout the Northwest, spur
investment in watershed restoration, and help
support Montana’s $226 million fishing
industry... New West |
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02/05/2010 -
EPA Reveals High
Hazard Potential at More Coal Ash Ponds.
Twenty-two electric utility facilities with coal
ash impoundments have written action plans to
make them safer. But on Thursday, as the U.S.
EPA made these plans public, the agency also
released engineering assessments of 40 more coal
ash impoundments showing they have the "high" or
"significant" potential to cause loss of human
life, environmental damage, or damage to
infrastructure... Environmental News Service |
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02/05/2010 -
Coal Lobby Group ACCCE Hires PR Firm Full of
Bush Admin Operatives. The American
Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE) has
hired two new public relations firms to hock its
message in the wake of the disastrous job done
by Bonner & Associates... Huffington Post |
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02/05/2010 -
Federal judge puts Sacramento River salmon plan
on hold. A federal
judge has lifted limits on irrigation pumping
from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, which
salmon fishermen say will threaten young fish
migrating to sea and the future of the fishing
industry... Eureka Times-Standard |
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02/05/2010 -
Feds Propose Refilling Pot of Salmon Recovery
Money. In its new budget request to Congress
this week, the Obama administration has included
some money for Oregon and four other Western
states to restore salmon habitat... Public
News Service |
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02/05/2010 -
Snowpack suffers after dry months. February
mountain snowpack, which warms in the spring,
filling rivers and streams that fuel the
agriculture and energy sectors, is just 73
percent of the average, the U.S. Department of
Agriculture Natural Resources Conservation
Service reported Thursday... Great Falls
Tribune |
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02/04/2010 -
Pikas won't be listed for protection, feds say.
Pikas, the iconic squeakers of the high country,
will not be listed for protection as a
threatened or endangered species, the U.S. Fish
and Wildlife Service decided after a yearlong
population-status review... Seattle Times |
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02/04/2010 -
Montanans lobby delegation on climate change.
Farmers, professionals and small businesses from
around the state pressed Sens. Jon Tester and
Max Baucus about supporting measures that not
only promote green energy, but also curtail
greenhouse gas pollution... Billings Gazette |
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02/04/2010 -
Advisory Group Gives Sportsmen Voice on
Conservation. Federal officials unveiled a
new advisory council on wildlife conservation
and hunting issues on Thursday... New West |
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02/04/2010 -
Magic City Fly Fishers Expo coming to Billings.
The Billings Magic City Fly Fishers Expo 2010
opens in the Holiday Inn Convention Center on
Saturday, Feb. 20 at 9 am... Laurel Outlook |
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02/04/2010 -
Obama creates
clean-coal task force. Washington will
develop a comprehensive strategy to speed
development of carbon capture and storage
technology for the coal industry, the U.S.
president said... UPI.com |
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02/04/2010 -
Water Movements Can Shape Fish Evolution.
Researchers from the University of Minnesota's
Institute of Technology have found that the
hydrodynamic environment of fish can shape their
physical form and swimming style...
ScienceDaily |
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02/04/2010 -
Burbot anglers count on ugly fish's wander and
lust plight. Burbot. The eel-like fish
species that put the U in ugly, sometimes called
ling, sometimes named eelpout (and my favorite:
lawyer) spawns in a writhing ball about two feet
in diameter... Great Falls Tribune |
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02/04/2010 -
DNRC to schedule hearing on water rights
protections. Several Montana ranchers and
water users who petitioned the Department of
Natural Resources and Conservation over a water
rights issue were notified Monday that the
matter will get a closer look... Billings
Gazette |
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02/04/2010 -
President Touts His Alternative Fuels Plan.
President Obama moved on Wednesday to bolster
the nation’s production of corn-based ethanol
and other alternative liquid fuels and ordered
the rapid development of technology to capture
carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of
coal... New York Times |
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02/04/2010 -
Bark beetles rocked by sound. In a Northern
Arizona University School of Forestry lab,
researchers are listening to the sound of
western forests under attack: the scratching,
scraping, crunching of the Ips bark beetle and
its cousins chewing the life out of ponderosa,
pinyon and lodgepole pines... Arizona Daily
Sun |
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02/04/2010 -
Colorado river basin levels low.
According to the
latest snowpack report from the Natural
Resources Conservation Service, Colorado basins
were at 86 percent of average as of Monday. The
percentage is the lowest since 2003...
Denver Post |
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After
his great Kamchatka presentation, Ryan Peterson
of The Fly Shop in Redding, CA
wrote back thanking the chapter. He also wanted
us to know that the
In
September, FVTU members assisted Beth Gardner
and other USFS employees in removing brook trout
from Sheppard Creek in the upper Stillwater
River drainage. The report is now in on the
Sheppard Creek Cutthroat Trout
Restoration Project
so far. The final
count was 1244 brook trout age 1+, plus maybe
another 1000 of young-of-year removed.
The good news is that the cutthroat trout seem
way up. Beth estimates 1,028 individuals, which
is an all-time high since USFS began monitoring.
Read the full
USFS
