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February 11, 2002
Pheasant, anyone?
The New York State DEC is accepting applications from clubs and individuals interested in raising ring-necked pheasants in cooperation with the state's Reynolds Game Farm, which is located just outside of Ithaca.

The Day-Old Pheasant Chick Program and the Young Pheasant Release Program reared more than 75,000 ringnecks between them in 2001.

In the former program, volunteers take chicks from the Reynolds facility, raise them to adulthood, then stock them in areas opening to hunting in late September or October.

Participants in the Young Pheasant Release Program obtain birds that are 6 to 8 weeks old, briefly feed and water them and turn them loose in June or July.

For details on either program, contact the DEC Region 7 office in Cortland at (607) 753-3095 or the Region 6 office in Watertown, 785-2261.  Applications are due March 15.  (from M. Kelly column, Syracuse papers)
N.B.  Pheasants are a non-native species, raised only for hunters who like to kill them.  This shows DEC favors hunters over native species and the environment.

October 5, 2001
ANTHRAX VICTIM WAS "AVID OUTDOORSMAN"
This rare disease is usually transmitted to humans when they skin and butcher
an animal they have killed.  Another hunting hazard along with chronic wasting disease (a transmissible encephalopathy similar to BSE --"mad cow" disease).

June 2001
IDAHO FISH & GAME DEPT PROMOTES PREDATOR SLAUGHTER
The Idaho Department of Fish and Game ((IDFG) planned to engage Wildlife Services (US government's wildlife killing agency specializing in eliminating animals interfering with human commercial interests) to kill bears and mountain lions in the Clearwater area because they were reducing the elk population coveted by human hunters.  Strong objections from the public at large forced the abandonment of this plan.  IDFG counteracted by engaging sport hunters to do the killing.  Worse yet, IDFG is supplying hunters with dog food to use for
baiting predators to a convenient killing location.  Even many sport hunters denounce this practice as unsporting.  Many states have laws forbidding the shooting (but not the trapping) of animals with the use of bait. 

May 10, 2001

NATIONAL PARK SERVICE ACTIVITIES PROVE DEADLY TO WOLVES:
In Alaska's Denali National Park, the "Toklat" and "Sanctuary" wolf packs
are the most viewed, most photographed, most famous group of wolves in the
world. Although they are protected within Park boundaries, those who
unwittingly wander on to surrounding state lands are mercilessly trapped and
hunted. (Ironically, the trappers responsible for killing off the wolves
include a Park Service employee and the owner of a lodge for wildlife-
watching tourists). Compounding the wolves' already dire situation is the
fact that recently, NPS officials inadvertently killed three pack members
when they bungled an operation to tranquilize and collar members of the
pack. Two alpha members and one pup died in the operation, and now, it is
thought that only a single pup remains in the Sanctuary pack. Fortunately,
the NPS has allowed the Alaska Wildlife Alliance to step in and provide food
for the remaining pup. But as long as trapping continues in the Toklat and
Sanctuary wolf territories, their fate remains dim.

WHAT YOU CAN DO:
I) Contact the National Park Service and ask that they take steps toward
stronger protection for the Denali Park wolves, including: 1) The issuance
of a request to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game for an immediate
emergency closure of both the Sanctuary and Toklat wolf territories to ALL
hunting and trapping, and 2) the immediate cessation of all trapping by Park
Service employees, regardless of whether or not it is done on state lands.
Contact: Robert Arnberger, Alaska Regional Director, National Park Service,
2525 Gambell Street, Anchorage, AK 99503 / Ph: 907-257-2690 /
Fax:907-257-2533.

II) Contact the Governor and ask him to close the Denali National Park, to
hunting and trapping of wolves: The Honorable Tony Knowles, PO Box
110001, 3rd Floor State Capitol, Juneau AK 99811-0001, ph: (907) 465-3500
/ Fax: (907) 465-3532 / email: Governor@gov.state.ak.us
For more information, contact the Alaska Wildlife Alliance at: P.O. Box
202022, Anchorage, AK /http:://www.akwildlife.org / (907) 277-0897 /
email:awa@alaska.net



May 5, 2001
NEW WILDLIFE REFUGE ON ISLAND OF VIEQUE, PUERTO RICO
(from the Endangered Species Coalition) Navy has transferred some 3,100 acres on the Puerto Rican island of Vieques to become the "newest addition to the National Wildlife Refuge System says ENS 5/4. Vieques has been the center of heated protests over Navy live-fire training exercises and the refuge was created to protect beaches, coastal lagoons, mangrove wetlands and upland forests that provide habitat for 4 plants and 10 animals listed under the ESA, including manatees, brown pelicans and 4
species of sea turtles.

April 23, 2001
FLORIDA APPROVES MANATEE PROTECTION SETTLEMENT:
(from Endangered Species Coalition) The Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission has approved a settlement with 18 environmental groups who had sued the agency to "better protect manatees from death and injury from collisions with boaters" says the SF Chronicle, AP 4/19. Under the settlement the state will create 14 "safe havens" where boating and fishing is greatly restricted, designate speed limits in 8"hot spots" where large numbers of manatees have been killed by boaters and increase enforcement on state waterways. So far 30 manatees have been killed by boaters compared with 78 last year.

March 28, 2001
Message from Senator Hillary Clinton
Thank you for writing to me about the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The following is the text of my press release from February 27, 2001 as I joined a bipartisan and bicameral coalition, led by Senator Joe Lieberman (D-CT) and Congressmembers Nancy Johnson (R-CT) and Ed Markey (D-MA), to announce legislation to protect the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from oil exploration:

Special places like the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge are a part of our natural - and our national - heritage. The Arctic Refuge is part of what makes our country so unique, so beautiful and so precious. It deserves protection, notexploitation.

Drilling for oil in the Arctic Refuge is bad environmental policy. And it is bad energy policy. What we need are incentives for energy efficient products and alternative and renewable fuels, and improved conservation. What we don't need is to despoil an environmental treasure on a gamble for oil where the odds of finding significant supplies are remote.

Most of the people in New York, like most of us here, may never have a chance to see the Arctic Refuge. But we value places like the Refuge because they say something about who we are as a people. We benefit as a country because the refuge is there, untouched, as God created it. Let us save the Refuge from the oil rigs and the environmental damage that will surely follow.

I appreciate your letting me know your views about this important issue. Please visit my website http://clinton.senate.gov for regular updates on my activities in the United States Senate.

Sincerely yours,
Hillary Rodham Clinton
United States Senator
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