I got this email from the NRDC (I get a lot of their Take Action emails to find out what’s going on out there) and I just can’t quite grasp how things like this come up. The gist of what is pasted below is that the U.S. Forest Service is going to open a road that has been closed for like 8 years. In those eight years, bears, cougars and other Wyoming wildlife have been happily frolicking over and across said road. The road leads to nowhere in particular. Why, I ask, particularly in this time of economic trouble, would the government bother spending the money to reopen a pointless road that has already transitioned into habitat for someone else??
The email:
Dear Maya,
In the next few weeks, the U.S. Forest Service plans to reopen a
road that runs through the heart of grizzly bear habitat in
Wyoming’s Sweetwater Valley.
Please go to www.savebiogems.org/bears/takeaction and urge the
Forest Service to keep the road permanently closed.
With encroaching development on nearby lands, the Sweetwater
Valley — inside the Shoshone National Forest — has become a
secure oasis for threatened and imperiled wildlife.
In the eight years that the road has been closed, an abundance
of wildlife has thrived here, including grizzly bears, wolves,
lynx, cougars and moose.
In fact, grizzlies that have just come out of hibernation are
grazing right now on grass and other plants found in the valley.
There is no rationale for the Forest Service’s proposal to
reopen the road, which leads nowhere and has languished for
years. Reopening the road would only disturb and threaten the
Sweetwater Valley’s wilderness and wildlife.
Please go to www.savebiogems.org/bears/takeaction right away and
urge the Forest Service to leave the road closed. Time is
running out, as forest officials plan to reopen the road in the
next few weeks.
Thank you for taking action to protect our remaining western
wildlands.
Sincerely,
Frances Beinecke
President
Natural Resources Defense Council
Go to the links in the email to protect these grizzlies!
courtesy of the NRDC BioGems site
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