Back to Prison For Farmers & Species Off The ESL

Back to Prison For Farmers & Species Off The ESL. I'm Greg Martin with today's Northwest Report.

Father and son ranchers from Oregon are going back to federal prison over their 2012 arson conviction after setting a fire that burned about 140 acres of BLM land near Diamond, OR. David Sparks has more.

SPARKS: Dwight Hammond and his son, Steven set a fire on their own land as a prescribed burn to control invasive species such as juniper trees and sagebrush on rangeland, but the fire spread to nearby BLM land. The Hammond's were convicted in 2012 under the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996. Oregon Farm Bureau's president call the sentence a "gross government overreach."

The Oregon Farm Bureau has a petition to support the Hammond's at www.savethehammonds.com.

Three species found in Idaho and neighboring states don't require federal protections under the Endangered Species Act. Last weeks announcement by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service takes the Idaho ground squirrel, the Columbia spotted frog and a plant called the Goose Creek milkvetch off the Endangered Species List. Government officials have been working to update the ESL in recent months.

That's today's Northwest Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network of the West.