10-4 IAN Sheep Grazing Closure

 Woolgrowers not happy about Payette National Forest plans. Some stories, sagas, or make that range wars will never end it seems. Enviro’s and land management agencies are a great example. The whole issue of domestic sheep grazing public lands and potentially spreading pneumonia to big horn sheep is just one of these never ending situations. Quoting an Associated Press article “The Payette National Forest aims to protect wild bighorn sheep by reducing rangeland suited for domestic sheep and goat grazing by 70 percent by 2013. This plan, in the works for years, protects 94 percent of bighorn sheep summer habitat. Scientists and forest officials have concluded bighorns can contract deadly lung diseases when they encounter domestic sheep; ranchers fear closures will put them out of business.”

Remember U of I Professor Dr. Marie Bulgin called hogwash to this contention and was put on leave…ultimately to be exonerated. Here’s Stan Boyd, Executive Director of the Idaho Woolgrowers Association about disease spread: “There’s not conclusive scientific evidence that that transmission occurs.”