Rocky Mountain pikas not nearing extinction, study finds

 

 

A team of researchers from the University of Colorado has concluded that pikas, hamster-sized mammals, are doing better than previously believed, finding the population is holding its own in the southern Rocky Mountains.

The study, in the September issue of the journal Ecology, paints a brighter picture for the species than other surveys, notably a study from Nevada's Great Basin earlier this year in which local extinction rates were found to have increased fivefold in the last decade.

In 2010, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service denied endangered species status for the rare creature, in part because there was insufficient data about its habitat and population numbers. Pikas are a member of the rabbit family and live in rocky slopes throughout the Rockies.

But scientists, seeing few of the small animals, have surmised that pikas are abandoning former habitats and moving upslope as temperatures rise.

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Grizzly blamed for Yellowstone hiker death

Endangered arroyo toads cling to existence in the Tehachapi Mountains

Pika could be a candidate for endangered listing as a result of global warming

-- Julie Cart

Photo: The American pika is highly sensitive to changes in temperature. Credit: U.S. Geological Survey

Mountain lion killed in attempt to cross 405 Freeway

One of a handful of mountain lions living in the Santa Monica Mountains was killed Tuesday trying to cross the 405 Freeway near the Getty Center at the start of morning rush hour.

The National Park Service got a call from the California Department of Transportation informing the agency that one of the mountain lions it had outfitted with a tracking device had been hit by a car near the Getty on-ramp between 6 and 7:30 a.m. “We believe it may have made such a daring crossing attempt possibly because it was being flushed out of the area it was in by another male lion,” said Woody Smeck, superintendent of the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area.

The 15-month-old male, known as P-18, was one of three kittens born last year in the recreation area and had been tracked since he was a few weeks old. He started to roam eastward from his mother’s home range in Malibu Creek State Park earlier this summer and Tuesday wound up in the southbund lanes of the 405 near the Getty on-ramp.

Smeck said another mountain lion was killed crossing the 405 in the same area three years ago. The park service believes the Santa Monicas are home to six to eight of the animals, including the father, P-12, and brother, P-15, of the animal killed this week.

The father had better luck navigating Southern California traffic. He crossed the 101 Freeway more than two years ago near the border of Los Angeles and Ventura counties and has lived in the Santa Monicas since then.

Smeck said the park service has talked to Caltrans about installing a fence during the 405 widening project that would funnel wildlife into an underpass near the Getty or building a bridge suitable for wildlife crossings. 

“It is clearly a challenge,” Smeck said of the 405, one of the busiest freeways in the region.

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Grizzly blamed for Yellowstone hiker death

Endangered arroyo toads cling to existence in the Tehachapi Mountains

Pika could be a candidate for endangered listing as a result of global warming

-- Bettina Boxall  

Photo: P-18, shown a month ago in a photo taken by a remotely operated camera. The mountain lion was killed Tuesday while attempting to cross the 405 Freeway. Credit: National Park Service

Grizzly blamed for Yellowstone hiker death

Yellowstone National Park rangers are trying to capture a grizzly that they say killed a hiker from Michigan last week, the second fatal bear attack this summer at the famed park, authorities said Monday.

The body of John Wallace, 59, was discovered Friday along a trail near an area of the park known for its high population of bears. An autopsy concluded he died from injuries in a bear attack.

“We know of no witnesses” to the attack, park Supt. Dan Wenk said. “We think we provide visitors with pretty good knowledge and techniques to keep them safe in the backcountry. Unfortunately, in this case, it didn't happen that way.”

Rangers set traps and plan to kill the animal if they can establish through DNA analysis that it was the one that attacked Wallace, Wenk said. He said park officials do not believe the bear was involved in the other mauling this summer several miles away from where Wallace's body was discovered.

In July, a female bear with cubs killed a hiker from Torrance. Officials did not kill the sow grizzly because they concluded it was defending its cubs.

In the latest case, there were no signs of cubs in the area where Wallace was killed. Wallace, of Chassell, Mich., was apparently traveling alone and had pitched a tent in a developed campground sometime Wednesday, park officials said.

Authorities said Wallace likely was killed Wednesday or Thursday during a hike along the Mary Mountain Trail. Rangers also found grizzly tracks and bear droppings near Wallace's body.

The body was discovered in an area of the park that rangers close from March to June because it is considered “high-density” grizzly country.

In the case of Wallace's death, Wenk said there was too little information to know if it was a defensive attack or not. As a result, he said the bear would be killed if it can be positively identified as the culprit.

Despite the killings, Wenk said dangerous encounters remain rare between grizzlies and the more than 3 million people who visit the park each year. The July killing was the first inside the park first since 1986.

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Yellowstone grizzly bear euthanized for 'predatory behaviors'

Victim of Yellowstone grizzly bear mauling was Torrance resident

Agency seeks to end sea otter relocations, to allow them off SoCal

-- Associated Press

Photo: A grizzly crosses a highway near Yellowstone National Park. Credit: David Grubbs / Billings Gazette

The cave is his classroom, the environment his passion

I picked up my candle lantern and entered the cool, damp and dark Crystal Cave at Sequoia National Park. I had paid my fare to take candlelit tour at dusk, hiked down the steep mountainside and prepared to enter the cave’s gaping mouth with a handful of park visitors, expecting to see fanged bats in the shadows.

And then came the cave naturalist and tour guide, Billy Dooling, 26, who promptly reminded the group to hold the candle upright, not to touch any of the dagger-like stalactites or stalagmites, and to not worry about the bats …because there were none.

Bummer, I thought to myself, blinking to see in the flickering darkness. The 48-degree chill crawled up my spine and I shuddered as the gigantic cavern opened up to reveal hundreds of ghoulish calcite formations that had spent millions of years twisting and warping in the marbled sanctuary.

Of 280 caves in the park, Crystal Cave is the only one open to the public, but is inaccessible without a professional guide, such as Dooling.

A biology graduate from Missouri Baptist University in St. Louis, Dooling works for the nonprofit organization Sequoia Natural History Assn. and has spent his first season as a guide educating visitors about cave conservation. It was about halfway through the tour when I realized Dooling was going beyond the history of the cave, informing us of its future and how we can help keep it intact.

I connected with him soon after to learn more about his role as a national park tour guide, active environmentalist and undercover educator.

City Council not commenting on Laguna Beach access issue

The Laguna Beach City Council accepted petitions that supported public beach access through private property at Rockledge in Laguna Beach, but refrained from making any comments on the emotionally charged issue.

City Manager John Pietig advised the council to button its lips because of a lawsuit filed by a Rockledge resident against his neighboring property owner, Mark Towfiq, and the city. He argues those who go through the property are trespassing.

"This property has always been protected by a gate at the ocean and an iron gate in front of the property," Towfiq said. "If you are the public, you have been trespassing if you are going to use this property to get to the ocean. There is no other way around it."

The issue of public access through Towfiq's property was raised at the July 12 meeting, according to the Coastline Pilot.

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Climate change and health: How vulnerable is your city?

Study ranks air pollution from coal and oil-fired power plants

California bill would reveal chemicals used in "fracking" process

--Barbara Diamond, Times Community News

Lake Tahoe clarity second-worst on record

Lake Tahoe lost nearly 4 feet of clarity last year, sending water visibility to the second-worst level on record.

UC Davis' annual State of the Lake Report pegged the 2010 Secchi depth -- the point below Tahoe's surface at which a 10-inch white disk vanishes from view -- at 64.4 feet. That's just a few inches more than the 1997 record.

Researchers said such year-to year variability is not uncommon, adding that the long-term trend remains one of slowing clarity loss.

The report was released as state and federal officials gathered for the annual Lake Tahoe Summit against a background of growing tension between Nevada and California. Nevada is threatening to pull out of the bistate compact that regulates land use in the Tahoe Basin unless it is amended to make it easier to approve development.

California Gov. Jerry Brown and Nevada Gov. Brian Sandoval, who attended the summit, said Tuesday that they would work to complete an overdue update of the basin's regional plan. They also signed into law new pollution limits that call for incremental improvement in the lake's clarity until it returns to nearly 100 feet, where it was in the 1960s.

Attaining those goals is “a huge, huge task,” said Jared Blumenfeld, regional administrator for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, who said it took 10 years "and about $10 million worth of science” to develop the standards. They essentially call for a 65% drop in the amount of fine sediment washing into the lake over the next 6½ decades, or 1% a year.

The job of meeting those standards will fall largely on local and regional governments in the Tahoe Basin at a time when federal funding for environmental restoration at the lake is dwindling. The Interior Department is making a final payment of $34 million from public land sales in the Las Vegas area that have funneled more than $300 million to Tahoe projects. Legislation sponsored by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) to renew funding is unlikely to get far with congressional budget-slashers.

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Nevada seeks to loosen California's grip on Tahoe development

Tattered economy has a silver lining for conservationists

At Lake Tahoe, a scuba diver's body is recovered after 17 years

-- Bettina Boxall

Photo: Lake Tahoe from the Nevada side. Credit: Richard Derk / Los Angeles Times

The water's up at Lake Powell

A year ago, things were looking grim on the Colorado River. After more than a decade of drought, the reservoir system was only about half full and water managers were expecting another dry year. Arizona and Nevada faced the prospect of cuts in water deliveries.

Instead, it just kept on snowing and raining in the upper basin last winter and spring. June flows into Lake Powell, which stores water for release to Lake Mead, were 176% of average. July flows were 280% of average.

Powell hasn't been this high in a decade and the level of Mead, the biggest reservoir in the country, is shooting up. Although it's too soon to tell whether Colorado's stubborn drought is over, talk of shortages has been put off for at least several years.

Read more on the water levels at Lake Powell.

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California drought drove up energy costs

Gov. expected to declare California's drought over

In a region that imports water, much goes to waste

Photo: The view across Lake Powell from Lone Rock Beach. Credit: Bettina Boxall / Los Angeles Times     

Arcadia tree-sitters plead no contest, get community service

 

A judge Thursday sentenced four tree-sitters who tried to save a grove of century-old oaks and sycamores in the foothills above Arcadia to community service.

Each of them pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor trespassing charge, ending a legal battle that began eight months ago when the group known as the “Arcadia 4” occupied trees to block Los Angeles County Department of Public Works crews from cutting down the 11-acre grove to create a dumping site for mud scooped out of Santa Anita reservoir.

John Quigley, a veteran of such protests, and Travis Jochimsen were sentenced on Thursday in Alhambra Municipal Court to 20 days of community service with a nonprofit organization of their choice. In an earlier proceeding, Andrea Bowers and Julia Posin pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor trespassing charge and were sentenced to 10 days of community service.

On Thursday, in a statement read on the courthouse steps after sentencing, Quigley, 50, claimed his actions on Jan. 12 “were out of necessity to defend the public good and our natural heritage,” and that the removal of what he called the “Arcadia Woodlands” was “a crime against nature and the people of Southern California.”

“I’m proud of us,” added Posin, 23.

Quigley’s attorney, Colleen Flynn, said the pleas will be dismissed after one year. “It’s quite a victory in light of the fact that the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office originally wanted jail time and over $20,000 in fines and restitution,” Flynn said.

Prosecutors dropped more serious misdemeanor charges of failure to disperse and obstructing, delaying or resisting a police officer in lawful execution of his or her duties, Flynn said.

After the department razed the trees, residents from adjacent neighborhoods organized a community-based organization called the Urbanwild Network, which is dedicated to seeking alternatives to the destruction of woodlands across Los Angeles County.

A week ago, Public Works crews hauled 3,000 cubic yards of sediment out of the reservoir, which was last dredged in 1993. The 83-year-old facility is a crucial component of the county's aging flood-control system and is used to recharge underground aquifers that the cities of Sierra Madre and Arcadia rely on for drinking water.

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A river runs through Los Angeles. Seriously.

Newhall Ranch development clears environmental hurdle

Eco-activist who blocked BLM auction in Utah is convicted

-- Louis Sahagun

Photo: A tree is removed from Arcadia after tree-sitters were evicted. Credit: Mark Boster/Los Angeles Times

A river runs through Los Angeles. Seriously.

Three years ago, the Army Corps of Engineers had plans that would have exempted parts of the Los Angeles River from clean-water regulations. A biologist with the corps tipped people to the plan, then took a protest paddle down the river, which was illegal. She got in hot water with the corps, and eventually left.

How things have changed. Monday, the colonel in charge of the river took to a kayak with elected officials, inaugurating a pilot program to allow the public to paddle at least a short section of the much-maligned river. Soon, you'll be able to do it too. If you're willing to pay, and wait.

"I'm actually out on the water and not worried about getting arrested for it," quipped City Councilman Tony Cardenas, one of the dignitaries paddling a stretch in the Sepulveda Basin on Monday.

More details on Paddling the Los Angeles River.

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Tule vegetation infests lower Owens River

Researchers find plastic in more than 9% of fish in north Pacific Ocean

A journey of discovery on the LA River

-- Geoff Mohan

Photo: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Col. Mark Toy, commander of the Los Angeles district, is among the first people to legally explore the Los Angeles River in decades. Credit: Arkasha Stevenson/Los Angeles Times

Yellowstone National Park again gets 900,000 visitors in July

Yellowstone National Park saw 900,000 visitors in July, marking the third year in a row the park has seen such volume.

July is typically the park’s peak visitation month. The park recorded 906,935 recreational visitors in July 2011, 957,785 in July 2010, and 900,515 in July 2009.

This year is the second-highest monthly visitation level recorded since 1872, when the park first opened, according to park officials. 

“We believe it has something to do with the economy,” said park spokesman Al Nash. “Visiting the park is a great value. A seven-day pass for a family is just $25; you can’t even take a family to a movie and get by with spending $25”

July’s numbers are higher than the previous seven months combined, recording 1,848,658 recreational visitors from January through July 2011. During the same period in 2010, visitation was 8% higher, at 2,011,586 visitors recorded.