A snapshot of the plentiful and growing Western Arctic Caribou Herd in Alaska/ADF&G photo
Why is it that reporters with a good story to tell sometimes can’t seem to avoid the pit of embellishment that makes journalism look so bad?
“Though that news barely registered with the American public, it was powerful: the imminent disappearance of a large mammal species from the Lower 48. And the Selkirk caribou are only the tip of the melting iceberg. Across a broad swath of Canada and Alaska, caribou populations have been plummeting for decades. The main cause: industrial development in their habitat.”
Caribou populations are declining in parts of Canada and Alaska. They are also rising in other parts of Alaska. Earlier this year, the Alaska Department of Fish and Game announced the western Arctic caribou herd, the state’s largest, had increased to 259,000 caribou from 201,000 the year before.
“Caribou, a type of deer, live across a massive slice of the planet’s north, from the Arctic tundra south through the boreal, or northern, forest. They reproduce slowly: Females are pregnant for nearly eight months and give birth to just one baby at a time,” Rosner wrote.
Caribou are a herd animal. They reproduce slowly if there are few productive cows in the herd. They reproduce rapidly if there are a significant number of highly productive cows, as happens to be the case with the western Arctic herd at the moment.
The herd underwent a decline earlier this decade because it was composed of a lot of old cows, many of which have now died, and because calf survival was poor due to predation, which has also declined.
“With fewer productive cows exiting the population and an increased number of calves joining the herd things were bound to improve,” state wildlife biologist Alex Hansen said in a January statement that pointed out that “Alaska’s caribou herds frequently experience cyclic highs and lows influenced by natural factors including range condition, weather, disease, and predation.”
This has been going on for ages. The few Alaska herds in decline now are by no means an indication the numbers in general are “plummeting” in the 49th state. Not to mention there is little in the way of “industrial development” within the Alaska caribou range.
A simple Google search and a map should have made the latter obvious to Rosner. Just as a simple Google search would reveal the fact that the various subspecies of caribou – primarily woodland and barren-ground animals – should not be confused.
A caribou is not a caribou
The woodland caribou is a subspecies in trouble throughout most of its range. The status of the various subspecies of barren ground caribou is a wholly different story involving in what is in some ways a wholly different animal.
The barren-ground caribou are animals of the tundra. The woodland caribou are animals of the mountains.
The woodland species, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, “inhabit high elevation, forested areas with deep snowfall and steep, mountainous terrain. During the winter, they feed solely on lichen
growing from certain forest trees. The deep snowpack lifts caribou up
to five meters into the canopy of the spruce-fir and cedar-hemlock forests to reach this lichen. All other caribou feed primarily by ‘cratering’ or pawing at lichens buried in shallow snow at lower elevations.”
Because Alaska lacks for spruce-fir and cedar-hemlock forests, it is home to few woodland caribou. But because the state has massive expanses of tundra, it is home to a lot of barren-ground caribou – an estimated 750,000 at the moment.
Where those animals have declined and remained low, the issue is not with “industrial development” but with natural predation.
The textbook case is the Mentasta caribou herd which calves in the nearly 20.6-million-square-mile Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve, a conservation unit the size of West Virginia and six-times the size of Yellowstone National Park.
The Mentasta herd numbered near 3,200 by 1987 when a decline started, Gretchen Roffler and colleagues noted in a peer-reviewed study published in the Journal of Mammalogy in 2012.
As the nearby Nelchina herd – a road accessible band of caribou that is the most viewed and hunted in the state – increased, “the Mentasta herd began a steady decline to approximately 600 by 1999, largely as a result of substantial predation of young calves during 1990–1999,” she wrote.
When she and her colleagues studied the herd in early 2000s, the number of caribou was still low and it has remained that way. Industrial development is not a threat to their long-term survival. Death at the claws and fangs of wild predators is the threat.
The Mentasta caribou, as one biologist once put it, made bad life choices. Instead of massing on calving grounds away from predators, Mentasta females calve in the midst of a lot of wolves and bears and thus a lot of their young die as food for those predators.
The story is much the same for the Denali caribou herd, which only rarely ventures outside the nearly 9.5-million-square-mile Denali National Park and Preserve, an area about the size of Vermont.
Denali is Alaska’s most popular park. The number of annual visitors is now near 650,000 per year, an increase of nearly 280,000 people since the Denali caribou herd crashed in 2000.
People versus caribou?
Some in Alaska dislike Denali’s industrial tourism. The development outside the park entrance is referred as “Glitter Gulch,” not necessarily affectionately, and bus loads of tourists roll up the Denali Park Road in waves every summer day.
But the Denali caribou numbers aren’t tied to this industrial tourism. In fact, tourism in the park was generally falling as the herd declined, according to park service numbers.
Tourism started creeping upward in the mid-2000s, and so did caribou numbers.
But it’s all irrelevant because the events aren’t related. Winter weather and predation, not people, are the well documented factors affecting the Denali caribou population, according to the data from the park’s now decades long study.
Caribou population numbers are naturally controlled by two things: The number of old animals dying, and the number of young animals surviving to replace them.
Severe winters, something to which Alaska is prone, can make life tough and deadly for both young and old. But the young have a particularly tough time in the natural world in which caribou live.
“In their first 15 days of life, caribou calves are very vulnerable to predation and, on average, over half the calves die during this period,” the Park Service’s Denali study notes. “Bears and wolves account for more than 80 percent of calf deaths. Another 10 percent of the deaths are caused by golden eagles, wolverines, and coyotes.”
News or propaganda?
Rosner notes similar predation problems facing woodland caribou, but then clearly doesn’t understand them or simply spins them.
Roads in Canada, she writes, “provided the wolves year-round access to tasty caribou flesh. Research suggests that wolves can travel up to three times faster along roads and trails than they can in unbroken forest.
“Opening up the forest also brings in more of the animals wolves crave—deer, elk, moose. With more to eat, the wolves can proliferate, increasing the pressure on caribou. And because the wolves have so many species to feast on, their populations remain large even as caribou numbers shrink.”
These things are all true. Habitat changes, whether natural or manmade, affect all wildlife species. Logging of big, high-mountain timber which supports the lichens on which woodland caribou depend is a problem for the woodland caribou in the U.S. and Canadian West, where the animals are near extinction.
“…(But) it’s the surge in predator attacks since 2009 that has chiefly driven the herd’s decline, a change directly related to human activity,” he wrote. “In recent decades, resource extraction has destroyed broad swathes of the ancient forests on which the caribou depend.
“As shrubs and young trees sprout in cleared areas, they attract deer, moose and elk, the favored prey of mountain lions and wolves, which have arrived in force. Joe Scott, director of international programs for Conservation Northwest—a National Wildlife Federation affiliate based in Washington State that ardently supports caribou conservation – calls Selkirk wolves powerful. ‘They’re 110-pound moose hunters,’ he says, that routinely take down animals twice the size of mountain caribou.
“Caribou have little defense against this predator invasion. They forage in small groups widely scattered across dense forests and high-altitude meadows. This pattern long made hunting them so difficult that few predators bothered. But roads and clear-cuts created by logging, mining, pipeline construction and oil and gas extraction, along with trails that recreation companies create for snowmobilers and skiers, now provide both wolves and mountain lions with easy paths to a virtual mountain caribou buffet – and the consequences have been devastating.”
Enlightenment
The only pertinent fact Warren left out of his story is the shift in human attitudes over the last 30 years. Large predators – wolves, mountain lions and grizzly bears – were once badly persecuted across the West.
As a result of hunting, trapping and poisoning, their population numbers were dangerously depressed. Wolves and grizzlies were driven onto the endangered species list.
Attitudes toward these animals changed as they began to disappear. The endangered listing provided them protection and inspired recovery efforts. Predators numbers are now recovering to nearer natural levels.
Woodland caribou are to some extent paying the price.
Ecologically, interactions between predator and prey in environments involving multiple predators and multiple prey get complicated. The biologists working in Denali Park in the 2000s discovered that the state of Alaska’s careful management of salmon to boost returns to more than 100 million fish per year for decades now has helped increase wolf numbers in the park.
As a result, more caribou, moose and Dall sheep die.
The world is an interconnected place. Everything humans do – even the seemingly most benign things – affect the planet in some way. It’s complicated.
The only thing simple is that when predators cease to kill prey – no matter whether the predators are other animals or humans – the prey prosper. See white-tailed deer, a cousin of the caribou. Many urban areas of the U.S. are now overrun with deer because urban environments lack for the deers’ natural predators and are closed to hunting.
There are so many deer in heavily developed New Jersey that the Department of Agriculture and the National Audubon Society warn that the animals are destroying their own habitat.
More than 100 whitetails per square mile is a staggering number. It would equate to about 30 caribou, a larger bodied animal, per square mile. The western arctic herd roams an area of about 140,000 square miles and peaked at about 409,000 caribou (about 3 caribou per square mile) in 2003.
When a decline began shortly thereafter, state biologists worried about the herd overusing its range suggested a downward trend was a good thing.
Arctic Alaska happens to be one of the few parts of the state that has seen development on the scale that would be considered “industrial.” The North Slope of the Arctic is home to the Prudhoe Bay oil fields.
Since oil development began at Prudhoe, the caribou population of the central arctic herd has gone from 5,000 to 70,000 and now back down to 22,000. Biologists admit they’re not sure why.
At this point, the scientific data is such at that the Slope’s industrial development can be neither credited for the caribou increase nor blamed for the caribou decline, though oil industry supporters and environmentalists can find tidbits of information in the data that make it possible to argue for either point of view.
Journalists aren’t supposed to be on the side of either interest when covering stories like this. Journalists are, or once were, expected to provide an at least somewhat objective view of big, complicated pictures.
It’s sad when they don’t. Rosner is no Claas Relotius – the German reporter who got a lot of attention for being fired after fabricating a story about Fergus Falls, Minn. to portray it as an example of an American Heartland community obsessed with support of President Donald Trump – but Rosner’s reporting is indicative of the lack of simple fact-checking that has crept into so much American journalism these days.
And the biggest loser, sad to say, is journalism – a business the view of which just keeps “plummetting” in the eyes of the American public.
Categories: Commentary
Thanks, Craig, for an interesting piece. If you’ll consider human hunting pressure on any of the caribou herds as you’ve done with natural predators, I’d like to see that analysis since Fish & Game may approximate those deaths. Moreover, hunters should acknowledge the losses.
Happy New Year’s Eve to all people !! My first new year’s resolution . Be nice to everyone I interact with for a week !
“When sites are overrun by trolls, they drown out the voices of women, ethnic and religious minorities, gays–anyone who might feel vulnerable. Young people in these groups assume trolling is a normal part of life online and therefore self-censor. An anonymous poll of the writers at TIME found that 80% had avoided discussing a particular topic because they feared the online response.”
http://time.com/4457110/internet-trolls/
Ah yes, the poor “victims”. So glad the “Thought Police” instituted an “anti-bullying” campaign for the weak minded. Please, tell me who “women, ethnic and religious minorities, gays” feel vulnerable. I feel none of the groups you mentioned deserve special treatment, nor should they. Maybe you are just feeling guilty because Steve-O called you a bigot. This is going WAY off topic Steve.
“Scapegoating is used to distract citizens from real problems and divert criticism, targeting minorities, liberals, socialists, other religions, secularists, dissenters, etc…
Fascist governments are male-dominated, and women viewed as second-class citizens; they are adamantly homophobic, and endorsed by the dominant religion of the country.”
https://www.adn.com/opinions/2018/12/30/americas-drift-toward-fascism-is-cause-for-concern/
Steve you presented an opinion piece an obviously politically motivated individual by a left leaning news source . It’s got to much trash in it to refute in time I have . Bottom line is it’s premise is nonsense. There is no change in drift towards facism . We have always had some here but mostly our nations principles/ laws reduce its effects. The author tries to redifine facism and make it stick to America. He is trying to rewrite facts which he is not qualified to do . It’s not viable for a rational discussion to include his piece as any form of reality except he is off base and upset. Daily news was smart to put a disclaimer at bottom making it clear they are not part of his messy opinion.
Nothing wrong with being homophobic, transphobic, liberalphobic, socialistphobic, etc.. Facebook says there are 57 genders. I am against all but 2. Would you call Obama Motors, ObamaCare, or Obama trying to take over the banks FASCISM?
What is with all this women nonsense? Want to see what a woman run train wreck looks like, just look towards Sweden.
Bryan you were doing pretty good until you started indiscriminately picking on groups of people for no viable reason. Equation of Sweden’s problems with women is plain silly. Are there no men in Sweden that make up its nation ? Please take your phobic rant back . Impressionable people could read this comment section. I promise you that you have taken up the wrong battle. It’s better to cuss and swear like a fisherman than exhibit irrational thoughts like you did . All those people you threw shade onto make up our great nation and world. When you exhibit phobic opinion like you did you show lack of knowledge and make it harder to trust your words without research. Eroding your credibility and influence. Please rethink your crazy statement do some research and retract it .
Opinion, I will take nothing back. People can have differing opinions. If somebody is homophobic who cares. I don’t. It is their view or opinion and they are entitled to it. Do I have to accept all the silly gender nonsense there is today when there are only 2 genders? Of course not. Steve is the one that brought-up and labelled select groups as “victims”. I get your PC gasp but, I don’t subscribe to it.
Bryan thanks for acknowledging my point. Although it was not a pc gasp . I also acknowledge your concept people can have different opinions. You are so right !!! My point is you show to little knowledge and understanding of the different people and groups you slammed. When you diss them it shows your lack of thought and accurate science . I respect anyone until they prove otherwise. Regardless of type . It’s nothing pc . It’s about functioning and fact . Not preconceived notions of people . Who they really are do on individual basis is what matters . Nothing else . Pc drama never enters my mind .
Opinion, I enjoy your input and out of courtesy of Craig’s thread, I am going to abstain from further gender comment. Personally, I think the younger gen have mental disorders as there are only XX and XY. Nothing in between.
Steve’s HAARP might relate to this caribou article in some people’s mind but, not the genders Steve mentioned. So, Happy New Yeat my friend. I am bowing out.
Bryan, relative to your statement about only 2 genders what gender would you class a person with both male and female genital parts?
Frankly I’m unsure that it would make much difference without a precise definition of “gender” but you seem to have your own definition to be making your statement. What is it?
Bryan,
I hadn’t seen your post about bowing out but you can’t expect to come on here and make a statement that there is only XX and XY and think you will be given the benefit of any doubt. While you may be referring to which of two bathrooms any one individual may be given permission to enter, the general looking at XX and XY is biological and there are indeed several in between (biological).
Go ahead and “bow out” but your statement is absurd!
Um Bill, the Hemerphadites you are refering to have sex chromosomes showing male-female mosaicism (where one individual possesses both the male XY and female XX chromosome pairs). So, there you have it, XX and XY ONLY. No “LGBQT”. Ok, it is New Years Eve, school is out until next year.
Well Bryan, you didn’t answer the question of what gender that individual is!
Further, if you are only talking chromosomes you have left out XXY and XYY.
Not surprised you would want school to be let out! Sort of like getting out of the kitchen when things get hot.
Bryan,
It is not OK to have all those “phobias” built up in your brain.
“A phobia is a type of anxiety disorder that causes an individual to experience extreme, irrational fear about a situation, living creature, place, or object… Phobias are more serious than simple fear sensations and are not limited to fears of specific triggers.”
And for the “bigot” thing…
There was NO basis for those remarks…
I am a heterosexual male and have joked many times about “man dates” with friends…
Like 2 guys going to the shooting range and out for drinks…socializing….
“Man date is a neologism of the 2000s that is used to describe a social situation where two men spend time together one-on-one. The men may be any mix of heterosexual and homosexual. However, “man date” refers to a platonic social encounter, not sexual implied or actual.” Wikipedia
Maybe U can start 2019 with a better understanding of the culture that U are a part of?
Good Luck!
Bryan, here is a bit on hermaphroditism that you may enjoy: https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/true-hermaphroditism
Of particular note is that approximately 50% of them menstruate so perhaps you will want to weigh in here on whether/not this 50% is what gender?
I only ask this because you’ve set yourself up as the “gender” expert here.
Steve the bigot Stine, you’ve really dug in on the queer shaming. Now you freely admit you joke about it, while claiming it’s not a sexual thing you said and claiming you never said it. Here’s what you said:
Bryan,
Maybe U and Steve-O can hook up on a “man date”…
U two seem to be “cut from the same cloth”.
Hook up on a man date can only be taken one way. You think that by trying to insult Bryan and myself by claiming we are gay is ok, it’s not. You are the troll and the bully you linked to.
Steve Stine the homophobic bigot on full display.
Steve-O and Steve, while I had never heard of a man-date I didn’t think of it as being queer shaming. That is probably because I find it difficult to think that Steve does or ever has done that (just my opinion). It just plain seems “out of character” that he would do that.
Yet it is pretty clear that, if I’m correct, a misunderstanding has taken place. This, in my opinion, is a pissing match that could be fixed fairly easily.
Good luck. https://www.elitedaily.com/humor/guys-need-go-man-dates/1901504
Bill,
I’m glad you shared your opinion on whether Steve Stine is a bigot, his own words show he is. Which part of when he said that Bryan and I should hook up on a man date do you think the misunderstanding comes from? Steve Stine was using “hook up” as a sexual term, to do so on a man date would be homosexual in nature, Steve Stine is using clearly homophobic and bigoted remarks in an attempt to have Bryan and myself “STFU”. Steve Stine is a bigot and trying to use queer shaming to silence people he disagrees with.
Or maybe it’s all just a big misunderstanding and Steve Stine has repeatedly refused to say he is misunderstood, instead he has doubled and tripled down on his statements.
Steve-O, I only remarked on whether/not Steve was “queer shaming” and didn’t mention bigot. I’ll say here that many on here are bigots until they’ve been shown an argument that exposes their opinion(s) as being wrong. There are a few who refuse to see arguments that oppose their opinions but, by and large, most see the writing on the wall.
As I mentioned that it seemed out of character (to me) that Steve was making any gay sexual reference, you still maintain that he was. This is from one of Steve’s posts: “… However, “man date” refers to a platonic social encounter, not sexual implied or actual.” It seems to me that he is clearly referring to his use of “man-date” was not intended as “sexual.”
Frankly, I don’t think I can remember anyone gay-shaming anyone on one of Craig’s posts yet there has been plenty of controversy. I just think you have over-reacted here over a simple misunderstanding.
Happy New Year, by the way.
Well Bill, regardless of what you think, hooking up is a common term used to describe sexual activity. Use your internet to google it if you need to. The bigot Steve Stine clearly meant to insult Bryan and myself by queer shaming us, it back fired on him since his (in)tolerant ways are on full display. I’m not surprised you are defending Steve Stine and his bigoted comments, the two of you share a lot of the same behavior and terminology like insulting people you disagree with, telling them to “STFU”, an so on.
Good point Steve – O
Well Steve-o, you and I haven’t agreed on much over the last while so probably shouldn’t have expected us to here, either.
I agree that Steve meant to cast you and Bryan together (as alike in your thinking) but I still don’t think he was queer-shaming. It just doesn’t pass my smell test but it does yours and you are the expert on your opinion. I’m curious, what would be the purpose for “queer shaming” if, as you say, that was what he intended?
I apologize for even stepping in here and only had good intentions as I felt/feel that you are misreading what he wrote (that’s all). I’m not defending what he wrote, either-just giving my interpretation of what (I think) he did not mean.
It won’t happen again.
Thanks Bill and a safe & happy new year to you!
You are correct in all your responses on this thread…
Steve-o showed up “like someone pissed in his brandy” and I should not have responded, but never was I “queer shaming” like he said.
Frankly, I had never heard that term before.
I thought “man date” was as PC as it comes, completely non sexual.
Oh well, when folks show up to make a scene…
Then that is what they will do.
Thanks again and Cheers!
Hook Up:
“Meet up, or making a connection between people”
(Formal Definition)
Bill,
I’m guessing the reason Steve Stine insults, name calls, and degrades people with a different opinion is tye same reason you do. From what I can tell it’s the way that you guys figure you can get people to “STFU”, Steve Stine even linked to a couple articles about doing what he did and continues to do. Why some people decide to behave that way isn’t for me to say.
Steve Stine, you know what you were saying when you said it, it’s clear as day.
Steve-O, you are “reaching” here.
But you are the expert on your opinion.
Time magazine was the very first fake news I ever recognized. They had a faked picture. Supposedly went to a war zone snapped a picture of rubble and young children’s bodies. Problem was it was dolls staged to look like bodies. Time magazine is a sick demented source . Openly misleading people claiming to be news . That was around 35 years ago . I have taken time magazine with a grain of salt ever since. It’s a trash magazine .
You are expecting us here to take your word for this??
Even if what you say happened it could have been an unscrupulous reporter that stepped out of bounds-if such was the case, the magazine would surely have printed a retraction and explanation.
Your “supposedly” is the real “smocking gun” IMO.
Bill , don’t take my word for it – though the word is good as I’m not in habit of presenting fake news . Please research the current situation with news sources. You will see what I speak of is a common problem. Take Brian Williams for example. So as to your excuse “unscrupulous reporter” to clarify accurately for you ,photographer – there is an editor to catch such “mistakes” or fakes ? Bottom line is a fake photo used by time magazine showed a larger story about their integrity. Their drive for profits and readers at all cost and possibly even political motivation to twist news and create drama . It’s undermining truth which eventually undermines democracy. Times 35 plus year old picture which I can’t look up online to show you , really told a story of a ethically challenged photographer, writer, editor and corporate environment. Which is news of today. Something you can study easily yourself. Your excuse- out of bounds is just that a lame excuse used to deny responsibility. Who put that reporter and editor into position of agent for times ? The leader or owners/ management is the legally responsible parties . According to the law classes I’m taking. So out of bounds photographer doesn’t hold water legally. Thus neither does your statement/ excuse. I wish you were right more often about magazines and news printing retraction correction. Fact is they don’t always. Anyway even when they do the damage was done and truth was twisted. People rarely notice the retraction.
Talk is cheap, whiskey costs money Rayme.
All you’ve given us is a bunch of talk with not a sliver to back up your stance. You are entitled to your opinions, of course, but you are not entitled to your own facts.
News sources do fail, from time-to-time, but when they are exposed the integrity of their employers does come into play-the legal argument is only for the courts.
Until you can back up your accusation, it is nothing but an assumption and hardly warrants something like they are a “sick demented source.” And it certainly has nothing to do with whether/not current news sources are a problem.
With that in mind, I call “hogwash” on your accusation.
Bill you could use to be polite. My correct name isn’t rayme and neither is my handle . It appears that when you are distressed you resort to insults name calling and innuendo . My job is not to compile information for you that you will then ignore and denigrate. You are free to consider what I’ve said and use your own time to determine its accuracy. I’m sorry I offended you by accurately smearing what appears to be one of your favorite magazines. Time magazine. I didn’t realize you would be so easily offended. I did not mean to piss in your brandy so to speak. This is about to be new year and I’m truly hoping you have a wonderful day ! When I have time I will compile some information printed by fake news time magazine but until then please use your apparently unlimited time to research the problem on your own.
Whatever your name is, your argument is “hogwash.” Note: no name calling, either. I have no opinion on Time Magazine and haven’t read it, other than an occasional article when it appears in an office while I’m waiting for an appointment-it just doesn’t have any appeal, to me. That said, you accusations, without back up, are just that;your opinion that doesn’t hold much water around here IMO. Your argument about your “accurately smearing” is nothing but more “hogwash.”
Whenever you get around to backing up your accusations, let me know. Until then stfu.
Let me rephrase my last comment to make it more polite, Opinion: Put up or shut up!
Bill I think you should also research communication by internet with unknown people . For some reason it’s been shown people have a tendency to be abusive when using this medium for communication. People tend to be more polite when talking in person. Would you tell a person in the library to stfu ? Or put up or shut up ? Your internet discussion is a good point for research. I doubt you would be so disrespectful in person. Have a wonderful day Bill . Example- if you met a fisherman on the dock it wouldn’t be particularly safe to say put up or shut up . Or STFU . Whereas at home on your computer you feel 100% safe to say verbally abusive communication. That’s pretty much definition of a bully. I know you are not a bully so your method of communication on the internet is below who you are . May peace bless your soul. Have a good day bill .
Cry us a river here opinion!
Frankly if anyone (to my face) argued as you have with no evidence backing them up I would treat them the same way. I initially just asked you for some backing up of your accusation and you had none and proceeded to get huffy about my calling you names, etc. You were never called any name but at some point you are going to be labeled as a “bullshitter.”
You are on notice to either put up or shut up about the Time Magazine accusation-that’s all. This is not the honor system around here and never has been. Your insisting that you don’t post “fake news” doesn’t cut it either. You may believe it but nobody else does.
Simple as that!
Bill you are being excessively defensive of my accusation about time magazine. You have taken it very personally. I’m curious why ? I would provide the picture for your direct reference but it’s hard to find being an occurrence 35 years ago . But I will save it for you if I run into it again. That said just because I can’t find it has no bearing on weather it occurred. So your premise that if it’s not found means I’m a bullshitter is complete nonsense. If your logic works that way you need to take some classes. If it doesn’t exist then of course you might be considered correct. In this case you are not . Also I have nothing to personally gain by smearing time magazine so you are attacking windmills. Further more just because you say something doesn’t make it so . Have a great new year bill .
Opinion, it matters not whether it’s Time, Look or Saturday Evening Post, there is nothing personal, only that when you make such an accusation and follow it with “magazine is a sick demented source” I thought you needed to back-up your accusation (at least). Pretty simple here, your opinion doesn’t hold much water with just your say-so other than it’s your opinion. Like I said, “this is not the honor system” and like Craig says “never assume.”
So………………………….you either come up with some sort of back-up or we will be thinking of you as a “bullshitter.” Your opinion (of Time Mag) is noted but your reasoning is your own-you don’t like it for your own reasons that will remain unknown (as fact). I would think that such a “sick demented source” would have several other ethical issues that you could put your finger on. 35 years is a long time for any magazine to be totally squeaky clean. And it doesn’t matter whether/not you have any interest in smearing Time (according to you), only that you did it with nothing behind it. Do you think anyone else on this site could get away with pushing such crap? You were given a chance to put up and you failed. End of story.
Ok bill . I didn’t go back very far in my search. Start with last year. Time magazine issued a correction over its fake picture of trump making a Honduran girl cry . It was a political hit piece hack job . With the purpose of coloring people’s minds against a certain idea and person . That’s a trashy thing to do unless trump really stood there and made a girl cry . Time put effort into creating a fake concept and when called on it they retracted and apologize. As I understand. I am sure I can find hundreds more instances for you since you are apparently to preoccupied with mean thoughts to look for yourself. You have clearly failed in your point. Now it’s your turn to put up or shut up and prove time magazine is clean ethical source. Good luck .
Opinion,
You are mixing up “fake picture” with real picture used out of context.
You initially said:
“Time magazine was the very first fake news I ever recognized. They had a faked picture. Supposedly went to a war zone snapped a picture of rubble and young children’s bodies. Problem was it was dolls staged to look like bodies. Time magazine is a sick demented source”
Where is your evidence of this?
The story you mention was not a fake picture, but a real girl taken, but used out of context.
Just so you know, although the “correction” was issued for the media to say the little girl was not removed from her parents…
“Time is standing by its cover. Editor-in-chief Edward Felsenthal says in a statement: “The June 12 photograph of the 2-year-old Honduran girl became the most visible symbol of the ongoing immigration debate in America for a reason: Under the policy enforced by the administration, prior to its reversal this week, those who crossed the border illegally were criminally prosecuted, which in turn resulted in the separation of children and parents. Our cover and our reporting capture the stakes of this moment.”
So this example you bring up was not a fake picture like you initially said?
Just sticking to the facts….
Happy new year!
Well Opinion, since I don’t read Time Mag. it would be difficult for me to take any stance on their ethics but I will say that were it between “Cadet Bone Spurs” and Time Mag. the choice is clear. And “trashy” is hardly a “sick demented source” but it’s obvious that you are one who deals in “alternative facts” that you believe are factual (perhaps like Cadet Bone Spurs).
But getting back to your original “fake picture,” we don’t know any circumstances (other than you felt it was faked). We don’t know what war (only that it was supposedly a war zone) but let’s assume that a faked picture got published with, I assume, a war story. You seem to feel the photographer (on purpose) got the picture through editors and “..really told a story of a ethically challenged photographer, writer, editor and corporate environment.” You also wrote: “Their drive for profits and readers at all cost and possibly even political motivation to twist news and create drama . It’s undermining truth which eventually undermines democracy.”
Now that’s an awful lot to swallow with only your 35 year old memory of something you feel is “sick and demented” yet haven’t shown us anything “sick and demented.” You want us to take your word for it but that’s not how it works for “readers and thinkers” IMO.
I’m going to get out in front of my skis here and suggest your “personal gain by smearing Time” is nothing other than Time Mag. has dissed your hero (Cadet Bone Spurs) and you feel the need to trash them whenever you can. Good luck with that.
Steve Stine you are 100% wrong. I’m not going to waste my time educating you if you can’t draw a correlation between news ethics and using a girl who never met trump a girl who was never separated from her parents by anyone except the the parent. Look it up . Listen to the fathers side of story. Photo manipulation and story manipulation to smear a person. Without exact clarification in words on picture. If that’s not a fake what is . Dang Steve you disappoint me . Irrigardles of who they smeared . I don’t give a damn it was trump . Bottom line they used manipulation of pictures to manipulate viewers to their opinion. A blatant lie and trash ! Bill your twisting of words and bullshit statements show you would make a damn good reporter in this age . Go kiss times rear and get a job . You are so full of crap it’s beyond comprehension. I hate fake news and all inaccurate news with a passion and that’s why I mentioned time article. A misinformed public is a danger to our nation and democracy period . Honest reporting is imperative. I’m a patriot period I could give a rats ass about who is in power . Pure and simple. So get in front of your skis again bill and make an ass out of yourself. Damn guys use your brains !
Time Magazine = Leftist propaganda garbage.
It appears that I’ve pushed a burr up under you saddle, opinion.
And here I thought that my job here was only to piss off Mongo.
By the way Bryan, you’ve still not answered the question about what gender are those folks with both male and female genitals.
Just to be sure you call people names, insult them, queer shame them, tell them to “STFU” and somehow you think you are being persecuted, is that right?
This is all I know about craigmedred.news: if he doesn’t attract some others that don’t have the first name Bill, Bryan or Steve the author thereof is in deep shit. Unless, of course, said names empty their pockets monthly into the coffer. Do you named folks actually do anything else with your life?
Well monk, I don’t spend a lot of time worrying about what others on here do with their lives.
Well, now I’m pissed that I didn’t make the Monk list of shame….
Don’t you think that maybe, just possibly, that only a small percentage of readers actually comment. I bet that’s something smart sciency people could figure out, huh? Also, just for a second, let’s consider the possibility that Craig does this like a real business person would do and is slowly building his business and base. I brag up Craig’s articles all the time to people that I feel will take the time to read them. What about you? Do you just check up on all of us losers to see if we are still around – if so, what’s that make you?…
Cheers~
Monk, Craig writes stories on various topics of interest on a BLOG site (A blog is a type of website, usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary and descriptions of events) . Some choose to comment on these topics INCLUDING YOURSELF.
Are there some people who comment reguarly -of course. I assume that is the goal.
Well Monk,
Folks like you are in their own sub-category here at “the home for readers and thinkers”…
fake handles with nothing good to add.
You will see there are 2 distinct commentators here on Medred.
Those with original thoughts and experiences to share and a second group who can only waste our precious time responding to personal attacks and blanket statements of “too many comments” from the first group who is addressing the issue at hand.
Maybe you should stick to TV for your “entertainment”?
You set ’em right, boy!
The Atlantic……………….who the hell reads that?
I gotta disagree with you Craig, when you say “the biggest loser, sad to say, is journalism – a business the view of which just keeps “plummetting” in the eyes of the American public.” The biggest loser is “the American public”, not “journalism”. Journalism is alive, maybe not well, but alive…unfortunately propaganda is thriving and clearly outpacing journalism by far.
Most people who read the article you point out as being inaccurate will never know what they read was BS, journalism looses, but the American public looses way more in knowledge and accuracy in information. It’s not helpful for anybody no matter how or why it happens.
People that don’t watch tee-vee.
Oh, Monk,
Only twats get their news solely (or maybe even partially) from the news.
This is where I normally say ‘Cheers!’, but I’ll let you fill in the blank with the vast amount of cranial goo that you’ve absorbed from watching Fox, CNN, MSNBC, etc…
https://www.nps.gov/articles/denali-cakn-moose-surveys.htm
“Based on the last successful survey conducted with adequate snow cover (2011), there are an estimated 1477 moose in the survey area on the north side of the Alaska Range, or about one moose for every 6.7 square kilometers or one moose for every 2.6 square miles. Biologists actually observed only 496 moose in the units surveyed, but when the density is extrapolated to the units not surveyed, the population estimate for the entire survey area totals 1477 moose (with 90 percent certainty that the estimate is within 20 percent of the actual number of moose in the area). “
For Steve
Woodland caribou was “Once upon a Time” a prolific deer species back home in Minnesota. But by the early 1900’s over hunting but especially logging ended their reign there. Now the same is happening to the state’s moose population. Whitetail deer which were Not native to Minnesota but came in after logging Changed the forests and altered the ecosystem. Men who once hunted the caribou out as well as now the moose employ the Same Failed predator policies there as here in Alaska. Kill the majority if not All the predator species to Boost the ungulate populations so we have More trophy animals to Kill ourselves! Human selfishness is the Root of All Evil! We can’t manage our own country yet we Stick our noses into Everyone & Everything’s business thinking we Know best and all we do is Muck it all up! God had a nice running operation going, life ebbs & flows just fine Without our help and our selfish greed to have a Larger set of antlers over the garage or mantle!
“Kill the majority if not All the predator species to Boost the ungulate populations so we have More trophy animals to Kill ourselves!” Boy, what a load of horsepuckster.
Predators have been killed in Alaska for a long time and today there are just as many of them (predators) as there has ever been. Further, I’ve never heard of removing predators to increase “trophy animals” either.
The predator programs here involve the general removal of certain predators to increase calf production (mostly) when certain ungulates are suffering in numbers. Underlying situation is to allow these ungulates to bounce back and provide hunting success for Alaskans (and other hunters). Certainly some hunters are trophy hunters but they tend to be a minority IMO. Here are some moose hunters that clearly not trophy hunters:
https://www.juneauempire.com/news/yukon-river-moose-meet-an-alaska-winter-hunting-adventure/
As I always say, Bill Yankee…the voice of reason.
Someone piss in your brandy tonight, Steve-O?
Guess Bill Yankee isn’t the voice of reason I give him credit for…even when I give him the credit.
No brandy and no piss Bill. I was trying to give you credit for a good point, seems like you missed that…
Sorry, it could be my fault, my patented irony font has yet to be accepted in most major comment sections.
Oh, if you are ever driving by “Glitter Gulch”, stop in the burger joint right across from the gas pumps and grab a burger. Damn tasty.
First i did not know there was caribou in that part of the lower 48. Next i do not believe alaska has any woodland caribou, just barren ground. Also the state has done a great job with I.M. Nelchena has for the last two decades of stable population of caribou, due to harvesting the surplus along with hunters and trappers taking wolves. most recent the 40 mile caribou are at a population were we need to start stabilizing the growth. this happen mostly as a result of minimizing motility during the calving season.
Why the central arctic caribou population plummeted was little harvest of the surplus annual and central arctic caribou split off with porcupine caribou and tasakpuk caribou. Along with some evidence of range condition lacking to support 70,000 and an in balance of diverse ages of caribou herd. i do not believe predation was or is a factor with the decline in the central arctic caribou, nor harvest. This herd is a watch them and count them. we have little access to control the growth by harvest because of the 5 mile corridor restrictions.
Roads do not seam to effect caribou movement. Nelchena and 40 mile caribou cross multiplies of major highways and hundreds of mining roads within their ranges. Infrastructure is not a limiting factor as western arctic caribou migrate right though downtown Kotzebue and delta caribou have been in downtown Fairbanks and are regularly seen in healy and cantwell.
Caribou do what caribou do.
the Chisana herd is considered “woodland caribou.” https://www.nps.gov/articles/chisana-caribou-herd.htm
the Central Arctic Caribou herd appears to have declined when significant members of that herd left to join the Western Arctic Caribou herd, though no has firm numbers on how many.
caribou to have a bad habit of doing what caribou decide to do. there is often no answer to the question why.
caribou to have a bad habit of doing what caribou decide to do. there is often no answer to the question why.
I believe because they are unpredictable. they will use migration patterns they have for the last decade, but for what ever reason they’ll choose a different route. Which may have less disable habitat. Or they will stay in and area were habitat is diminishing and not move in the valley next to them,which has incredible habitat. They will break off and join a different heard. Just to name a few.
ADF&G has no hard numbers on how many caribou from central arctic broke off and joined a other herds. Because they can not distinguish which caribou belong to which herd. they only have collared caribou which has shown dispersal.
Sorry i forgot about the chisana herd. But i will say that just because the cross borders does not always indicate what species they are. 40 mile caribou also cross and go to Dawson. Dawson is the outer range of woodland caribou in the yukon. Have they mixed?
You wrote:
“Everything humans do – even the seemingly most benign things – affect the planet in some way. It’s complicated.”
Yet you did not explain the State of Alaska’s intense “campaign” of killing wolves and bears around the Mulchatna Caribou Herd?
This area is one of the few active “predator control zones” where no bag limits are enforced and “Ted Nugent Type” hunters can kill wolves and bears all year long without discretion?
How does this effect our planet?
“Mulchatna Caribou Herd Predation Management Area. The Mulchatna Caribou Herd Predation Management Area is established to increase the Mulchatna Caribou Herd (MCH) within Units 9(B), 17(B), 17(C), 19(A), and 19(B) to aid in achieving intensive management (IM) objectives; the Mulchatna Caribou Herd Predation Management Area encompasses approximately 39,683 square miles; multiple predator control areas may be utilized within the management area; however, the combined active control areas will be limited to a total of 10,000 square miles, which is 25 percent of the management area”.
What overall health of the Biosphere will be obtained if we kill off “Keystone Species” so that more “Boo” may prosper?
Science tells us that any loss of biodiversity is not good for an ecosystem.
http://www.adfg.alaska.gov/index.cfm?adfg=intensivemanagement.unit_9b_17b_17c_19a_19b#anchor
With respect to your thinking on these issues Steve, I’ll just say that Alaska is a huge state with many different predator-prey issues and they are all dependent on a single Fish and Game agency. And predators certainly include hunters.
For example, look at the different regulations for “hunting big game from a boat.” This is strictly prohibited in areas of SE: http://www.kinyradio.com/news/news-of-the-north/juneau-man-sentenced-in-gmu-4-boat-incident/
Other areas of Alaska allow it if the boat is motorized and forward motion has stopped. My own interest was piqued when I beached my canoe to shoot a bull moose in September (GMU 20B). I was asked, by a friend, if I had stepped out of the canoe in order to shoot-I didn’t remember, frankly, but this canoe was only propelled by a paddle so it didn’t matter. I suspect that had this been in SE Alaska, things would have been different.
And I’ve heard numerous stories of SE deer being shot from boats when they are concentrated on the beaches after big snowfalls. I would not be surprised if more deer have been killed this way than others. Sort of like the number of whitetail deer shot with spotlights and 22 caliber rifles in lower 48. Speculation, of course.
In GMU 16 wildlife is routinely killed from boats (mainly airboats and jetboats) and guides and hunters both laugh at the “forward motion” guidelines.
Some have told me “at least we got off the throttle to shoot”.
Personally, I feel in-season aerial spotting for moose with small aircraft and helicopters is a larger concern to management issues and this is allowed throughout most of the state especially when commercial guiding operations are involved.
I had heard of waterfowl being shot from moving airboats around Cordova-it’s a crapshoot, of course, and a violation would most likely involve forfeiture of the boat. Whew!
I’m unsure of how aerial spotting of moose could be regulated but it’s on the books for sheep. Constant bitching about whether/not the transporting of hunters is an excuse for spotting.
How about preseason spotting of trophy bulls-I’m sure much of this is done for those guides specializing in these extremely large bulls. I just haven’t followed this in B of Game proposals but expect it’s an issue in some areas.
A friend who is a guide told me “in season” spotting for brown bears was stopped years ago, but it still goes on for those large bull moose ALL season.
Sure, there would still be pre-season spotting and seeing the game while in transport, but the in-season is the most annoying and disruptive in my opinion.
Especially if you are hunting deep in the woods and attempting to call in a moose for harvest.
GMU’s 14 and 16 are notoriously loud from what I have encountered over the last decade during moose season.
How could you stop the general flying around and looking at moose, by private pilots? I’m guessing a registered guide with an airplane could be regulated here, but pretty difficult to stop non-hunters from looking. Perhaps the term “spotting” has a particular definition that doesn’t include general tourist “looking.”
I do remember a supercub that flew over me (2017 moose season), following a drainage, at elevation of about 50 feet. I felt that fellow was looking for moose and was in an area whereby access was impossible so there wasn’t any damage (to me). I’ll never know, of course, but if this sort of thing were going on incessantly it would be annoying, for sure. This was close to an area boundary, so it could have been F & G looking for violations, but the flight wasn’t along the boundary.
Steve,
You hear and see a lot of things that should be reported to the troopers, I sure hope you report these crimes against all Alaskans our common resources. If you don’t report these things I can only hope that you think of yourself as being complicit in these horrendous activities, if not well then…
Steve-O,
Not sure where U call home, but hunting from a motor boat in Alaska for moose is totally legal (at least in GMU 14 & 16)…
The joke is the regulations state “motor needs to be shut off and forward progress stopped”…
Well, when running an airboat upstream that only takes a second to flip a switch and wait a second or two to take aim.
What have a described that would make me “complicit”?
And what activities are so “horrendous” that U speak of?
Steve,
Your made up stories don’t pass the smell test. If they were true you should have reported the individuals you claim broke the law, if you did not do that then you failed as a citizen. By sharing your failures here you only further those who would do wrong. You’ve put yourself in a situation where in you cannot win and make yourself look good, even if the sky is falling with chemicals to raise or lower the temperature of the climate for whatever reason you think might make sense.
I know, I know, HAARP did it and I am a paid Russian bot. Problem is I’m just an average Alaskan, tired of reading the crazy stuff you post.
Happy New Year, assuming you think that the New Year is the New Year and not a goberment contrived scheme to trick us all.
Steve-o…
U make NO sense at all.
Which example is “breaking the law”?
Please tell!
Any fool can sit at Deshka Landing ALL hunting season and see boat after boat leaving and hunting for game.
This is Not illegal.
Our appointed F&G reps brag about killing mom and baby bears in books they have published (Green).
I am just an average land owner watching the Travesty occur…
Under the guise of “Predator Control” and bait stations for animals.
You are just another GOP fake “handle” taking jabs at the messenger…
Your dislike for me is well understood NO matter what my personal beliefs entail.
I am certain your personal attacks on this site are far from over (New Year or Not).
Just what I figured, Steve, re-read your posts. Your claims are bunk and you know it. Not attacking the messenger at all only the message, re-read my posts.
Do you think anyone who disagrees with you or points out you are wrong is a Russian bot of fake handle? They must all be HAARP employees and chemtrail making pilots as well, huh?
Steve-Oreo…
Please do give ONE example of my “complicit” actions that U spoke of…
You said “illegal” activity witnessed….
Discussion on the weather and climate has NOTHING to do with what U stated…
Maybe U are a Russian bot or Babcock who can tell these days online?
Why not state your real name if you have any accusations or just “STFU” since you obviously have nothing to add to ANY discussion here or any time you comment on this site.
Steve,
Your story is falling apart, there’s no need to keep making stuff up.
Where do you draw the line on bringing chemtrails into the conversation? Is it just this conversation? I’ve seen you bring it into just about every subject Craig has posted on over the last few months, everyone that I know who believes chemtrails are a secret goberment conspiracy does the exact same thing. Are the chemtrail believers the only people who can bring them up?
Well Steve,
I guess you got backed into a corner with NO evidence or examples of complicit behavior, so you wish to play the geoengineering card.
I did not make up “cloudseeding” nor do I feel it is a “conspiracy”.
Here are declassified docs from the Vietnam War.
It states:
“The Department of Defense has requested our approval to initiate the operational phase of ProjectPopeye in selected areas (map at clip)2 along the infiltration routes in North Vietnam and southern Laos. The objective of the program is to produce sufficient rainfall along these lines of communication to interdict or at least interfere with truck traffic between North and South Vietnam. Recently improved cloud seeding techniques would be applied on a sustained basis, in a non-publicized effort to induce continued rainfall through the months of the normal dry season.”
So is this gov run site all a lie in your mind?
https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v28/d274
Steve,
Your words are right up there ^. They haven’t disappeared. You were the one claiming people broke the law, until you backed away from your comments and decided that nobody broke the law.
What purpose do you think weather is being manipulated by chemtrails for? What is the end game and why?
Steve,
I suggest you do your own research if you have an interest in Geoengineering.
I merely point out that the technology DOES exist and has proven highly successful in government studies since the early 1960’s.
The gov site I gave you above stated:
“In our view, the experiments were undeniably successful, indicating that, at least under weather and terrain conditions such as those involved, the U.S. Government has realized a capability of significant weather modification. If anything, the tests were “too successful”.
That is why I have shared videos of JFK and LBJ speaking of “controlling the weather”.
I do not claim to be an expert, yet there are ample declassified documents to back up my statements.
Please feel free to join our discussion on weather and climate articles when they are mentioned.
You can also check out videos from Dane Wigington at geoengineerwatch.org. or on the youtube channel by the same name.
Dane is a past Bectal Engineer and very knowledgeable on the subject. (Not your typical Liberal)
Steve,
I’ve done some research into the subject, enough to know that it’s not “proven highly successful” as you claim (on a side note, that is how to correctly use quotation marks…you use the actual words the person you are quoting used). More importantly than if the technology exists and is being used, knowing the reason why the technology might exist and what the purpose it is being used for is a far more pressing matter. If it is just to make clouds to prove we can that is far different than any nefarious means that most chemtrail believers tend to think.
Sorry Craig, off topic – HAARP is a target of conspiracy theorists, who claim that it is capable of “weaponizing” weather. Commentators and scientists say that advocates of this theory are uninformed, as claims made fall well outside the abilities of the facility, if not the scope of natural science.
“Stanford University professor Umran Inan told Popular Science that weather-control conspiracy theories were “completely uninformed,” explaining that “there’s absolutely nothing we can do to disturb the Earth’s [weather] systems. Even though the power HAARP radiates is very large, it’s minuscule compared with the power of a lightning flash—and there are 50 to 100 lightning flashes every second. HAARP’s intensity is very small.”[5] Computer scientist David Naiditch characterizes HAARP as “a magnet for conspiracy theorists,” saying that HAARP attracts their attention because, “its purpose seems deeply mysterious to the scientifically uninformed.”[6] Journalist Sharon Weinberger called HAARP “the Moby Dick of conspiracy theories,” and said the popularity of conspiracy theories often overshadows the benefits HAARP may provide to the scientific community.[46][47] Austin Baird writing in the Alaska Dispatch said, “What makes HAARP susceptible to conspiracy criticism is simple. The facility doesn’t open its doors in the same way as other federally-funded research facilities around the country, and it doesn’t go to great efforts to explain the importance of its research to the public.”[37] In 2016, in response to these claims, the University of Alaska Fairbanks Geophysical Institute, which manages the facility, announced that HAARP will host an annual open house in August, allowing visitors to tour the complex.
Bryan,
Maybe U and Steve-O can hook up on a “man date”…
U two seem to be “cut from the same cloth”.
Funny, how the Liberals are considered crazy by you too, yet you guys bring up “chemtrails” and HAARP on a Caribou Story?
Must be too much eggnog by the fire?
Steve,
Are you really trying to queer shame Bryan and myself? Really? Some people…
Wait a minute Steve, I have never brought-up HAARP. The whole thing is just too silly. Nonsense, thus, I do not bring it up. You habe brought it up on almost every thread it seems. Starting to sound like Monk with the name calling.
Ok guys, so the thought of a “man date” makes U both uncomfortable…
As for Bryan’s HAARP info…
It is B.S.
Your quote said:
“…that “there’s absolutely nothing we can do to disturb the Earth’s [weather] systems…”
Well, here is a news release from the office of Naval Research showing how the HAARP can create “plasma clouds”.
“These glow discharges in the upper atmosphere were generated as a part of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) sponsored Basic Research on Ionospheric Characteristics and Effects (BRIOCHE) campaign to explore ionospheric phenomena and its impact on communications and space weather.”
Now that is funny “space weather”???
“The next HAARP campaign, scheduled for early 2013, will include experiments to develop denser, more stable ionization clouds.”
BTW 3.6 megawatts is enough electricity to power nearly 600 homes…and to think this thing runs on Diesel!
https://www.nrl.navy.mil/news/releases/nrl-scientists-produce-densest-artificial-ionospheric-plasma-clouds-using-haarp
Steve Stine,
You’ve exposed yourself as a bigot. You dismiss those you disagree with and call them names.
It’s sad really, when you aren’t queer shaming people and going on and on about chemtrails you sometimes bring something of value to the conversation. But going forward it will be hard to think of you as anything other than bigot Steve Stine.
BTW, Steve the bigot Stine, 3.6 megawatts powers a lot more than 600 homes…don’t read the first sentence of whatever you google to give you your information, do some actual research.
Steve O.
You are definitely out for a fight online tonight.
Sorry I tried to respond to your insults.
I will not in the future no matter what they entail.
Happy trails!
When did I insult you Steve the bigot Stine? You see I’m not insulting you for calling you what you are, a bigot, but I would like to see where you think I’ve insulted you. You think saying that Bryan and I should hook up on a “man date” is a good old fashioned joke and that we should just let you get away with it by claiming I’ve insulted you, please show me where I insulted you and your bigoted ways. You’ve called me names, claimed I am a made up persona, told me to “STFU”, and then tried to slander myself and Bryan by denigrating homosexuals for some unknown reason.
Steve Stine, you’ve not only doubled down on your queer shaming…you’ve now tripled down on it. For shame sir, for shame.
Steve the bigot Stine, here are a few direct quotes of how you’ve insulted me on just this section of this thread…
Steve-Oreo
You are just another GOP fake “handle”
U are a Russian bot or Babcock
you obviously have nothing to add to ANY discussion here or any time you comment on this site
U and Steve-O can hook up on a “man date”
U two seem to be “cut from the same cloth”
Must be too much eggnog by the fire?
Those are just a few of your direct quotes in this section of this thread, there are other comments directed at other people who you disagree with that show you are the on with the problem attacking others with personal attacks.
Almost every post you have responding to another poster insults anyone you disagree with, go read them as if you are the person they are addressed to and tell me different.
Go re-read all of your posts from every comment section on this site, HAARP, chemtrails, and insults. And you say I have nothing to add here? I don’t take kindly to bigots and when they make themselves known, as you have, I will shine the light of day on them.
Steve, once and for all can we put this whole HAARP program to rest? No name calling. But, how can you call it BS? Besides, a leftist university is using it. How does that help the conspiracy?
“Work on the HAARP facility began in 1993. The current working IRI was completed in 2007; its prime contractor was BAE Systems Advanced Technologies.[1] As of 2008, HAARP had incurred around $250 million in tax-funded construction and operating costs. In May 2014, it was announced that the HAARP program would be permanently shut down later in the year.[3] After discussions between the parties, ownership of the facility and its equipment was transferred to the University of Alaska Fairbanks in August 2015.”
Also, there isn’t much development in the Selkirk Mountains that I ever saw. The grizzly was reintroduced there several years ago. The cougar, along with wolves have a solid pressence there as well.
Why should this surprise anybody? Usual lies from the usual sources. Take the Polar Bear for example.
I hardly think tourism in Denali is affecting the caribou in any meaningful way. We are talking about a 90 mile dirt road running through over 6 million (6,075,029) acres – or 9,492 square miles. As for the tourism “Glitter Gulch” is a minor footprint. Also, each park bus holds approx 70 people who are charged on average $35 (70x$35=$2,450 per bus). So, in 2017 tourists brought in $14.8 million. Not bad for a minor footprint with almost zero affect on caribou and wildlife.
Nice Bryan! First you “think” that tourism in Denali is not affecting caribou in “any meaningful way” and then conclude (after some calculations on bus money) that there is “almost zero affect on caribou.”
Are you in the running for one of Mike Dunleavy’s advisory positions on wildlife??
Fair enough Bill, but maybe you can explain how a single lane dirt road that is 50 feet wide and 90 miles long in a vast land of 6 million (6,075,029) acres – or 9,492 square miles can or does affect the caribou in any way? Remember the pipeline? “All the caribou will die, it will prevent their migration, yadda” when in reality what happened?
I don’t have an explanation one way or the other, Bryan.
I suspect that the road has little effect on caribou (or wolves) however the number of buses traveling said road may have much.
I remember a popular poster, back in the day, with the caption “more than one way to get caribou to cross the pipeline.” The poster showed several caribou carcasses being carried by a forklift crossing a bridge over the pipeline.
Well Brian,
You act like everyone who enters the park arrives seated on a bus and sticks to the main road?
Do you not remember Jeff King entering the Park via his “Argo” and taking a bull moose illegally?
Many poachers affect the wildlife populations within the park’s boundary and let’s not forget:
“There are over 600,000 visitors (642,809 in 2017) that venture to Denali every year. At many national parks, there is an entrance station where visitors can be counted. But at Denali, visitors access the park in numerous ways and in many locations.”
(Wikipedia)
Many of the “McCandless” type personalities do not just stay on the road.
https://www.adn.com/alaska-news/article/jeff-king-fined-4750-poaching/2008/12/06/
Steve, Craig was refering to tourists and “Glitter Gulch”. And yes, I’d venture to say 90% of the tourists enter Denali on bus and never leave the confines of it except for a picture here and there. I’d be more worried about the locals drunk, or on meth, poaching. But, why bring potential Federal charges when you can just poach the boundries? My point being a huge portion of Denali visitors come by way of cruise ship, stay at the Princess Resort, infuse money in “Glitter Gulch”, and spend most of their vacation on a bus while doing very little harm to the environment.
Well Bryan,
I guess that “very little harm to the environment”, would depend on how you view cruise ship “discharges” and diesel exhaust from ships, trains and buses that cart their asses around?
As for once they arrive in the park, it is obvious that a snake of buses many miles long all summer does disrupt wildlife patterns….to what extent is highly debatable.
One study I found stated:
“Between 1972 and 1997, annual visitation to Denali National Park increased from about 45000 to 350000, with attendant increases in traffic on the park road. The mean number of caribou, grizzly bear, and Dall sheep observed did not decline (p > 0.301 ) from 1973 to 1997. The number of moose observed declined by more than 50% (R² = 0.529, p < 0.001 ). The estimated population of moose also declined over the same period."
I would think just like the railroad all summer, many of these moose were killed by buses during this period…over 50 percent decline is a pretty large chunk of moose to loose in Denali N.P.!
https://www.jstor.org/stable/40512202?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
Come on Steve..Bit hysterical arent you? Moose killed by buses in DNP? The buses average what? 35mph? As for cruise ships I do not know but, “Tourism in Alaska statewide, direct visitor industry spending is more than $2.42 billion annually. It generates 38,700 jobs in Alaska and $1.3 billion in labor income. On average, each visitor spends approximately $1,000 in Alaska during their visit, on top of the cost of the airfare or cruise to get here. – ‘Anchorage.net'”.
Think of how much welfare chedda that pays.
So, obviously one has to take the good with the bad.
Plus, why on earth do you quote a 20 year old study?
Bryan,
I quote the study from the late 90’s cause it proves your statement of “very little harm to the environment” is completely FALSE!
A 100 miles of buses HAD a huge affect on moose when visitors jumped “from about 45000 to 350000, with attendant increases in traffic on the park road.”
Where do you think over 50 percent of the moose went?
They did not get “packed out” by those bus loads of tourists.
This decline in a food source for wolves caused many packs to look outside the park for food.
In turn many of these wolves were killed by hunters and trappers as “buffer zones” are not enforced…
So, even though this study was from years ago, we still see the effect of this huge decrease in moose population today (which was correlated to the explosion in tourists along park road corridor).
Nature is connected through the Web of Life.
Boy Steve, I just find it hard to believe that those moose declines are due to Park road and buses. This comment in the article is not your source, I hope: “Roads in Canada, she writes, “provided the wolves year-round access to tasty caribou flesh. Research suggests that wolves can travel up to three times faster along roads and trails than they can in unbroken forest.”
While I have no idea of the research here, I find the comment absurd without something else added.
Steve, see a post I put at the top. Also “Approximately 60% of the calf crop died before 5 months of age. Productivity was significantly lower in the northern section of the study area where there is less high-quality habitat, suggesting that, even in this low-density population, nutrition could be a limiting factor. It appears that predation on young calves, winter weather, and nutritional constraints may be interacting to limit this population. Latent traits, such as overproduction of calves and migratory behavior, which do not currently enhance fitness, may persist within this population so that individuals with these traits can reap benefits when environmental conditions change.”
The road has virtually no affect with short or long term (studies from 1972) animal populations discussed in these comments.
“This 92-mile ribbon of road—winding west from the park entrance to Kantishna—was completed in 1938.” https://www.nps.gov/dena/learn/nature/road-history.htm
The sky isn’t falling, even if the crazy religion you’ve been following says it is.
Here’s some more information for those who think the buses are running moose over…https://www.nps.gov/dena/planyourvisit/visiting-denali.htm
Knowledge, they aren’t spraying chemicals in the air to keep it away from you…