Malheur Standoff Puts Science in the Crosshairs

[struggle4progress]

The antigovernment protest is putting research, wildlife, resources and artifacts at risk
By Zach Zorich on January 29, 2016

Before it became a flashpoint in an antigovernment protest, the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge was a place where dozens of scientists conducted research projects aimed at studying the plants, animals and ancient cultures who lived in eastern Oregon’s high desert ...

Malheur is unique because it contains a variety of environments including sagebrush steppe, salt desert scrub, stands of willow, wetlands, open lakes and wet meadows. This diverse ecosystem attracts hundreds of bird species, which humans have been hunting for at least 9,800 years ... Thousands of prehistoric and historic artifacts that provide insight into the lives of the Native Americans and ranchers who have called Malheur home are stored at the refuge’s headquarters ...

Today, there are 25 active biological monitoring projects at the refuge ...

The archaeology work at the refuge became one of the occupiers’ complaints against the government .. when the militia released a video showing one of their leaders .. inspecting cardboard boxes of stone artifacts that had been recovered from the refuge. Finicum .. expressed dismay over the treatment of the artifacts and asked for a liaison with the Burns Paiute Tribe to discuss returning the artifacts to them. The tribe has responded by enacting a resolution calling on the U.S. Department of the Interior to prosecute the militants to the fullest extent of the law ...

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/malheur-standoff-puts-science-in-the-crosshairs/

[struggle4progress]

1. Malheur occupation could set conservation efforts back years

Invasive carp may recolonize areas they were once eradicated from, depending on how long the occupation lasts.
Ben Goldfarb Jan. 25, 2016

... for Linda Beck, Malheur’s fish biologist, the takeover felt discomfitingly personal. It was on Beck’s desk, a cozy corner nook, that the insurgents laid their ammunition boxes and ate their pizza. It was Beck whom they called “carp lady,” and Beck whom Ryan Bundy referred to as “part of what’s destroying America.”

The displaced scientist observed the assault with bewilderment. The rebels claimed to speak for Harney County, but Beck had lived in Burns since 2009, and she’d never hesitated to wear her U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service uniform into town.

... Linda Beck — carp lady, symbol of federal overreach, alleged foe of Oregon’s ranchers — is the wife and daughter-in-law of Oregon ranchers. And in thwarting Beck’s research and management efforts at Malheur, the militants aren’t just standing in the way of science; they're potentially obstructing the same “traditional” land uses they endorse.

... Beck has spent years combating an even more insidious invader: common carp. The carp arrived at Malheur in the 1920s, released as a food source by either a local landowner or the feds (no one’s quite sure), and swiftly spread through the refuge’s lattice of ponds and rivers. They took up particularly tenacious residence in Malheur Lake, along whose muddy, shallow bottom they rooted, pig-like, for food. As the carp stirred up gunk, the lake grew cloudier, blocking sunlight from reaching aquatic vegetation. The plants died, and the insects they sheltered disappeared. Lacking habitat or food, the vast flocks of migrating ducks and geese that had once used the refuge as a pit-stop along the Pacific Flyway dwindled to a tenth of their former glory ...

http://www.hcn.org/articles/carp-lady-linda-beck-malheur-standoff-could-set-back-conservation-by-three-years

[Botany]

2. Oh my Dog!

"The tribe has responded by enacting a resolution calling on the U.S. Department of the Interior
to prosecute the militants to the fullest extent of the law ... "

*****

These Y'allQaeda a-holes have cut roads through the refuge w/back hoes and bulldozers that
they took from the maintenance area of the refuge.