Sierra Club: Why I hunt, writing contest.

[Tom]

Win a trip to Alaska. contest ends April 31.

http://www.sierraclub.org/huntingfishing/whyihunt/

What do you think?

 

[Washington Hunter]

I wish I was a better writer! I'd love to win the grand prize hunting and fishing trip to Alaska for two. Maybe Moosie will give it a shot!

 

[Curly]

What is open for hunting between August 19 and 26? Bear?

 

[Washington Hunter]

Probably blacktail deer.

 

[Washington Hunter]

Here's what it says about the prizes. Maybe somebody familiar with Alaska will have an idea what species would be hunted at that time and location.

4: PRIZES. Prize and approximate retail value (ARV): The grand prize package includes an all expense paid hunting and fishing trip for two to the Alaska sportsman's lodge including all lodging, ground transportation, meals, airfare to and from anywhere in the Continential United States to and from Anchorage, Alaska, flights from Anchorage to the lodge, fly outs from the lodge, lodge fees and gratuity. The winner will also receive a $500 gift certificate to Orvis. The Approximate Retail Value of the grand prize is $12,200. Three first prize winners will receive a $500 gift certificate to Orvis. The approximate retail value of the first prize package is $500. Three second prize winners will receive a $300 gift certificate to Orvis. The approximate retail value of the second prize package is $300. Three third prize winners will receive a $250 gift certificate to Orvis. The approximate retail value of the third prize package is $250.

 

[Erik in AK]

curly et al,

And caribou

 

[JoseCuervo]

I thot all the environmental groups were anti-hunting????

 

[Washington Hunter]

Yeah, everybody says the Sierra Club is anti-hunting, but they're not. Lots of their members are hunters. I've read through their website before and I agree with a lot of their ideas. I believe the guy who originally founded the Sierra Club was a hunter. And yes Jose, I know you're being sarcastic.

 

[Tom]

Here's the article about one of the 15 board member of Sierra Club resigning over this and other support for hunting.

http://www.chattanoogan.com/articles/article_83936.asp

He objects to hunting pictures of Sierra Club members in their newsletter also. Good riddens to him, eh.

 

[Delw]

Sierra Club Director Resigns to Protest Hunting Prize
posted April 17, 2006

Sierra Club Director Paul Watson, one of the 15 National Directors of the Sierra Club, has resigned today from the National Board of the Sierra Club.

He was elected to the Board of Directors in 2003 for a three year term. His term ends May 17th, 2006.

Saying, “I won’t fade quietly into the night,” Watson tendered his resignation on April 17th, which is a month before his term expires to protest the use of Club resources to finance a sport hunting trip to encourage hunting.

Watson was not notified of a contest posted in January 2006. The contest is an essay competition entitled Why I Hunt?

http://www.sierraclub.org/huntingfishing/whyihunt/

The first prize is a $12,700 hunting trip to the Sportsman’s Lodge in Alaska. Additional prizes totaling $3,000 will also be awarded.

“It appears to me that the Sierra Club should have better projects to spend $15,700 on than sending some nimrod to Alaska to shoot wildlife,” said Watson. “Last year they turned down my request for a $5,000 grant to assist the rangers in the Galapagos National Park deal with poachers."

Watson last year protested the posting of pictures of Sierra Club leaders posing with their trophy kills on the Sierra Club website. Each year, the Club is spending over two hundred thousand dollars on hunter outreach programs despite the fact that less than 20% of the Sierra Club membership are hunters. target="_blank">http://www.sierraclub.org/huntingfishing/whoweare.asp

Watson, who has been a Sierra Club member since 1968, thinks the Club is forgetting its role as a conservation organization. “This is John Muir’s Sierra Club,” he said, “It is not supposed to be the Sahara Club. You can’t love nature with a gun.”

Watson will not be attending his final Board meeting in San Francisco on May 17-20th.

“I have no intention of attending a meeting of a hunting club,” said Watson. ”I wonder how many of the Sierra Club’s 750,000 members know and approve of killing animals with their contributions?”

 

[Washington Hunter]

I think it's great that the Sierra Club sees hunters as their friend and not the enemy. Good riddance to that Watson guy.

 

[TheTone]

We had a pretty decent article in our local paper about a year ago on the clubs efforts to reach out and draw hunters and fishers to itself. I would that most hunters do care about the environment (and they all should), so the Seirra Club has a huge pool of potential memebers if they can convince hunters that they are on the same page. Good riddance to the anti hunter director for resigning, opinions like his are one of the reasons more hunters don't think of the Sierra club as a friend.

 

[Hangar18]

Here is my submission:

 

[Tom]

Are you sending it in?

Bart C. Semcer
Sierra Club
408 C Street, NE
Washington, DC 20002

Put a stamp on it and mail it quick, it has to be there by April 31.

 

[Hangar18]

Don't need a stamp. I have an unused postage paid envelope I received February 29th, 1998. I was going to mail them pictures of all the environmental damage that my friends & I caused with our snowmobiles, but I haven't found any yet. The damn snow keeps melting every spring.

 

[Washington Hunter]

Hangar18, you missed a good opportunity; you could have delivered your message in person:

Montana Chapter of the Sierra Club


Northern Rockies Annual Hunter and Angler Summit
Post Falls, Idaho - April 15, 2005


See our postcard for more information.


Sierra Club cordially invites you to join other Sierra Club volunteers and staff in attending the first annual Northern Rockies Hunting & Fishing Summit to be held April 15-17th, 2005 in Post Falls, Idaho.

This summit is an opportunity to answer the question of how to build a stronger and more effective Sierra Club by connecting the many Sierra Club members in our region who hunt and fish to the shared values of the traditional conservation community.

Featured summit speakers will include renowned outdoor writer Rick Bass, conservation biologist Shane Mahoney, Outdoor Life Magazine 2005 Conservation Award winner Jim Posewitz, as well as Scott Stouder and Dave Stalling of Trout Unlimited.

The Summit will be held at Templin's Resort in Post Falls, ID on the beautiful Spokane River and will feature special presentations such as Lewis & Clark conservation work, strategy sessions, sportsmen films and social events that celebrate our shared commitment to conserve wild America and pass on our outdoor traditions.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Scholarships are available to cover summit costs associated with food, lodging and limited ground transportation for the first 60 Sierra Club members who RSVP. Contact us today to be a part of this first annual gathering of Sierra Club sportsmen and conservationists.

For more information please contact: Jeff Holmes ([email protected]) in Spokane,WA at 509-868-3337 or Bob Clark ([email protected]) in Missoula, MT at 406-549-1142

SUMMIT LOCATION:
Red Lion Templin's Resort
414 E. 1st Ave.
Post Falls, ID.
208-773-1611
Visit http://www.redlion.com/WHC/hotels/ShowHotel.asp?ID=56 for hotel details and directions

 

[Washington Hunter]

Here's more...sounds like the Sierra Club is on our side (that is if you are a hunter and support the protection of wildlife habitat):

Boulder-White Clouds Update
by John Schmidt, chair, Eastern Idaho Group

The Boulder-White Clouds region of central Idaho is an area of stunning beauty, a place where people find solitude and wildlife seek refuge, where crystal-clear streams form the headwaters of river systems and where wild lands are still abundant. It truly is a place deserving of permanent protection under the Wilderness Act.

In mid-June, Idaho Representative Mike Simpson unveiled a proposal, "The Central Idaho Economic Development and Recreation Proposal Framework" that would, among other things, designate parts of this region as Wilderness.

Simpson has tried to include something for everyone in this plan:

economic aid to a struggling Custer County
guarantees of permanent access to motorized recreationists
Wilderness protection for some of the regions' wild lands.
While we hoped for a plan that we could support, we feel that Simpson's proposal has gone too far. As a whole the package is significantly flawed and has generated little outright support from the conservation community. Efforts to improve the proposal are being attempted, but so far Simpson's team has shown little inclination to address the major concerns raised by conservationists.

The most appealing component of Simpson's proposal is the nearly 320,000 acres to be protected as Wilderness - but this is roughly only half of the area available for wilderness protection. Simpson's plan excludes many areas that have been recommended for Wilderness protection in the past. The Framework's provision to purchase and retire livestock grazing permits within the proposed Wilderness area is also an idea supported by both ranchers and conservation groups.

In written comments to Simpson, and in a private meeting with his chief of staff, we have identified four main points that collectively prevent us from being able to support his proposal. Those four points include:

Giving Away Our Public Lands: The Framework proposes to transfer about 1,600 acres of public lands to Custer County and ultimately to private development. Although the land grab has largely been kept out of public sight, we now know it includes prime lands in the Sawtooth National Recreation Area (SNRA) near Stanley. These lands were originally set aside with the intent that they'd be permanently protected. Yet Simpson's plan would target them for subdividing. These are the classic views of the Sawtooth Peaks between Stanley and Lower Stanley. They are also home to three plant species found no where else on earth, and historic wintering areas for elk.

Simpson's intent is to provide economic assistance to Custer County, yet when he conducted public hearings to roll out his proposal, he repeatedly heard local leaders ask for direct appropriations of money instead of federal land. It was pointed out that Congress (of which Simpson is a member) is in arrears for payments in lieu of taxes (PILT funds) to fund county governments. So, while Simpson can find money to buy out grazing permits and lavish money on the ORV crowd, he is unable to directly allocate a penny to Custer County except by giving away our public lands.

While we recognize the importance of rural economic development, privatizing public lands as a quid pro quo for Wilderness designation is a show-stopper. The Sierra Club will strongly and actively oppose any plan that promotes the disposal of our public lands, including lands withing the SNRA, described as one of Idaho's crown-jewels.

Wilderness Water Rights: The Framework specifically prohibits federal reserved water rights within the areas proposed for Wilderness designation.

Water is a crucial value of Wilderness and especially in the Boulder-White Clouds, with its abundance of pristine lakes, rivers and streams, and important salmon and trout fisheries. Increasing human pressures, climate change and future loss of snowpack, and overallocation of Idaho waters will lead to increasing pressure on these waters. The many corridors and wildlands excluded from this wilderness proposal will be open to water development. These waters are vulnerable to exploitation.

Idaho has no mechanism to protect the water resources in the Boulder-White Clouds Mountains. If, as some assert, there is no threat to these waters, then why not protect these waters with a water right? Congress should explicitly provide - not deny - a federal reserved water right for these waters. Wilderness without water is no wilderness at all.

Motorized Recreation Language: This fragile ecosystem with its brutal winters is home to elk and mule deer, antelope, mountain goats and wolves, wolverine and lynx, and other species. Any action by Congress should recognize and protect wildlife as part of our society's stewardship responsibility. The Simpson plan, however, largely ignores its harm to wildlife -- from giving away elk wintering grounds to developers near Stanley, to legislating corridors for dirt bikes and snowmobiles right into critical wildlife areas.

The proposal will lead to increased motorized activity on the west side of the White Clouds, threatening wildlife and solitude as well as affecting outfitters and guides who operate in this area. It will also grandfather-in and guarantee motorized use in many areas within the Boulder-White Clouds.

It will open up new areas to motorized activity and lavish public monies on building new ORV trails, including one million dollars to the Idaho Department of Recreation to be used to promote motorized activities Areas at risk include Champion Lakes, Frog Lake, Germania Creek and Railroad Ridge.

These ORV provisions become the law of the land if they're approved by Congress. Yet much of the language of this proposal would strip away the discretion of federal land managers to balance ORV recreation demands with the ecological realities of this high country and the wildlife. Simpson's giveaways to motorized vehicles in the Boulder-White Clouds simply goes too far and is another show-stopper for the Sierra Club.

Wilderness Study Area Release Language: Roughly half of this wild land will be protected as wilderness. What happens to the other half? Could future generations protect these areas as wilderness? Those areas excluded from Wilderness designation would be released and managed according to their respective forest plans. There would be no guarantees that these wild lands would remain wild, and given the emphasis on motorized recreation in this area, these lands could easily lose their wilderness qualities as motorized use encroaches in them. Worse, some areas stand to be "hard-released" and opened to motorized recreational use. The Northern Rockies Chapter volunteers and staff are working with others in the conservation community locally and nationally to improve the proposal. Regrettably, the eleventh-hour interest by Rep. Simpson to hear the concerns of the Sierra Club and other conservation organizations bodes poorly.

The Sierra Club remains committed to protecting the Boulder-White Clouds, one of America's most precious wildands. Add up the cost to wildlife, fisheries and water resources, scenic values, and wilderness solitude; then layer the far-reaching and terrible precedents for federal environmental laws and policy, and the Simpson proposal leaves you with "sticker shock". Barring significant changes in it, we are prepared to actively oppose the deal in order to ensure that a flawed plan doesn't become federal law.

For more current information on the chapter's efforts to gain genuine protection for the Boulder-White Clouds including a copy of the chapter's comments on Simpson's plan and photos of some of the areas mentioned above visit the chapter's web site at http://idaho.sierraclub.org

 

[Ithaca 37]

I think it's great that the Sierra Club is reaching out to hunters.

 

[Hangar18]

WH - Why would I drive to Post Falls from Boise (400 miles one way in a truck that gets 12 mpg at the cost of $2.69 / gallon), when I can put my message in the mailbox 20 feet from my front door and send it at the Sierra Club's expense? That there is bad money management.

Here's more...sounds like the Sierra Club is on our side (that is if you are a hunter and support the protection of wildlife habitat):

Do an internet search on current SC board member Paul Watson. See how much he supports your hunting.

I am a hunter and support the protection of wildlife habitat. I am also an example of someone that has learned and can do this without the "help" of the Sierra Club. I learned the values of conservation through good land stewardship growing up on a small ranch in Wyoming. Those values were reinforced and expanded upon by time spent in the Boy Scouts and a couple of college courses. My first Elk hunt was with my dad on my fifth birthday (still haven't killed one yet though), and my first snowmobile ride occured before that. I also know that my snowmobile travels over the snow (which melts EVERY spring). My snowmobile stays out of big game winter range (and not by accident) where designated by the appropriate public agency, as deliniated on every winter travel map.

I oppose anything and everything the Sierra Club says or does because most of the time it affects where I can ride my snowmobile. That most definitely includes any designation of new wilderness. I too oppose CIEDRA but for different reasons than the SC.

There are other ways of protecting wildlife habitat. There is no rational reason to close an area to snowmobiling other than to protect winter range, and that is already done.

What do I do to protect wildlife habitat? Mostly nothing. I practice low impact hunting / hiking by walking from my truck; leave no trace; and writing letters to those responsible for decision making when land raping is on the table.

I don't have time because I am too busy with work, volunteering with my son's Boy Scout troop, and trying to keep my riding areas from being closed by people that think OUR public lands should be closed to everyone that does not share their set of values. There are 4 million acres of designated wilderness just in Idaho. They can take their values there.

BTW - This is an OPINION for those that have made the mistake in the past of thinking otherwise.