This is the third of the draft policies on grazing. Forwarded by Jane Clark
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DRAFT POLICY III
Livestock Grazing: Public Lands
The Sierra Club advocates an end to commercial livestock grazing on
public lands. Subsequent to the removal of livestock, the Sierra Club
supports the restoration of natural processes and the restoration of
native plants and wildlife. The Sierra Club further supports the
preservation, as open space, of the private land portions of ranches
holding public land grazing leases.
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Chronological listing of Sierra Club Groups and Chapters that have
approved resolutions calling for a Club policy opposing livestock
grazing on federal public lands.
Groups:
Lehigh Valley (PA) March 9, 1999
Algonquin Shores (John Muir) March 31, 1999
Niagara (Atlantic) April 27, 1999
Iroquois (Atlantic) May 10, 1999
Susquehanna (Atlantic) May 12, 1999
Rochester Region (Atlantic) May 13, 1999
Northeastern Pennsylvania (PA) August 3, 1999
Heart of Illinois (IL) August 10, 1999
Montgomery County (MD) August 12, 1999
Piasa Palisades (IL) August 16, 1999
Woods and Wetlands (IL) September 1, 1999
Northern Alameda County (S.F. Bay) September 27, 1999
El Paso Region (Rio Grande) October 13, 1999
Many Rivers (OR) October 22, 1999
Shawnee (IL) November 18, 1999
Central New Mexico (Rio Grande) January 10, 2000
Juniper (OR) January 25, 2000
Rogue (OR) February 8, 2000
Rincon (Grand Canyon) February 10, 2000
Chapters:
Atlantic (NY) June 5, 1999
Vermont June 21, 1999
John Muir (WI) July 17, 1999
Ohio September 12, 1999
Loma Prieta (CA) October 11, 1999
San Francisco Bay (CA) December 13, 1999
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Appendix
I. Overview of Public Lands Grazed By Livestock
A. Federal Lands
Approximately 98% of all livestock grazing on public lands in the U.S.
occurs in the 11 Western states. The remaining 2% is mostly in the
Midwest, where about 325,000 acres of Bureau of Land Management (BLM)
lands and several million acres of Forest Service lands (including
National Grasslands) are open to ranching. Approximately 100,000 acres
of National Forest in the East and some other non-Western federal lands
are commercially grazed. (Jacobs 1991:21)
The U.S. Forest Service and BLM administer 85% of Western public
ranchland--about 260 million acres, or an area the size of the 14
Eastern seaboard states plus Missouri. Of this 85%, the BLM administers
63% (163 million acres) and the Forest Service administers 37% (97
million acres). Roughly 90% of Western BLM and 70% of Western Forest
Service land is managed for ranching [outside of Alaska]. (Jacobs
1991:21)
National Wildlife Refuges (NWRs), administered by the U.S. Fish &
Wildlife Service, are the only federal lands in the U.S. where wildlife
has officially been given higher priority than recreational and
commercial activities. Federal law states that no recreational or
commercial use shall be permitted on these lands unless the Secretary of
the Interior determines that these activities are compatible with the
primary purposes for which Refuges are established. As of 1991,
according to Jacobs (1991:470), 156 of the 368 NWRs in the 17 Western
states and Pacific Islands allowed commercial livestock grazing and/or
haying.
In the 11 Western states, the National Park Service currently
administers 23 National Parks, 47 National Monuments, 11 National
Recreation Areas, and 17 National Memorials, Historic Sites, Historic
Parks, Battlefield Parks, Seashores and such. These 98 NPS units cover
about 17 million acres, or 2.3% of the West. Somewhat less than 3
million acres of this land is open to commercial ranching, including 7
National Parks, 7 National Monuments, 5 National Recreation Areas, and 7
National Memorials (Jacobs 1991:473)
B. State Lands
Most state land was established for the purpose of supporting education,
including state colleges, while smaller land grants were provided for
state institutions, internal improvements, and other purposes.
Typically, Western states require state lands to be used to return the
highest possible revenue to state school systems. "The 11 Western
states presently own approximately 46 million acres--roughly 6% of the
West. About 36 million acres, or nearly 80% is used for livestock
ranching." (Jacobs 1991:478)
"Various state parks, state-operated regional parks, and state land
trusts are ranched, often as a condition of their establishment. Many
of these lands are purchased and set aside for the expressed purpose of
preserving their natural character for the enjoyment and use of the
people." (Jacobs 1991:480)
II. Economics of Public Lands Grazing
The federal grazing program, which benefits a relatively small number of
individuals, is heavily dependent on taxpayer subsidies.
A. Direct and indirect annual subsidies may reach $500 million (Hess &
Wald 1995), which include $180 million for the BLM grazing program
(Nelson 1997:666) and $13.9 million for Wildlife Services' pest and
predator control (Predator Project 1997:4).
B. Although the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Farm Service Agency is
mandated to give emergency livestock feed relief to ranchers only in
periods of extreme drought, in practice it hands out $100 million to
$500 million annually during both dry and wet years. (Holechek 1995)
"In effect, emergency feed relief creates artificial drought by
subsidizing overgrazing. It allows ranchers to run a grass deficit.
Each year that they overstock and overgraze--irrespective of
rainfall--their rangelands produce less grass, and with less grass their
need for drought relief mounts." (Hess & Holechek 1995)
C. Federal subsidies benefit approximately 22,350 livestock operators
(2.3% of the operators in the contiguous 48 states) (U.S. Department of
Interior 1994:3-65), who collectively produce only about 2% of the U.S.
beef supply (Committee on Government Operations 1986). The
approximately 4,600 sheep producers with federal permits (U.S.
Department of Interior 1994:3-65) represent about 4% of U.S. producers
(Vegetarian Voice 1991:13).
D. Control of the majority of federal forage is concentrated in the
hands of a relatively small percentage of permittees. For example, the
largest 24.4% of permittees on U.S. Forest Service lands control 79% of
the forage (General Accounting Office 1993), while an even greater
concentration of power exists among BLM permittees, the largest 9.1% of
whom control 74% of the forage (General Accounting Office 1992). Hence,
it is these large private and corporate ranchers to whom most of the
federal subsidies accrue.
E. In the 11 Western states livestock grazing on federal public lands
provides only 0.06% of the jobs (<18,000) and 0.04% of the income (Power
1996:Table 8-2).
F. Recent research shows that most rural counties have little economic
dependence on federal grazing. Of 102 counties in the 7 state region
encompassing the Columbia River Basin, only 11 counties were found to
have more than 1% of total income or employment associated with public
land grazing. (Power 1999) (Federal grazing leases in this region
support about a third of the total federal grazing supply in the 11
Western states.) Of the 11 counties exceeding the 1% threshold only
Clark (ID) had an income dependency exceeding 2%, and a job dependency
exceeding 3.5%. (Power 1999)
III. Environmental Impacts of Livestock Production
Managing our public lands for livestock production has resulted in a
domestication of our ecosystems. Numerous unfavorable consequences for
the environment ensue from the devices installed and actions taken on
behalf of livestock.
A. Fencing
1. Fencing can obstruct wildlife movements, even to the point of
fragmenting habitat and causing reduced vigor and mortality. Barbed
wire fences cause injuries or mortalities when animals such as deer
attempting to jump or pass through the fence get entangled in the
strands. The cleared rights-of-way along fences and roads facilitate
the invasion of weedy species. (Donahue 1999:127)
2. Although most North American ungulates can move through or over
traditional three-wire barbed-wire fences, some problems exist. First,
not all fences are as loosely constructed, and tighter fences such as
woven wire can severely impede movement of native wildlife. Pronghorn
antelope are particularly limited in their ability to cross fences, and
woven wire fences can effectively fragment their habitat and ultimately
cause population decreases or extirpation. Second, even though species
such as mule deer can and do easily jump fences, a certain number
(especially juveniles) get tangled in them and die every year. In times
and areas where these animals abound, these losses may not limit
population densities. However, as populations decline, such losses
become more significant. (Noss & Cooperrider 1994:241)
3. Fencing of riparian areas can entangle wildlife, and can trap and
concentrate cattle along streams. (Ohmart 1996:271)
B. Water Developments
1. Data obtained by Burkett & Thompson (1994) implied that definitive
effects of artificial water sources on native wildlife species were not
detectable.
2. Most stock tanks are dirt. Ranging from bathroom-sized to acres in
area, they are scraped into the earth with bulldozers, backhoes, and
graders. This often involves bringing heavy equipment across land never
even driven on before. (Jacobs 1991:211) "Wildlife tends to shun these
stock tanks, which are usually little more than nearly sterile, viscous
mudholes frequented by hordes of bellowing cattle. Many large wild
animals actively avoid cattle and/or sheep (and their smell), and thus
tanks. Most small animals have been killed off or forced away from
sacrifice areas, and many of those in surrounding areas may refuse to
cross the wide 'zones of nothing' around tanks, especially with
livestock present." (Jacobs 1991:216-217) "In sum, stock watering
developments are ugly sores upon the land. They harm ecosystems by
bringing ranching degradations to areas that had little or no ranching
previously." (Jacobs 1991: 219) See Jacobs (1991:211-220) for a more
thorough description of water developments and their impacts.
3. "[D]eveloping water sources for livestock often involves taking water
from streams, springs, or seeps, where it was used by native plants and
animals, and moving it somewhere else for livestock. In other cases,
springs have been drilled, resulting in overuse of aquifers and eventual
drying up of water sources historically used by native species. Areas
around natural water or water developments tend to become sacrifice
areas when livestock are present. Livestock typically denude these
areas of vegetation and compact the ground. Of little value to any
native species, sacrifice areas do provide nodes for establishment of
exotic plants and diseases." (Noss & Cooperrider 1994:242, 244)
C. Pest and Predator Control
1. In fiscal year 1996 Wildlife Services killed nearly 100,000 predators
in the West. Livestock protection accounts for 69% of its Western state
office expenditures of federally appropriated funds. Aerial gunning and
spring-loaded sodium cyanide traps are the most common methods of lethal
predator control used by Wildlife Services in the West, and neither of
these methods are able to only target depredating individuals.
(Predator Project 1997:2)
2. See Jacobs (1991:252-314) for a thorough presentation of the types of
animals killed on behalf of the livestock industry: grizzly bear, black
bear, wolf, coyote, fox, mountain lion, jaguar, ocelot, jaguarundi,
golden eagle, bald eagle, California condor, raven, deer, pronghorn,
bighorn, buffalo, elk, horse, burro, prairie dog, jackrabbit, kangaroo
rat, pocket mouse, pocket gopher, grasshopper, rattlesnake, etc., and
the methods used to kill them: guns, poisons, traps, denning, dogs.
3. "Most controlled species, such as wolves, coyotes, and mountain
lions, are at or near the top of the food chain and may often influence
the structure and function of the entire ecosystem. For example,
predators may not only limit abundance of prey at times, but they may
strongly influence their distribution and movement patterns, thereby
influencing impacts of herbivores on vegetation. One can make a good
case that all large predators are likely keystone species. Thus, where
wholesale predator control (i.e. attempts to extirpate or drastically
reduce densities of predators over a large area) is a component of
livestock management, then livestock grazing must be considered a
serious treat to biodiversity even if direct effects on vegetation are
minimal." (Noss & Cooperrider 1994:242-243)
4. As of 1919 prairie dog colonies covered some 40 million hectares,
more than 20% of the short-grass prairie landscape in the U.S. Today
98% of those populations have been eradicated in an ongoing control
effort by range managers who view prairie dogs as pests that reduce the
amount of grass available to cattle. Prairie dogs provide food or
shelter for many other animals, from pronghorn antelope and bison to
mice and burrowing owls. In addition, the defensive encampments they
build attract a plethora of predators from hawks, coyotes, snakes,
badgers and bobcats to black-footed ferrets. (Baskin 1997:165-166)
5. The prairie dog is a keystone species upon which approximately 170
vertebrate species rely for survival. Eradication of prairie dogs from
large areas has led to near extinction of black-footed ferrets.
Mountain plovers, ferruginous hawks and swift foxes have been proposed
as candidate species under the U.S. Endangered Species Act, and their
listing proposals cited prairie dog poisoning as a factor in their
decline. (Miller et al. 1994)
D. Fire Control
1. On the overgrazed lands of the Southwest, fire suppression has
allowed woody species such as big sagebrush, pinyon pine, and juniper to
invade millions of acres of what were previously grasslands or mixed
grassland/shrublands, profoundly changing their ecological
characteristics. (Cooperrider, Wilcove et al. 1995:69-70)
2. Negative effects of prescribed burning:
a. reduction or elimination of natural fires causing reduction or
elimination of native fire-dependent species;
b. destruction of brushland and dependent wildlife;
c. in forests, a reduction of foliage height diversity, creating a
2-layered instead of multi-layered forest, with attendant reduction in
wildlife diversity;
d. in grass/shrublands, diminishment of native species along with target
shrubs;
e. because organic litter doesn't have time to rebuild and all of each
target area is burned, there is more frequent and more complete loss of
energy stored in ground litter than with natural fires;
f. more frequent and more complete elimination of wildlife cover at
ground level than with natural fires;
g. recurrent short-term elimination of ground level food supplies needed
by wildlife;
h. because prescribed fire is managed to burn all of a target area
evenly, thereby creating a relative biotic monoscape, there is increased
danger of pest and disease outbreaks;
i. because prescribed burns provide much less diversity of impact than
natural fires, there is a reduction in biome diversity;
j. most natural fires burn near the end of or following growing seasons,
after most animal inhabitants have finished breeding. Prescribed
burning often is done preceding or early in growing seasons, when it may
hamper breeding, destroy nests, and kill small animals. (Jacobs
1991:243-244)
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