so long wetlands

[bob]

The destruction has begun, a good article from a large midwestern newspaper.

http://www.suntimes.com/output/outdoors/out11.html

[bill]

yadda yadda yadda. You have to keep some of this in perspective. Didnt the article say states now have more control? Werent there plenty of ducks,geese and wildlife before Clintler went on his ILLEGAL land grab spree? We need to protect our wetlands and resources, yes. Buy quit your whining into your tofu burger and get involved yourself. Amazing, Bush has been in power for about a month and already the country is going to pot, according to you Clintler deciples.

[FlyBoy]

$&cking democrats. Bush is NOT for BIG government. He would like decisions like this made at the state level, not the Feds. Unlike the former president (I can't even bring my self to say his name) who would rather the government told me what kind of cereal I had to eat in the morning.

I am for preserving wetlands, wildlife in general. But I would rather our local DNR administer decisions like that. Not some greasy palmed, soft money democrat.

Do you own any guys? Keep voting democratic, and you will soon be competing with Canada to see who can own fewer guns. Check out Australia some time.

-John

[MR.Pike]

Oh Boy!! It's all over now. I was waiting for this ,,, Now I can finally fill in this lake I'm on and pave it for a parking lot. I'll have to cut all these trees down around the lake too.( too much shade). How stupid,,,,,,, these articles are getting boring.




<;{{{{{<<( Mr.Pike

[The reason being]

Just a lot of bitter, liberal sore loosers. Did you also notice the current results of the ongoing, total, Florida recount are not in the news? It seems that all the reportes and such that are counting the ballots are still finding GW in the lead. Oh by the way, Loudmouth Baldwin, isnt there a train you should be catching? Even your wife doesnt want you around, and you said you'd leave, so....GO!

[eyewinder]

I've lived in the Midwest for almost all of my 50+ years. Every time I hunt or fish, I'm reminded of what lengths many landowners will go to in order to squeeze another tillable acre or two from what was once a woodlot or wetland.

[Tallmike]

I agree with the poster who asked that this article cited be put in proper perspective. The sky is not falling. Why is it you never heard much about the homeless either during the past eight years? Take a visit to Montana and talk to a few landowners out there. Those people detested the Clinton administration and their onerous Big Brother, the government, tactics. Allowing no roads to be built in some of the mountainous wilderness areas had a lot to do with wildfires running out of control this past summer. Why is it so great to let someone in Washington D.C. decide what state residents can and can not do in regard to public propeties? Who is to get so high and mighty in regard to the Kankakee river, ten miles south of where I live. There are programs in place which are attempting to restore some of the marsh lands. I agree with this. But I also defend the right of an uncle who farmed land bordering the Kankakee that came down through his family dating back to the time of the Civil War to continue farming this land. Some of it was drained many many years ago. The things in that article strike me as simply another whiner with sour grapes in his mouth. There simply aren't any quick and easy answers anymore to many of these environmental issues. There is a lot of room for compromise and less for such easy finger pointing at an administration only one month in office. Please, give me a break.
That massive Clinton Ad. land grab allowing no roads, no access, didn't help anyone but the government to remain Big Brother.

[K Crowley]

Giving states more control is not necessarily a bad thing. A WI developer was recently convicted of CRIMINAL charges and faces jail time if he doesn't restore the wetlands he filled. Read about it here:

http://www.wispolitics.com/freeser/pr/pr0012/pr00121303.html

[GullGuide]

What are you talking about???
Dont you remember the 80's? Or do you have alzhiemers as bad as Ronnie? There were VERY few ducks and geese in the 80's. Not until the 90's, starting with elder Bush's administration did the ducks rebound. During the Clinton administration, the duck numbers reached their highest level since the fish and wildlife service began keeping records. In the 90's, there was more wetland restoration and less drainage than ever before. This is a topic that I am very involved in and hold very dear to me, so don't try and blame this guy or that guy. I began hunting in the good years of the late 70's early 80's. I SUFFERED through the lean mid to late 80's. And watched the skys fill again in the 90's. You can say all you want about how few ducks there were the last few years, but the truth of the matter is, they did not even come down from Canada until after the season had closed for the last 4 seasons and we never really got that good northwest storm to push em through Minnesota. The LAST thing we need is for more drainage to begin. If this increases, the late 80's will look like "the good old days" in comparison to what might happen.
>"////=<

[MR.Pike]

True about the Duck and goose #'s but c'mon .I seem to remember a few floods mixed in there( 90's) and If memory serves me,,, Devils lake and others in the pothole region are at all time high levels the past few years also. Any correlation??? The populations run in cycles. Now with the snow geese wrecking their nesting grounds, who will get blamed when they start the natural nose dive they are heading for? Just a thought from a fellow concerned waterfowl buff. I think most of hese responses were a bit off the hip,,, I know mine was.




<;{{{{{<<( Mr.Pike

[Bayside]

I work in the planning & zoning department for one of the most well known counties in Wisconsin, and everything in the article is true, plus more possible long reaching effects that were not metioned. Believe what you want or stick your head in the sand, I have worked for city and county government for over 9 years and have never seen the DNR as alarmed as they are now! The decision has basically made it LEGAL to fill any wetlands in unzoned Towns that do not fall under shoreland zoning (in which case the county would have jurisdiction). With the information that I have available, I truly feel the situation could possibly be even worse than the author has lead you to believe. Please call your state representative and tell him or her we need to take action immediately to preserve our wetlands. Lets try and preserve what we have here in Wisconsin!

[Box]

Amen Mr. Pike.

I too am diehard duck hunter, and hunt in West Central MN. The floods were big for ducks, and remain to be. Remember the drought years? We had fantastic shooting when the rest of the country saw about two ducks. Thats cause we had the water and thats what ducks like. You can't blame a pres for lack of rain.

And not every wetland will be drained just because it can. I have watched several (local) wetlands get the tile ripped out and fill back up. Man is that a sight in the spring! Ducks everywhere. And that is due to local effort, at least the ones I am familiar with.

Give control to locals. Heck, the farmers can make more $$ leasing hunting rights than growing a few beans... :)

Yes, right from the hip! ha! ;)

Box
MN

[Backwater Eddy]

The increase in wetlands overall is due to the new wet cycle. This has a lot to do with the duck/goose boom of the 90's-01.

Wetlands reduce frooding and improve water quality. How many tax dollers & FEMA billions could be saved by replaceing drains with marsh's?

BE

[reality]

All of you out there so worried the democrats will take your guns and yet are willing to allow the republicans to do what they want with the natural resources of our country. Something is wrong with that picture. I challenge you to do two things before you bash, first do your research on the record of the republican party and the environment, second when local controls are returned to the small communities what will be top priority? The health of the environment or the health of the local economy? If the local land barren can make an extra dollar by draining a marsh, cutting down a woods, do you think he is going to think twice about the effect is has on the animals that used that marsh or woods? Who is going to stop the local power brokers from doing what they want when control is handed over to these same power brokers???

[FlyBoy]

I love these people. They post with names like "Environmentally concerned", no email address, no name, just a mask. They must be busy riding that donkey. If you talk out of both sides of your mouth, you tend to contradict yourself. First you bash the republican party, then talk about how we should turn decision making over to the local communities. Have you noticed who is for small government? It sure isn't Al Gore and his pack of cronies.

I agree, some of the Republicans don't have the best track record with the environment, some of that is due to their 'pro business' attitude. The other half of the story is, they ARE for small government. If we let them do that, the local communities, will begin to police our back yards. I'm all for that.

-John
John@Laser27.com

[Fat Cat Republican]

Ahh ca ca ca(coughing on my fat cigar)...Next time you boyz change yer oil in them pickups, just stop by my place go to the end of the dock and dump it. That mosquito breeding lake is such a waste, we could put a nice mall in there or maybe a coal burning power generator. Pardon me as i refresh my snifter with some 30 year old scotch...back to the destruction of our natural resources; I Fat Cat Republican propose a bounty on the manatee and an open season on the spotted owl effective immediately.

Well that's enough hard work straitening out this country for 1 day. Time to go down to the Clinton Presidential Library, I here the adult section is 2nd to none. After that I'll be chilling at the country club.

good slashing and burning to ya,
Fat Cat Republican

We can blame the other political perspective all we want, but the problem is US not political parties. I want my 200hp boat and my big v8 truck to pull my boat and camper. I need my quad to get me out on the lake, lawn mower, weed wacker, chainsaw, etc,etc,etc!

We may not pull the trigger, but we pay the assassins to do the dirty work.

EVERYTIME YOU FILL YOUR TANK UP YOU GIVE YOUR STAMP OF APPROVAL AND SANCTION THE SEARCH FOR MORE OIL!!!

Whaa, whaa we whine, it those guys over there!:'(

[Rickyp]

Please name me one republican president who in the last 30 years has shrunk the size of the federal government. It's all talk.

[Jerry]

Y'see here we go again...everybody wants to boil everything down to an "understandeable" few bytes. There is not a simple answer but look at it from my point of view (not necessarily the correct one but "mine" nevertheless)..
When we overreact "the sky is falling..the sky is falling!" we get reactionaries like the "tree huggers" and "Environmentalist Whackos'" that ran this country for four years. When one "suspects" that there might not be enough water or we're endangering some species or another, we overreact.
I can remember one Japanese farmer in California who lost his land and was prosecuted because he killed some ##### "endangered" Rat on his farm. I can remember dam projects going thru years of litigation because of some Snail Darter...do we want to go there again? Not me!

[Bayside]

Does anyone realized what has already happened??? The Supreme Court HAS decieded the Corp of Engineers CANNOT dictate whether or not someone fills in a wetland. News flash the sky has already fallen!!! Unless states themselves implement emergency measures, it is LEGAL to begin filling wetland areas that do not fall under shoreland zoning. Why aren't you reading about it in newspapers and magazines, you may ask? We don't want anyone to know! Having recieved memo's from WDNR, they want to keep this as low key as possible until something can be done. They know as soon as certain people become aware of what has happened literally thousands of acres of wetland areas would be filled in within a matter of a few months. As far as who is to blame I am not sure it is George W. but it doesn't appear he wants to help resolve it either, on another interesting note though he has approached congress to open up National parks for oil & natural gas exploration.

[FlyBoy]

Who added more government? Clinton or Bush or Regan. Think hard before you answer.