In perhaps on of the biggest NO DUH moments of the year, the Sacramento Bee has a front page article this morning on just HOW BAD....

http://www.sacbee.com/2010/04/25/2703875/bee-exclusive-livestock-waste.html

CATTLE F*#K UP SIERRA WATERSHEDS. Some scientist at UC Davis had the nerve to check for e coli in Sierra streams and what do you suppose he found?

Places where grazing has been permitted are FOUL!!!1111

Buckeye Creek in the Hoover Wilderness - don't drink THAT water, Hunewill Ranch has insured this stream is poisonous to the human gut.

Devastation Creek in the Desolation Wilderness, ditto.

Ever climbed Chiquito Dome? Don't you DARE drink out of Chiquito Creek!!!111 That's right - its a cow sewer.

In fact, if cattle are allowed to graze in a any given drainage you can COUNT on the stream having e coli in it. COUNT ON IT.

All those giargia stories are mostly e coli stories.

The image of the cowboy west and the American conservationist image afforded ranchers is a bunch of BULLSH#T.

Time to charge market rates for grazing permits, time to require ranchers clean up after themselves when dining at the public trough and time to close down whole swaths of Sierra watershed to cattle.

DMT

In graduate school I studied the effects of land use practices on the concentration and distribution of Giardia lamblia and Cryptosporidium parvum and fecal coliform bacteria. There were statistically significant higher concentrations of both the bacteria and protozoans in watersheds where dairy farming took place when compared to protected watersheds (pristine forest where humans were not allowed) and watersheds with suburban developments.

Don't think any sane person would ever drink untreated water out of any stream, no matter how high or deep in wilderness, at least not for the past 30 years!

This is more old news. Long ago, they found high levels of e. coli in Pear Lake, right next to the hut. Even back when I started this, there were clear advisories and warnings about boiling water for backpackers. While I did fine till about 1981, you can get sick, and I will never wish to go through that again.

My wilderness group long lobbied against cattle in wilderness, paid for by my decades of dues. With tens of thousands of hikers, it's a lost cause. It'll get worse. SP doesn't want further mention of the main local perps, I am threatened with a ban. No, it's not natural to poop in the watershed, so please, bag it, burn it, or bury it (as a last resort, hopefully in the desert)!

Every visit to this miserable place is support for the cattle industry and the resulting environmental consequences, including cowshit in your water. We eat way too much beef in this country. WAY too much.

I go there all of the time. They do have free refills of soda, offer chicken and fish in addition to pork ribs (tasty), and other non beef items. Sounds like more enviro club hypocrisy, to boycott the place except to use the nicely clean restroom, and then dump the napkins (more malicious waste) in the trash without even using them!

Other fast food outlets are just as bad or worse. Then there's supermarket meat departments. And steak houses and all.

There's no cattle where I now go, just people. Some educated or trained to pollute, with stupid kids that don't know how to use an outhouse, and enviro club singles that demand a $200 luxury motel room so they can take a dump!

1000Pks wrote:My wilderness group long lobbied against cattle in wilderness, paid for by my decades of dues.

You mean the SC MLC?!?!

1000Pks wrote:

My wilderness group long lobbied against cattle in wilderness, paid for by my decades of dues.


You mean the SC MLC?!?!

To respond, first, I have been formally warned about any further mention of you know who. If loss, injury, or death is to result from someone not now knowing about the obvious hazard and malice that I speak of, my hands are clean.

I refer to a specific wilderness organization, I have belonged to many. None of whom would think to have a cattle drive into wilderness for the fun of it, part of the sick games that the once mentioned club would love to do.

Yes, there are groups and people who do work to save the planet, once many decades ago that we presumably tried to do. The infection of our water sources is irreversible. I try to make it better, so by some chance no illness might result from an emergency drink from a stream, but the tens of thousands of hikers and all, with pack animals in the draw, make that near impossible!

1000Pks wrote:To respond, first, I have been formally warned about any further mention of you know who.

Warned by whom?

Day Hiker wrote:... support for the cattle industry and the resulting environmental consequences, including cowshit in your water. We eat way too much beef in this country. WAY too much.

True, but you really can't get away from a lot of the issues with beef unless you buy the expensive grass fed stuff, preferably, free range plains state raised. That doesn't solve the sierra issue, but people need to ask themselves if clean water and intact ecosystems are less valuable than cheap beef.

Hey, here's what beef that I dined on last week. There are bad practices, and good.

http://www.pratherranch.com/