Idaho’s Beautiful Copper Basin Is Being Wrecked by Livestock
All photos by Adam Bronstein, WWP, August 2020
Beautiful Copper Basin, located in Central Idaho, represents one of our greatest opportunities to restore ecological function and viability on western public lands today. The solution? Remove destructive livestock grazing.
Cows are the most prevalent mammals found in the Copper Basin today. The region’s ecological potential is being smothered by heavy hooves.
The banks of Star Hope Creek, another cutthroat fishery that is being decimated by cows on our public lands.
These ponds up Broad Canyon can be seen right off of the hiking trail. They were beat all to hell by the hooved locust.
Eroded stream banks and cattle hoof prints created this minefield up Broad Canyon, a popular recreation area in the Basin.
Another photo up Howell Canyon. The only wildlife we found here were water birds swimming in cow feces.
Boone Creek is a complete cow disaster and it is being treated like a private stockyard. In 2019, IDFG killed wolves here to protect livestock from depredation.
The Ramey Creek cow-bomb has detonated!
This spring feeding Ramey Creek. The cow infestation has crippled its function. But it could come back to life if it was just left alone.
Dear USFS, Just because things have been done a certain way for a long time, doesn’t make it right. Ecological destruction on public lands is not history that should be celebrated.
Riparian degredation up Howell Canyon. What a mess!
The East Fork of the Big Lost River is supposed to be a “blue ribbon cutthroat fishery”. All we found were eroded banks, mowed grass, warm water and cow patties. What a shame!
Coal Creek is in sad condition. It looks like a brownfield waste site. The cow poop is nuclear strength.
This photo was taken up Muldoon Creek. The cows are mowing down prime wildlife habtat, displacing moose and other iconic species.
Little Boone Creek looks like a drainage ditch at a cheap golf resort.
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