HELENA, Mont. (AP) -- A federal appeals court denied a request to block the use of a helicopter to haze wild bison as officials in southwestern Montana wrapped up the annual drive of the animals back into Yellowstone National Park.
A three-judge panel from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ...
Tuesday, May 21, 2013 10:50 AM
HELENA, Mont. (AP) -- Montana wildlife officials on Tuesday rejected allegations that a Montana rancher and hunting guide illegally baited wolves by leaving sheep carcasses piled up on his property near Yellowstone National Park.
Wildlife advocates had accused William Hoppe, who lives near G ...
Wednesday, May 15, 2013 9:44 AM
MISSOULA, Mont. (AP) -- Climate change warnings tend to focus on the losers, but western Montana would come up a winery winner, according to a new scientific analysis of temperature trends.
"Winter temperatures have been a limit to vineyard growth in our state," said Gary Tabor, ...
Friday, April 19, 2013 9:27 AM
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) -- Aggressive gray wolf hunting took a toll in much of the Northern Rockies last year as the predator's population saw its most significant decline since being reintroduced in the region.
Numbers released by state wildlife agencies show Wyoming's wolf population down 16 per ...
Friday, April 12, 2013 10:35 AM
MISSOULA, Mont. (AP) -- Scientists say warming temperatures could turn parts of Montana into wine producing areas.
Gary Tabor is director of the Center for Large Landscape Conservation in Bozeman and one of the co-authors of "Climate Change, Wine and Conservation."
He tells the Mis ...
Tuesday, April 09, 2013 10:27 AM
MISSOULA, Mont. (AP) -- A delegation of Chinese and Korean wood and lumber companies is visiting Idaho and Montana.
The group spent Thursday in Coeur d'Alene at the Small Log Conference, hosted by the Forest Business Network.
The delegation arrives in Missoula Friday, where the ...
Friday, March 15, 2013 8:42 AM
BOZEMAN, Mont. (AP) -- Farmers and ranchers groups seeking to prevent the expansion of the winter range of Yellowstone National Park bison are taking their case to the Montana Supreme Court.
The Bozeman Daily Chronicle reports (http://bit.ly/151cSFI) the Montana Farm Bureau Federation an ...
Thursday, March 14, 2013 9:00 AM
The new president of the National Association of Wheat Growers says the most pressing concern is completion of a new farm bill.
"To just sit there and keep haggling over the same issues, we hoped to have one done by 2012 and it wasn't achieved then," said Moccasin, Mont., farmer Bing Von Bergen. ...
Thursday, March 07, 2013 12:00 PM
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) -- With at least 223 gray wolves killed by hunters and trappers as Montana's wolf season closed Thursday, Gov. Steve Bullock and wildlife officials said they now have the right management rules in place to reduce the predator's numbers but maintain a viable population.
...
Friday, March 01, 2013 8:38 AM
BUTTE, Mont. (AP) -- The Bureau of Land Management is proceeding with a plan to move 700 wild horses to a ranch in southwestern Montana, despite the fact that the owners of neighboring ranches are concerned about whether the land can sustain and the fences contain the animals.
The first trucklo ...
Monday, February 25, 2013 7:24 AM
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) -- Agricultural analysts say Montana's 2012 wheat crop was valued at a record $1.7 billion, making it the fifth time in six years that the crop has been valued at over $1 billion.
The Billings Gazette reports (http://bit.ly/Zu1Yea ) farmers harvested 194.7 million bushels o ...
Thursday, February 21, 2013 7:22 AM
Washington FFA members are mourning the death of the organization's state adviser.
H. Wayne Gilman died unexpectedly Feb. 3 at Virginia Mason Hospital in Seattle. He had been state FFA adviser since 2004.
FFA members honored Gilman with a moment of silence and a prayer Feb. 7 during the Spokane ...
Thursday, February 14, 2013 12:00 PM
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) -- A Montana judge issued an injunction Friday allowing wolf trapping and hunting to continue outside Yellowstone National Park, as lawmakers in Helena advanced a measure to loosen restrictions on killing wolves statewide.
Combined, the two actions pave the way for a ...
Friday, January 18, 2013 4:56 PM
LIVINGSTON, Mont. (AP) -- Whether gray wolf hunting and trapping should continue outside the gates of Yellowstone National Park is in the hands of a state judge, after Montana wildlife officials pressed Monday to reinstate a temporary ban.
At issue in the lawsuit before District Judge Bre ...
Tuesday, January 15, 2013 7:31 AM
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) -- Montana officials were due in state court Monday to ask a judge to reinstate a temporary ban against the hunting and trapping of gray wolves near Yellowstone National Park.
At issue are two areas north of Yellowstone near the town of Gardiner totaling about 60 squa ...
Monday, January 14, 2013 11:29 AM
BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) -- North Dakota Agriculture Commissioner Doug Goehring says it appears that the North American Bison Cooperative has resumed paying beef producers owed money by an associated company that is now defunct.
The Agriculture Department earlier this month said it would seek ...
Friday, January 11, 2013 9:16 AM
BILLINGS, Mont (AP) -- Montana's decision to let migrating bison roam freely across 70,000 acres outside Yellowstone National Park was upheld by a court ruling Monday that dismissed a pair of lawsuits challenging the policy.
District Judge E. Wayne Phillips issued a 78-page ruling in whic ...
Monday, January 07, 2013 4:11 PM
HELENA, Mont. (AP) -- The federal agency responsible for protecting animal and plant health has agreed to improve how it responds to public-records requests after a Montana wildlife advocacy group claimed the agency regularly put off responses to Freedom of Information Act queries.
The U. ...
Wednesday, January 02, 2013 2:17 PM
HELENA, Mont. (AP) -- A sharply divided Montana Supreme Court has ruled that forcing a Hutterite religious colony to pay workers' compensation insurance for jobs outside the commune is not an unconstitutional intrusion into religion.
The 4-3 decision upholds a 2009 law requiring religious ...
Wednesday, January 02, 2013 7:15 AM
CORVALLIS, Mont. (AP) -- A western Montana agricultural research center is losing its only scientist.
Mal Westcott will retire Jan. 4 from the Western Agricultural Research Center after 26 years on the staff.
The Ravalli Republic reports (http://bit.ly/VfwBju ) the research center east of ...
Monday, December 24, 2012 8:00 AM
GREAT FALLS, Mont. (AP) -- More than a dozen Hill County landowners say they are closing 50,000 acres of private land to public recreation to protest the state's purchase of a ranch along the Milk River.
Landowner Dan Redding said Wednesday that 17 landowners in northwest Hill County are closin ...
Thursday, December 20, 2012 8:57 AM
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) -- Montana wildlife commissioners on Monday closed down the gray wolf season in some areas outside Yellowstone National Park after several collared animals used for scientific research were shot in recent weeks.
The closures prohibit hunting and trapping for the preda ...
Monday, December 10, 2012 2:16 PM
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) -- Montana wildlife commissioners approved the final piece of a $7.8 million ranch purchase along the Milk River near the Canadian border on Monday, despite objections from neighboring landowners and some lawmakers.
On a 4-to-1 vote, Fish, Wildlife and Parks Commissio ...
Monday, December 10, 2012 1:46 PM
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) -- The shooting of collared gray wolves from Yellowstone National Park is prompting Montana wildlife commissioners to consider new restrictions against killing the predators in areas near the park.
Wolf trapping in Montana kicks off Dec. 15. It's the state's first suc ...
Monday, December 10, 2012 7:45 AM
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) -- Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer is asking the White House to reject calls for more water releases from reservoirs on the Missouri River to ease drought conditions downstream.
Elected officials from states along the Mississippi River this week said the additional rel ...
Friday, November 30, 2012 9:14 AM
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) -- A trial is under way in Billings in the case of a rancher charged with failing to provide adequate veterinary care to five horses on a ranch he once owned on the Crow Indian Reservation.
A jury was sworn in Monday afternoon in Yellowstone County Justice Court.
James ...
Tuesday, November 27, 2012 7:30 AM