You just thought you owned some land - Frog-Haven

[kobayashi]

Just caught this about some Frogs

http://www.nola.com/politics/index.s...downer_fi.html

GULFPORT, Miss. -- Edward Poitevent tried again Tuesday night to convince the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service that designating his family's land in St. Tammany Parish as critical habitat for the Mississippi gopher frog is a bad idea and one that could thwart development on the land to the tune of $36 million. Fish and Wildlife officials at a public hearing in Gulfport described the need to find new homes for the endangered frog, of which only 100 adults remain in the wild.
View full sizeEllis Lucia, The Times-PicayuneEdward Poitevent is fighting plans by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to expropriate this family-owned timberland along Louisiana 36 northeast of Lacombe.
The agency has suggested designating some 1,500 acres belonging to the Poitevent family as critical habitat, with the remaining 5,000 or so acres located on public and private land in four southern Mississippi counties.
The agency allowed each of the night's almost 20 speakers five minutes to make comments. Arriving at the microphone with a thick booklet containing his concerns, Poitevent tried to summarize his thoughts in a handful of excerpts from the materials.
He noted that his family's land -- a swath of timberland along Louisiana 36, north of Slidell -- doesn't contain the frog or the elements needed for the frog's survival, and that the land will remain in its present condition until at least 2043, when a timber lease that Weyerhaeuser Co, holds is set to expire.
Poitevent also said the land is not essential to the stocky, wart-covered frog's conservation, as much of the property cited is in Mississippi, and the agency has yet to seek critical habitat in Alabama, where the frog also once lived.
Poitevent has said he would not allow the frogs on his land in any event, as his right under the law. Whether a landowner is agreeable is not a consideration, as the biologists are required to look at both occupied and unoccupied lands under the Endangered Species Act.
Poitevent said the potential $36 million impact on a single family is disproportionate, and noted as well that the designation would cost that the parish sales and property tax dollars.
View full sizeScott Threlkeld, The Times-Picayune archiveTh

From Maley's Energy Blog http://stevemaley.com/2012/02/01/int...-million-rsrh/

[Windwatcher]

Yep---I lost a sale of timber land because someone spotted some special woodpecker and that shut the timber harvesting down. I know this land that is in question. It is good for timber growing, and that's about it.

[Katfive]

Yep---I lost a sale of timber land because someone spotted some special woodpecker and that shut the timber harvesting down. I know this land that is in question. It is good for timber growing, and that's about it.

well at least now we KNOW why Windwatcher is so negative toward peckers!

[Windwatcher]

Yes, Kat. They can be very pesky.