From one of our mining buddies in Idaho:
South Fork Clearwater confluence with Crooked River
Oh my God! Will you look at that… Just another successful project by the Be a Perce Tribe.
This is the turbidity level at the mouth of Crooked River this morning where it joins the South Fork of the Clearwater River. This is being caused by the runoff through the habitat restoration project that removed all the ground cover and rerouted approx. 2 miles of the stream channel. (It looks like a picture of Mordor along there if you haven’t seen it yet)
What I cant understand is there is no Agency monitoring, no records being kept, no public outcry. If we as miners did something like that and created this type of disturbance we would be crucified for it by the media and in court with suits filed by a half dozen environmental groups and Federal Agencies.
What a bunch of hypocritical do thee wells.
Where is the “Watchdog” from the Idaho Conservation League who supposedly loves this river so much he has to drive it everyday taking pics and videos to protect it from summer suction dredgers?
Where are the Friends of the Clearwater who protest against every logging project or disturbance created by any work scheduled in the Forest or along the rivers here?
Where is Mr Barker from the Lewiston Morning Tribune and his Outdoor Editorial? He has been so quick to criticize and attack the local miners on the Clearwater River area, especially the small scale suction dredgers.
Well Mr Barker and you supposed Enviro Groups, no amount of small scale dredging could cause what we are looking at from this project so why aren’t you criticizing this in your editorial pieces this week or threatening lawsuits for violating the Clean Water Act and endangering spawning ESA species over this?
If this projects disturbance is justified by its long term benefits then the same can be said of the reclamation projects for mining operations. If the end result is improved habitat conditions from both actions then obviously the only difference is hypocritical ideology and prejudiced bias of opinions..