Mark Anderson A few years ago traditionally democratic Minnesota found itself in the middle of its own North/South conflict. The North represented farming, logging, and other primarily rural land-based interests while tile South, seat of the state government and Minnesota's metropolitan areas, represented urban interests. The South relies on the wilderness "up north" for its recreation, retreat, and spiritual recuperation from the stresses of the city. The North relies on that same land for its livelihood. The inevitable debates raged across the state; wolves vs. livestock, lumbering vs. recreational la nd use, etc. The key to the argument in Minnesota rested on an assumption, made in the cities, that the issues were simple, solutions equally so, and the Democrats would, as always, resolve the ,situation. Well, the issues were not simple, nor the resolutions, and the Democrats were swept out in an election that stunned the state. There had been no willingness to seek compromises. A few environmental problems are clear-cut. But most are anytiling but clear; and our responses are usually much too simplistic. In Northern California, Upriver Downriver an almost heroic little magazine, tries to look at the problems inherent in a growing, changing world, by focusing in on the knowable microcosm, the bio-region. By exploring concerns on an intimate basis, person-toperson and farm-to-farm, they bllild solid connections that span differences and create communities. This article is excerpted from a more comprehensive study of one such problem. We reprint it with permission from Upriver Downriver, ($6/yrJ, Box 390, Cazadero, CA 95421. - CC by Leonard Charles Five years ago, I didn't believe that coyotes killed sheep, or rather didn't believe they killed more than the odd stray or weakened animal. A self-avowed ecologist, I endorsed the environmentalist belief that coyotes preferred native prey, while sheep kills were the infrequent acts of "bad" coyotes (usually an old or sick one, or one who had lost a paw in some previous encounter with a trap). The coyote is too often the friend of those who have nothing to lose and the foe of those who do. Agreeing with John Muir, I believed sheep to be " hooved locusts," the products of sheepranchers who themselves were notorious for the wanton destruction of wildlife, and overgrazing much of the American West. On the other hand, coyotes were noble predators, wild-even magical-beasts, and part of the balance of nature. I
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