
Editor’s note • This article is published through the Colorado River Collaborative , a solutions journalism initiative supported by the Janet Quinney Lawson Institute for Land, Water, and Air at Utah State University. Coby Hunt’s farm field near the southeast Utah town of Green River would normally be filled with alfalfa growing up to his knees. This year, however, it was barren — pale gray dirt cracking under the late summer sun. The only green things were scraggly scraps of whatever accidental plants somehow survived without irrigation. It wasn’t a pretty sight for Hunt. “It hurts,” he said as he surveyed the desolate field. “But there’s also a benefit of it looking like this, right?” That benefit is taking the water he could have used to irrigate his land and leaving it in the nearby Green River, which flows to the increasingly strained Colorado River. “There’s only so many pieces of the pie you can pull out before there’s no pie,” he said. “Every little bit you can save adds more.” Across Utah, farmers are experimenting with ways to tighten their water use as agriculture, drought and population growth collide to put pressure on the state’s limited water resources. Some are installing more efficient irrigation technology . Others are testing unconventional crops . In Hunt’s case, he’s taking some of his farmland out of commission entirely — for a time and for a price. (David Condos | KUER) Dry soil cracks in one of Coby Hunt’s fallowed fields near Green River, Aug. 19, 2024. For years, the federal government has paid some Utah farmers to leave their fields empty as a way to keep more water in the Colorado River. Now, Utah is trying its own version of this — and changing how it keeps track of the water that’s saved. For the past two years, Hunt has taken part in a federal program that pays farmers to temporarily leave their fields empty and lease the conserved water to the government. It’s something that has been going on for years across the Colorado River Basin . Now, Utah is launching its version of that effort. The new multimillion-dollar plan incentivizes conservation and aims to do a better job of tracking that saved water in hopes of getting credit for it in future Colorado River dealings. ‘Some ... farmers don’t like it’ The practice of leaving a field idle for a season is called fallowing , and Hunt conceded it’s not for everyone. “Some of the farmers don’t like it, he said. “In fact, they don’t like me for leasing my water.” Many don’t want the feds involved in their business, he said, or worry the government might take their water permanently if they show they can get by without it. For farmers who grow other crops, like Green River’s famed melons , he said, it might not make financial sense to sit out a year and lose your customer base. “But to me, if I can help with the problem — like with drought, if I can help with that — then I think that’s a good thing,” he said. Hunt usually grows feed for the cattle he raises, so he’s still had plenty to do while this 30-acre field sits empty. Fallowing has just meant he needs to buy hay from elsewhere. He feels good about the amount of water it saves, too. His water right would typically allow him to use six acre-feet of water a year, he said — enough to cover Hunt and the acre he’s standing on over his head. Because his fields are some of the last ones upstream from Lake Powell, it’s easy to imagine the water he conserves making it to the reservoir. (David Condos |KUER) An irrigation canal draws water from the Green River in southeast Utah, Aug. 19, 2024. Roughly three-fourths of all water used in Utah goes to agriculture. That’s why farmers like Hunt are vital to Utah’s new effort to conserve more Colorado River water, called the Demand Management Pilot Program . What’s novel about it is how it will track and document the water savings. “Eventually, our goal is to create a sort of savings account in Lake Powell or other reservoirs,” said Lily Bosworth, an engineer with the Colorado River Authority of Utah , which is administering the pilot. Then if the state needs to send extra water downstream to meet its future Colorado River obligations, Bosworth said it could pull from that Lake Powell savings account instead of forcing users to cut back. Utah is still in the process of making sure it can get credit for the program’s saved water at both the regional and federal levels, she said. Utah is putting $4.4 million into the pilot over the next two years. Applications opened in mid-December, and the plan is for the first round of farmers to start conserving by the spring irrigation season. ‘Conservation is a beneficial use’ Besides getting paid, Bosworth said the primary benefit for farmers is that they hold onto their water rights, avoiding the “use-it-or-lose-it” situations that have kept some from conserving in the past. A new state code in 2023 opened the door for farmers to apply with the Division of Water Rights to flag a portion of their water rights as conservation. Utah’s Demand Management Program will follow that water downstream in two ways. One is using regulations to distribute the saved water, Bosworth said. The state could enforce a target level of streamflow and step in to prevent other water rights holders from using that water between the field where it was conserved and the reservoir where the state wants it to go. The other option would be to time when the saved water enters the system. The state could hold it in an upstream reservoir and then release it as a pulse after the irrigation season ends. Theoretically, that would mean there’s less chance of another water right holder using it before it gets to its destination. The program might require extra measurement tools along the river to track the saved water and make sure it’s traveling downstream. Utah’s investment illustrates a big change, Bosworth said. “Recognizing that conservation is a beneficial use, to me, is a pretty big deal. That’s a major shift in thinking about how we view water in Utah and in the West.” Of course, Utah’s demand management program is happening during tense negotiations between the seven basin states over how to divvy up the shrinking Colorado River. “Even though I definitely think it’s innovative and a step in the right direction — like, the Upper Basin should be doing demand management — I’m not sure that it’s going to immediately affect the post-2026 negotiations,” said Elizabeth Koebele, an associate professor at the University of Nevada Reno who studies water policy. Utah will be the first Upper Basin state to incentivize and track water conservation in this way, Koebele said, so it could serve as a model for Colorado, Wyoming and New Mexico. If all four launch demand management programs, she thinks that could improve the Upper Basin’s negotiating position with the Lower Basin states of California, Nevada and Arizona. She doesn’t see that happening, though, at least not before current river agreements expire in 2026. There’s an inherent tension between saying “we can’t cut our water use” and “we can do more conservation,” Koebele said, and Utah and its neighbors are still generally pushing back against any future water cuts. “It scares me when the rest of the Upper Basin states say, ‘We’re not going to play ball,’ she said. Eventually, Koebele said that could prompt a “ compact call ,” where Lower Basin states force the Upper Basin to curb their water use. If Utah has a little extra water socked away in its reservoir savings account, that might help the state’s situation, she said, but getting to that unprecedented point in the river negotiations would be risky. ‘We can figure it out’ As the West gets hotter and drier , it’s also unclear whether paying farmers not to farm is the best long-term solution. “We’re seeing this trend toward aridification that’s undeniable in the Colorado River Basin,” Koebele said. “In my perspective, we’re never going to come up with enough money to compensate everyone for conservation on a permanent basis.” Especially with the coming change in presidential administrations, a lot of the federal money that’s gone to pay farmers to conserve in recent years could dry up . The demand management strategy, Koebele said, could help deal with short-term droughts and buy some time, though. (David Condos | KUER) Farmer and rancher Coby Hunt stands next to idle irrigation equipment in one of his fields near the town of Green River, Aug. 19, 2024. Utah is launching a new program that will pay producers to leave their fields empty, as Hunt has done, and leave their irrigation water in the Colorado River system. Just north of his fallowed field, Hunt stood on a platform overlooking the wide, rushing Green River. It’s a behemoth compared to most waterways in this parched part of southeast Utah. The town where his fields are gets just 6.5 inches of precipitation each year. “The river is definitely our lifeline,” he said, pointing out the spot where his irrigation canal draws from the river. “Without it, we’d be nothing.” Despite the hurdles facing the Colorado River, he hopes that what’s happening in his field can be a small part of finding a solution to keep the water flowing. “How can we make it work for everybody? How can we make people downstream happy?” he asked. “You still gotta have farmers farming to feed everybody.” “It’s a delicate thing. But I think if we all work together, we can figure it out.” This story was produced as part of the Colorado River Collaborative . KSL-TV photographer Mark Wetzel contributed to this story.After institutions for people with disabilities close, graves are at risk of being forgotten
In conclusion, the Shanxi Loongs' triumph over the Beijing Ducks is a defining moment in their season and a reminder of their potential to compete at the highest level. With their eyes set on the championship, the Loongs are ready to take on any challenge that comes their way and write their own success story in the annals of basketball history.
In a thrilling matchup between the City Eagles and the Lakeview Lions, Little Peyton's pivotal steal from Edwards in the final minutes of the game showcased the effectiveness of their double-teaming defense. The game, which had been neck-and-neck up until that point, was completely turned on its head by Peyton's quick thinking and defensive prowess.None
As Hope Sampson brought her day’s hunt to a close, she wound her way down a steep grassy hill. Sampson and Mattie Budine, her hunting partner, hadn’t seen a single deer all day. But when they reached the bottom of the hill, a spooked doe leapt through the short bunch grass and settled 60 yards away. With calm and practiced grace, Sampson dropped her backpack and raised her rifle while resting the barrel on her pack. She was calm and took slow breaths as she aimed at the whitetail that stood broadside in front of her. Her chance at a shot came during a weekend of hunting put together by the . The pair were 10 miles west of Philipsburg when Sampson encountered the deer. As she stared down the scope of her .308 rifle, she was taking part in a shrinking American culture — one which continues to be the foundation of wildlife conservation today. The club’s hunting mentorship program aims to educate students about ethical hunting. Sampson didn’t shoot the doe they saw midday, and she knew she wasn’t going to even before she dropped her pack. Part of hunting ethically is practice, making sure the real shot is accurate and effective. “It’s a really hard concept for some people to understand how you can love and respect a species or even an individual animal so much and still be able to take its life,” Sampson said. “It’s something you can’t understand until you’ve done it.” The pair wasn’t dead set on harvesting a deer on that early Saturday in November. It served as a dry run for the real deal — Sampson’s mentorship hunt the following weekend. Elliot Drewery and Claire Mcatee lookout over the rolling hills outside of Philipsburg in search of deer crossing from private property onto public land. Across the United States, the number of hunters is decreasing, according to U.S. Fish and Wildlife data. Montana, traditionally a hot spot for elk, deer and bird hunting, is seeing a different shift. From 2012 to 2022 there was a 7% decrease in resident hunters in the state, while the number of nonresident hunters increased 44%. Hunters and anglers contribute heavily to conserving wildlife and fisheries through excise taxes and license sales. According to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the population of hunters nationwide has decreased by around 2% of the U.S. population since 1991. “I think we are all trying to see if that is a trend that extends on,” Libby Metcalf, the associate dean of the Franke College of Forestry and Conservation, said. “It could be a full stop reversal of declining trends, or it could be just a random blip.” The next Fish and Wildlife survey in 2027 may help determine whether declining hunters is a serious concern. “To be clear, that’s not where we are at in Montana,” said Greg Lemon, the division administrator for communication and education at Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks. While Montana isn’t suffering from revenue or overall hunter loss because of the increase of out-of-state hunters, the Backcountry Hunters and Anglers Club continues to teach ethical and sustainable practices in its chapters across the nation. Last year, license sales in Montana made up 59% of the Fish, Wildlife & Parks budget, totaling over $92 million. These funds also come from the 1937 Pittman Robertson Act, which established a tax on firearms, ammunition and archery equipment. The FWP received $29 million from these taxes, making up 18% of the budget. Growing up in Pennsylvania, dove hunting with her father was one of Sampson’s favorite pastimes, often retrieving the doves he shot. But sometimes the doves were still alive, and Sampson would bring them back for her father to kill. “Eventually we got to this point where I would bring it back and my dad would be like ‘No, you have to do this, you have to kill this animal,’ and so it was kind of this natural progression,” Sampson said. Handling the doves helped Sampson develop a love of the animals. “When you get up close, they’ve got this beautiful pink sheen on their breast and the sweetest, loving, little beady eyes,” Sampson said. “I have such an appreciation and love for that species, and the individual dove, but I also know it means so much for me to take that animal’s life, and then it fuels me.” Sampson wasn’t always excited to hunt, though, and she recognizes hunting isn’t something everyone understands. In the years since those childhood trips, she found herself drifting away from hunting. “Hunting is not something you can be pressured into liking, you really have to come to it yourself,” Sampson said, “I initially hated deer hunting, because it’s really boring because you get up and wait in a tree stand and wait for the deer to come.” As a senior studying environmental science and geography, she has come to realize that hunting in Montana is different from in Pennsylvania. Instead of sitting in a tree for long hours, Sampson found herself using a spot and stalk method — a different hunting technique used in Montana’s fields and forests. Several of her friends at the university were into hunting as well, and she realized that for many folks in Montana, it is a way of life. “I started coming back to it on my own terms,” Sampson said. Part of those terms is a greater responsibility to the hunt. Growing up hunting with her dad, she didn’t plan as much, and it wasn’t always her own experience. She wanted to feel the weight of that responsibility by taking the time to build up her confidence to shoot, stalk and plan the hunt herself. Sampson also wanted more experience in the field. The weekend before her practice hunt with Budine, she went out with friends just to spend time outdoors, and not necessarily to kill a deer. “It just reminded me exactly of the way I grew to love being outside,” Sampson said. “It’s in a way that’s not super intense. I’m not really stressed about anything, I’m just outside looking for clues.” Mattie Budine, a senior at the University of Montana from Massachusetts, looks through the scope of her rifle at a buck chasing deer while Elliot Drewery, middle, and Claire Mcatee help out. Her roommate and mentor, Budine, knew exactly how Sampson felt. Just a few years earlier, Budine had been the observer and mentee. Budine, a senior, grew up in Massachusetts in a nonhunting family and now studies wildlife biology. She also runs the university’s Wildlife Society chapter. Her mentor, Nicole Bealer, helped her to get her first buck. Since then, she has stayed involved in the university’s hunting and angling club and its close-knit community. “I think it brings a lot of people together and shares good values,” Budine said. Another mentee of Bealer’s is the current club president. Claire Mcatee is from Clemson, South Carolina, and studies wildlife biology. Like Sampson, Mcatee gained experience through dove hunting with her father and sister. She watched popular hunting media like Meateater, and it made her want to become more hardcore in her hunting. “I can grow up and be rich and famous and all that’s great, but I really just want to be a badass,” Mcatee said. As a freshman in the club, Mcatee helped pack out a bull elk shot by a mentor-mentee duo. Snow and sleet, rough terrain, and the weight of the large elk on their backs made the experience tough. “It was an absolute shit experience, physically, mentally, emotionally — it sucked,” Mcatee said, “I got back in the car at the trailhead, and I was like, ‘that was so much fun’ like the perfect example of type-two fun.” The day after, she and Bealer went out again and Mcatee shot her first whitetail doe. From then on, Mcatee knew she wanted more. “To me, this is the most badass thing I can do,” Mcatee said. Now, as president of UM’s chapter of Backcountry Hunters and Anglers, Mcatee reviews mentee applications, coordinates with mentors on who will take who out and helps run a range day to get students familiar with their rifles. “The goal of the program has always been to identify the barriers that keep people from learning to hunt or continue to hunt, and breaking down those barriers, so there’s no excuse,” Mcatee said. With hunting in the U.S. on the decline, students at the University of Montana and Montana State University are teaching others how to hunt ethically. One of those barriers is creating an open space for people to learn to hunt and socialize with other hunters. This is largely what James Goerz sought to create when he started the program 10 years ago. After getting out of the Marines in 2010, he chose to study wildlife biology at UM. Often hunting with friends from his wildlife biology courses, Goerz found himself frequently taking out many folks inexperienced in the sport. “It was just friends teaching friends,” Goerz said. Ten years after it started, it still has the same spirit. Aspiring hunters are paired with more experienced peers and alumni who guide them in their quest to fill their hunting tag. Nonshooting observers — who aren’t sure if they are ready to hunt but want to join in the experience — are also sometimes assigned to the pairs. Goerz views hunting as an important education tool for teaching students about public lands and wildlife. “It gives you a hands-on perspective on what it means to manage a resource,” Goerz said. Goerz hopes to share a part of Montana culture with students in the short few years they spend at UM. He jokes about “brainwashing them, but in a good way,” and teaching interested students the ethical responsibility hunters have to the resource and the land. “When they go back to Massachusetts or to Texas or to California, I’d like them to take that part of Montana with them,” Goerz said. The R3 movement is perhaps the biggest example of efforts to increase hunting participation. It focuses on recruitment, retention and reactivation of hunters. While trends have shifted over the last four years — with a spike in outdoor recreation during the COVID-19 pandemic — people with a stake in hunting still worry about its longevity. “When hunting was declining it was kind of paired with the out migration of rural areas to more urban centers, so we can think of demographic shifts as one of factors that may have led to a decline in hunters,” Metcalf said. Metcalf studies recreation trends, oftentimes women in hunting, and barriers of entry to folks who want to hunt. She points to studies across the last 20 years that depict a cultural shift in how people engage in the outdoors, largely due to technology, but with a multitude of factors influencing them. “Between the demographics, between some of this technology, between a loss of connection to some of these rural areas, I think this created this great shift away from outdoor based activities in general,” Metcalf said. Mcatee also has anxieties about hunting’s future. “I’m worried about losing the culture associated with hunting, being down to earth, being willing to be uncomfortable and sacrifice, to feed yourself and your family,” Mcatee said. Mcatee thinks some people are unhappy with R3 because they think there are already too many hunters. But she thinks hunting culture is deeply important to American culture, and that could disappear as more people choose indoor activities. “A lot of hunting is through mentorship, so if you don’t continue the mentorship and there’s a gap, then what are we gonna do?” Mcatee said. A week after their hunt near Philipsburg, Sampson and Budine were out again, looking to fill their tags. This time, Sampson was with her mentor, Nicole Bealer, and an observer. Budine was out with Mcatee and Montana State University’s Backcountry Hunters and Angler’s president Elliott Drewery. Walking down a closed road in the predawn light, Budine, Mcatee and Drewery found a trio of deer. The hunters knew they were in luck. The deer advanced over the ridge, out of sight. Budine moved down the road and set up the shot. Drewery sat next to her to help advise. Even though she could’ve made the shot, it didn’t feel safe. The buck was standing on the ridgeline. If Budine missed the shot, the bullet would go off over the ridge, and could hit other hunters or animals. They could get a better shot if they were patient. Their game of cat and mouse lasted for nearly two hours, stalking the deer through deadfall of tree limbs and branches. Finally, a clean shot in the dense woods presented itself. Drewery extended his arm against a tree, and Budine shouldered her rifle, resting it on his arm. Budine’s shot rang out over the ridge. The 80-yard shot was perfect. Budine had ensured a quick, humane death for the deer. The trio soon went to work on gutting the deer. They decided they would take out the organs and drag it out whole. They moved fast. As blood pooled in the body cavity, Budine reached in and pulled out the heart. She could see where her bullet pierced the organ. After washing their hands off, they tied the antlers to a stick and dragged the buck half a mile to Drewery’s car. As Budine arrived back to the cabin with her deer on the roof of Drewery’s Subaru Crosstrek, Sampson and Bealer were still out in the field. Just as they were ready to take a break, they discovered a fresh set of tracks. Excited, they followed the prints to a small buck and several does. For the next four hours they moved carefully and slowly, leery of spooking the deer. They crawled on their stomachs through the fresh snow to get closer. The terrain was rough. Dense trees and deadfall made it difficult for the hunters to get a clear sight line to the deer. A clean shot was something Sampson knew she wanted above all else, something she felt responsible for. On top of the difficult terrain, the recent snow and below freezing temperatures made the experience all the more intense. Sampson’s pants were so wet they began to freeze in the cold air. Finally, the deer bedded down. But to Sampson’s frustration, her intended target — the large buck — chose to lie behind a tree. Sampson had to wait for nearly an hour for the buck to move from behind the tree before she could take the shot. As the minutes dragged on, Sampson grew restless, uncomfortable from laying in the snow. “(Sampson), do you even want to shoot a deer today?” Bealer jokingly asked. But Sampson wasn’t ready to give up. The larger buck finally stood up from behind the tree. It was time for Sampson to put months of preparation to the test. She stared down the scope and gave herself one last moment to double-check the shot. But the buck moved farther into the dense woods, making a clean shot uncertain. Sampson felt defeated. Almost as quickly as she lost that opportunity, however, another deer popped up just 20 yards down slope — the original one the pair had been tracking. Sampson quickly readjusted her position and scoped in. Bealer yelled for the buck’s attention. The deer turned to look. Sampson took the shot. The buck fell. Her season was complete. The responsibility toward the hunt and the ethical shot Sampson wanted to make had been fulfilled. “It was such a gratifying experience. I didn’t know how happy I would feel,” Sampson said. Sampson isn’t sure where she’ll go after graduating or what job she’ll be able to get. But she knows she wants to continue hunting. During her time in the club, she heard mentors like Mcatee talk about how “it’s just easier to not hunt than it is to hunt.” Sampson understands that notion, but she’s found herself already trying to get back out to the field, no matter where she ends up in the future. Like so many hunters who had come before, Sampson was choosing the hard route. Get local news delivered to your inbox!
The Trade Desk’s Ashton De Santis: Upfronts Uncovered – Measurement and accountability take centre stageOverall, the adjustment of VIP device sharing benefits by Tencent Video reflects the challenges and complexities of the online streaming industry. As competition intensifies and content costs rise, companies must find a balance between providing value to their users and managing their operational expenses. By communicating transparently with its users and ensuring that existing members are not disadvantaged by the policy change, Tencent Video aims to maintain the loyalty and satisfaction of its VIP members while adapting to the evolving landscape of the digital entertainment market.
MIAMI — Shaq Barrett’s retirement during the summer stunned the Dolphins and their fans. But after a few months on the sideline, the two two-time Pro Bowler wants back in. Javascript is required for you to be able to read premium content. Please enable it in your browser settings.This victory not only marks a significant moment in the Shanxi Loongs' season but also sends a strong message to the rest of the league. By defeating the previously undefeated Beijing Ducks, the Loongs have shown that they are a force to be reckoned with and a serious contender for the championship title.Big Ten could place four teams in playoff, thanks to IU's riseLil Wayne, Camila Cabello & GloRilla to Headline 2025 College Football Playoff Concert in Atlanta
2021 has been an extraordinarily exciting year for gamers, with the highly anticipated releases of GTA 6 and NS2 generating huge buzz in the gaming world. As we look forward to the upcoming year, many analysts are predicting that 2022 will be a monumental year for the gaming industry, with these two blockbuster titles leading the way.