Eagle events are canceled

The Eagle Watch Week activities scheduled to start Friday at Lake Coeur d’Alene have been canceled.

With the accumulation of snow, more on the way and declining numbers of bald eagles, state and federal officials decided Tuesday to forgo the annual event, which had been scheduled to run through Jan. 1 at Wolf Lodge Bay.

In past years, hundreds of people have visited the bay to visit with eagle experts and use spotting scopes to view the eagles that congregate there each November and December to feast on spawning kokanee.

Although 70 percent of eagle watchers have come from within a three-hour drive of the lake, 30 percent have come from all 50 states and 36 foreign countries, according to surveys conducted by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management.

BLM surveyors counted 127 bald eagles in the bay two weeks ago.

The weekly count declined to 67 last week. Only 21 were counted Tuesday, but the birds were difficult to spot among snow-covered trees, they said.

Spokane County

No emergency, county says

One day after Spokane Valley Mayor Rich Munson declared an emergency in his city because of the winter conditions, Spokane County commissioners declined to do the same.

In a meeting Tuesday, Commissioner Todd Mielke said that with arterials clear and traffic moving, declaring an emergency would send the wrong message two days before Christmas – especially with businesses hurting from lost commerce caused by the past week’s snowfall.

In a press release Monday, Munson said he declared the emergency in hopes of attracting state or federal money to help pay for the response.

But commissioners pointed to state law that emergencies should be declared only if life or property is at risk or if a government needs help to relieve “a stricken community.”

The “threshold is not whether we want to put us into position of recouping funds,” Commissioner Mark Richard said.

“Although we are stretched, we don’t seem to be in an emergency situation,” Richard said.

Commissioner Bonnie Mager added: “We don’t want to cry wolf.”

Still, commissioners said they will consider the issue again today and might be more likely to make a declaration later this week.

Man arrested after gun threat

Spokane police arrested a man Tuesday on charges of felony harassment after he reportedly used a handgun to confront two snowplow drivers who were clearing residential streets in front of his mother’s home.

The incident occurred about 3:30 p.m. in the 400 block of East Providence Avenue when a woman began yelling at the drivers.

Her son, 53-year-old Clay Moon, also yelled at the drivers while holding a handgun, Officer Brian Eckersley said in a news release.

A short time later, the city received an anonymous phone call from a male who threatened to shoot the next plow drivers who came along, Eckersley said.

The call was tracked to Moon’s residence.

Officers found a loaded handgun at Moon’s home, police said.

It was one of many calls officers have responded to resulting from residents experiencing heightened stress as a result of the series of snowstorms, Eckersley said.

“Remember, when July comes we will all be laughing about those crazy days in December,” Eckersley said.

“Try not to reflect on those days from your shared cell at the Spokane County Jail.”

Unregistered offenders caught

Two sex offenders who failed to register have been caught and sent back to Spokane.

On Sunday, two detectives flew to Indiana to pick up 29-year-old Billy Ray Roberts, said Spokane County sheriff’s spokesman Sgt. Dave Reagan. In September 2003, Roberts was convicted of third-degree rape of a 15-year-old girl, Reagan said.

Also Sunday, sheriff’s deputies flew to Houston to pick up Michael R. Trout, Reagan said. Trout was convicted in 2002 of third-degree rape of a 17-year-old girl.

His other convictions included residential burglary with sexual motivation, Reagan said.

Reagan said the Sheriff’s Office rarely travels so far to pick up unregistered sex offenders, but it’s willing to do so if necessary.

“I’m committed to tracking sex offenders down and making them comply with the registration law,” Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich said in a press release.

Seattle

Cobain guitar costs $100,000

A smashed guitar from the late grunge rocker Kurt Cobain has been sold to an unidentified private collector for $100,000.

Helen Hall, a broker in England, says it’s the second-highest known price for an item of Cobain memorabilia.

The seller was punk rocker Sluggo of The Grannies and Hullabaloo.

The sale was confirmed Tuesday by Jacob McMurray, senior curator at the Experience Music Project, where the taped-up Fender Mustang guitar in sunburst finish was displayed for a time.

“It’s a really cool-looking guitar because it’s smashed and held together with duct tape and Kurt Cobain wrote on it,” McMurray said.

Sluggo said he traded a working guitar for the smashed one during the first U.S. tour of Cobain’s band, Nirvana.

McMurray said Nirvana, living hand-to-mouth, was on a tour in New Jersey when Cobain smashed the guitar on stage and went looking for one to play at his next gig.

The swap was made while Cobain was staying at the apartment of Sluggo, who goes only by that name, and Sluggo’s girlfriend, McMurray said.

He said he hoped the buyer would allow the instrument to return to Seattle for a Cobain exhibit he is preparing for 2010.

“There’s not a huge amount of broken Nirvana guitars out there,” McMurray said, adding that most amount to “little slivers and fragments.”

Olympia

States change sturgeon rules

Fishery managers in Washington and Oregon are making it easier for anglers fishing for sturgeon to measure the fish to make sure they comply with state size limits.

The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife announced Tuesday that the two states’ fishery managers have decided to base official size limits for white sturgeon on “fork length” rather than the fish’s full length.

“Fork length” is the distance between the tip of a fish’s nose and the fork in its tail.

The change is designed primarily to make it easier to measure thrashing sturgeon, which often run 4 to 5 feet in length, said Brad James, a fish biologist for the department.

A maximum size limit will be retained to protect large, breeding female sturgeon.

The department announced the 2009 sport fishery for Columbia River white sturgeon will open on New Year’s Day.