SPOTTED OWL PLAN PROMPTS CALL FOR SCIENTIFIC EVALUATION

    


 The threatened species of the northern spotted owl just aren't getting cut any slack, especially from the Department of Interior (DOI). 

     Several international scientific societies are joining together to ask the DOI to reconsider their proposal for commercial timber harvest in the Pacific Northwest. The Society for Conservation Biology, The Wildlife Society, and the American Ornithologists’ Union are calling for a full environmental impact statement and peer-reviewed scientific assessment on the potential impacts of the DOI's proposal, which would allow commercial timber harvesting in the critical habitat of this species. They are recommending that the EIS identify "a range of experimental forestry techniques, appropriate scientific methodologies to assess those techniques, and a scientific process for evaluating impacts on northern spotted owls."


     Many of the scientists are disheartened that the species protection is having to be re-visited. Paul Beier, president of the Society for Conservation Biology states that, "Any activity that can have significant long-term consequences for the owl must be fully vetted by the peer review process. An environmental impact statement is the best vehicle for accomplishing this task.".  


     The ESA requires that all federal agencies avoid activities that will harm critical habitats for threatened and endangered species.  Through this, the DOI is required to not  embark on a management scheme based on untested forestry management activities which could have significant, unforeseen, and long-term negative implications for the spotted owl.  As of now, there seems to be little  scientific knowledge regarding the effects this new management plan will have on the spotted owls. The species lives in closed-canopy, old growth forests--the reasoning for them being given protection was due to unsustainable timber harvesting.   As of now, the DOI assumes that the spotted owl will benefit over long-term, but scientists are saying that this is an untested/unverified management theory.  


     John R. Faaborg, President of the American Ornithologists’ Union, made this claim, “The USFWS has proved thoughtful in its approach to the barred owl question by planning carefully designed experiments to determine if the reduction of competition by this encroaching species will benefit the northern spotted owl. The AOU encourages the Service to take the same thoughtful approach to the issue of forest management and timber removal by approaching it first on an experimental basis.”


     You would think that they would follow Faaborg's request right? Only time will tell. 


     If interested, you can read the full letter here to see what was actually said to the DOI secretary


http://www.enn.com/press_releases/3966

Dolphins Show Illness in Wake of Gulf Oil Spill

http://www.enn.com/wildlife/article/44184

California Wildlife Official Under Fire for Puma Hunt

So what happens when you're a wildlife official and you decide to hunt a species that is illegal in your state in a neighboring one? Scrutiny. 

Dan Richards is the state Fish and Game Commission president in California, where cougar killing is banned.  Recently, he went on an Idaho cougar hunt and took a man-sized cougar.  Animal rights activists and 40 California Democratic Assembly members have demanded that he resign from his appointed position and to top it off he was hit with a complaint to the state's ethics commission that the lion hunt was an illegal "freebee".

Richards has argued that what he has done was legal--in Idaho, it is completely legal and he utilized what he killed and has informed the public that he will not step down.  Cougar hunting was banned in CA in the early 1990s, but it is still legal in many other states.  The article states that, "The mountain lion population in the state is stable with an estimated 4,000-to-6,000 of the creatures. The big cats can only be killed by special depredation permit or to preserve public safety or to protect endangered bighorn sheep." 

However, now CA's Lt. Governor is questioning whether they should have a hunter in Richard's position, since he seems to not be "in step" with everyone else (since he went out and killed a cougar).  It has been proposed twice in CA that cougar hunting be reinstated--however, it has yet to be.  This is what the CEO of the Humane Society of America had to say on his blog about the issue: "If Richards didn't agree with the voters' judgment to ban lion hunting, and even if lion hunting is in fact legal in Idaho, as president of the commission he should have exhibited some respect to the electorate he serves and restrained himself from killing a lion for the heck of it." However, many of his Republican colleagues are stepping up for him and saying that he has done nothing wrong and what's his business should in fact remain his business. 

http://www.thestate.com/2012/03/02/2175131/calif-wildlife-official-under.html#storylink=misearch

Declining Dolphins

There's good news in the dolphin world--three new wildlife sanctuaries have been declared by the government of Bangladesh, with the hopes that they will help to prevent the extinction of the Irrawaddy and Ganges river dolphins, which are both threatened species. Apparently the Yangzte dolphin is already believed to be (native to this area), so leaders are hoping that these sanctuaries will help to protect the remaining two species for a similar fate. These sanctuaries will cover a total of 11 square kilometers, which includes 31 kilometres of channels. The size and location of the sanctuaries was determined using scientific findings from a study by the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and the Bangladesh Forest Department. Currently, there are no numbers of exactly how many of the Irrawaddy and Ganges river dolphins there are.  They are being considered as on the decline because they have started to disappear in many of their original habitats.  Contributing factors are believed to be depletion of their natural prey as well as being tangled in fishing lines. 


This is what the director of WCS's Asian Freshwater and Coastal Cetacean Program, Brian D. Smith, has to say about the issue: "Declaration of these Wildlife Sanctuaries is an essential first step in protecting Ganges River and Irrawaddy dolphins in Bangladesh. As biological indicators of ecosystem-level impacts, freshwater dolphins can inform adaptive human-wildlife management to cope with climate change, suggesting a broader potential for conservation and sustainable development.


With these sanctuaries, they are hoping to protect other species as well. 
http://blog.arkive.org/2012/02/new-sanctuaries-to-help-threatened-dolphins/

Bat Habitats or Strip Mining?

Over the past few years, nearly 7 million bats have died due to white-nose syndrome.  One of the species that have been hit the hardest is the Indiana bat, an endangered species.  So, if these endangered bats are found in an area, isn't it our job to protect them? Well, the Forest Service in Illinois doesn't seem to think so. They have come up with the Shawnee National Forest Plan, which will trade out a parcel of the forest, which happens to be endangered bat habitat, for strip mining for the Peabody Energy Company.   The Center for Biological Diversity and Sierra Club oppose the land swap, and are suing the Forest Service for not consulting with the US Fish and Wildlife Service first to see that this deal would not illegally hurt the species.  Just last summer, biologists found 2 types of endangered bat species roosting and foraging: the Indiana bat and the gray bat.  So far the dreaded white-nose syndrome hasn't appeared in gray bats yet, but biologists believe that they are susceptible to the disease as well. As far as the Indiana bat goes, their numbers have been reduced by 70% in the Northeastern US.  The chair of the Sierra Club's Shawnee National Forest Committee Jim Bensman, has this to say: “The Forest Service has a legal obligation to make protection of endangered species a top priority. When the agency found out last summer there were Indiana bats and gray bats on the land, its first move should have been to safeguard that habitat, not move forward with a plan with Peabody to have it strip-mined.”

I will be on the look-out for what happens with this issue. 

http://www.enn.com/press_releases/3924

No Guts, No Gators