2 Articles:
5-year
review of spotted owl and marbled murrelet
Seeing
forests and trees
April 21, 2003
R1allnews@r1.FWS.GOV
Contact: Joan Jewett, 503-231-6121
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced today
it is conducting a
5-year review of two threatened birds, the
northern spotted owl and the
marbled murrelet.
The 5-year review, as required for all listed
species under the Endangered
Species Act, will assess the best available
information on how the birds
have fared since they were listed for protection
in the early 1990s,
including analyses of population data and threats
to the species. The
Service is soliciting information from all
sources. Comments must be
received by June 20, 2003.
"The purpose of the review is to ensure that the
species have the
appropriate level of protection under the ESA,"
said Dave Wesley, Acting
Regional Director of the Service's Pacific Region.
"Reviewing the latest
information will also lead to better management
and improved conservation
of the species."
The review will consider information that has
become available since the
original listing determination, such as:
population and demographic trend
data; studies of dispersal and habitat use;
genetics and species
competition investigations; surveys of habitat
amount, quality, and
distribution; adequacy of existing regulatory
mechanisms; and management
and conservation planning information. The review
will assess whether new
information suggests that the species' populations
are increasing,
declining or stable; whether existing threats are
increasing, the same,
reduced or eliminated; if there are any new
threats; and if any new
information or analysis calls into question any of
the conclusions in the
original listing determination.
The Service will also review whether the Pacific
Northwest population of
marbled murrelets qualifies for
listing under the agency's current policy on
Distinct Population Segments.
The policy was adopted in 1996, after marbled
murrelets in the Pacific
Northwest were listed as threatened. The ESA
authorizes vertebrate animals
to be listed as either species, subspecies or
Distinct Population Segments.
A Distinct Population Segment is a population that
makes up a portion of a
species' or subspecies' population or range.
If the Service determines that a change in either
species' classification
is warranted, the agency may separately propose to
reclassify or delist the
species. If the agency does propose a change, it
would go through a formal
rulemaking process, including public review and
comment, as defined in
section 4(a) of the ESA. No change in
classification would occur until the
completion of that process.
The northern spotted owl was listed in 1990 and
the marbled murrelet was
listed in 1992. The Northwest Forest Plan, signed
in 1994, is a
comprehensive strategy for managing 24.4 million
acres of Forest Service
and Bureau of Land Management lands that maintains
and restores old-growth
forests and recognizes their importance to the
economy and jobs of the
region.
Comprehensive research and monitoring programs for
both of these species
have been carried out and are ongoing on both
Federal and non-Federal
(state, private, tribal) lands. As a result, a
large body of new
information has become available. Although this
information has been made
public throughout the past decade, and the Service
has continued to use the
best available data in carrying out its ESA
responsibilities, this
information has not been evaluated under the ESA's
5-year review process.
The Service has agreed to initiate the 5-year
review of these two species
at this time in connection with the proposed
settlement of two recent
lawsuits: Western Council of Industrial Workers,
et al. Secretary of the
Interior (regarding the northern spotted owl), and
American Forest Resource
Council et at v. Secretary of the Interior
(regarding the marbled
murrelet). The proposed settlement agreements are
currently pending
consideration by the District Court in Oregon.
The Service is asking that anyone with new
scientific or commercial
information concerning the status of the northern
spotted owl and the
marbled murrelet submit it to: Field Office
Supervisor, Attention: Owl and
Murrelet 5-year Review, Oregon Fish and Wildlife
Office, 2600 SE. 98th
Avenue, Suite 100, Portland, Oregon 97266.
Information on the northern
spotted owl may be sent electronically to
owl_information@r1.fws.gov.
Information on marbled murrelets may be sent
electronically to
murrelet_information@r1.fws.gov.
Notice of this review was published in today's
Federal Register.
See Questions and answers for more information.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is the
principal Federal agency
responsible for conserving, protecting and
enhancing fish, wildlife and
plants and their habitats for the continuing
benefit of the American
people. The Service manages the 95-million-acre
National Wildlife Refuge
System, which encompasses 540 national wildlife
refuges, thousands of small
wetlands and other special management areas. It
also operates 69 national
fish hatcheries, 64 fishery resource offices and
81 ecological services
field stations. The agency enforces Federal
wildlife laws, administers the
Endangered Species Act, manages migratory bird
populations, restores
nationally significant fisheries, conserves and
restores wildlife habitat
such as wetlands, and helps foreign governments
with their conservation
efforts. It also oversees the Federal Aid program
that distributes hundreds
of millions of dollars in excise taxes on fishing
and hunting equipment to
state fish and wildlife agencies.
NOTE: This news release and others can be viewed
on either the Service's
Pacific Regional home page on the Internet at
http://pacific.fws.gov or the
National home page at:
http://www.fws.gov/r9extaff/renews.html
The Washington Times: Commentary
http://www.washtimes.com/commentary/20030515-084346-2563r.htm
Seeing forests and trees
By Charli Coon
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
In 1995, a late-winter storm laid waste to
hundreds of thousands of trees in a 35,000-acre
area of the Six Rivers National Forest in
California. Trees lay strewn across the forest
floor, creating conditions particularly ripe for
the kind of uncontrollable, unnaturally hot fires
that threaten communities and lives.
Officials charged with managing the forests at
Six Rivers knew what had to be done. The dead
trees had to be removed and the forest floor
cleared — all before fire season began.
But they needed permission from Washington,
D.C., first, so they submitted various options to
their superiors to accomplish this, as the
National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) requires
them to do. Then they waited while courts and
others plowed through challenges to every part of
their plans. By the time forest officials won
approval for what was — for them — a no-brainer,
they managed to clear just 1,600 acres before
disaster struck.
Before it was over, 125,000 acres had burned,
and $70 million had been spent to contain the
fires. On top of it all, the U.S. Forest Service
had to go back to the drawing board and create
still more plans for improving the forest because,
of course, the fire had changed the land
conditions.
The intent of NEPA — to ensure forests aren't
ripped apart indiscriminately with no concern for
environmental fallout — is a good one. But in
practice, its requirements have become tools used
to prevent plans from being enacted until they're
rendered moot by the onset of the fires or disease
that managers sought to avoid. These shackles on
sound forest management have allowed America's
forests and rangelands to reach "a crisis of
ecological health," according to the U.S.
Department of Agriculture.
Last year alone, wildfires burned more than 7
million acres of public and private lands — an
area larger than Rhode Island and Maryland
combined. These fires claimed the lives of 21
firefighters, destroyed thousands of structures
and forced tens of thousands of people to evacuate
their homes. The two-headed monster forest
officials now confront — forests with excessive
"loads" of dead trees and other brush and forests
deteriorating because of disease and insects — now
consumes 190 million acres of public land, an area
twice the size of California.
Communities such as Flagstaff, Ariz., and
Klamath Falls, Ore., no longer can afford to have
sound forest management plans stifled by
extremists and their frivolous challenges until
fire season arrives and it's too late to help.
That's the focus of President Bush's proposed
Healthy Forests Initiative, embodied in the
Healthy Forests Restoration Act of 2003 to be
taken up this month in the House.
The initiative would make it easier for forest
managers to "thin" forests — fell and remove
diseased or dead trees — to perform "prescribed
burns," in which small, controllable fires are set
to prevent unwieldy conflagrations, and to
otherwise treat forests against insect and disease
infestation.
It would do so by streamlining the
administrative appeals and court challenges to
fire-prevention strategies on up to 20 million
acres of forest near residential communities,
municipal water supplies, areas with threatened or
endangered species and areas where trees are
infected with certain insects. Forest Service
officials estimate they spend 40 percent of their
time and $250 million per year assembling multiple
plans for projects when they know what is needed,
all to fulfill the requirements of NEPA.
The bill would allow forest managers to
develop one plan for public comment rather than
allowing the public to weigh in on the universe of
options available. And on those 20 million acres
most in need of treatment, it would remove the
option of doing nothing — a popular one among the
hard green left and one required by law now to be
among the top options.
It's time we recognize that times have changed
with respect to our forests. Our burgeoning
population means more of us live near forests and
rangelands than ever before. Leaving the forests
alone may sound like the best environmental
practice, and it may have been 100 or more years
ago when the occasional natural burn could correct
overgrowth without threatening communities. Now,
circumstances demand we control the elements, and
thankfully, we have the technology and know-how to
do so.
But how we do so must be based on what's best
for the forests and the people who live around
them. And those who have devoted their lives to
the study of these ecosystems can best make those
decisions — not extremists who insist that to
touch a forest is to defile it.
Charli Coon is an energy and environment
analyst at the Heritage Foundation.