Category Archives: Environmental Issues

Larry Wilson: Collaborative forest planning continues

Commentary, Environmental Issues, , ,

Larry’s column is nicely timed this week. A lengthy series of Flathead National Forest Plan revision “stakeholder collaboration” meetings winds up tonight. Several North Fork folks have been participating.

In the more than 60 years I have been on the North Fork, I have been involved in a lot of planning efforts. These involved six years on the Flathead Basin Commission, 20 years on the Montana Governors Team negotiating with British Columbia, the Flathead County Planning Board, the North Fork group that started the Interlocal, and then the North Fork Land-Use Advisory Committee, which guided the Flathead County Commissioners from no planning to adopting a North Fork plan.

In addition, I have spent countless hours and several decades on groups or committees involved directly or indirectly with Flathead National Forest planning. All of these were slow-moving and acting and at times very frustrating, and I had decided I had done all that I could and would withdraw to the sidelines where I could comment on the new generation without spending time in meetings.

Then the Whitefish Range Partnership came along. I didn’t just jump on board but drug my feet for a month or more and finally agreed to be on the group, representing no one but myself as a North Fork resident.

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Wandering Oregon wolf may have found a mate

Environmental Issues, News, , , ,

Remember “OR7,” the Oregon-based wolf that created a stir when it wandered into Northern California a couple of years ago? It looks like it has found a mate and settled down in Oregon . . .

Oregon’s famous wandering gray wolf, dubbed OR-7, may have found the mate he has trekked thousands of miles looking for, wildlife authorities said Monday. It’s likely the pair spawned pups, and if confirmed, the rare predators would be the first breeding pair of wolves in the Oregon’s Cascade Range since the early 1900s.

Officials said cameras in the Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest in the southern Cascades captured several images of what appears to be a female wolf in the same area where OR-7’s GPS collar shows he has been living.

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist John Stephenson said it is not proof, but it is likely the two wolves mated over the winter and are rearing pups that would have been born in April. Biologists won’t start looking for a den until June, to avoid endangering the pups.

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Another lawsuit filed over forest priority nominations

Environmental Issues, News, ,

Another lawsuit challenges Gov. Steve Bullock’s nomination of  more than 5.1 million acres of national forest land in Montana as top priorities for restoration . . .

A new lawsuit has been filed over Gov. Steve Bullock’s nomination of 5.1 million acres of U.S. Forest Service land for priority management.

The complaint filed last week by Wildwest Institute, Conservation Congress and Friends of the Bitterroot is the second since Bullock forwarded his choices for expedited restoration and management to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack in April.

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Study: sage grouse doing fine on Southeast Montana grazed lands

Environmental Issues, News, ,

There may be some bright spots in the sage grouse situation . . .

Cattle and greater sage grouse seem to be getting along just fine in southeastern Montana, according to a recent Fish Wildlife and Parks study, and that’s a big deal.

As sage grouse have been listed as a species worthy of protection under the Endangered Species Act, but precluded by higher priorities for now, western farmers and ranchers have been concerned about what the implications of such a decision might mean to the way they use the land.

“They’re real worried that if that bird gets listed, the federal government will come in and tell them how to manage that ground,” said Melissa Foster, an FWP biologist who was the lead author of a four-year study in Powder and Carter counties.

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Judge tells U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to get off the dime on lynx recovery plan

Environmental Issues, News,

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service was told in federal district court to get moving on a lynx recovery plan . . .

Saying a decade was long enough, U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy this week ordered the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to finish its recovery plan for the imperiled Canada lynx, giving the agency 30 days to present its proposal.

Environmental groups that sued the agency lauded the decision as a critical and long-sought win for the wild cat. FWS said it would review Molloy’s ruling and determine its next move.

“We are reviewing the judge’s decisions and working on a strategy to comply with it,” said Leith Edgar, public affairs specialist with the Mountain-Prairie Region of FWS.

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George Wuerthner: Manage federal forest lands with all Americans in mind

Commentary, Environmental Issues, ,

In a Missoulian op-ed, George Wuerthner expresses misgivings about the impact of the forest restoration provisions in the new farm bill . . .

Recently the Bullock administration convened a committee to designate federal forest lands that could be logged under a special categorical exclusion provision of the recently passed Farm Bill.

This section of the Farm Bill repeals the National Environmental Policy Act to allow an unlimited number of commercial logging projects – up to 3,000 acres in size each – to be implemented on U.S. national forests without any environmental analysis of harmful effects to threatened/endangered or sensitive species. It would also eliminate administrative appeals, severely reducing public participation in forest management decisions.

Under the proposal, any lands outside of special set asides like wilderness areas and proposed wilderness deemed “threatened” by insects, disease or wildfire could be logged. Since insects, disease and wildfire are the major ecological processes that rejuvenate and restore forest ecosystems, and are found in all forested ecosystems, this means just about any federal forest lands could potentially be logged.

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See also: “Gov. Bullock lists 5.1 million acres of forest lands for restoration“

Inbred wolves struggle, moose thrive at Isle Royale NP

Environmental Issues, News, , ,

An interesting interplay between genetic diversity and climate change . . .

During their annual Winter Study at Isle Royale National Park, scientists from Michigan Technological University counted nine wolves organized into one breeding pack and a second small group that is a remnant of a formerly breeding pack.

In the Isle Royale Wolf-Moose Study’s annual report released today, the researchers say that over the past three years, they have tallied the lowest numbers of wolves ever: nine in 2011-12, eight in 2012-13 and nine in 2013-14. During the same period, predation rates — the proportion of the moose population killed by wolves — also dropped to the lowest ever recorded, while the number of moose doubled, to approximately 1,050 moose.

Wolves are the only predators of moose on the remote island national park in northwestern Lake Superior. The moose population has been increasing because wolf predation has been so low.

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Judge won’t force protection of whitebark pine

Environmental Issues, News,

A federal judge turned down a suit to force protection of whitebark pine . . .

A federal judge has ruled against conservationists who sought to force the government to protect a high-elevation pine tree whose nuts are a food source for threatened grizzly bears.

The Wildwest Institute and Alliance for the Wild Rockies sued after the government designated in 2011 that protections for the whitebark pine tree were warranted, but precluded by other priorities.

U.S. District Judge Dana Christensen ruled on April 25 that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service designation leaves species such as the pine tree in limbo. But he declined to overturn the government finding, saying it’s up to Congress to allocate enough money to pay for protections.

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Northwest Montana grizzlies could be delisted by late 2016

Environmental Issues, News, , ,

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is still projecting the delisting of grizzly bears in this corner of Montana within the next couple of years . . .

Wildlife managers could propose the delisting of the major grizzly bear population in Northwest Montana by late 2016.

A collective of federal, state and tribal officials gathered in Hungry Horse last week for the spring meeting of the Northern Continental Divide Ecosystem subcommittee. The group discussed updates on local grizzly conservation and management issues, including the ongoing problem of bear attractants like chicken coops.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is reviewing nearly 3,000 public comments on a post delisting management strategy for grizzly bears in the NCDE that was proposed a year ago. Chris Servheen, FWS grizzly bear recovery coordinator, said the plan would incorporate the comments and be completed in the coming months. After that, a threat analysis will be conducted to identify several characteristics of the NCDE, including the bear population’s status and the status of its habitat and regulatory mechanisms that would be in place to protect grizzlies if they were delisted. This analysis is expected to start in 2015, according to federal officials.

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Chickens ‘like crack’ to bears

Environmental Issues, News, , ,

Here’s another article discussing the growing problem of bears being attracted to chickens and chicken feed . . .

For years now, bear managers have been preaching the same sermon — residents in bear country need to secure their garbage, take in their bird feeders each spring, clean up fruit trees in the fall and feed their pets indoors.

But now there’s a growing new problem — chickens.

“Chickens are the new garbage,” Chris Servheen, grizzly bear recovery coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, said last week during a meeting of bear managers from across the state.

More and more people are now raising chickens as the move to small agricultural operations in both rural areas and in towns continues to grow.

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