Wildlife

Friday News Roundup: Hogs, Montana Story, Bourbon and Decarbonization

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Photo North Dakota Game and Fish

Best headline.. goes to the Cowboy State Daily for

Hogpocalypse Now? Feral Swine In Colorado, Montana Could Bode Badly For Wyoming

 

Hordes of hogs running wild across Wyoming aren’t likely anytime soon, some hunters and wildlife agents said, but feral pigs reaching the Cowboy State could be inevitable.

There have already been reports of feral swine showing up in Colorado, North Dakota and Utah, and there’s serious concern over them pushing south from Canada into Montana.

Perhaps worse, people sometimes deliberately transplant feral hogs, apparently because they want the opportunity to make money by offering “canned” hog hunts, Montana’s state veterinarian, Martin Zaluski told Cowboy State Daily.

“Much of the spread of feral hogs has been in stock trailers being pulled down highways at 80 miles per hour,” he said.

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As a special treat for our TSW Montana residents… here’s a Livingston, Montana resident (Walter Kirn) getting grumpy ( in a good writer way) about a recent New York Times Magazine story…

Walter: There always has to be a center of evil in the United States, right? For a while, it was northern Idaho, like you say, which did genuinely have some Christian white supremacist compounds as it were. But so now I guess it’s Montana’s turn in the stocks. But more than that, I think the piece was a lifestyle piece gone wrong. Everything about it was exotic. Even if I were Marxist, I’d want to move to Montana after I read this piece. It looked unreconstructed and wild and full of characters and conflict and so on….

The funny thing is that having lived there for 32 years, this is now about the third cycle of ‘Montana as militia threat’ that I’ve watched in the press. In the nineties around the time of the Oklahoma City bombing, there was something called the Patriot movement and the militia movement. And it was usually located in Montana because, for readers of the New York Times, you can pretty much set any scary trend in Montana without anyone checking on it. It’s harder nowadays because there are direct flights to Bozeman and there didn’t use to be…

Walter: But accompanying the text of this piece, and even more damning in the eyes of the person who knows nothing about Montana, were a bunch of photographs that were absolutely completely manipulated and filtered in the way of like dystopian campaign ads. They put dark filtering on them, and they showed things like some kind of a Republican meeting in a hotel ballroom or something, but filtered so as to look like some satanic pageant.

Here’s a link to the discussion with Walter and Matt Taibi on Substack.  It might be behind a paywall.

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Another interesting article on the White Oak Initiative and how they need openings for seedlings to get started:

But the intensity of land use a century or two ago tipped the balance too far. “Back then, we did wide-scale burning on purpose or accident. We abused the system with practices we don’t think [are] appropriate now,” says Stringer. That realization led to policies that introduced decades of fire suppression, such that shade-loving trees have enveloped the undergrowth again. Add in pests and invasive plants encouraged by climate change, and baby oaks don’t stand a chance.

But controlling invasive species and pests, and cutting to provide light to the understory, takes commitment and resources many forest owners don’t have. “Missouri’s forest cover is 15 million acres, and 12 million acres are privately owned. Only 10 percent of that is being actively tended to,” notes Missouri State Forestry specialist Hank Stelzer. “Landowners have the attitude, ‘If it’s green, it’s good.’ So the forest is like an unweeded garden, and we know what happens when you neglect a garden. You don’t get large tomatoes; you get insects and disease. We see the same thing in woodlands. We don’t get the quality white oaks or those that can sustain climate change.”

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Decarbonization Corner

Following the Money- Climate Edition

(note there are many things that people can do or fund about decarbonizing, from concrete to nuclear to hydro to geothermal; this focuses on anti-fossil fuels and pro- wind and solar.)

I find ENGO’s interesting and where the $ come from, and to what specific ends.

Robert Bryce apparently had the patience and the facility to look into climate related ones.. which relates to our federal lands issues in that, for example,  “rapid scaling” and “stopping the expansion of fossil fuel infrastructure.”

Given that other ENGO’s are likely to litigate some of the rapid scaling (but will be with the big $ on the “stopping the expansion”), it would be interesting to see (if we could, but I don’t think we can) what this money will be used for.

 

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Building Things, McKibben on the IRA

Bill McKibben in this New Yorker article  which is generally interesting.. talks about rural people being influenced by outside (bad, fossil fuel) groups.

The same kind of manufactured opposition is shaping up on land. For many years, surveys found that solar energy was incredibly popular across political groups—Republicans, independents, and Democrats all favored far more public support for photovoltaics. But front groups sponsored by the fossil-fuel industry have begun sponsoring efforts to spread misinformation, crisscrossing the country with slide shows claiming that wind turbines routinely catch on fire, or lower property values, and that solar farms shed toxic chemicals into the water supply. “There’s always been some run-of-the-mill nimbyism,” Norris, the North Carolina solar developer, said. “But there’s an increasingly organized opposition effort.”

So.. I’ve actually attended public meetings on these things and I didn’t see any sign of “front groups”. Maybe the difference is that it seems like a good idea. until it industrializes your landscape. And we were told industrialized landscapes were bad and to be resisted, until now. Notice how concern for the environment is now NIMBYism and even “the culture wars”. I don’t know the answer, but more listening, and less critiquing might be a start. And if our neighbors, protecting what they see as their environment, become the key to the “climate crisis slipping irretrievably out of control” then perhaps someone has bet on the wrong decarbonization horse.

Based on the way that project approvals work, it’s going to come down to a county-by-county basis,” Norris told me. “I thought solar energy was insulated from the culture wars until relatively recently, but it’s getting worrying.” Nationally, Billy Parish said, “We used to be able to say solar polled in the low nineties for popularity. But I think that’s probably begun to trail off a bit, become a little more polarized. It’s still very popular, but there’s definitely slippage.” And that slippage could mean a thousand different fights, each one delaying change past the point where the climate crisis slips irretrievably out of control. “Thanks to the I.R.A., money is not the chief obstacle,” Gillis said. “What Congress did was change the economics of the technologies we’re talking about. But what they did not do was remove all the other barriers slowing us down. Really, economics was the tailwind for renewables already. It just got better with the I.R.A. But the other friction remains.”

PERC’s Private Lands Prescribed Fire Report, Brucellosis Payments, and Dog-Mountain Lion and Dog-Wolf Interactions

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1. Another Prescribed Fire Report  “Burn Back Better” from PERC. How Western States Can Encourage Prescribed Fire on Private Lands.

Here are their recommendations.

Recommendations
  1. Improve permitting systems to remove bureaucratic obstacles to prescribed burning.
  2. Develop more flexible approaches to setting “burn days” in which different types of prescribed fires can be implemented.
  3. Design training opportunities and other resources to educate and support, rather than regulate, landowners’ use of prescribed fire.
  4. Clarify and improve liability regimes to reflect the public benefits of prescribed fire.
  5. Harness private investment to benefit forest health through catastrophe bonds.

In their summary, they have another map from FEMA (interesting given today’s other post).

 

2. Brucellosis Compensation Fund

Paradise Valley ranchers who participated in a 2019 survey ranked the disease brucellosis as the most concerning wildlife issue they face, and a think tank, several conservation and sporting groups and a financial tech firm have partnered up to propose a solution.

Earlier this month, the coalition announced plans to set aside a “Paradise Valley Brucellosis Compensation Fund” for ranchers whose cattle contract the bacterial disease from wildlife. It’s part of an effort to build tolerance for the elk that migrate across the valley’s working lands.

3. Mountain Lions Attacking Pet Dogs near Nederland from the Colorado Sun

Mountain lions killed 15 dogs in 30 days near a Colorado town. Attacks continued and now a lion is dead.

It’s interesting because the story includes the views of different people in town and also the Colorado Parks and Wildlife folks who have the challenging job of helping manage wildlife-human conflicts.  It’s a long article, but also another one of “no one understands why this happens at this particular time and place, but it does.”

4. Wolves Also Attack Dogs But Usually Not Pets

Cat Urbiqkit of the Cowboy State Daily did a review of dogs and wolves’ coexistence issues:

The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources maintains a website and phone app where it maps “wolf caution areas” due to recent conflicts between wolves and dogs.

The agency reports, “Although wolf attacks on pet dogs in residential areas are rare, they do occur and have increased in recent years.” In 2016, more than 40 dogs were killed by wolves in that state.

What does vary is the type of dog killed by wolves, which is largely reflective of the interconnected human-dog use of areas occupied by wolves.

In Alaska, it’s tethered sled dogs.

In Wisconsin, it’s trailing hounds used for hunting.

In Wyoming, it’s livestock guardian dogs used to protect domestic sheep flocks. In 2021, a wolf pack (the Dog Creek pack located in western Wyoming) killed or injured five livestock guardian dogs, according to the Wyoming Game & Fish Department’s Annual Wolf Report.

Urbigkit also reviews some northern European wolf literature.

That 2003 paper also noted: “Our results suggest that, in the wolf pack exhibiting strong aggressive and/or predatory behavior towards dogs, this behavior may constitute a tradition that may be passed on from generation to generation within a family unit. The hypothesis that aggressive behavior by wolves towards dogs is an inherited, traditional behavior, has important management implications and should be investigated further.”

The Grizzly in the Driveway by Rob Chaney: Book Review and Discussion

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First of all, I would recommend reading this book, and possibly giving it as a gift to people with TSW-like interests.

Rob Chaney, well-known journalist and currently Managing Editor of the Missoulian, is the author.  He’s got a strong background in this and other federal lands issues, knows and interviews many of the key people, and tells great stories.  The stories alone are worth the price of admission.  Naturally, I disagree with his views on all kinds of topics, but I both learned much from, and was greatly entertained by his stories.

Apparently there are internet communities around specific bears as Chaney discusses in the chapter titled “Ursus arctos Facebookii.”  There’s also a discussion of drone-induced wildlife harassment (where do all those videos come from anyway?).  More generally, there’s much of interest in this book, and Chaney is an excellent writer.  In fact, you can see in the photo that I placed so many tabs for things I considered to be interesting.. well, there’s so many it held me up from writing this review. Where to start?

The grizzly is Nature’s performance-enhancing drug.

Yest taking that drug, while it may make you better, it will also extract a price. Because what do you do when you enter the wilderness? You meet the wild. You meet thunderstorms that rattle your teeth, rivers that rip your boots off, and , just maybe, a grizzly bear that might maul you.  You measure yourself against the Universe, see how infinitesimally tiny you are compared to the indifferent cosmos, and yet you come out somewhat enlarged.

Take the bear out of the temple, and the magic becomes indifferent.  The thunderstorms and rivers and mountain peaks don’t look you in the eye.  They don’t pass judgment on your worthiness, or edibility, or threat potential.  It’s not anthropomorphizing to say the grizzly makes a decision about any encounter between the two of you, once in which you have virtually no standing to justify or sway.  As the Glacier Park t-shirt says “Some days the bear gets you; some days it just walks away.” Get sanctified by a a grizzly bear, and you wear a pan-denominational robe of glory.

Anyone with any affinity for wilderness longs for that kind of transfiguration.  That promise that if I go in deep, I will return empowered, enlighted- or at least verified as beyond merely human.

I used to call the attitudes of some folks “carnivolatry.”  This isn’t, strictly speaking, accurate, as it seemed to be mostly about wolves and grizzlies (an omnivore) and not so much about mountain lions. “Transfiguration,” “sanctified” and all spiritual/religious terminology.  Personally, I like Wilderness as a place to be with (usually) fewer humans and (usually) more quiet.  Being challenged by large animals is not part of what I go there for; in fact, it’s a bit of a pain for me to follow the grizzly rules as I like to be there alone.  That’s why I prefer places without them. But I’d never read about these religious views before “temple”  “magic” and so on.

I like this quote about the Wilderness Act:  “the result is a law commanding preservation of places never well understood for relatively undefined purposes.”

And how Native Americans (who disagree among themselves, as he notes) and Tribal sovereignty might influence decision-making.

“Some people derive life-changing benefit from seeing a grizzly. What is that worth? How does a Hindu explain to a Muslim that in India a cow is sacred and must be allowed to wander in the streets unmolested, until it wanders across the border into Pakistan , where it’s a commodity to be eaten and tanned into leather? How do I tell a Hutterite Farmer on the Rocky Mountain Front that my grizzly siting is worth his family having to live behind electric fences? All those precepts get thrown in a blender when North America’s sovereign Indian Nations get involved. And they have, in a big way.”

Then there’s the spiritual rights argument..

Does an Indian making a spiritual-rights claim by protecting a grizzly bear from a hunter actually commit hunter harassment, a criminal offense in Montana, Wyoming and Idaho? Or would the protection be a treaty-backed, constitutional exercise in Freedom of Religion?

It is the position of the FWS that they cannot consider the religious implications of their delisting decision because this would conflict with the ESA,” the tribal attorneys wrote in Crow Tribe vs. Zinke. This position is in violation of RFRA  (Religious Freedoms Restoration Act) and is arbitrary and capricious.

There’s a section on women in Indigenous traditions and shamanic work, including the work of Barbara Tedlock.

There’s a whole chapter called “The Bear on the Bicycle” about biking and bear conflicts, which I’m sure is of interest to many.  And other recreationists that were not around in the past.. like endurance runners.

Such runners routinely race fifty miles across the Bob Marshall core in a dayy, on a route that professional outfitters like Smoke Elser spend a week leading dudes on horseback through the most productive grizzly habitat in the Lower 48. Few can afford the thousands of dollars such guided adventures cost. Fewer still have the stamina to “Bag the Bob” in a twenty-four-hour ultramarathon. Yet both groups claim a vested interest in teh heart of the biggest bit of landscape in the contiguous United States that grizzly bears still call home.

Who am I to tell the runners to stay home? I was out there too, packing a three-ounce titanium cooking post instead of an outfitter’s cast-iron skillet. I enjoy the assistance of modern technology in ways that don’t involve wheels.

The Endangered Species Act asks people to think about what adjustments we’re willing to make for other forms of life. National surveys show most people support such sacrifices. This breaks the debate down to two questions.  First, do we want to keep having wild grizzly bears? If no, then the Endangered Species Act “problem” goes away with them.

But if we say yes, we want grizzlies, then the debate becomes all about limits and sacrifices.  Not only loggers and miners, but bikers and hikers must leave something on the table for the bear.

It does seem a bit ironic that “loggers” who came to grizz country were bad news for coming in and cutting trees..and miners, whose behavior was fairly predictable,  but the various forms of recreation reach much further, more regularly, and for all seasons of the year.  Maybe the bear would be better off if the loggers and miners returned, and all varieties of recreationist were excluded.  Just a thought.

Anyway, there are many possible discussion topics in this book.  The comments below will remain open if you want to read the book and discuss further.  As you can tell from the tabs in the photo, I only touched upon a few of the interesting things in this post.

“Proforestation” It Aint What It Claims To Be

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‘Proforestation’ separates people from forests

AKA: Ignorance and Arrogance Still Reign Supreme at the Sierra Club.

I picked this up from Nick Smith’s Newsletter (sign up here)
Emphasis added by myself as follows:
1)  Brown Text for items NOT SUPPORTED by science with long term and geographically extensive validation.                                                                                                                                                        2) Bold Green Text for items SUPPORTED by science with long term and geographically extensive validation.
3) >>>Bracketed Italics for my added thoughts based on 59 years of experience and review of a vast range of literature going back to way before the internet.<<<

“Proforestation” is a relatively new term in the environmental community. The Sierra Club defines it as: “extending protections so as to allow areas of previously-logged forest to mature, removing vast amounts of atmospheric carbon and recovering their ecological and carbon storage potential.”          >>>Apparently, after 130 years of existence, the Sierra Club still doesn’t know much about plant physiology, the carbon cycle or the increased risk of calamitous wild fire spread caused by the close proximity of stems and competition driven mortality in unmanged stands (i.e. the science of plant physiology regarding competition, limited resources and fire spread physics). Nor have they thought out the real risk of permanent destruction of the desired ecosystems nor the resulting impact on climate change.<<<

Not only must we preserve untouched forests, proponents argue, but we must also walk away from previously-managed forests too. People should be entirely separate from forest ecology and succession. >>>More abject ignorance and arrogant woke policy based only on vacuous wishful thinking.<<<

Except humans have managed forests for millennia. In North America, Indigenous communities managed forests and sustained its resources for at least 8,000 years prior to European settlement. It is true people have not always managed forests sustainably. Forest practices of the late 19th century are a good example.                                                                                                                                                 >>>Yes, and the political solution pushed on us by the Sierra Club and other faux conservationists beginning with false assumptions about the Northern Spotted Owl was to throw out the continuously improving science (i.e. Continuous Process Improvement [CPI]).  The concept of using the science to create sustainable practices and laws that regulated the bad practices driven by greed and arrogance wasn’t even considered seriously.  As always, the politicians listened to the well heeled squeaky voters.  Now, their arrogant ignorance has given us National Ashtrays, destruction of soils, and an ever increasing probability that great acreages of forest ecosystems will be lost to the generations that follow who will also have to cope with the exacerbated climate change.  So here we are, in 30+/- years the Faux Conservationists have made things worse than the greedy timber barons ever could have.  And the willfully blind can’t seem to see what they have done. Talk about arrogance.<<<

Forest management provides tools to correct past mistakes and restore ecosystems. But Proforestation even seems to reject forest restoration that helps return a forest to a healthy state, including controlling invasive species, maintaining tree diversity, returning forest composition and structure to a more natural state.

Proforestation is not just a philosophical exercise. The goal is to ban active forest management on public lands. It has real policy implications for the future management (or non-management) of forests and how we deal with wildfires, climate change and other disturbances.

We’ve written before about how this concept applies to so-called “carbon reserves.” Now, powerful and well-funded anti-forestry groups are pressuring the Biden Administration to set-aside national forests and other federally-owned lands under the guise of “protecting mature and old-growth” trees.

In its recent white paper on Proforestation (read more here), the Society of American Foresters writes that “preservation can be appropriate for unique protected areas, but it has not been demonstrated as a solution for carbon storage or climate change across all forested landscapes.”

Proforestation doesn’t work when forests convert from carbon sinks into carbon sources. A United Nations report pointed out that at least 10 World Heritage sites – the places with the highest formal environmental protections on the planet – are net sources of carbon pollution. This includes the iconic Yosemite National Park.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) recognizes active forest management will yield the highest carbon benefits over the long term because of its ability to mitigate carbon emitting disturbance events and store carbon in harvested wood products. Beyond carbon, forest management ensures forests continue to provide assets like clean water, wildlife habitat, recreation, and economic activity.
>>>(i.e. TRUE SUSTAINABILITY)<<<

Forest management offers strategies to manage forests for carbon sequestration and long-term storage.Proforestation rejects active stewardship that can not only help cool the planet, but help meet the needs of people, wildlife and ecosystems. You can expect to see this debate intensify in 2023.

We Still Don’t Understand What’s Killing Cow and Elk Calves in Colorado: and Draft Wolf Reintroduction Plan

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It’s fascinating to me that scientists are thought to be able to predict movement of wildlife populations in fifty years due to climate change, but we don’t actually understand what makes them tick (or not, in this case).  In my view, better models are built from understanding what makes animals tick.. physiology, behavior, genetics, diseases, predation, and so on.

Mysterious Deaths of Cattle Near Meeker Colorado

This has attracted the attention of media across the country and in Britain.

The best one I’ve read for those interested in the details of biology, was written by the Klinglesmith family who owns the dead calves.  It’s an interesting story of how the ranchers, Colorado Parks and Wildlife, Wildife Services, and various diagnostic laboratories  have worked together to figure out what happened.  The article even has references.  Apparently the cause is till  not clear. Warning: some of the photos are graphic.

This whole process has taught us that these investigations will require a lot of time and effort on the part of CPW staff and landowners in rural Colorado. We promise to continue to work with the local staff here in Rio Blanco County to figure out whether wolves are present or if there is another explanation for the apparent stress and trauma these calves suffered.
As a multi-generational ranching family, we are committed to running a progressive livestock and wildlife operation. However, we are also committed to working with those in our state and keeping them updated on our scenario.
Bridging the gap that exists between urban and rural is important to us. The future of livestock production in our state remains equally important. We understand this is a highly contentious issue, but hopefully we can agree on the fact that collaboration is key to working toward a solution. The relationship between state agencies, livestock associations, the Colorado public, and ranching families is crucial in moving forward with the process of coexisting with all wildlife on our landscape.

Colorado Draft Wolf Reintroduction Plan Coming Out

Comprehensive story on CPR here. Worth a read for those interested. CPW seems to have really engaged with the public on this one, certainly not an easy task.

Adding More Wolves to Colorado, Why?

So you may wonder why Colorado is adding more wolves when it already has them. Here’s a bit of history to give context.

You’d have to ask the folks (mostly urban) who voted for the state ballot initiative to reintroduce them.  At the time there were two schools of thought, one that they were coming in naturally, so why mess with Mother Nature, and the other.. I guess they felt Mother Nature needed help. But isn’t that unnatural? Oh well. Here’s where the $ came from.  Sorry about the ad in my screenshot.

 

Here’s the county votes..green came out for and red against the initiative.

The vote ended up being very close, Now a ballot initiative is an interesting critter. It’s a simple vote, so there is no analysis of say, impacts to communities.  Effectively, and unilaterally, urban areas are able to impact rural communities.  Even though the urban areas may have higher incomes, which in other contexts might trigger social justice concerns. In fact, Catholic moral theologians could probably have an entire conference devoted to whether this kind of decision-making follows the social justice principle of subsidiarity or not.

But it is what it is, and the CPW folks seem to be doing their best to honor the views of those impacted.

We Still Don’t Understand About SW Colorado Elk Calves

Interesting article by Bruce Finley today in the Denver Post.  There may be a paywall.

But in southwestern Colorado elk have been decreasing for two decades from more than 140,000 to around 122,000 – raising concerns.  Elk calf survival rates south of Interstate 70 are estimated at 30 or so per 100 cows,  compared with rates in northwestern Colorado near Craig and Steamboat Springs around 58 calves per 100 cows.

Going back to the previous article, northwestern Colorado is the area potentially planned for wolf reintroduction, and already has wolves moving in.

CPW crews also are conducting research into why more calves aren’t surviving.

The forces impeding elk survival include loss of habitat and degradation due to roads, traffic, energy development, and increased residential and commercial construction along migration routes. Surging recreational activities in western Colorado also complicates elk survival.

State and federal ecologists point to climate warming as a factor, favoring hot and dry conditions that reduce vegetation elk in southwestern Colorado need. Aridity in some areas is shrinking vegetation that elk eat and that provides cover for calves facing predators: coyotes, bears and mountain lions.

Now it seems like we know what elk eat, and what they use for hiding cover for their calves,  thanks to observations and generations of researchers.  And it seems like different years are wetter or drier. For example check out this map of Colorado’s water year 2022. where many parts of SW Colorado seem to be doing quite well. So if it were climate warming, then CPW or someone could compare calf survival in years with more grass and less grass, or even elevations with different physical conditions.  Perhaps that’s what CPW is looking at.  Looks like there have been calf declines in other places as well. , in this example South Dakota. Maybe those folks figured out what was going on?

Sierra At Tahoe Ski Area Re-opens

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After the Caldor Fire seriously impacted the ski area, Sierra At Tahoe is open again. As you can see, it was a high intensity portion of the fire, with the previous forest being highly flammable and loaded with decades of heavy dead fuels. After several droughts, the area did not have any salvage operations. The area is also known to have nesting pairs of goshawks around.

As you can see, snow sports people will be enjoying a new experience of skiing and boarding, without so many trees ‘hindering their personal snow freedoms’. *smirk*

Colorado big game corridor amendment

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Wildlife crossings, such as this one under U.S. Route 285 near Buena Vista, Colorado, provide safe passage for migrating elk and other animals.
Matt Staver/Getty Images

The Bureau of Land Management Colorado State Office is considering an amendment to oil and gas program decisions in existing BLM Colorado resource management plans to promote the conservation of big game corridors and other important big game habitats on BLM-administered land and minerals in Colorado.  The scoping period ended September 2.  This press release includes a link to the official website.  Here is the project description:

Description: The BLM will propose and analyze, with the best available scientific methods and information, a statewide amendment to existing BLM Colorado land use plans to evaluate alternatives for planning-scale oil and gas management prescriptions for the conservation of important big game habitat. The BLM will consider whether to incorporate new or changed oil and gas management decisions in existing land use plans, such as limits on high-density development, including facility and route density limitations, and other lease stipulations that would incorporate conservation measures for important big game habitat areas in Colorado.

This is in response to the 2018 USDI Secretarial Order No. 3362, “Improving Habitat Quality in Western Big-Game Winter Range and Migration Corridors,” and the release of the state of Colorado’s Big Game Policy Report, which recommended the bureau actually undertake this amendment to strengthen oil and gas lease stipulations consistent with new wildlife rules.

This sounds like good planning, which should be expanded to include:

  • The Forest Service.  Especially if you are talking about connectivity, it does little good if it runs into a “wall” created by management of other ownerships.  How is the Forest Service going to be involved in this?  (Especially where BLM administers leases on national forests.)
  • Other energy.  We have talked about the need to do this kind of thing for renewable energy proposals, and why shouldn’t that be integrated with this kind of planning effort for oil and gas?
  • Other species.  Just because big game species have more lobbying power doesn’t mean such efforts should ignore the same kinds of connectivity issues for other species like sage-grouse and large carnivores.  Including areas used by many species should be a goal.
  • Other states.  The Order calls for collaboration with states, and it looks like Colorado has taken the initiative here, but that doesn’t mean the BLM couldn’t be promoting this elsewhere, or that it is precluded from initiating an effort that would include state participation.

 

Eagles and Wind Turbines: A Roundup of Recent News Stories and Some More General Reflections

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Wildlife biologist Mike Lockhart admires a golden eagle after trapping, sampling and fitting the raptor with a GPS device in June 2022. (Dustin Bleizeffer/WyoFile)

For years we have been told that oil and gas drilling on federal lands is bad because:

1*Federal land is abused for the profits of a few. (corporate profits)

2* Pristine landscapes are industrialized

3* Placement of infrastructure interferes with recreation

4* Bad for wildlife,

5* Roads bad for water quality, also increase human activity

6* Other environmental concerns

7*Methane leakage, chemicals onsite, and finally

8*Usage of oil and gas (not considering substitution from elsewhere)

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If you’ve ever been to a wind installation (whose footprint is much greater and, with proposed solar, is going to be gigantic), you’ll know where I’m going with this.

Some will argue that sacrificing concerns 1-6 are necessary for a low-carbon future.  On the other hand, through time, there will be other choices (including in the new IRA) for low-carbon energy such as the nuclear plant being developed in Kemmerer, Wyoming that will use former coal plant workers and existing powerlines.

Anyway, I’m bringing your attention to three stories about this, two current stories one from Wyofile, one from the AP and one from 2019 from the Hill.

The Wyofile story is an interview with a retired USFWS wildlife biologist now doing resarch for USGS and Conservation Science Global.

 The expansion, which energy experts believe may even accelerate further under the Inflation Reduction Act, could pose a serious threat to eagles and other wildlife in certain areas without field-data-driven information to guide avoidance and mitigation strategies, according to Lockhart. …..

This is probably one of the best places, that I know of anyway, for golden eagles in North America,” Lockhart said. “I am a big wind energy advocate and definitely a green energy supporter. But we can’t devastate one really critically important resource for another.”

Maestro has yet to file an official permitting request with the BLM and other permitting authorities. The company didn’t respond to WyoFile inquiries. To move forward, the BLM, which manages more than 80% of the project area, must conduct a full National Environmental Policy Act analysis with public comment.

The Maestro project isn’t the only wind proposal that worries Lockhart.

“I’m equally concerned about the ones that might impact breeding birds and kind of fill in those gaps between the existing wind [energy facilities],” he said.

Another field scientist concerned about modeling over field data (see, it’s not just me).

But Lockhart worries that the vital data from field research is emerging slower than encroaching wind turbines in southern and south-central Wyoming. Federal wildlife managers that can determine where and how wind energy facilities are configured to avoid threatening eagle populations are relying too much on modeling to fill in gaps between actual data, he claims.

“The data is just inadequate for making these [permitting] decisions,” Lockhart said…

Then there are cumulative impacts:

Of particular concern, he said, are proposed wind energy projects that will essentially fill in yet-to-be industrialized areas, such as the Maestro wind energy project in the Shirley Basin. Carlsbad, California-based Maestro Wind LLC proposes to construct up to 327 wind turbines spanning nearly 99,000 acres that straddle Highway 77 here. The project area essentially encompasses the heart of the Shirley Basin’s eagle habitat, according to Lockhart.

Wind energy developers, in the pre-construction federal and state permitting process, typically borrow from existing data on local nesting sites and eagle populations and hire consultants to conduct new surveys in the field. But that information isn’t typically compiled in a way that allows for a comprehensive count or region-wide database that could be used to analyze potential cumulative impacts.

Although the Wyoming Game and Fish Department reviews and comments on wind energy proposals in federal permitting, it doesn’t conduct comprehensive eagle field surveys and mostly defers to federal wildlife authorities, according to Public Information Officer Sara DiRienzo.

“There is a growing concern especially with raptors, such as the golden eagle or the ferruginous hawk, that there may be population impacts, especially when you look at locations that have multiple wind farms,” DiRienzo said. “Understanding the cumulative effects is still ongoing and not conclusive at this time.”

In the mid 90’s there were many Biodiversity workshops, and so I spent much time listening to presentations about endangered birds of various kinds (think owls and murrelets). I had to wonder whether populations go down partially because wildife biologists conduct activities that look like harassment, calling, baiting, trapping and so on.  Maybe there are studies on this.

The AP (Matthew Brown) has a lengthy story about eagles and windfarms. I found it in the Colorado Sun. Hopefully it’s not paywalled or is available elsewhere.

The rush to build wind farms to combat climate change is colliding with preservation of one of the U.S. West’s most spectacular predators — the golden eagle — as the species teeters on the edge of decline…

Federal officials won’t divulge how many eagles are reported killed by wind farms, saying it’s sensitive law enforcement information. The recent criminal prosecution of a subsidiary of NextEra Energy, one of the largest U.S. renewable energy providers, offered a glimpse into the problem’s scope.

The company pleaded guilty to three counts of violating the Migratory Bird Treaty Act and was ordered to pay more than $8 million in fines and restitution after killing at least 150 eagles — including more than 100 goldens at wind farms in Wyoming, California, New Mexico, North Dakota, Colorado, Michigan, Arizona and Illinois.

Government officials said the mortality was likely higher because some turbines killed multiple eagles and carcasses are not always found.

Prosecutors said the company’s failure to take steps to protect eagles or to obtain permits to kill the birds gave it an advantage over competitors that did take such steps — even as NextEra and affiliates received hundreds of millions of dollars in federal tax credits for wind power.

The company remained defiant after the plea deal: NextEra President Rebecca Kujawa said bird collisions with turbines were unavoidable accidents that should not be criminalized.

Utilities Duke Energy and PacifiCorp previously pleaded guilty to similar charges in Wyoming. North Carolina-based Duke Energy was sentenced in 2013 to $1 million in fines and restitution and five years probation following deaths of 14 golden eagles and 149 other birds at two of the company’s wind projects.

A year later, Oregon-based PacifiCorp received $2.5 million in fines and five years probation after 38 golden eagle carcasses and 336 other protected birds were discovered at two of its sites.

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We don’t have to go too far back in time, though,  to get a different take. From a news piece on The Hill.

Shawn Smallwood, a California ornithologist, told PolitiFact that about 100 eagles die each year due to impacts with wind turbines…

In truth, wind turbine collisions comprise a fraction of human-caused eagle losses,” Obama-era U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Director Dan Ashe wrote in 2016. “Most result from intentional and accidental poisoning and purposeful shooting. The majority of non-intentional loss occurs when eagles collide with cars or ingest lead shot or bullet fragments in remains and gut piles left by hunters. Others collide with or are electrocuted on power lines.”

I think Ashe’s argument is interesting.  If x, y and z contribute to decline of a species, when do we try to shut down x, y, and z, and when do we determine that if the majority of the loss is due to x and y, we aren’t concerned about z.  Is the way we think about this inconsistent?

Finally, these articles are about collisions.  Noise may also interfere with a variety of bird activities. For example, the highly political dramatized sage grouse..from a BLM document:

Recent research has demonstrated that noise from natural gas development negatively impacts sagegrouse abundance, stress levels and behaviors (Blickley et al. 2012; Blickley & Patricelli 2012; Blickley et al. In review). Other types of anthropogenic noise sources (e.g. infrastructure from oil, geothermal, mining and wind development, off-road vehicles, highways and urbanization) are similar to gas-development noise and thus the response by sage-grouse is likely to be similar. These resultssuggest that effective management of the natural soundscape is critical to the conservation and protection of sage-grouse.

 

 

Sensitive species and NFMA?

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Los Padres ForestWatch. The California spotted owl is listed as a Sensitive Species by the U.S. Forest Service and by the California Department of Fish and Game as a Species of Special Concern.

This question came up in the fuel treatment post yesterday, but it is worthy of its own post (wonky as it is).  I think there are some misconceptions out there about sensitive species.  This is without refreshing my memory (which I should do more often any more), but I was heavily involved in lots of this.

NFMA does not require identification or protection of sensitive species.  NFMA requires plant and animal diversity.  Habitat for viability is a requirement for diversity in the planning regulations (old and new).  Sensitive species have never been found in the planning regulations.  To the extent there was an implied regulatory requirement in the 1982 regulations, it was for viable populations of management indicator species (MIS).

“Sensitive species” was apparently created by the Forest Service (I’m guessing the Wildlife staff) as a means of both meeting the NFMA viability requirement and preventing listing under ESA, and requirements for sensitive species (including preparation of a Biological Evaluation) were to be applied to both plans and projects. The details may be found in FSM 2670 (which also addresses ESA requirements) and FSM 2620.  The current version of these is dated 2011, prior to the 2012 Planning Rule.  (The agency has frozen up in its efforts to update this manual direction.)

This led to a lot of confusion, even by judges, regarding what was required at the project level.  It sometimes appeared that parties/judges were saying that the NFMA viability requirement applied to each project (like ESA).  At one point (2004ish?), the Forest Service, issued an interpretive rule to clarify that the viability requirement in the 1982 planning regulation applied only to forest plan decisions (unless the plan imposed its own viability requirement on projects, which some did).

It also made this problem a focus of its efforts to produce a new planning rule.  Language now makes it clear that nothing in the 2012 Planning Rule applies to projects, and specifically the new requirements for species of conservation concern (SCC) apply only to forest plans (and projects must be consistent with what the plan says).

Meanwhile, forest plans that are being revised are following the new requirements for species of conservation concern. The Forest Service issued an internal letter to regional foresters on June 6, 2016 explaining that it would phase out the sensitive species designation. It recognized that, “As noted in the preamble to the 2012 planning rule, “[Regional Forester Sensitive Species] are…similar to species of conservation concern.”   It also stated that, “Applying both systems on the same administrative unit would be redundant.” Consequently, “Once a revised plan is in effect, the Regional Forester’s Sensitive Species list no longer applies to that unit.”

The letter acknowledges that a biological evaluation must still be prepared for a revised forest plan.  The letter doesn’t specifically instruct forests that have not revised their plans to keep preparing BEs for projects, but the Manual direction is still in place, so it is still official policy.

One observation I’ve made in reviewing forest plans revised under the 2012 Planning Rule is that sensitive species are often NOT considered “similar to species of conservation concern.”  Many sensitive species (with “viability concerns”) have not been designated SCC (“substantial concern about the species capability to persist over the long term in the plan area”) during forest planning.  Why is that?

The other thing I’ve seen when forest plans are being revised is that the Forest Service is not doing a very good job of explaining to the public that they are no longer going to have project analysis requirements for at-risk (but not listed) species separate from NEPA, and that some species they used to address at the project-level may not be addressed at all after the forest plan is revised.

Sighting Of Ultra-Rare Wolverine Confirmed In Grand Tetons: from the Cowboy State Daily

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As Friday draws to a close, I thought I’d post something fun and cheerful. From the Cowboy State Daily, my favorite Wyoming news outlet, with this amazing image. I’m glad that there are people at Wyoming Game and Fish who could identify a wolverine from this photo :). Here’s to our wildlife bio colleagues!

By Ellen Fike, Cowboy State Daily

It may look like nothing more than a grainy blip, but that blip is something not seen very much in Wyoming.

It’s a wolverine and seeing wolverines in Wyoming is really quite rare. In fact, it’s only the second time one has been seen this year — which is a lot.

For perspective, a wolverine is only seen on average about every two years in Wyoming. That’s why it’s a big deal.

Out On A Run

Mike Devine, who took a video of a wolverine while out on a run in Darby Canyon over the weekend, told Cowboy State Daily he wasn’t sure exactly what he caught on his phone. Then he went home and went through the video and compared the footage to other wolverines he saw online.

“I started thinking that I actually saw one and then after just watching some videos on YouTube, I was pretty sure it was and then I sent it off to friends who worked at a EcoTours and they had it checked,” he said.

Thompson Tenley, a guide at Jackson Hole Eco Tours, said they forwarded the video to Wyoming Game and Fish which later confirmed the animal was a wolverine.

They instantly posted it to their Instagram page.

“Rare wolverine sighting on the west slope of the Tetons!” the company wrote. “Thank you to our friend Mike Devine for sending in this incredible footage.”

Not That Unusual?

Devine, a carpenter who lives in Victor, Idaho, said he was excited to spot the animal but more surprised it wasn’t as rare of a sighting that he thought.

“The more people I’ve talked to it’s kind of surprising like how many people have seen them,” he said listing many friends in the area who have also had encounters.

The sighting comes just a few months after a wolverine was video recorded in Yellowstone National Park.

Zack Walker, non-game supervisor with the Wyoming Game and Fish Department, told Cowboy State Daily on Tuesday that it was quite rare for there to be two video recorded sightings of a wolverine in the same year.

“We get a handful of observations every year, but a lot of them are on trail cams or people seeing them, but not being able to grab their phones or cameras fast enough,” Walker said. “It’s really big to have the opportunity to see those videos.”

Growing Population

Walker said from the wolverine management data the Game and Fish Department collected over the winter, it appears that wolverines are popping up in more locations than they did five years ago. While he said the data the department has now does not confirm the population is getting bigger, that is believed to be the case.