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Spotted owl draft recovery plan is a no-go for non-industry
In Roseburg Tuesday night, commenters had their say on the 2007 Northern Spotted Owl Draft Recovery Plan.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service prepared for a throng and a ruckus. Instead a polite gathering came.
In less than two hours Tuesday night, commenters had their say on the 2007 Northern Spotted Owl Draft Recovery Plan.
The
majority of the 18 outspoken people, of the more than 50 who came to
the agency’s public information and comment meeting at the Douglas
County Fairgrounds, railed against the plan and called for improvements
to the 1994 Northwest Forest Plan.
At least two, however,
favored the plan and agreed that spotted owl populations would recover
and be delisted as a threatened species from the Endangered Species Act
with the draft recovery plan’s second option.
“Option 2 will
provide the greatest opportunity for allowing (the Bureau of Land
Management) to meet its statutory rate of inventory requirements
associated with the O&C Act and the Endangered Species Act,” said
Douglas County Commissioner Doug Robertson.
Robertson told a
panel of U.S. Fish and Wildlife officials that the option is the better
of the two for incorporating up-to-date science and information on the
location of spotted owls. It would allow land managers of public
agencies, such as the U.S. Forest Service and BLM, to make decisions on
where to designate spotted owl habitat.
Option 1 of the draft
recovery plan calls for the designation of Mapped Owl Conservation
Areas – or MOCAs – already identified as spotted owl habitat.
Among those who say Option 1 is the better of the two, hardly any say it flies.
“On
the news, there has been disturbing references to Bush appointees
manipulating scientific data in order to have a certain outcome in
recovery plans,” said Susan Applegate, an Oregon Wild board member and
a member of Umpqua Watersheds.
Ross Mickey of the American Forest Resource Council, a timber-industry group, said Option 2 incorporates the latest scientific data and would allow spotted owls to define habitat areas that they use.
Mickey is also a strong proponent for the plan’s design to improve spotted owl habitat with the removal of barred owls, an Eastern species — by shotgun.
“The barred owl has established itself throughout the spotted owl range and is growing in size every day,” Mickey said. “The barred owl is not only decimating spotted owl populations, but all our native owl species.”
Despite pleas for increasing owl habitat, Mickey said he fails to see how additional spotted owl habitat will help the species survive because it will make room for more barred owls.
Patrick Starnes, a Lookinglass cabinet-maker, brought a map to the meeting that outlines 400,000 of the nearly 1 million acres of the Umpqua National Forest that he said are in dire need of commercial thinning.
Starnes said the Northwest Forest Plan’s late successional reserves can continue to provide habitat for the northern spotted owl and other species for decades to come. There’s an ever-growing need, he said, to log fire-prone areas instead of fragmenting LSRs.
“That’s what this (timber) industry needs,” he said.
Comments on the draft recovery plan will be accepted until June 25. However, Dave Wesley, deputy regional director for U.S. Fish and Wildlife, said it is likely an additional 60 days will be granted for comments.
The number of people who attended the meeting was a far cry from the standing-room only public meetings on recovery plans for the northern spotted owl in the early 1990s. Over 400 chairs were left vacant.
“A decade ago, we would have filled this room and then some,” said Joan Jewett, a spokeswoman for U.S. Fish and Wildlife.
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• You can reach reporter Adam Pearson at 957-4213 or by e-mail at apearson@newsreview.info.
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