Fewer spotted owls in Washington
The harvest of spotted owl habitat on nonfederal lands around owl nests is driving the bird toward extinction in this state, conservation groups said Friday.
Logging rules enacted in 1996 to protect northern spotted owl habitat on state and private lands need to be strengthened, they said.
"It's no longer a secret why the northern spotted owl is rapidly going extinct around Washington state," said David Werntz, science director for the Bellingham-based Northwest Ecosystem Alliance.
Werntz based his comments on a draft report released late Friday by the state Department of Fish and Wildlife, which looked at how much owl habitat was harvested between 1996 and 2004 -- 73,000 acres -- and how much habitat remains -- 813,000 acres -- on state and private lands regulated by the state Department of Natural Resources' Forest Practices Board.
The report marks the first full assessment of owl habitat on nonfederal lands since the board adopted the rule in 1996.
Authors of the report and DNR officials said they wouldn't comment on the report until it goes through peer review and is made final for presentation to the board on Aug. 9.
Timber industry officials receiving the report late Friday could not be reached for comment, leaving only environmental groups to react.
"I think the rule is going to have to be fixed to maintain existing habitat," said Tim Cullinan, director of bird conservation for the Audubon Society state chapter.
Among the key findings of the report:
About 19,000 acres of prime owl habitat near owl activity centers have been cut since 1996.
"That's the critical habitat on state and private lands," Werntz said. "It's a direct body slam to the northern spotted owl."
About 24 percent of the owl habitat remains on average around the 392 owl sites identified in the report.
Based on previous studies, that's only enough habitat to give an adult owl a 70 percent chance of survival to the next year, Cullinan said.
The amount of owl habitat logged since 1996 on state and private lands is more than 41/2 times greater than what was harvested on federal lands.
The northern spotted owl was at the center of a major battle in the late 1980s and early 1990s to protect the Northwest's old-growth forests because the bird relies on those ancient forests for its prime habitat. Logging on federal lands was sharply curtailed to protect the bird.
But studies show the owl population in the state is dropping at a rate of about 7.3 percent a year since 1985, nearly twice the overall rate in the Northwest.
Sources of the bird's demise include habitat lost to past and present logging, wildfires, competition from the more aggressive barred owl and perhaps even West Nile virus, according to a scientific panel convened by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service last year.
The federal agency ruled last year that the bird still needs protection under the federal Endangered Species Act. It was first listed as threatened in 1990.
Many timber industry officials have said the burden for protecting the owl should rest with the federal forests, where the bulk of old-growth habitat remains.
The spotted owl rule as it's written allows harvest of up to 60 percent of the habitat around known owl activity centers in the 10 spotted owl special emphasis areas covering hundreds of square miles in the Cascade Mountains and Olympia Peninsula, but excluding southwest Washington.
Outside the owl emphasis areas, owl nests are protected during the nesting season, but after that, trees around a nest can be cut down.
State and large timberland owners have crafted habitat conservation plans that are supposed to protect some owl habitat and grow more over time.
It's not clear how many spotted owls remain in the state. The Fish and Wildlife agency database showed 1,044 owl activity centers in June 2004, but the number represents any site identified in the past 30 years. Some of those sites have been abandoned or lost to logging or wildfires.
This article is republished from The Olympian:
Fewer spotted owls in Washington
