Monthly Archives: December 2011

Fisher Comeback Planned for California

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Last week four more fishers were released in northern California, raising the number of fishers released to 39 in the Stirling City area in the past two years, says an article in the Contra Costa Times. With the release of the last four fishers, the program is now in a four-year monitoring phase, the article says.

Pacific fishers, unlike their eastern cousins, are thought to be dependent on old growth forests. The project area is anything but pristine, however. The land is owned by Sierra Pacific, a timber company. The article quotes a Sierra Pacific vice president saying that if the project is successful, it will show that fishers can survive on managed landscapes, which will mean Sierra Pacific can continue to log in fisher habitat, even if the animal is listed under the Endangered Species Act.

The article says the company will be allowed to do that anyway:

By hosting the fishers, the company, which owns about 1.6 percent of California’s land, also gets a 20-year guarantee it will be able to cut trees even if fishers are listed as endangered.

 Read the entire article here. There is also a slideshow of the recent release.

Here’s the California Department of Fish and Game’s description of the project. It includes a link to more detailed information in a .ZIP file and to the 2010 annual report.

Photo: Fisher release, courtesy of California Department of Fish and Game.

Fisher Comeback Planned for California

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Last week four more fishers were released in northern California, raising the number of fishers released to 39 in the Stirling City area in the past two years, says an article in the Contra Costa Times. With the release of the last four fishers, the program is now in a four-year monitoring phase, the article says.

Pacific fishers, unlike their eastern cousins, are thought to be dependent on old growth forests. The project area is anything but pristine, however. The land is owned by Sierra Pacific, a timber company. The article quotes a Sierra Pacific vice president saying that if the project is successful, it will show that fishers can survive on managed landscapes, which will mean Sierra Pacific can continue to log in fisher habitat, even if the animal is listed under the Endangered Species Act.

The article says the company will be allowed to do that anyway:

By hosting the fishers, the company, which owns about 1.6 percent of California’s land, also gets a 20-year guarantee it will be able to cut trees even if fishers are listed as endangered.

 Read the entire article here. There is also a slideshow of the recent release.

Here’s the California Department of Fish and Game’s description of the project. It includes a link to more detailed information in a .ZIP file and to the 2010 annual report.

Photo: Fisher release, courtesy of California Department of Fish and Game.

More Info on Solar Power Impacts Needed

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If you have felt lost while trying to evaluate the impact of a solar power project on wildlife, you are not alone. A literature review published in the December issue of BioScience says there is just not enough information out there.

The article focuses on the desert Southwest, but has broader implications. It goes through potential impacts by category, including habitat fragmentation, dust and noise.

You can find the entire article here.

You can read the editor’s note that summarizes the paper and findings here.

And, since the authors are U.S. Geological Survey scientists, you can read the USGS press release, which also summarizes the findings, here.

Photo: A desert tortoise. Photo by: Jeffrey E. Lovich, courtesy USGS

More Info on Solar Power Impacts Needed

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If you have felt lost while trying to evaluate the impact of a solar power project on wildlife, you are not alone. A literature review published in the December issue of BioScience says there is just not enough information out there.

The article focuses on the desert Southwest, but has broader implications. It goes through potential impacts by category, including habitat fragmentation, dust and noise.

You can find the entire article here.

You can read the editor’s note that summarizes the paper and findings here.

And, since the authors are U.S. Geological Survey scientists, you can read the USGS press release, which also summarizes the findings, here.

Photo: A desert tortoise. Photo by: Jeffrey E. Lovich, courtesy USGS

Tuppence a Bag

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I can’t answer the question of whether feeding the birds is a harmless way to get people to care about wildlife or a if its a tragedy. But of all the harm that feeding birds does or might do, it looks like we can cross pesticide exposure off the list.

The American Bird Conservancy had a lab test bird seed from various sources and found either no pesticide contamination, or levels below those believed to harm bird health.

Read the press release announcing the study here.

The nice thing about this study is that it included seed from WalMart, Home Depot, Lowes and Target, places where the average bird feeder might purchase seed.

The actual report does not appear to be available. I’ll keep looking and post when and if I find it.

Jaguar and Ocelots: Seeing Spots in Arizona

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What happens when an exciting wildlife sighting gets national media attention? Increased reports of rare wildlife? A sudden interest in that creature? Leave a comment to let us know what reactions you commonly get in your state.

The exciting wildlife sightings of this week are jaguars and ocelots in Arizona. There has been plenty of national coverage, including this article in the New York Times. The Times article dutifully notes that the Arizona Game and Fish Department has reassessed one of those ocelot sightings, and now believes it was a serval (Leptailurus serval), an African cat popular in the pet trade, or possibly a serval hybrid.

Here’s AZGFD’s press release on the jaguar sighting. And here’s a backgrounder on jaguars in Arizona.

Here’s AZGFD’s press release on the most recent ocelot sighting. And here’s the press release reassessing the ID.

Photo: An Arizona Game and Fish Department wildlife manager investigates a jaguar sighting. Courtesy of Arizona Game and Fish Department

Arizona Allows Night Hunting for Predators

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The Arizona Game and Fish Commission believes that reducing predators in certain game management units will boost struggling pronghorn antelope and bighorn sheep populations. It signed off on a rule that will allow the use of artificial lighting during night hunts of coyotes and mountain lions.

Read the full press release here. (All the media coverage I’ve seen about this so far is just a reprint of the press release.)

The press release says that 41 other states allow night hunting of predators.

Wouldn’t it be nice to know which states? The closest I could find to a list is this list of coyote hunting regulations from the National Predator Hunters Association. It reveals that as of early 2011: in Florida you can hunt coyotes at night by the light of the moon, but need a permit for an artificial light; you can’t use lights affixed to a vehicle in Georgia; you can’t hunt coyotes on Sunday in Maine; and you must use a light when hunting at night in Indiana and Ohio.

The link pops up a Word document.

Photo courtesy of Arizona Game and Fish Commission

Tennessee’s War on Wild Hogs Not for Civilians

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What’s the best way to get rid of an invasive species that is clever, dangerous and tastes pretty good? In the case of wild hogs in Tennessee, one strategy was not to put any limits on hunting the animals. Hunters were allowed, even encouraged, to hunt wild hogs at any time of year and kill as many as they would like.

Earlier this year, however, the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency rethought that strategy. It seems that instead of eliminating hogs in the state, the range of the animals was growing as enthusiastic hunters transported and released hogs in new locations.

Now the hogs are considered a nuisance species, and while landowners can kill wild hogs causing property damage on their land, the hogs can’t legally be hunted by the average citizen. Read the press release from the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency announcing the change, here.

This week The Tennessean reports that not everyone likes the change. While the state’s largest hunting organization supports the new designation, the article reports, another group, the Tennessee Hunters Alliance, has been formed to protest the new change.

Read the article in The Tennessean, with the history of the move, here.

 Photo: A feral swine piglet. By Steve Hillebrand, courtesy US Fish and Wildlife Service

Possibility of Renewed Horse Slaughter Creates Controversy

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Tucked into a Department of Agriculture funding bill signed into law in the middle of November was a provision for funding inspections of U.S. slaughterhouses that slaughter horses. This reversed a 2006 law eliminating funding for those inspections, therefore closing all of the horse slaughter operations in the U.S.

This didn’t mean that U.S. horses haven’t been slaughtered for meat in the past five years, notes an article in the Christian Science Monitor, which was among the first to have the story. It means that U.S. horses to be slaughtered for meat were shipped to Mexico and Canada first, the article says.

That journey is long and unpleasant, notes the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) — cruel, really. And while emphasizing that they support eliminating the slaughter of horses for meat everywhere, PETA has tenuously supported the refunding of inspections in the U.S., saying that it will reduce the cruelty of the horses being shipped for slaughter. (Read PETA’s blog statement here.)

The Los Angeles Times, while running the story a few days later, addressed the subtleties of PETA’s position. (Read the story here.)

The big issue, for wildlife managers, is that while privately-owned animals could be sent out of the country, the lack of inspection funding meant that there were fewer options for controlling populations of feral horses, which are a non-native species and can damage the habitats of native species. (See the feral horse position statement from The Wildlife Society, which is a four-page PDF.)

Only time will tell what this change of federal policy will mean for feral horses and native wildlife.

Photo: Healthy feral horses on a healthy range. Photo courtesy Bureau of Land Management (BLM)

In for a “Snowy” Winter?

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They’re big, they’re beautiful and if you live in the northern part of the United States, they may be in your neighborhood now. Reports from eBird suggest that this is an irruption year for snowy owls. Not often seen in the Lower 48, snowies are being reported in the northeastern U.S., particularly along the Great Lakes at the Atlantic coast.

While bird watchers are sure to be thrilled, but the addition of this unusual species to your state’s usual winter birds does add a bit of a management problem. Well meaning (and not so well meaning) people can easily cause harm to these birds, which are stressed out by being away from their home range.

The birds also attract media coverage when they are spotted. Here’s just a sampling:
The Gothamist (blog) reports a snowy near the Verazzano Narrows bridge in NYC.
More than 100 snowies in Wisconsin
Spokane Spokesman-Review (birding blog)
Minneapolis Star-Tribune (birding blog)

Read the eBird blog for more details, including the latest thinking on why these tundra birds sometimes pay us a visit, and for a fabulous map populated by eBird data.

Photo: Captive/rehabilitated snowy owl in Alaska. Photo by Ronald Laubenstein, courtesy of US Fish and Wildlife Service