The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service last week finalized a new rule revising the designation of critical habitat for the northern spotted owl under the Endangered Species Act of 1973, as amended (Act) by excluding approximately 3,472,064 acres in Oregon, Washington and northern California.
The changes include forestland in Linn and Tillamook, Washington, Multnomah, Hood River, Wasco, Yamhill, Clackamas, Marion, Polk, Lincoln, Jefferson, Benton, Lane, Deschutes, Douglas, Coos, Klamath, Curry, Jackson, and Josephine counties in Oregon.
The rule comes after the USFWS announced in December that it believed the owl should be reclassified from “threatened” to “endangered,” but that other priorities precluded the actual implementation of the finding immediately in the face of reduced budgets.
The American Forest Resource Council said the new rule “will better align northern spotted owl critical habitat with federal law and modern forest science at a time when unprecedented and severe wildfires threaten both owls and people from Northern California to Washington State.”
The Association of O&C Counties expressed strong support for the decision, which excludes all O&C lands from the 9.5 million acres previously designated by that agency as “critical habitat” for the spotted owl, which has been classified as a threatened species since 1990.
“This is a result AOCC has been seeking for a long time and we are pleased the agency finally agreed with us,” said Tim Freeman, a Douglas County commissioner who is AOCC president.
AOCC has long espoused sustained yield management as a means of achieving a full array benefits from these valuable forestlands, the organization said in a statement. Removing the redundant and unnecessary “critical habitat” label will allow focus on how sustained yield strategies can maintain and increase NSO habitat.
It cited three examples:
(1) Sustained yield strategies that employ extended cycles between harvest can provide substantial amounts of high-quality habitat over time.
(2) Most of the existing high-quality spotted owl habitat on the O&C lands is fragmented. Sustained yield strategies can help overcome this fragmentation by designating older forest emphasis areas that improve habitat quality and concentration over time.
(3) Much of the O&C lands are in fire-prone condition with existing high-quality habitat at risk due to high fuel loads. Management to improve fire resiliency while producing timber is a cost-effective method for maintaining and improving high quality habitat over time.
AFRC President Travis Joseph said the new designation rationalizes the application of critical habitat with the Northwest Forest Plan, opening the door to better outcomes for people, forests, and wildlife.
“What’s good for our forests, is good for the owl and our communities,” Joseph said. “If we are going to have any chance at recovering the NSO, we must improve the health and resiliency of our federal forests through scienced-based active management. Walking away from millions of acres of at-risk forests that need treatment has been an unmitigated disaster for the owl and forested communities for nearly three decades. This rule modernizes our approach and helps focus the federal government’s actions on the greatest threat to our national forests: catastrophic wildfires.”
According to an AFRC statement, recent statistics illustrate the impacts of catastrophic wildfire on NSO habitat. In Oregon, 2020 wildfires burned over 560 square miles of suitable nesting and roosting spotted owl habitat. Of that, over 300 square miles are no longer considered viable for the birds.
The USFWS’s NSO recovery plan points to the need for active forest management, yet forest management restrictions from previous critical habitat designations on over nine million acres have made it difficult for federal land managers to implement timely forest thinning and other activities to help mitigate further losses of habitat from wildfire and other threats.
Further, the agency recognizes the need to mitigate the threat of increasing competition from the barred owl. In the published rule, the USFWS indicates that it now has “further research and analysis to determine that the aggressive and invasive barred owl is the primary threat to the northern spotted owl.”
“The status quo has not only failed the NSO, misguided federal policies have devastated rural communities and businesses that depend on the forest,” Joseph said. Pointing to economic research, Joseph explained: “Local economies stretching from Northern California to Washington state are foregoing $100 million in GDP, $66 million in worker earnings, and more than 1,200 jobs every year to double down on a failed recovery strategy. These aren’t just numbers, they reflect real-world impacts to working families. This rule rights a wrong imposed on rural communities and businesses, and gives us a chance to restore balance to federal forest management and species conservation in the Pacific Northwest.”
Environmental groups filed a lawsuit in early December complaining that the USFWS has failed to perform requirements of the Endangered Species Act to aid northern spotted owl recovery over nearly a decade, claiming the
“On the one hand, you have biologists at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service acknowledging that northern spotted owls are extremely close to extinction and more must be done to prevent the extinction of the species,” said Susan Jane Brown, an attorney at the Western Environmental Law Center, one of the plaintiffs. “On the other, you have the Trump administration catering to the demands of an out-of-touch timber industry. Placing commercial interests ahead of the continued existence of this iconic species is shameful, and thankfully, not permitted by the Endangered Species Act.”