106 Old-Growth Dependent Species
Endangered Because of Bush Administration
Elimination of Wildlife Safety Net
A coalition of groups led by the Center for
Biological Diversity filed a petition today with
the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service requesting
protection of the Siskiyou Mountains salamander
as an endangered species under the Endangered
Species Act. The salamander was formerly
protected under a provision of the Northwest
Forest Plan called the “Survey and Manage”
Program, which required the Forest Service and
BLM to conduct surveys for the salamander and
protect its habitat. The Bush Administration
eliminated the Survey and Manage Program March
23, 2004. The Groups also issued a report
documenting that 105 other Survey and Manage
Species will require protection under the Act
and announcing their intent to petition these
species unless the wildlife survey requirements
are reinstated.
“Without the wildlife survey program, over
100 species are at risk of extinction,” states
Noah Greenwald, conservation biologist with the
Center for Biological Diversity. “If the Bush
Administration is going to sweep these species
under the rug and forget about them, we owe it
to future generations to protect them and the
old-growth habitats they depend on under the
Endangered Species Act.”
The Siskiyou Mountains salamander occurs in
southwestern Oregon and northwestern California
on rocky slopes under mature and old-growth
forest. Logging of old-growth forest is the
principal threat to this salamander’s survival.
The salamander occurs mostly outside the
protected reserves created by the Northwest
Forest Plan and thus the Survey and Manage
Program provided critical protection in areas
where logging is planned.
“Because of the Bush Administration’s removal
of the Survey and Manage Program, the Siskiyou
Mountains salamander and the old-growth forests
it depends on need protection under the
Endangered Species Act,” states Joseph Vaile,
Campaign Coordinator for Klamath-Siskiyou
Wildlands Center. “Our petition will ensure the
salamander has a safety net that prevents
extinction.”
The 106 species, including the Siskiyou
Mountains salamander, were determined to need
protection based on well-established criteria
for determining endangered species status and
based on the agencies own admissions. The
species include an assortment of old-growth
associated species, such as the Oregon red tree
vole, three other species of salamander, and
unique snails, mushrooms, lichens and mosses.
Most are found at fewer than 100 sites and many
are known from less than a dozen locations.
“Over the last Century, old-growth forests have
been severely depleted, placing these 106
species at risk of extinction,” states
Greenwald.
The wildlife protected by the Survey and
Manage Program play important roles in
maintaining the health and stability of
Northwest Forests. Loss of species through
extinction can reduce the forests ability to
adapt to change, such as global warming, and to
provide valuable ecological services, such as
clean water and air, and unique chemical
compounds for medicine and other products. “The
myriad of species found in remaining old-growth
forests represent a reservoir of diversity that
can help restore and maintain Northwest
ecosystems that have been ravaged by a century
of rampant logging,” states Doug Heiken, western
Oregon field representative for Oregon Natural
Resources Council. “The Bush Administration is
making a grave error by removing checks and
balances which ensure forests and wildlife are
protected.”
The petitioning groups include: Center for
Biological Diversity, Klamath Siskiyou Wildlands
Center, Oregon Natural Resources Council,
Northwest Ecosystem Alliance, American Lands
Alliance, Cascadia Wildlands Project,
Environmental Protection Information Center, and
Siskiyou Regional Education Project.
The report on the Survey and Manage species
and the Siskiyou Mountains salamander petition
can be found at:
http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/swcbd/programs/forests/nwfp/index.html
###
BACKGROUND ON THE SURVEY AND MANAGE
PROGRAM
(See
also ONRC Survey and Manage page)
In 1994, President Clinton enacted the
Northwest Forest Plan, which created a network
of reserves to protect old-growth forests,
watersheds, and species, such as the northern
spotted owl and marbled murrelet. Although a
substantial step forward, the plan failed to
protect roughly 20% of remaining old-growth
forests and set an estimated timber target of
one billion board feet per year. Scientists
charged by the Clinton administration with
evaluating the effects of the plan on over 1,000
species dependent on old-growth forests
predicted such logging was likely to jeopardize
many of these species.
To avoid massive species extinctions, the
Northwest Forest Plan proposed to "survey and
manage" hundreds of species, including 77
species which they promised to survey before any
ground-disturbing activities and if found, to
create buffers to avoid harming these species.
The U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land
Management, however, never followed through on
its commitment to survey and protect these 77
species.
In 1998, a coalition of groups sued the U.S.
Forest Service for failing to do the surveys
prior to conducting timber sales and in 1999,
Judge Dwyer, who presided over the northern
spotted owl litigation, ruled that the Forest
Service had in fact violated its own plan. Dwyer
then halted over 100 timber sales until the
surveys were completed, stating in his decision
that the survey and management requirements are
"clear, plain, and unmistakable... Far from
being minor or technical violations, widespread
exemptions from the survey requirements would
undermine the management strategy on which the
[Northwest Forest Plan] depends. The surveys are
designed to identify and locate species; if they
are not done before logging starts, plants and
animals … will face potentially fatal loss of
protection. The plan itself recognized the
importance of site-specific analysis.” Because
of the need to ensure that the “survey and
manage” species weren't driven to extinction,
the U.S. Forest Service never was able to
deliver the one billion board feet of timber
estimated under the plan.
After Republican campaign committees received
over a million dollars in campaign donations in
2000, George W. Bush promised to deliver the one
billion board feet by any means necessary. In
what has become the preferred method for the
administration to circumvent environmental laws
and public scrutiny, the Bush administration
used settlement of an industry lawsuit as an
opportunity to make good on their promise to the
timber industry. In 2001, Douglas Timber
Operators (DTO) and American Forest Resources
Council (AFRC) filed suit, seeking to prohibit
the Forest Service from protecting habitat for
plants and invertebrate animal species on
National Forests in western Washington, western
Oregon and Northwest California. Although the
suit was of questionable merit, the Bush
administration rolled over and agreed in a 2002
settlement to eliminate the survey and manage
program, which they did in a March, 2004 Record
of Decision.
The Survey and Manage Program originally
protected 304 species and 4 arthropod guilds
with an unknown number of species. The Forest
Service admits many of these species will be at
grave risk of extirpation because of removal of
the Survey and Manage Program. We have
identified 106 species that require protection
under the Endangered Species Act to survive.
