Shoshone Sage Grouse Numbers Double

[Washington Hunter]

Shoshone sage grouse numbers double, group says

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

SHOSHONE, Idaho -- Ranchers and government agencies working in south-central Idaho's Shoshone Basin believe they've helped double the sage grouse population during the past decade by reducing hunting and improving habitat, even as they continue to allow livestock grazing.

In 1994, ranchers and private citizens, as well as officials with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game and the federal Bureau of Land Management, formed the Shoshone Basin Local Working Group.

It's since taken steps such as installing barbed-wire fences north of Twin Falls to keep cattle off sensitive areas and increase the number of native grasses and shrubs.

The bureau, which last mapped the location and condition of sagebrush in this region in 1992, is now remapping the area.

And while officials aren't saying when it will be finished, they speculate results will back up anecdotal evidence showing an improvement in the habitat needed for the survival of North America's second-largest game bird after the wild turkey.

"Everything can live here -- and they do," said Jim Tharp, an employee with the bureau's regional office in Burley.

Species in decline

Across the West, the number of sage grouse has declined to about 200,000 in 11 states. That's down from more than 2 million a century ago.

In the Shoshone Basin, state biologists have helped identify valuable bird habitat and alerted livestock producers to the time of year when grouse would frequent these areas.

Ranchers now rotate their cattle grazing patterns to avoid priority areas, such as mating grounds called leks, when the spectacular birds with white breasts, dark brown throats and black bellies are using those locales.

State officials also have cut the daily bag limit to one grouse, down from three, and shortened the hunting season to one week.

So far, the sage grouse has avoided the U.S. Endangered Species Act's list of threatened animals.

On Jan. 7, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service refused to extend that federal protection to the bird, against the protests of environmental groups who say it needs help.

Despite claims of the Shoshone Basin group that its measures are working, not everybody is so optimistic.

The Western Watersheds Project has opted not to cooperate.

That group has won a federal court ruling that stopped grazing on 800,000 acres on the Idaho-Nevada border, and hopes to tie up another 160 million acres of bureau and U.S. Forest Service grazing allotments across the West with separate lawsuits.

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[jmcd]

Thats great news. It just shows what a little common sense and cooperation can do.

 

[1_pointer]

The Western Watersheds Project has opted not to cooperate.

 

[Ithaca 37]

"The Western Watersheds Project has opted not to cooperate." Good for them! Somebody has to counter balance the radical welfare ranchers.

 

[1_pointer]

Also good for them when they slow down projects supported and paid for by the state DWR (not to mention RMEF, Mule Deer Foundation, etc) in an effort to improve habitat for deer and sage grouse?

Somebody has to counter balance the radical welfare ranchers.

It does take a radical to counter a radical, but it doesn't mean either of them are helping make things better.

 

[Nut]

Looks like Montana Ranchers disagree and would rather be anti-hunting

Ranchers: Hunters, shoot fewer sage grouse
Associated Press — Sept. 9, 2005
BILLINGS, Mont. — A ranching group's recommendation that landowners, ranchers and hunters reduce hunting pressure on sage grouse this fall is drawing criticism from hunting groups and wildlife advocates who say ranchers are ruining the birds' habitat.



"It is a direct contradiction to allow liberal hunting of a species at the same time that court cases are being filed to add that species to the endangered species list," Bill Donald of Melville, president of the Montana Stockgrowers Association, said in a press release.



Hunting groups say habitat is the real issue.



"Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks data and other reports and research projects do not indicate that hunting is the real problem," Craig Sharpe, executive director of the Montana Wildlife Federation. "For decades, prime sage grouse sagebrush habitat has been burned, plowed, sprayed and grazed. Moreover, it appears the Montana Stockgrowers want us to eliminate hunting so they can maintain their grazing leases. This is a backward approach."



Ben Deeble, sage grouse project coordinator for the National Wildlife Federation in Missoula, called the request "hypocritical, inappropriate and erroneous."



"It's just a real disappointment," Deeble said. "To me, they're one of the least committed entities to sage grouse preservation in the state."



The Montana Stockgrowers Association adopted a resolution at its June meeting calling for voluntary hunting reductions. They also asked the state Fish, Wildlife and Parks Commission to restrict the season on sage grouse to one week with a one bird daily limit.



The state is already well below the harvest rates recommended for sage grouse by the Western Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, said Ron Aasheim, a spokesman for the state Fish, Wildlife and Parks Department. This year, the state reduced the allowable harvest of sage grouse from three daily and six in possession to two daily and four in possession. The sage grouse season opened Sept. 1 and runs through Nov. 1.



"We've never seen that harvest has been a factor leading to a decline in sage grouse," Aasheim said. "We respect their opinion, but we're balancing what's best for the habitat with what's best for the birds."



But Steve Pilcher, executive vice president of the stockgrowers association, said it's only logical that shooting the birds as their population is declining doesn't make sense.



"It's a real sore spot with ranchers out there" that landowners are being asked to alter their grazing while still allowing hunters to "deplete the sage grouse population," he said.



The association called its proposal "a first step in cutting back the efforts to list the species under the Endangered Species Act."



But last year, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service recommended against listing the greater sage grouse as a threatened or endangered species under the Endangered Species Act, despite its population decline across the West. The agency's director said the best solution for conserving sage grouse is for federal agencies and Western states to cooperate on conservation and restoration of sage grouse habitat.



According to the National Audubon Society, greater sage grouse were once found in 16 states and three provinces. A 1998 estimate of their population placed the number of birds left at 142,000. The birds are now found in Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, Idaho, Nevada, California and Washington.