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Saturday, Jul 11, 2009
Officials say grizzly bears in Yellowstone are thriving enough to be taken off the Endangered Species Act list. But if Congress passes a new bill, the act that helped preserve the bears may be headed for extinction.
Nov 23, 2005 | Last Tuesday, the grizzly bears that live in Yellowstone National Park socked in for the winter. Some got in some last-minute feeding, perhaps gorging on high-calorie whitebark pine nuts cadged from an unlucky ground squirrel's cache. Others were digging out their dens with those huge, powerful claws, getting their beds shipshape for the coming hibernation. And many were already snugly tucked in for the long sleep. But in Washington, D.C., far away from the largest grizzly population in the lower 48, humans were making portentous pronouncements that could roil even the fattest grizzly's peaceful slumber. The word from Washington: There are enough grizzlies in the Yellowstone area to declare that the bears are no longer threatened and to take Endangered Species Act protections away from them.
Environmentalists are divided over the decision, with some advocates arguing that it is premature and others supporting it. But all of them, as well as federal wildlife officials, agree that the grizzly's comeback is due in large part to the Endangered Species Act, which has helped preserve the big predator's habitat. And environmentalists are gearing up to fight a new bill, written by Rep. Richard Pombo, R-Calif., that they say would fatally weaken the ESA.
"It's a terrible bill. It undermines all of the fundamental protections of endangered species," says Bob Irvin, senior vice president for conservation programs at Defenders of Wildlife. "It would be devastating to endangered species and their habitats, across the board. In the 30-year history of the Endangered Species Act, it's certainly the first time the House of Representatives has passed such an egregious measure to weaken the act."
On Nov, 15, Secretary of the Interior Gale Norton proposed a major change for the grizzlies that live in the Yellowstone area, removing them from the federal threatened-species list.
"When it was listed in 1975, this majestic animal that greeted Lewis and Clark on their historic expedition stood at risk of disappearing from the American West," Norton said. "Thanks to the work of many partners, more than 600 grizzlies now inhabit the Yellowstone ecosystem, and the population is no longer threatened. With a comprehensive conservation strategy ready to be put into place upon delisting, we are confident that the future of the grizzly bear in Yellowstone is bright. Our grandchildren's grandchildren will see grizzly bears roaming Yellowstone."
For the Bush administration officials, the announcement was a chance to trumpet a major environmental coup: the country's most celebrated land predator restored on George W.'s watch! But some environmentalist groups, including the Natural Resources Defense Council and Defenders of Wildlife, see the proposed delisting as a case of kicking a still ailing -- if improving -- patient out of the hospital.
These environmentalists argue that delisting will make the grizzly's habitat more vulnerable to logging, roads and development. Currently, under the Endangered Species Act, federal agencies must consider the impact on grizzlies when, say, the Forest Service decides to build roads for logging or open up a new area of harvestable timber. When they haven't, the ESA has given environmentalists grounds to sue. In the past, to protect bears, the act has been employed to stop a ski development in the Gallatin Forest, argue for the removal of a fishing bridge where Yellowstone bears competed with humans for trout, and argue for major road closures in the Flathead, Gallatin and Targhee forests -- all lands that are contiguous to Yellowstone and that form the major portion of the grizzly's habitat.
Those humans who are lined up against delisting the grizzly point out that the bears are an isolated population, lacking habitat corridors connecting them with other grizzly populations, which would give them healthy genetic diversity for the long term. "I don't think that you should be moving an intensively managed population on a small habitat island from the endangered-species list," says Craig Pease, a biologist at Vermont Law School. "It looks to me like they should be on the endangered-species list forever."
Delisting the grizzlies will turn responsibility for their welfare over to the states -- which will mean some of them will be facing the barrel of a gun. Wyoming, Idaho and Montana, which along with Washington are the only states in the contiguous U.S. where grizzlies remain, have already announced plans for grizzly hunts when they take over the bears' management, which could be as soon as late 2006. But environmentalists fear that controlled hunting is not the biggest danger grizzlies will face if delisted. Under the Endangered Species Act, the grizzlies can be shot only if they threaten human life. But if they're taken off the list, they can be blown away if they threaten human property, according to Louisa Willcox of the Natural Resources Defense Council. Snacking in an orchard could be grounds for summary execution. Under current federal protection, poaching a grizzly can carry a fine in the thousands, plus restitution fees up to $15,000. Poaching would carry with it a fine of just $700 in states like Wyoming when the bears are no longer listed as federally threatened.
When Europeans arrived, between 50,000 and 100,000 grizzly bears ranged from the Pacific Coast to the Mississippi River. But they're mostly gone now, wiped out by habitat loss as humans moved into their domains. The bear whose image is on the California flag can no longer be found anywhere in the state. The bears have been driven out of 98 percent of their historic range in the lower 48 states. There are just 1,200 or so left there, including the largest single population, the 600 bears that live around Yellowstone, which could be delisted (30,000 grizzlies live in Alaska, and 22,000 in Canada).
"They're in less than 2 percent of their native habitat," says Dick Dolan, conservation director for the Greater Yellowstone Coalition in Bozeman, Mont. "We've got them ringed in, and their habitat is not coming back. They're not going to be wandering across the plains of central Wyoming again. It's never going to happen."
