The Return of the Spotted Owl Wars

Two decades ago, the northern spotted owl, a rare winged denizen of old growth forests in the Pacific Northwest, was the center of a vicious -- and sometimes violent -- battle between loggers and environmentalists. With owl populations in steady decline, that battle could start again.

Despite the bird's official listing as threatened and efforts to protect its home range, its numbers continue to fall from British Columbia to northern California. Now estimated to number between 3,000 and 5,000 pairs – and dropping by 3.7 percent per year – the spotted owl is at risk of declining to the point that the species would need to be "uplisted" from threatened to endangered, some experts warn.

And that, most agree, could reignite the "timber wars" of the 1980s and
'90s, with lawsuits flying and activists tree-sitting to stymie loggers whose livelihoods depend on access to national forests.

To avoid that, the spotted owl needs to recover. How does the Bush administration propose to help? By permitting logging on nearly a quarter of the land on which spotted owls are now protected.

The Fish and Wildlife Service says the plan reflects an updated understanding that spotted owls don't need old growth forest as much as thought. (This, of course, raises the question of whether the government should encourage logging within the nation's few remaining old growth forests -- a natural, national treasure irreplaceable in our lifetime. But that's another debate.)

But others say this updated understanding is just a timber industry wish list.

[Dominick] DellaSala, who was on the team developing a recovery plan, recently told Congress that "what was supposed to be a science-based plan was derailed by a pattern of political interference" by political appointees in the Bush administration.

The policy, says Della Sala, a forest ecologist and the executive director of the National Center for Conservation Science & Policy, is bound to "reignite the timber wars," and the next presidential administration "is going to inherit a train wreck."

Northern spotted owl's decline revives old concerns [Christian Science Monitor]
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Image: University of Washington*