Dear Friends,
Spring has sprung on the Palouse and in the lower reaches of the wild Clearwater country. Area streams and rivers are surging with snowmelt, as our many winged, hooved, and furred relatives are coaxing their young toward independence. The warming sunlight has burst open leaf and flower buds, and the cool breezes are alive with the scents of blossoms and the sounds of insects. But all is not well among the two-legged inhabitants of the wildest parts of the West...
Idaho Wolf Hunting Regulations Need Your Comments
The Idaho Department of Fish and Game (IDFG) has released its proposed hunting regulations for wolves in Idaho. A public hunting season could start this September for female and male wolves and allow killing of up to 328 wolves in Idaho during the 2008 season. IDFG has established 12 wolf management zones with wolf hunt quotas that are highest in the Clearwater River basin and north central Idaho.
As in Montana and Wyoming, Idaho now manages wolf populations after the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service delisted wolves as a federally endangered species in March 2008. However, 12 national and local grassroots conservation organizations, including Friends of the Clearwater, have filed a suit in Missoula district court to overturn this decision and halt wolf management plans.
Approximately 800 wolves presently inhabit Idaho backcountry wildlands, among an estimated 1,500 wolves in the Northern Rockies bioregion. Before the May 16 deadline, your comments on IDFG's proposed wolf hunting rules are needed to help these populations thrive. IDFG will hold several public meetings this week in Coeur d’Alene, Grangeville, Lewiston, Sandpoint, and St. Maries. Please see our action alert for meeting schedules and locations, points to consider in your comments, and IDFG contact information:
Keep the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness Wild
The Forest Service has released its draft project plan for weed management in the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness. Their extreme, preferred alternative aims to keep the Wilderness ‘natural’ by deliberately spraying herbicides on over 4,000 acres annually and releasing non-native species in 50,000 acres to suppress weeds, while ignoring prevalent, extensive, cheatgrass infestations. Elsewhere, the agency also supports stocking fish in high Wilderness lakes, which has wreaked havoc in other, natural, aquatic ecosystems. Because the project would not only compound exotic species problems and unnatural conditions but also increase human control over natural processes in Wilderness, it would directly violate legally mandated Wilderness character and likely prove ineffective.
Scientific research suggests that weed prevention measures in other natural areas best deter non-native plant establishment and expansion. These strategies would require mandatory quarantines of stock animals, equipment inspections at trailheads, and closure of affected areas until weed-free. They would also cause managers and visitors to reconsider wilderness as Wilderness, rather than as merely a playground, and thus realign recreational use methods with true Wilderness character. None of the project alternatives emphasize weed prevention beyond voluntary, weed-free feeding of livestock for 48 hours before Wilderness entry.
Besides only nominally recommending a weed monitoring program, the plan would unleash the ‘herbicide treadmill,’ as increasing weed resistance to herbicides necessitates perpetually greater application doses. The agency initially implemented a temporary, similar project in the Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness, which, although apparently unsuccessful in abating weed infestations, will continue endlessly into the future. A previous, low-impact approach to weeds in the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness that included hand pulling, limited herbicide use, and general avoidance of the situation was supplanted by the present proposal, which also lacks project reassessment guidelines.
The Forest Service is accepting comments on their weed management project until May 19. Please e-mail or write to the Powell Ranger Station urging agency personnel to facilitate weed prevention and monitoring and abandon herbicide application and non-native species introduction. The following link describes the project proposal, its implications for Wilderness, pertinent comment suggestions, and contact information:
The Giant Palouse Earthworm Resurfaces
Two possible giant Palouse earthworms have recently been unearthed hundreds of miles apart. In November 2007, Lee Matthews of Seattle discovered an eight- to ten-inch specimen on his property near Leavenworth in central Washington. He had encountered several, similar worms since 1991 while digging and sent his most current find to University of Idaho (UI) researchers. In March 2008, a UI scientist and student found two small parts of a likely giant Palouse earthworm in a soil sample from Paradise Ridge near Moscow, Idaho.
Over the last thirty years, only seven occurrences of the long, whitish pink, aromatic, native species, Driloleirus americanus, have been reported. Due to its limited numbers, local citizens and conservation organizations, including Friends of the Clearwater, petitioned to list the earthworm as endangered in August 2006. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service denied it protection in October 2007, citing limited information about the species' distribution, range, and population size. The petitioners sued the agency over its decision in January 2008 and believe that the new specimens will bolster their case to protect the near-extinct worm found in isolated areas with amenable conditions.
UI scientists note that the Washington specimen physically appears to be a giant Palouse earthworm or a closely related, new species in the same genus. However, because it is preserved, its DNA cannot be tested. Another earthworm beyond the Palouse was positively identified near Ellensburg, Washington, indicating that other populations may exist in Northwest habitats with similar biological characteristics.
Researchers at UI have sent the Paradise Ridge specimen, found in a remnant, native prairie, to the University of Kansas for DNA analysis. Data generated there will reconstruct the earthworm's history, relatives, and habitat. Most significantly, this information could facilitate comparison of DNA material derived from other worm casts and burrow linings. These data could then determine the earthworm's presence throughout the extensively compromised Palouse ecosystem.
Find out more about the giant Palouse earthworm and recent findings:
For the wild,
Helen Yost
