The Bush administration has released a final plan for helping out the northern spotted owl, after a prior plan was deemed to have been watered down by political interference. Critics admit the plan is an improvement over last year's draft -- which relied heavily on, ahem, taking out predator barred owls with shotguns -- but still wish more emphasis had been put on restricting logging in the threatened bird's old-growth forest habitat. "We are definitely concerned this is not going to be sufficient to recover the owl," says Steve Holmer of the American Bird Conservancy. "It does appear to have some pretty significant loopholes." U.S. Fish and Wildlife officials say the spotted owl could be recovered within three decades if all goes well; the recovery plan will be reviewed in 10 years to see whether it's working.
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caniscandida Posted 10:17 am
17 May 2008
But just to be clear: It is possible that the barred owls, who are lately expanding their range into the traditional range of spotted owls, may sometimes prey on the chicks of spotted owls. But I strongly doubt that spotted owls are regular prey items for them. Surely the issue against barred owls is that they may be better at taking possible nesting sites away from spotted owls, and may be better at catching prey items that the spotted owls might have caught.
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Wolverine Posted 3:52 am
18 May 2008
Of course, none of the above is meant to imply that killing trees in the West or other ecosystem destruction is OK, because it's not.
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