Efforts on 2 Fronts to Save a Population of Ferrets

[depakid]

Black-footed ferrets in South Dakota are facing danger from plague and the poisoning of their prey.

A colony that contains nearly half of the black-footed ferrets in the country and which biologists say is critical to the long-term health of the species has been struck by plague, which may have killed a third of the 300 animals.

A much-publicized endangered species in the 1970s that had dwindled to 18 animals, the black-footed ferret had struggled to make a comeback and had been doing relatively well for decades. But plague, always a threat to the ferrets and their main prey, prairie dogs, has struck with a vengeance this year, partly because of the wet spring.

The ferrets are an easy target for the bacteria. “They are exquisitely sensitive to the plague,” said Travis Livieri, a wildlife biologist here who is trying to save the colony. “They don’t just get sick, they die. No ifs, ands or buts.” Humans can catch plague, but it is easily treated with antibiotics.

Mr. Livieri is working with the federal Fish and Wildlife Service’s black-footed ferret recovery team, the Forest Service and some volunteers to try to save the colony at Conata Basin by dusting prairie dog burrows with flea powder that kills the plague-carrying insects. Mr. Livieri is also working on a vaccination program, prowling the prairie all night to capture ferrets for injections.

But the fight is not only against the plague. While the federal Forest Service is part of the effort to protect ferrets, it has also, at the request of area ranchers, poisoned several thousands of acres of prairie dogs on the edge of the Conata Basin, a buffer strip of federal land adjacent to private grazing land. The buffer strip does not have ferrets, but it is good ferret habitat, experts say, and if they were to spread there it could help support the recovery.

But prairie dogs eat grass, and a large village can denude grazing land. The rodent, in fact, has long been detested in the West as a pest.

Of even more concern to biologists and environmentalists, though, is a Forest Service study of an expanded effort to kill prairie dogs in ferret habitat, which biologists say could be devastating to the restoration of the ferrets.

J. Michael Lockhart, the former director of the recovery effort for the Fish and Wildlife Service, retired in January in part to protest the poisoning of prairie dogs, believing that could jeopardize the fragile gains of the ferret. “I think it’s insane,” said Mr. Lockhart, now a wildlife consultant. “Those sites are so important. They need to preserve as much of that habitat as they can.”

More: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/15/science/15ferrets.html?hp

[litlady]

1. I did research on this story!

Quite an interesting story because two tax-payer financed government entities are working against each other - one group wanting to preserve the ferret and another trying to poison the prairie dogs, the ferrets' main source of food. And all of that just to appease 12-15 ranchers that are only leasing the land from the government, and though environmental groups have asked to find a better location for the cattle to graze.

[malakai2]

2. It's a little more complicated than that

The Fish and Wildlife Service has a mandate to work for the delisting of the species. Once delisted, population management would go back to the states, and because maintaining ferrets requires large, high density prairie dog towns, those states in the historic range aren't exactly eager to see ferrets recover or assist in the process. Not helping matters at all are various levels of senior management in the agency, who are concerned only with trimming the budget or protecting their jobs. If the agency was adequately funded, recovery of ferrets and many other species could be achieved quickly, leaving states with the option of reintroducing ferrets free of Federal oversight.

The Forest Service also has a mandate to conserve listed species, as does any other Federal agency under the Endangered Species Act as currently written. It had the effect of an uberstatute after the Tellico Dam decision but with the recent Arizona Water Permitting decision, SCOTUS limited the scope to discretionary actions only. Now, that still applies in this case and because the field staff in ranger districts is supposed to be responsible for drafting alternatives in an EIS process, ferret conservation should take top priority on Forest Service land capable of supporting ferrets.

The local ranchers come into play right about here. Many of those, particularly in the Wall area, have been there since the 1860's. Those that run their herds entirely on private land either pay taxes on their grazing land or pay approximately $22 per AUM, though they do get considerable other subsidy help from various Fed programs. Those that graze on Forest Service land benefit from a New Deal program in that the Fed bought non-productive lands back from those families in the 1930's, but families retained the right to graze that land under permit for about $1.76 per AUM (currently). Those rights stick with the original base properties, so as they are bought and sold, the grazing privileges stick with the property. This enables some people to raise cattle with a substantially smaller base property than others, with a lower lease cost per AUM than everyone else, all while still benefiting from other subsidies. They are a little strange about criticism from what they perceive as outsiders, especially if those outsiders are part of a Federal agency. A curious thing about South Dakota, those ranchers in the Conata Basin proper (where the ferrets are) tend to think their "grazing rights" are absolute (they aren't), are property rights (again, they aren't), and should be the Forest Service's top priority. So a few of them contact a local politician, who happens to know John Thune and Mike Rounds (SD Governor) personally.

As highlighted above, South Dakota is not at all eager as a state to help with ferret recovery. When the Conata reintroduction began, a certain prairie dog acreage was thrown out as the minimum that might be large enough for a ferret population to persist (at the time, about 12,500 ac, though firm figures were not available as Conata was one of the first reintroduction sites) and the state has held fast to that number as the maximum acreage they'd support. While the threat of listing black-tailed prairie dogs in 2000 prompted them to conserve more acres of prairie dogs statewide, they've clung to the Conata acreage originally thrown out back in the 1990s as though it was written in stone. As it happens, the data from the Conata population demonstrates that the figure the state has in mind will not maintain a ferret population, and that a figure roughly three times as large is necessary. Compounding this is the severe drought that's hit the area over the past decade, which has combined with overgrazing to leave large areas devoid of grass. Ranchers and SD officials see that and reason that it's due to prairie dogs, so the call for increased poisoning back to the original 12,500 acres has crescendoed.

To date, because the landowner in question is a Federal agency, it can't carry through with state-mandated poisoning because such an action is discretionary and subject to FWS approval, which FWS will not grant because it would jeopardize the Conata population. Enter John Thune, who seems to have intervened with the Undersecretary of Agriculture to force through a poisoning EIS in record time. That appeased the state and local landowners, put the local Forest Service staff in a tough spot (they know it'll be shot down by FWS or a court, but they've been instructed by people in very high positions to do it anyway), and believe it or not, has put FWS field staff in a tough spot (they get almost zero support from the regional and Washington offices). So far, that EIS was very close to being signed, but with a personnel change in the Forest Service close to the field level it appears someone will be able to prevent it's adoption through the year.

It doesn't help matters that other states within the historic range won't help with recovery, or that private entities in those states that do want to help are subject to laws such as the Kansas home rule law that mandates poisoning of prairie dogs on private land. Also not helping is the continued march of plague eastward across the Great Plains, and the lack of an easily administered vaccine to protect ferrets and prairie dogs. Research on several fronts is progressing and some of it may help with a new plague vaccine, but intractable political problems at the level of agencies, states, Congress, and high levels of the Executive Branch will continue to prevent recovery of ferrets.

I worked there for a few years, became very familiar with the players, and will probably have no part of it ever again.

[litlady]

3. Interesting details...

When I looked at it, I saw how many different bodies were involved in the situation that made it more complicated. Each body had different interests in mind and thus created a gridlock situation (your information made that even clearer).

The CNN report noted that a lead scientist quit because he felt economic interests trumped scientific ones. The transcript of the report is available here: http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0802/21/acd.02.html (the prairie dog/ferret discussion is about 2/3 of the way down starting with this sentence: "O'BRIEN: Welcome back. If it weren't for the Endangered Species Act, the symbol of our nation would probably be extinct. But while bald eagles are thriving today, the law which kept them from disappearing is under assault.")

Did you find the situation futile then?

[malakai2]

5. The guy on CNN was Mike Lockhart

He was the Black-footed Ferret Recovery Coordinator for several years, ending this past January when he took early retirement in a FWS restructuring. There had been some general nastiness back and forth between field staff and regional managers, which has continued with with the new recovery coordinator and the rest of the field staff fighting to get simple things like funds from the regional office to keep ATVs in safe working order (for the Conata project), or to get the Washington office to complete paperwork authorizing ferret releases at new sites in time to prevent mortality of animals in captivity (one such delay may have precipitated certain people leaving the project).

My take on FWS is mixed. Region 6 (KS, NE, SD, ND, MT, WY, CO, UT) was managed a few years ago by a biologist who was an advocate for field employees, and he was shipped off to make room for a guy who wanted to do less with lower funds. My impression of him was not favorable, and his directions to field staff (cave to WY on wolf issue, cave to SD on wolves and ferrets, etc.) reinforced that early impression. He's since left and now there is another restructuring with what I've heard is a budget guy taking over the region, and at least one of the major positions immediately beneath that will be filled with a guy who is being moved in for reasons other than his ability to successfully manage listing and recovery. I've met several from that level on up, and while they usually leave me in awe of their ability to work rolodex connections and talk a lot without saying anything, I'm also aware that those abilities should have us moving in a far more successful direction. Almost all field staff I ever met were dedicated and sacrificed a lot to do what they thought was right, though morale has declined across the board with severe budget and staffing cuts (such as Mike Lockhart) over the past few years. If I had to go back I'd consider it, but I wouldn't want to work in that region again. Maybe in a region where the general public appreciates their wildlife a bit more than out on the plains.

On ferrets, I think the species can be recovered despite ferocious political opposition. It will cost several times more than it might have if we'd had a favorable administration these past 8 years, and it will ruin careers and push dispirited field people out of a couple agencies (I know several of those personally), but it'll happen. It'll happen because there are just enough dedicated people willing to sacrifice a bit of money to increase prairie dog acreage on their land, and just enough people to sacrifice a personal life to live in the middle of nowhere working long hours in all sorts of weather to manage ferrets on the ground. And when the ferret is ready to come off the list, some regional and national office staff will come out for a photo op and ceremony and pat themselves on the back for a job well done, though if they'd actually supported field staff over the years they might be able to share the stage with those who actually made it all possible.

As for Conata in particular, I think that site is toast. Plague kills prairie dogs as well as ferrets, and the more densely colonial species such as blacktails can show colony-wide mortality of 95 percent or higher with survivors being those that escaped exposure through simple luck. Eventually populations can recover somewhat before being ravaged again, and the long term population level looks like a set of stairs running down to zero. Conata is essentially one very large, dense town of blacktails, separated into wards by a few shallow drainages or dirt roads, so if weather conditions are favorable for plague transmission (warm and humid, not normal for Conata but does happen in fall and spring) the remainder of the complex could be infected in short order. A plague vaccine does exist and it does work for both prairie dogs and ferrets, but it is expensive and requires a booster. Research is being done on an oral vaccine that could be broadcast in bait, but that is at least 3 years out, maybe more given NEPA requirements. The ferrets out there right now can be vaccinated and maybe moved to other sites that have been exposed to plague (whitetail sites can support ferrets through plague outbreaks because whitetails are less densely colonial) if those other states are willing to accept those animals. Those states may not be willing. The pesticide dusting they reference in the article is very time and labor intensive because the dust needs to be applied into every burrow, and the process needs to be repeated annually to break the flea-plague transmission vector. 10,000 acres of dusting will require a 10-12 hour per day, 7 day per week field crew commitment into autumn, and having done that in the past, I can assure you that people stuck working 14 hour days nonstop for weeks on end with a day off here or there generally do not want to come back in subsequent years. I don't see them repeating it next year.

I don't think the Forest Service poisoning project will go anywhere. David Tenney is no longer with the Department of Agriculture and he was a driving force in pushing that EIS through. Mark Rey took over some of that, but he can't exactly accelerate the timetable for field level managers who are responsible for signing the Record of Decision. A new manager at that level just took over and will probably want to review all the work that had been done to date to ensure a poor ROD isn't being signed, so I don't see how they'd even put it out there for this fall (poisoning season). Get a new administration in Washington, change the political appointees in the Department of Agriculture, and all this goes away. If for some reason the ROD is signed, FWS may make an ESA jeopardy call and thereby prevent any expanded poisoning, and it's certain that several environmental groups would seek an injunction to force ESA compliance if FWS field managers are overruled at the regional or Washington office level. All of this isn't to say that people shouldn't stay aware of the goings on out there, if nothing else it's a great case study of how government works and what individual players can do, elections be damned.

[litlady]

6. Thanks for the information!

I do hope the species can recover. And I also agree that it is a good case study on government, and particularly the gridlock involved in environmental issues.

[XemaSab]

4. My range experience teacher has the license plate "ONE AUM."

:D

/my contribution to this thread