Northwest grizzlies reach the brink

The Selkirk and Cabinet-Yaak grizzlies live in habitat that is limited or not present in high-elevation grizzly recovery zones of the Yellowstone ecosystem, pictured here

By Environmental News Network staff

In the Selkirk Mountains of northern Idaho and Washington and the Cabinet-Yaak ecosystem of northern Montana and Idaho, the last lower elevation habitat for grizzly bears in the lower 48 United States endures.

There, a small number of grizzlies can find wet, dense forests dominated largely by cedar and hemlock trees — habitat that does not exist or is in short supply in the high-elevation grizzly bear recovery zones of the Yellowstone, Northern Continental Divide and Selway-Bitterroot ecosystems.

Once part of a contiguous population of more than 50,000 bears that ranged from Mexico to Canada, the present population in the Selkirk and Cabinet-Yaak ecosystems teeters on less than 100 individuals.

Conservationists are continuing their campaign to reclassify grizzly bears in the region from threatened to endangered. Currently, all grizzly bears in the lower 48 United States are listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.

Last week U.S. District Court Judge Paul Friedman heard the latest round of arguments from conservation groups in a nine-year battle to protect grizzly bears that live in the Selkirk and Cabinet-Yaak ecosystems. A final ruling on the population status is expected in the next few months.

According to Doug Honnold, an attorney for EarthJustice Legal Defense Fund who is representing the case, grizzlies in the Cabinet-Yaak and Selkirk ecosystems face ever-increasing habitat destruction from logging, recreation and road building. Since the grizzly was listed in 1975, the Cabinet-Yaak system has lost more than 280,000 roadless acres, or 17 percent of the recovery zone.

If the bears are listed as endangered, many human activities will be further restricted, Honnold said. In 1999, five bears in the Cabinet-Yaak perished. "That's a lot when you consider that there were only about 30 bears in the area."

"Lower elevation habitat has always been a part of the grizzly bear's breadbox," said grizzly biologist Brian Horejsi. "That is where their year begins when they come out of their dens. The more bears you have and the greater diversity and distribution, the better off they are genetically."

Conservationists first asked the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to list the Selkirk and Cabinet-Yaak grizzlies as endangered in 1991. A year later, the Wildlife Service issued its first formal refusal to reclassify the grizzly bears. That noncompliance was followed by a lawsuit launched by 16 conservation groups.

Grizzly bear populations are scattered throughout the Northwest. The focus of the reclassification effort is the Selkirk and Cabinet-Yaak regions of Washington, Idaho and Montana

Judge Friedman rejected two findings by the Wildlife Service that the grizzly bears did not warrant additional protection. In 1999, the agency admitted that the Selkirk and Cabinet-Yaak grizzlies faced enough threats to qualify as an endangered species. Nevertheless, the Wildlife Service claimed that an endangered listing for grizzlies was precluded by the need to protect other endangered species such as the boreal toad.

"There are nine species ahead of the grizzly bear," said Chuck Davis, endangered species listing coordinator for the Wildlife Service. "We are already eating into next year's budget for species listings."

According to Davis, almost all of the agency's funding for endangered species listings is spent on court-ordered actions.

The Wildlife Service also claimed that grizzly bears in the Selkirk and Cabinet Yaak ecosystems are connected by their contact with grizzly bears in Canada's Purcell Mountains and that they should be treated as a single population of about 70 bears. Based on that conclusion, the agency said that enhanced protection for the grizzlies could wait until a later date.

But conservation groups say time is running out for the two population groups. "Grizzly bear protection is going to require our full scientific, legal and democratic attention forever," Horejsi said. "That is not what the agencies are tellling us."

Groups that support reclassifying the Selkirk and Cabinet-Yaak grizzly bears note that Canada does not provide grizzly bears with nearly the same protection that they receive in the United States. They point to the recent loss of four out of five bears that entered the Purcell Mountains from the United States. The Purcells are more accurately characterized as a "mortality sink" than a "connecting link," according to Louisa Willcox, coordinator for the Sierra Club Grizzly Bear Ecosystems Project.

Wildlife management agencies have long claimed that healthy grizzly bear populations in Alberta and British Columbia would be the savior of adjoining and declining U.S. populations. But grizzlies are still hunted legally in both regions.

A recent study by Alberta's Environmental Protection Branch found that 72 percent of the province's forest land is leased for drilling, mining or logging.

"There's no doubt that grizzly bears live in both Canada and the United States," said Honnold. "The question is: Can they survive in both places?"

Copyright 2000, Environmental News Network, All Rights Reserved

Poaching, over-fishing threaten Russian brown bears
September 12, 2000
Bears in France spark wild debate
April 25, 2000
Salmon shortage starving Canadian grizzlies
March 12, 2000
Grizzly bear 'troublemakers' get second chance at sanctuary
September 18, 1999

Grizzly population denied more protection
Groups pressure Canada to protect species
Politics' role in ESA listings questioned
Grizzlies not out of the woods — yet
Final plan afoot to reintroduce grizzly bears

grizzly bears
Endangered Species Act
EarthJustice Legal Defense Fund
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Sierra Club Grizzly Bear Ecosystems Project

Note: Pages will open in a new browser window

External sites are not endorsed by CNN Interactive.