Woodland caribou tracks crossed the glade and led into a grove of trees. But the caribou themselves were elusive.

“They’re down there, the rascals,” said Layser, a wildlife biologist who works for the Selkirk Conservation Alliance. “Why can’t I see them?”

After repeated circling, he spotted the four caribou resting in the snow, brown rectangles against the whiteness. The cream-colored fur around their necks was just visible.

Once found from northeast Washington to Glacier National Park, with additional strongholds in the Great Lakes states and Maine, the last woodland caribou population in the lower 48 states has come to this: four animals spotted during a 3 ½ -hour flight.

Nearly 30 years after their endangered species listing in 1984, woodland caribou’s prognosis remains precarious. The dark, wet forests of the Selkirks represent their last, tiny toehold in the continental United States.

About 46 caribou remain in the South Selkirk herd, which straddles the U.S.-Canadian border, but nearly all of the animals are in British Columbia. During aerial surveys over the past dozen years, wildlife biologists have counted four or fewer caribou south of the border.

This year was no exception. The four caribou spotted by Layser were about six miles inside the United States.

With so few caribou documented in the United States, some local residents question federal efforts to recover the shy forest dweller. More than $4 million has been spent for that purpose.

“Unless you count the Canadian caribou, we really don’t have a caribou population,” said Lee Pinkerton, a retired Border Patrol agent who lives in Bonners Ferry. “The only caribou being seen are right on the border. Once in a while, they’ll range down in the United States.”

Lee and others argue that the herd is virtually extinct in the lower 48 states and say it’s time to abandon recovery efforts.

But environmental groups aren’t willing to give up on the Selkirk caribou. In 2009, several groups sued the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to force the agency to designate critical habitat for caribou. In November, the agency proposed listing 375,562 acres as critical caribou habitat in North Idaho and northeast Washington.

The proposal has riled up some residents of Idaho’s Bonner and Boundary counties, where earlier efforts to protect caribou habitat led to unpopular closures of backcountry snowmobiling areas. However, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service officials said they don’t expect the habitat designation to lead to further land-use restrictions.

Layser spent 20 years working on caribou issues for the Forest Service before he retired and took a job with the Selkirk Conservation Alliance, one of the plaintiffs in the suit. He acknowledges the steep challenges to recovering caribou but thinks it’s worth the effort.

“If caribou disappear from the Selkirks, we won’t be able to bring them back. Politically, socially, it won’t work,” he said. “And if they do disappear, it won’t be because we couldn’t recover them. It will be because of apathy.”

Caribou once plentiful

On a recent morning, Layser took off from Sandpoint Airport with Dave Parker, owner of Northern Air, who contracts for aerial wildlife surveys. The Cessna headed north toward Canada, flying over the snowy ridges along the Shed Roof Divide.

Fresh snowfall coated the peaks like fondant icing on a wedding cake. Even dainty snowshoe hare tracks were visible from the air.

These austerely beautiful but inhospitable ridges are prime winter caribou habitat. When the snow deepens, the caribou trek up to the high country, using their broad hoofs like snowshoes. Heading to high elevations helps the docile caribou avoid predators, which tend to stay in lower elevations where deer and elk are concentrated.

Layser and Parker, veterans of many wildlife flights, recalled previous caribou sightings. Parker once watched a caribou give birth. The glistening calf slipped out onto a patch of snow and wobbled to its feet.

Through the 1950s, caribou populations in the Selkirks were estimated at 100 animals. Historical numbers were probably much higher, because the caribou’s range extended south to the Clearwater River, Layser said. When he was a graduate student at Washington State University, one of his professors kept a box of scorched bones taken from a fire pit along the Snake River; the campfire was made by wagon-train emigrants who had eaten caribou steaks on the Oregon Trail.

In 1889, a hunter and trapper named H.C. Lindley reported taking 25 caribou and 40 wolves during a single winter at Priest Lake. A year earlier, Teddy Roosevelt reportedly passed through Sandpoint en route to a caribou hunt near Kootenay Lake in British Columbia.

The animals – bigger than deer, but smaller than elk – were staples for the Kalispel and Kootenai tribes. And as recently as 1959, a woodland caribou was spotted within St. Maries’ city limits.

Lichens are main food source

The reasons behind the caribou’s demise are complex. Unrestricted hunting decimated herds during the early 1900s. Caribou reproduce slowly, and calf mortality is high. In more recent decades, fragmented habitat and cougar predation took their toll on the remaining populations.

Caribou haunt old-growth forests: western red cedar and larch at lower elevations, and subalpine fir and Engelmann spruce above 4,000 feet in late winter.

They spend about seven months in the high country, grazing on “old man’s beard” lichens that dangle from tree branches. The lichens grow so slowly that it takes 120- to 140-year-old groves of trees to produce enough forage for caribou.

Beginning in the 1960s, the Forest Service expanded its road network and timber sales, venturing deeper into those old-growth forests. Additional acreage was lost to wildfires, which burned large tracts of the Selkirks about the same time. And, north of the border, Highway 3 was built across Kootenay Pass, further fragmenting habitat and resulting in caribou deaths from vehicle collisions.

Meanwhile, openings from timber harvests created forage for deer, elk and moose populations. As their numbers increased, cougar populations shot up. One cougar, responsible for killing at least three caribou, was named “Mr. Nasty” by biologists. Washington, Idaho and British Columbia eventually liberalized their cougar hunting seasons to reduce cougar predation on caribou.

The big cats are believed to be responsible for the low survival rates of caribou transplanted from British Columbia’s northern herds in the late 1980s and 1990s. The transplants were intended to create two new, self-sustaining herds in Washington and Idaho, but those efforts didn’t succeed.

A total of 103 caribou were transplanted, but the South Selkirk herd experienced a net gain of only 18 animals. The herd grew from 30 caribou to 48 during that time.

Former U.S. Sen. Larry Craig asked for an audit of the caribou recovery program, which spent $4.7 million between 1984 and 1998. In its report, the U.S. General Accounting Office said the caribou recovery program had achieved modest gains. Without the transplants, the South Selkirk herd probably wouldn’t exist, the audit concluded.

Additional transplants aren’t being considered, and even if the U.S. had the desire, British Columbia might not have animals to spare. The province’s herds have dropped from 2,500 to 1,700 caribou in the past 15 years, said Chris Ritchie, a manager for B.C.’s Ministry of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations. The figures are for the same ecotype of caribou found in the South Selkirk herd, which are sometimes called “mountain caribou” in Canada.

When an avalanche wiped out Banff National Park’s tiny herd of five caribou three years ago, biologists didn’t think the northern herds had surplus caribou to restock the park. Instead, Parks Canada is working with a captive breeding program at the Calgary Zoo.

Locals skeptical of recovery efforts

Recent meetings on the proposed critical caribou habitat have drawn large audiences. Liz Sloot, who chairs Boundary County’s tea party movement, was one of a crowd of 100-plus people who attended a meeting in Bonners Ferry, a heavily timber-dependent community near the Canadian border.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service expects to spend about $366,000 on the critical habitat designation, including $45,000 for a study of potential economic impacts. A final decision on critical habitat is expected later this year.

“It’s a waste of my taxpayer dollars for them to be doing this,” Sloot said. “The caribou aren’t here, they’re in British Columbia. If they’re an endangered species, that’s British Columbia’s problem, not ours.”

Sloot has never seen a caribou in Boundary County, but Mike Ripatti has. About 20 years ago, the cattle rancher spotted a caribou on the old Boundary Creek Road. It was radio-collared, so it might have been a transplant, and it was ambling north.

“That caribou looked like it was headed back to Canada,” Ripatti said.

Ripatti wonders how the critical habitat designation will affect his ability to run cattle on a federal grazing allotment that his family has leased since the 1930s. “First it was the grizzly, now it’s the caribou,” Ripatti said. What bothers him about federal efforts to protect endangered species are “the road closures and the anti-logging sentiment,” he said.

U.S. Fish and Wildlife officials said they anticipate few, if any, changes in activities as a result of designating critical habitat.

People are wondering, “Am I going to lose snowmobiling privileges? Am I going to lose the ability to cut firewood or harvest timber?” said Brian Kelly, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s state supervisor in Boise. “Basically, no. Those (critical habitat) acreages shouldn’t change the activities occurring on the land, because we’re already consulting on caribou habitat.”

Most of the proposed acreage is within national forests, and some is in a wilderness area. The Forest Service already goes through a formal consultation process with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on timber sales and other activities that could affect caribou. Even if caribou weren’t protected, many of the restrictions would remain in place to protect grizzly bears and old-growth habitat, agency officials said. Snowmobile activity in caribou habitat, meanwhile, was restricted by a 2007 court order that remains in effect. In the northern portion of the Selkirks, snowmobilers must stick to 89 miles of formal trails. Cross-country travel is prohibited because caribou avoid areas with snowmobile traffic, studies indicate.

Through designating critical habitat, “we’re looking at what caribou would need if we could get them back, the amount of habitat and the type of habitat,” Kelly said.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service recognizes that the South Selkirk herd is primarily in British Columbia, said Susan Burch, a branch chief with the agency in Boise.

“But it does exist here in the United States and … this is the last remaining caribou in the lower 48,” she said. “These are considered some of the most endangered mammals in the U.S.”

Since caribou are hard to see, biologists aren’t entirely sure how many members of the South Selkirk herd are in the U.S., she said: “It could be four, it could be 10.”

After woodland caribou disappeared from Maine, efforts were made to reintroduce them, but the transplants weren’t successful.

“Once they’re gone, they’re gone forever,” Burch said.

‘Just doing what they do’

As the Cessna headed north during the aerial survey, it crossed briefly into British Columbia. Hollows in the snow indicated where the Cutoff Peak wolf pack had bedded down.

The wolves were hidden in the trees, but their presence is a new factor on the landscape. If the South Selkirk herd is to recover, Layser said careful monitoring of wolf and cougar populations will be required, along with ongoing protections for old-growth habitat. The proposed critical habitat represents less than 1 percent of the caribou’s historic range in the Northwest, he said.

As the Cessna flew over the ridges, he and Parker, the pilot, looked for more caribou tracks punched through the snow. But the only sightings that day were the four caribou about six miles from the international border.

Parker wondered if the small group would be back next year, perhaps with calves.

“Winter is a peaceful time for caribou,” he said. “They’re just doing what they do. All of this controversy is because of where they lay their heads.”

State Fish and Wildlife Department officials say purchasing the land along the Okanogan River about 20 miles north of Omak will allow the agency to protect spawning and rearing habitat for salmon and steelhead, and grassland and shrub steppe beneficial to wildlife.  

The property will become part of the Sinlahekin Wildlife Area, managed by WDFW to provide habitat for a variety of fish and wildlife species as well as public access for outdoor recreation, such as fishing, hunting and wildlife viewing.

The $795,000 purchase price will be funded with grants from the state Salmon Recovery Funding Board and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

The $968,000 grant will fund restoration work on an area of nearly a million acres in Ferry County, according to the Northeast Washington Forestry Coalition.

The Northeast Washington Forestry Coalition (Coalition) worked with the Colville National Forest to secure the grant from the federal Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program (CFLRP), the program that will fund restoration projects in 13 states, including the Colville National Forest.

The CFLRP was funded by Congress to try new approaches to efficiently expand the amount of restoration work on public lands.

The Coalition deemed the nearly $1 million grant a “game changer.”

“This is exactly the news we needed,” said Ron Gray, Vice President of the Northeast Washington Forestry Coalition. “We worked very hard to get this grant and our success [in obtaining the grant] says a lot about the quality of the collaborative process. We’re very thankful to many state and federal elected officials who spoke up on behalf of our proposal.”

Stepping up

The grant award, which was also applauded by Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers, will help protect private property from wildfire, restore water quality and fisheries and control invasive plants. Decommissioning old logging roads and removing small diameter trees will also be addressed by the grant.

“I appreciate the Forest Service stepping up on behalf of Eastern Washington,” said McMorris Rodgers. “This definitely builds our confidence going forward.”

Colville National Forest Supervisor Laura Jo West said she is also excited about the work the grant will fund.

“This is great news for the communities of this area,” said West. “With this funding, we can generate a lot of quality jobs doing major projects to improve forest habitat, restore watersheds and reduce wildfire risk around communities.”

The ongoing collaboration between the Colville National Forest and the Northeast Washington Forestry Coalition has not gone unnoticed, since the Coalition has received national recognition for accomplishing more than two-dozen projects on the CNF in the last eight years. The projects helped to improve forest health and wildlife habitat, while improving community safety and generating jobs for local mills, the Coalition said in a press release.

“These investments in restoring America’s forests will provide real benefits that we breathe, drink and feel in our everyday lives,” said Laura McCarthy of the Nature Conservancy. “By supporting these collaborative projects, the Forest Service and Congress are directly helping Americans in their lives and livelihoods.”

For more information about the project, visit http://www.fs.fed.us/resto¬ration/CFLR/

The Colville and Idaho Panhandle national forests were among 13 national forests chosen for millions of dollars worth of restoration projects.

On the Colville, the money will be used to create open, parklike stands of ponderosa and lodgepole pine in dry areas of the forest through thinning and small, controlled fires. On the Idaho Panhandle, the focus is restoration of the Kootenai River watershed.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced the awards last week, which include first-year funding of at least $1 million in new appropriations for the Colville National Forest and more than $300,000 for the Idaho Panhandle.

The funding is expected to continue in future years. It would include new appropriations as well as matching Forest Service dollars from existing national, regional and local budgets, said Jason Kirchner, a Forest Service spokesman.

Backing from community groups was essential to securing the restoration money, which went through a highly competitive selection process.

“It wasn’t just the Forest Service pushing this along. It was the whole community working on their issues,” Kirchner said.

The Northeast Washington Forestry Coalition worked on the Colville proposal, while the Kootenai Valley Resource Initiative was instrumental in the Idaho Panhandle’s proposal. The two groups seek to find common ground among the timber industry, environmental groups, tribes, local governments and other interests.

“Caring for the forest where we live and work and play is a shared responsibility,” said Patty Perry, administrator for the Kootenai Tribe of Idaho, which is part of the Kootenai Valley Resource Initiative. “This will offer a great opportunity for our community.”

If the project receives full funding over the next decade, it would result in more than $20 million in restoration work in the Kootenai River watershed.

Projects to improve water quality would benefit the river’s struggling populations of white sturgeon and burbot, a freshwater cod. Replanting whitebark pine trees would help grizzly bears, who eat the trees’ calorie-laden seeds. Reducing the risk of large wildfires in the watershed that provides Bonners Ferry’s drinking water is also a priority.

The work is expected to create about 144 full- and part-time jobs. One local sawmill is evaluating whether it can add a second shift in the future, said Dan Dinning, a Boundary County commissioner.

On the Colville National Forest, treating overcrowded stands would also create new jobs in rural communities. If fully funded over the next decade, the projects would create more than $70 million worth of restoration work.

The goal is to return the Colville forest to more natural conditions, creating stands of trees that are better equipped to survive droughts and insect attacks. Trees logged during that process would be sent to local sawmills or turned into energy in Avista Corp.’s Kettle Falls biomass plant.

Over time, habitat would improve for animals such as Canada lynx, grizzly bears and pileated woodpeckers. Thinning dense thickets of trees will also increase deer and elk forage and winter habitat.

As overall Forest Service budgets have declined, money earmarked for restoration has also decreased, said Mary Farnsworth, supervisor of the Idaho Panhandle National Forests. “We would not be able to do this to this extent without this funding,” she said.

At the end of 10 years, the forest ecosystems should be healthier and more resilient, Kirchner said. The changes will benefit people who like to recreate in the woods, as well as plants and animals.

“If we have a healthy forest that’s functioning, then everyone gets to enjoy it,” Kirchner said.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said that over the next three years the 10 projects from Oregon to North Carolina will expand the number of acres thinned and restored on national forests by 20 percent and increase timber production by 25 percent. They will maintain or generate 1,550 jobs.

The projects were submitted by local organizations made up of timber, conservation and community groups that have been working for years to produce a reliable stream of timber from national forests while reducing fire danger, insect infestations and erosion. The 10 projects funded last year amounted to $24 million.

“This is about jobs. It’s about restoration. And making sure forests are in a position to preserve precious water resources,” Vilsack said in a teleconference call with reporters. “We continue to work on collaborative efforts to make sure we have left these forests in better shape.”

Mike Anderson of the Wilderness Society, a conservation group, said it represented the first time full funding has gone to the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program, enacted by Congress in 2009.

“Hopefully, this program will spread to more and more parts of the country,” he said. “This is going to allow us to really tackle the problem and get ahead of the problem for the first time.”

Ann Forest Burns of the American Forest Resource Council, a timber industry group, said forest restoration has struggled for years to gain traction and that these projects focus the work on large areas in specific locations. She said regional offices of the Forest Service will match spending with in-kind work, such as monitoring ecological conditions and timber production.

The 10 projects include two each in Oregon, California and Idaho, one in North Carolina, one in Missouri and one in Arkansas and Oklahoma. The Forest Service also came up with $3.6 million to fund three projects in Washington, Arkansas and Mississippi.

The biggest grant was $3.5 million for the Lakeview Stewardship Project in Oregon, where Collins Pine will be seeing increased log supply for its Fremont Sawmill in Lakeview. A new plant that was supposed to burn small trees and branches from forest thinning has been shelved by lack of demand for green electricity.

Locally

The U.S. Forest Service has committed nearly $1.3 million for restoration work on the Colville and the Idaho Panhandle national forests, the agency announced Thursday.

The money is part of $40 million in national grants that will be used to thin dense forests, reduce the threat of forest fires near rural communities, decommission roads and improve the health of watersheds, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said.

U.S. Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., applauded the $968,000 in funding that the Colville National Forest will receive. The Northeast Forestry Coalition, a cooperative effort among business, community and environmental groups, has been working with the Forest Service to identify high-priority projects on the forest, she noted.

A similar effort is under way through the Kootenai Valley Resource Initiative on the Idaho Panhandle National Forests, which will receive $324,000.

It’s slated for 1:30 p.m. at the Inn at Priest Lake in Coolin.

Commissioners asked Fish & Wildlife last month for formal coordination authority on the habitat designation.

The board hopes to influence the designation process through the coordination.

Fish & Wildlife announced last November it proposed designating 375,562 acres in Bonner and Boundary counties and Washington state’s Pend Oreille County as vital habitat for the endangered member of the deer family.

The deadline to comment on the proposal is Jan. 30, although the comment period could be extended another two months.

“We’ve received some requests for an extension and we’re working on that right now to meet that 60-day extension request,” said Susan Burch, chief for listing and recovery at Fish & Wildlife’s Boise office.

Woodland caribou were listed under the Endangered Species Act in 1984. The Selkirk Conservation Alliance and several other environmental groups sued in 2002 to bring about habitat protections. A subsequent suit in 2009 forced Fish & Wildlife to designate critical habitat.

A final rule is due by Nov. 20, according to the terms of the settlement in the 2009 suit.

The proposed designation has set resort operators and forest users at Priest Lake on edge. They fear the designation will result in a year-round halt on recreation on public lands above 4,000 feet, where the caribou dine on arboreal lichens in old-growth forests.

County commissioners are building a coalition of other governments in the tri-state to challenge the designation.

“We’ve got about 10 or 12 counties all asking to be in involved,” said Commission Chairman Cornel Rasor.

Commissioners here have been unrelenting in their criticism of the proposal, which they contend is propped up by weak science and over-inflated population estimates.

Fish & Wildlife estimates there are 46 caribou in the recovery area, although county officials point out only several have been spotted in Idaho over the years.

“For three caribou, we’re going to tie up over 375,000 acres? That’s over a hundred thousand acres per caribou that people can’t use,” said Commissioner Mike Nielsen.

Commissioner Lewie Rich said the agency is skirting the impacts of wolves and mountain lion have on the caribou population.

“They would not deal with the predation issue,” said Rich.

Fish & Wildlife declines to speculate on what impact the designation could have on recreation and other forest activities.

“There’s no intent to close anything or do anything different. It just adds another conversation between the federal agencies,” said Burch.

Burch said the designation does not give the government authority to appropriate private lands, nor does it grant it access to private lands.

“It doesn’t create a wilderness — I think that’s one of the biggest misconceptions just in general of critical habitat,” she added.

Reports of wolf tracks, wolf kills and howling on the reservation — all the way from Omak to Inchelium — have become more and more frequent since 2007, said Randy Friedlander, manager of the wildlife program for Colville Tribes Fish and Wildlife.

Now that it’s certain, the tribal agency wants to study the wolves, and find out what tribal members want to do about them.

Last winter, the tribe confirmed with a DNA test of scat that they are not hybrids or dogs. Remote camera images since then show there’s more than one.

“They’re here. So — What are we going to do with them now? — is the next question,” Friedlander said.

This winter, they’ve invited tribal members to fill out a questionnaire asking how they feel about gray wolves returning to the reservation, whether they’re culturally or spiritually significant, and if the wolves should be hunted or trapped if there are too many.

Based on the more than 90 questionnaires returned so far, wolves appear to be just as controversial among tribal members as they are in other parts of Washington, Friedlander said.

Officials now think there are at least three wolves, and as many as nine now living on the reservation, said Joe Peone, the tribes’ director of Fish and Wildlife. There’s no evidence yet that there’s an active pack, defined by the state as a breeding male and female with pups, he said. Mostly, reports have been of lone tracks.

Except for a small strip of land between the Okanogan River and Highway 97, wolves are not considered endangered by the federal government on the reservation.

That means the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation — a sovereign nation — will develop its own plan for managing them, Peone said.

“We’re going to be managing them. And when I say manage, I mean we’re going to be removing some,” he said. But just how many wolves tribal members want on the reservation, and how they’ll want them removed when the wolf population exceeds that number, is yet to be determined.

Peone said they will be asking for help from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, mostly with an effort this spring to trap and radio collar wolves to learn more about their ranges and habits.

They’re also planning to set out hair snares to add to information being gathered with remote cameras, which have taken pictures of three wolves — two of which could be the same wolf.

Friedlander noted that Colvilles haven’t lived with wolves on their reservation for between 80 and 90 years, so even elders aren’t likely to remember how wolves were dealt with in the past.

Peone said non-tribal members who live on the reservation and will also be affected by the wolf’s return are welcome to comment at the tribes’ district meetings, scheduled in January and February.

And, in addition to developing a plan for wolves living on the reservation, Peone said, the tribe hopes to work with state officials to develop understandings about wolves living on what’s known as the North Half — an area north of the existing reservation where tribal members have longstanding hunting rights. “We plan to sit down with the state and talk about what we can do relative to the North Half,” he said.

The land is located in Boundary and Bonner counties in Idaho, and Pend Oreille County in Washington. These lands are currently considered by the USFWS to be occupied by the caribou.

The majority of the proposed critical habitat lies on the west side of Boundary County.

On Monday at the Kootenai Valley Resource Initiative meeting, the USFWS presented information on the proposed issue.

Protected under the Endangered Species Act, the caribou was listed as endangered in 1984. It is estimated that there are about 46 caribou in the area, according to USFWS. 

The USFWS believes the primary threat to the species survival is the loss of contiguous old growth forest habitats due to timber harvest and wildfires, according to a USFWS press release.

Human activities such as road-building and recreational trails can also fragment caribou habitat and facilitate movement of predators into the caribou’s range.

About 175 people turned out for Monday night’s meeting which was held at Kootenai River Inn. 

In what was supposed to be an informational meeting, citizen disapproval was apparent with several people voicing opinions out loud.

“You have a better chance of spotting Big Foot than a caribou out there,” shouted one disapproving attendee.

The purpose of KVRI as explained by co-chair Dan Dinning is to bring information to the community and that is what the group hoped to accomplish by inviting the USFWS.

“This is not an official public hearing or public meeting it is an informational meeting,” Dinning said. “The object of it is so we can all become very well-educated on what is being proposed and where to interact so we can interact very intelligently according to the process that is laid out for us.”

Boundary County Commissioner Ron Smith said the commissioners are in the process of drafting a letter to the Idaho Department of Wildlife in Boise. He said they would be asking for three public hearings in Boundary County. At these meetings community members can voice their concerns.  He also said they would be asking for a 60-day extension on the comments and public hearings. Deadline for written comments is Jan. 30.

Smith also said the commissioners are trying to coordinate with the Boundary County School District to use the Becker Auditorium for the public meetings which will seat about 500 people.

“We will send out a press release outlining all of this and another press release after IDFG gets back to us about the request,” Smith said.

Bryon Holt of the USFWS said by Nov. 12, 2012 the final critical habitat rule will be delivered.

The question was asked what they thought was causing the declining numbers.

“To be perfectly honest we don’t know exactly what is impacting the population or why the population is declining,” answered Holt.  “We are trying to get a better handle on what exactly is driving the status of the population, but we can’t tell you exactly what that is.”

After Holt’s comment the crowd shouted, “wolves, wolves.”

“We are working with the University of Montana and doing a study to look at the interaction between wolves and caribou  and we are working to get a handle on that,” Holt said.

“We are consistently hearing (about the number of caribou) 46 or 47 caribou, how many are in Idaho, is there some way you can show a general designation of how many are actually in Idaho,” asked Dinning.

In a census of the caribou population taken by Idaho Fish and Game from 2000 to 2009,  it stated there were only a few caribou on the U.S. side of the border to Canada.  Patty Perry of KVRI said not to take the numbers from the census out of context.

Perry said  Wayne Wakkinen of Idaho Fish and Game, will be attend the February KVRI meeting.  He will present an overview of three different studies that have gone on over the last several years regarding caribou.

According to USFWS whenever critical habitat is proposed an economic analysis is required.

Holt said economist will look at everything it will cost to manage caribou today without the designation, and then if they designate critical habitat on top of that, they will figure out what the additional cost will be. 

“It is called an incremental analysis which the courts will go one way or the other on,” said Susan Birch with USFWS.

The economic analysis wont be coming out until around April 2012.  Holt said the comment period will reopen after this analysis is presented.

At the end of the meeting the forest service reitterated that this is not a decision at this point.  People have  time to comment and the forest service is evaluating the plan and how it may effect the community.

“We want to have conversations with you, but if you want your comments submitted you have to submit them first in writing,” said Holt.

To send a comment electronically go to the Federal Rule making eRulemaking Portal at http://www.regulations.gov.

To mail in a comment send it to U.S. Fish and Wildflife Service; Division of Policy and Directives Management, 4401 N. Fairfax Dr., MS 2042-PDM; Arlington, VA 22201.

Comments need to be in by Jan. 30, 2012, 11:59 p.m. eastern time.

To view more information go to the USFWS website at www.fws.gov. People can go to Kootenai.org to view KVRI information from the meeting.

Bryan and Deb Gotham said, “Our dream is for generations of our family to raise cattle, horses, and timber in this beautiful country. Selling the development rights helps us today without compromising our dream for the future. We’re very happy about it.”

The easement was purchased entirely with private dollars raised by the non-profit wildlife conservation organization Conservation Northwest. The easement will soon be reassigned to the Okanogan Land Trust, based in Tonasket, which works to protect open space and working lands in eastern Okanogan and western Ferry counties. Walter Henze, OLT board member, said, “We’re proud to partner with the Gothams to help protect this area’s heritage. We are also excited to have another project in Ferry county, and hope we can do more work here in the future.”

Conservation Northwest and the Okanogan Land Trust are also partnering with the Gothams on an application to the Forest Legacy Program administered by the state Dept. of Natural Resources. This application was one of the top three in the state, moving it forward to compete nationally for federal funds that would allow the purchase of a working forest easement on most of the rest of the Gotham property. Conservation Northwest also has an option for the purchase of an easement on additional Gotham acres. 

This effort is part of Conservation Northwest’s program to collaboratively protect wildlife habitat on public and private lands in northeast Washington. Mitch Friedman, Conservation Northwest’s executive director, said, “The Gotham Ranch is providing beef, timber, and livelihoods in a way that is compatible with the needs of wolverine, lynx, and other wildlife. Nestled right up against the Kettle Crest and the potential wilderness lands there, this represents a great balance that I think a lot of people can get behind.” 

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) announced Nov. 29 a proposal to designate about 375,562 acres in Bonner and Boundary counties in Idaho and Pend Oreille County, Wash., as critical habitat. That area is home to about 46 caribou.

Under the Endangered Species Act, critical habitat identifies geographic areas that contain features essential for the conservation of a listed species. Federal agencies must consult with the USFWS on projects that would modify the habitat 

Snowmobiling restrictions in high elevation areas north of Priest Lake remain in effect while the U.S. Forest Service devises a new winter travel plan. Greg Hetzler, who is in charge of drawing up the travel plan, said this habitat designation would impact anything they would do in the travel plan.

“We would have a hard time moving on with the travel plan,” he said, in light of the new announcement.

Tim Laser, a wildlife biologist for the Selkirk Conservation Alliance, said there are some good protections in Fish and Wildlife’s plan, but it doesn’t address everything.

He said they especially need to work with counterparts in British Columbia where most of the caribou habitat lies. The latest proposal affects only the U.S. half.

One issue he pointed out is providing a crossing at Highway 3 just north of the boarder. Since it was built in 1963, the road has cut the caribou ecosystem in half, he said. 

Addressing predation and motorized recreation on both sides of the boarder are other areas Laser feels need looking at. He is reviewing the USFWS proposal and said the Selkirk Conservation Alliance plans to submit comments about these areas.

SCA has been doing winter flyovers of caribou habitat in North Idaho for about eight seasons. They monitor where the caribou are, check to see if snowmobilers are staying within their boundaries and check on other species including wolves, wolverine and bears. 

Last season, the weather prohibited the helicopter flights during the prime part of the season, in February and March. They managed to get in the air only twice during the regular season and they didn’t see any caribou then, Laser said. 

Caribou prefer elevations above 4,000 feet and steep terrain with old-growth forests. When winter snow deepens, mountain caribou feed almost exclusively on arboreal lichens that occur on trees that are typically 125 years or older.

The loss of old growth forest to timber harvest and wildfire is the primary threat to the species’ survival, according to a news release from USFWS. Human activities such as road-building and recreational trails can also facilitate the movement of predators into the caribou’s range.

A 2002 lawsuit brought by environmental groups Defenders of Wildlife, The Lands Council, Selkirk Conservation Alliance, and Center for Biological Diversity petitioned the USFWS to designate habitat. A 2009 settlement agreement gave the service until Nov. 20 to submit a final rule. 

The designation of critical habitat does not affect land ownership or establish a refuge, wilderness, reserve, or other conservation area. 

The proposed habitat designation is the first part of a two-step process. USFWS will gather information about caribou from other agencies and tribes. 

Comments and materials concerning this proposed rule can be submitted by Jan. 30, 2012, electronically at www.regulations.gov. Go to docket No. FWS-R1-ES-2011-0096 and click on the Proposed Rules on the left side of the screen.

Comments may be emailed to Public Comments Processing, Attn: FWS-R1-ES-2011-0096; Division of Policy and Directives Management; U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service; 4401 N. Fairfax Drive, MS 2042-PDM; Arlington, VA 22203. 

Birders' Top Spots |

Salmo-Priest Wilderness, Site 15 from "Palouse to Pines Loop" of the Great Washington State Birding Trail

Location: Selkirk Mountains of Pend Oreille County, in the extreme northeastern corner of Washington.

Habitat: Premier alpine destination. U.S. Forest Service land, 39,937 acres of forest and mountains.

Best season for birding: Summer. Go soon for late-summer birding and early fall colors along the Pend OreilleRiver.

Birds commonly seen: Spruce and dusky grouse, northern goshawks, white-winged and red crossbills, three-toed and black-backed woodpeckers, Clark's nutcrackers, boreal owls, pine grosbeaks; plus all four chickadees: boreal, mountain, black-capped, chestnut-backed.

Viewing tips: Salmo Divide Trail — Hike first mile on forested Trail 535. Fire lookout — Stunning vistas of Washington, Idaho and B.C.

Getting there: Backroads-suitable vehicle advised. From Highway 31 at Milepost 16.4, turn east onto Sullivan Creek Road. Drive 4.8 miles. Turn left onto Forest Service Road 2200. Drive 6 miles. Veer left, staying on Road 2220. Drive 14.2 miles. Turn right into Salmo Divide Trail parking. Fire lookout: Return 0.2 mile to primitive Forest Service Road 270; hike or drive 2.2 miles to old tower. NorthwestForestPass required.

These proposed wilderness areas are low timber value lands and have no roads or ORV trails in them, and some opponents who showed up mentioned possible U.N. conspiracies that claim setting aside a few small areas for wildlife and hikers is somehow going to end society as we know it.

Unfortunately, it’s not just a few wing nuts taking an extreme approach. Rep. McMorris Rodgers signed on to a bill in Congress that would roll back protections for more than 60 million acres of roadless forest areas across the country.

Rhetoric around the Colville and forest management that pits different user groups against each other will only ensure that everybody gets less of what they want. Polarization doesn’t create jobs, leadership does.

The meeting at Colville two weeks ago was, as one Spokane man put it, “a freak show” of conspiracy theorists who essentially commandeered the evening with insolence.

They twisted the meeting to profess tangent views such as outdated private-property-rights takeover hysteria and misinformation about the Yellowstone-to-Yukon wildlife corridor concept – which is just that:  a concept.

And by the way, what does it have to do with an informational meeting about Colville National Forest plan revisions?

The effort turned out to be a waste of time because of loud people demanding answers to questions not relevant to the meeting and in a forum where no answers could be given.

The meeting hijackers were just as obnoxious but a lot less entertaining than PETA wrapping a naked lady in fake fur to get attention.

The Forest Service staffers conducting the meetings can’t even respond to such tripe. It’s not in their jurisdiction.

The meeting bullies might as well go blow off their mouth’s at the next PTA meeting, where their issues would be similarly irrelevant.

The Colville Forest meetings are about explaining the forest plan, from grazing and timber management to wilderness proposals. Nothing more.

The problem with rude people is that they give the impression they represent a larger portion of the public than they actually do.

They do this by repulsing and repelling decent people who just want to be informed and make constructive criticism.  Many people simply walked out of the Colville meeting, I’m told.

Let’s insist the Forest Service and elected officials recognize this and pay more attention to the thoughtful comment that will be trickling in.

­WENATCHEE ­ The Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest’s proposal to add 125,800 acres to existing wilderness is one feature of the agency’s new Forest Plan that’s already drawing attention.

Conservation groups are calling for more wilderness acres, while some users ­ including mountain bikers and snowmobilers ­ say there’s already enough wilderness on the forest. Snowmobiling and mountain biking are among several activities not allowed in wilderness areas.

The plan recommends adding thousands of acres to seven of the forest’s eight wilderness areas, which currently total more than one-third of the forest ­ or 1.47 million acres. Only the Chelan-Sawtooth Wilderness has no additional wilderness acreage under the preliminary plan.

Forest Supervisor Becki Heath said a major reason they’re proposing to add wilderness is to help the Forest Service manage existing wilderness boundaries and trails.

According to the plan, about 2.5 million visitors enjoyed the Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest in 2005. Unlike most other national forests, where the majority of use is by local residents, about 60 percent of people visiting this forest live more than 50 miles away. Those visitors pumped more than $177 million into local economies.

“On a national scale, the Okanogan-Wenatchee provides for over 10 percent of the total national backpacking use due to large wildernesses with extensive trail systems combined with fine weather,” the plan states.

But Heath said the Forest Service is not recommending more wilderness because it’s needed for recreational purposes.

She said the forest is required under forest planning rules to consider whether portions of its 1.5 million acres of roadless areas are suitable and capable of becoming wilderness. More than 927,000 acres of potential wilderness are not recommended as new wilderness.

The Sierra Club is one group that wants the Forest Service to recommend more of those acres as wilderness.

“Wilderness is the best way you can protect some of these areas,” said Graham Taylor, the Sierra Club’s conservation organizer for the Western regional office in Seattle.

Taylor said his group would like more land in lower elevations included in the recommendation, so wilderness can become more accessible for older hikers and families with children.

He said the Forest Service proposal adds only 3 percent of the forest to new wilderness. “These are unique opportunities to protect the forest, and the 3 percent of additional wilderness are not sufficient to protect the forest and balance out the needs of different users,” he said.

Gary Allard, of the Butte Busters Snowmobile Club in Okanogan, said he doesn’t expect to lose any snowmobile trails with the Forest Service proposal, but “We’re going to end up snowmobiling right next to the wilderness boundary,” he said.

Allard said he thinks the proposal flies against the Wilderness Act.

“If you read the bill, there should be a buffer. You’re supposed to have a quiet area, not bring it down to a paved road,” he said.

He said even if there are no snowmobile trails impacted, new wilderness means other uses will not be permitted, such as woodcutting. “We’ve got all this wilderness area that’s already non-motorized, and all we’re going to end up with is more catastrophic fires.”

Glenn Glover, executive director of Evergreen Mountain Bike Alliance, said combined with new wilderness on the Colville National Forest, almost 250,000 acres of new wilderness are recommended. “There are significant amounts of mountain bike trail that would be within the proposed wilderness areas, and that is of real concern to us,” he said.

The mountain biking group will look at the proposal more carefully in the next few weeks to detail its concerns, he said. “It appears there were some fairly broad brush strokes used, and proper consideration isn’t being given to recreation,” Glover said.

He added that mountain bikers also like to see lands protected. “We are not opposed to all wilderness designations by the Forest Service,” he said, adding that he’d like to work with other conservation groups to help keep certain areas open to mountain bikers, and out of the wilderness.

Patrick Toombs, a member of Evergreen Mountain Bike Alliance and manager of Das Rad Haus bike shop in Leavenworth, said local mountain bikers and hikers get along quite well, and rarely want to push each other off local trails.

“We obviously love wilderness, and we want what’s here to stay,” he said. “But as far as what I know about this proposal, it’s not good. It’s going to shut out too many valuable user groups ­ people who spend money in hotels and restaurants in Wenatchee, Leavenworth and Cashmere.”

The Colville’s managers proposed adding 101,000 acres of new wilderness to the 1.1-million acre Northeast Washington forest in a recent forest plan revision.

Their preliminary recommendation would expand the existing Salmo-Priest Wilderness and create four additional wilderness areas in the Selkirk and Kettle ranges: Profanity, Hoodoo, Bald Snow and Abercrombie Hooknose.

The acreage includes popular hiking and hunting destinations, two of Eastern Washington’s tallest peaks – Abercrombie and Hooknose, each more than 7,000 feet – and habitat for grizzly bears, lynx and woodland caribou. Conservation groups say the land represents some of the wildest, most remote country left in the Lower 48 states.

“People are going to look back and thank us that we had the foresight to protect places for traditional activities and wildlife as our region continues to grow,” said Derrick Knowles, director of Conservation Northwest’s Columbia Highlands campaign.

But it’s still early in the process, cautioned Debbie Kelly, a Forest Service spokeswoman. Creating a new wilderness area requires an act of Congress, and they often take years to gain approval.

Wilderness designations are for landscapes that have kept their “primeval” character, with little impact from human activity, according to the 1964 Wilderness Act. Logging and mining are prohibited in wilderness areas, along with chain saws, motor vehicles and mountain bikes.

Grazing cattle on federal allotments is allowed.

Additional wilderness in the Colville National Forest would help provide recreation opportunities for the Spokane metro area, according to a Forest Service analysis.

Currently, only two wilderness areas exist within a three-hour drive of Spokane: the Salmo-Priest Wilderness on the Washington-Idaho border and the Juniper Dunes Wilderness in Franklin County. As the region’s population increases, demand for wilderness experiences is expected to grow.

Forest officials evaluated 21 roadless areas on the Colville for wilderness potential. About 129,500 acres didn’t make the cut.

In some areas, Forest Service officials wanted to keep the option of timber harvests to reduce fire danger near rural communities, said Margaret Hartzell, project manager for the forest plan revision. Other areas were heavily used by ATV riders and snowmobiles. Mining claims were also excluded from consideration.

Conservation Northwest and The Lands Council of Spokane had hoped to see more acres recommended for wilderness, including several thousand acres along Sherman Pass and the 13-mile Canyon area south of Republic, Wash.

Both environmental groups are part of the Northeast Washington Forestry Coalition, which also includes timber companies, outdoor recreation groups and business interests.

Forestry coalition members are backing new wilderness designations on the Colville.

But they also support stepped-up logging on other parts of the national forest and investments in new trail systems for mountain bikers and motorized recreation.

Learn more

Forest plan revision meetings:

July 16, 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., Colville Center, 985 South Elm, Colville. \

July 28, 5-7 p.m., Republic Elementary School Multipurpose Room, 30306 E. Highway 20, Republic.

July 30, 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., Okanogan County Fairgrounds, Agriplex Building, 175 Rodeo Trail Road, Okanogan.

Maps and more information: www.fs.usda.gov/goto/okawen/plan-revision.