Groups challenge ‘colossally reckless’ plan to kill west coast barred owls

PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) – A group of animal advocacy organizations are calling on the federal government to stop a proposal that aims to save spotted owl populations by killing invasive barred owls in the west coast.

A coalition of 75 animal advocacy organizations, led by Animal Wellness Action and Center for a Humane Economy, sent a letter to United States Secretary of the Interior Deborah Haaland on March 25, urging her to stop the plan proposed by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service “to shoot more than 500,000 barred owls over the next 30 years across millions of public and private lands in California, Oregon, and Washington,” according to the organizations.

The draft plan, published in November of 2023, includes shooting barred owls in the three states over the course of several years and aims to protect spotted owls in several regions — including Oregon’s coast range, western and eastern cascades, and the Oregon Klamath province.

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The USFWS’ Draft Barred Owl Management Strategy states, “Lethal removal of barred owls from identified management areas is the only population reduction method that is proven to work in reducing barred owl populations, thereby improving spotted owl population response.”

During lethal removal, officials will attract the birds with recorded calls then shoot the barred owls that approach them, according to the draft strategy, which is designed to be a “humane kill” that reduces the chances of officials accidentally killing birds other than the barred owls.

The draft plan states barred owl management is most effective when continued for an extensive period of time for at least five years.

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The organizations that are critical of the plan acknowledged barred owls compete with spotted owls but said the USFWS plan will lead to “dangerous and far-reaching collateral effects.”

“This plan will cause severe disruptions to wildlife from the forest floor to its canopies, producing an untold number of mistaken identity kills of other native owl species (including spotted owls), disrupting nesting behavior for animals, poisoning wildlife from dispersed and fragmented lead, and causing rapid dispersal and social chaos among many other species inhabiting these forest ecosystems,” the organizations wrote.

The letter continued, “The plan to kill barred owls is a colossally reckless action, almost unprecedented in the history of American wildlife management. It should be sidelined with all deliberate speed, and non-lethal management actions to protect spotted owls and their habitats should be made the priority actions of the USFWS.”

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“The USFWS has had some limited success with wildlife-control or wildlife-eradication plans on islands or contained ecosystems, but the logistics of this situation bear no resemblance to that set-up,” noted Wayne Pacelle, president of Animal Wellness Action. “This control plan will have to be conducted over millions of acres of public and private lands, and it targets a low-density, nocturnal, migratory species living far off the forest floor. I am astonished that no adult in the room at the Fish and Wildlife Service put the brakes on this plan solely on the impossibility of its success.”

The Department of the Interior and the Oregon Fish & Wildlife Office declined to comment on the letter.

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The Oregon Fish and Wildlife Office noted, the agency has a responsibility to manage the owl populations, adding the spotted owl population could be wiped out if they don’t take action.

“Barred owl removal is not something the Service takes lightly; however, the Service has a legal and ethical responsibility to do all it can to recover northern spotted owl populations. Unless invasive barred owls are managed, the federally listed northern spotted owl will be extirpated in all or a significant portion of its range,” a spokesperson for the Oregon Fish & Wildlife Service told KOIN 6 News.

The USFWS draft plan described the “western invasion of barred owls,” explaining the birds began expanding to the west in the early 1900s and were previously separated from spotted owls in the Great Plains and harsh conditions in the Northern Boreal Forest. Officials said theories point to changes in conditions, such as tree and forest expansion in these areas for the westward expansion.

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However, Animal Wellness Action’s Pacelle argued, “We cannot start wiping out native species for range expansion that is likely a derivative of human actions. The whole plan is self-defeating given that it would inevitably produce incidental shootings of more than a dozen other owl species that inhabit the Pacific Northwest, including spotted owls.  The Service should give us even one example in its decades of work where a plan of this type has succeeded.”

USFWS said they considered lethal and non-lethal options for barred owl management, noting, “the Service considered a variety of nonlethal methods, none of which were able to meet the purpose and need of the draft strategy, which is to rapidly reduce barred owl populations to improve the survival and recovery of northern spotted owls and to prevent declines in California spotted owls from barred owl competition.”

Officials said capturing and transporting barred owls to another location is not an option because of their invasive nature.

According to USFWS, implementation of the Barred Owl Management Strategy is not mandatory, but the agency believes widespread implementation is necessary and will work with tribes, federal, state, and private partners to implement the plan.

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