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Color Country Local Working Group

August 2001 Meeting Minutes

August 2001 Meeting Minutes

Triple C Even Center
Panguitch, Utah
August 2nd, 2001

This was the first informational and organizational meeting of the South-central Valleys (SCV) local working group (LWG) which will be focusing on sage grouse conservation planning efforts in the Garfield and Kane County areas of Utah.

The meeting began with a dutch-oven dinner provided by the USU Extension Service, the Jack H. Berryman Institute and the Quinney Professorship for Wildlife Conflict Management at Utah State University.

After an introduction by Kevin Heaton (Garfield/Kane County Extension Agent) and a welcome by Senator Blackham, Terry Messmer (USU Extension) provided some background on previous local working groups, which have been formed to address sage grouse conservation issues. Terry also introduced and showed a Fox News segment entitled "Vanishing Freedom" which addressed the potential impacts of the Endangered Species Act (ESA) on local communities and ranchers.

Terry pointed out that this is not just a grouse meeting, it's a community based conservation meeting. There can be benefits for grouse and livestock. San Juan County had an additional 20,000 acres of CRP designated due to the candidate species listing status of sage grouse. This was 1.2 million dollars more into the local economy.

Presentations were then given by the following folks:

Sage Grouse Biology Dean Mitchell-Utah Division of Wildlife Resources
Sage Grouse and the ESA Laura Romin-U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
PARM Member(s) of the Parker Mtn. Local Working Group
Discussion/Q&A

Sage Grouse Biology

Dean provided information on sage grouse biology. There are currently 2 different species of sage grouse in Utah. The Gunnison sage grouse occurs south and East of the Colorado River. The Greater sage grouse occurs throughout the rest of the state. He provided information on the issues that have led to their declines in the past and present. He also provided information on the current research efforts that are taking place in San Juan County, Parker Mountain, and the Strawberry Valley.

Sage grouse and the ESA

Laura pointed out that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service doesn't want to list species, however, anyone can submit petitions to list, therefore they are obligated to address species declines if they are petitioned. There are valid concerns that are brought forth from environmental organizations. So far they have been petitioned for the Washington segment, and the USFWS came up with a warranted but precluded decision, which makes it a candidate species. So far the USFWS has not received a petition for greater sage grouse, but the Southwest Center for Biological Diversity has said they have one. In the meantime we have time to work and hopefully avoid it. With Utah and other states increasing their efforts we may be able to avert the listing. Dean's statewide conservation plan will also help in their decision. The USFWS understands the concerns of private landowners of increasing numbers of animals that can then get listed. Recently, they've addressed those concerns with the Safe Harbor agreement for listed species and the Candidate Conservation Agreement with Assurances for non-listed species. If a private landowner is interested in conserving species on their property they can restore habitats and the USFWS can provide them with a permit so if the species is listed in the future, they will not need to have additional regulatory mechanisms imposed on them.

PARM

Members of PARM were there to offer their experiences with the process. PARM has been working on sage grouse conservation planning efforts since 1998. A current member of PARM acknowledged that his first response to the process was skeptical, but that he is getting calls now from all over the western U.S. regarding the program and process. He felt it was important to note that we don't always have to agree on everything, but we are all working towards the same goal. He felt it was important to note that in Oregon, the cattle guys can't even water their livestock on the river due to the salmon situation. He recommended that the ranchers in this area participate so they can use good scientific data and not just make recommendations on hearsay.

Another member of PARM noted that we need to address the conservation plan at the local level so we can accommodate the ranchers and the birds, not just have the USFWS dictate what is going on. Conflict is one of the tools used by environmental organizations to move these things, Fox news came over because there was a conflict and that is what sells.

Verl Bagley, the Wayne Co. Ext. Specialist pointed out that it is also important that economic issues be addressed. These folks need several incomes to make it financially; they can't just ranch or have the other job. The community backs the conservation planning process, and that works just fine. He pointed out that these 2 guys are community leaders and have done a great deal to move the process through to the rest of the local community. They have done the job of selling it to the rest of the grazers and community.

Discussion and Q&A

Several topics were brought up for discussion during this session:

ESA

· The level of restoration of sage grouse habitats and populations needed to avoid listing.

· Timelines for the listing process, recovery plans.

· Importance of conservation planning efforts, implementation of the plans.

· Importance of Utah to a range wide sage grouse recovery effort.

Hunting

· Hunting a species that is in decline.

· The impact of hunting on breeding populations.

· Acceptable harvest numbers.

· Non-hunted populations.

· The red flag of removing hunting.

· Cooperative wildlife management units for upland game.

Predators

· Effect of predators on individual populations.

· The change in predator numbers and species since settlement.

· Predator control on transplanted birds.

· The interplay between the habitat conditions and predation.

· The need to control one species to help out another.

Transplants

· Moving birds from core areas to those areas that are low in number.

· The need to understand transplant site habitat conditions.

· The need for predator control.

Habitat

· Increased funding sources for range improvements with partnerships.

· Benefits to sage grouse can benefit livestock.

· Loss of habitat due to agricultural conversion and wildfire.

· Fragmentation of habitat due to roads, oil and gas development, construction of power lines.

· Encroachment of Pinyon-Juniper.

· High predator numbers, non-native predators.

· Lack of diversity of sagebrush age classes.

· Poor understory conditions, lack of diversity of forbs, low insect populations.

· Livestock grazing.

Populations

· Different driving forces for declines in different areas.

· Compatibility of Utah prairie dogs and sage grouse.

· Impact of weather/climate on populations.

Conservation Planning

· Incorporation of this process with other processes, i.e., watershed planning.

· Long time frame for habitat conservation plans and conservation plans.

· Lessons learned from working with the desert tortoise and Utah prairie dogs after ESA listing-Proactive is better1

· Involvement of environmental organizations.

· Legislative involvement.

· Effects of environmental organizations and court cases on planning efforts.

· Need for local rancher and landowner involvement.

Kevin Heaton thanked everyone who helped out with the meeting and all those who came to express their concerns and offered up their ideas.

The meeting was over at 9:10 pm.

There is a mailing list for those who would like to be involved in the conservation planning process. The South-central Valleys LWG will be meeting again in September. If you need further information on this LWG, please contact Joel Flory at (801) 557-0180 or ceurUTatnetscape.net