Gifford Pinchot Task Force 2009 Spring Newsletter

Supporting Northwest biological diversity & communities 917 SW Oak Street, Suite 410 Portland, OR 97205 www.gptaskforce.org ph: 503-221-2102 fax: 503-221-2146

News from the Woods Printed on 100% recycled paper with soy-based ink

Spring 2009 Non Profit Organization U.S. Postage PAID Permit No. 4677 Portland, OR

3,000 Acre Expansion of Spencer Ridge Roadless Area Funded By Emily Platt Gifford Pinchot Task Force Mission

The Gifford Pinchot Task Force supports the biological diversity and communities of the Northwest through conservation and restoration of forests, rivers, fish, and wildlife.

The Task Force is happy to report the recent receipt of a grant from Ecotrust’s Whole Watershed Restoration Initiative that will support the removal of 7.9 miles of road from the edges of the Spencer Ridge Roadless Area just east of Mount St. Helens. The project is designed to restore natural flow patterns and improve habitat for winter steelhead, spring Chinook, coho, and resident rainbow and cutthroat trout by removing failing roads in the Lewis River basin. The project will also expand the Spencer Ridge Roadless Area by 3,000 acres which will benefit deer, elk and other native wildlife populations, specifically improving gray wolf habitat by removing Forest Road 2575 and elk calving habitat by removing Forest Road 9325. Removing these roads will restore the natural river flow path of 10 perennial streams and reduce road density within the Clear Creek subwatershed by 24%. The project will also restore connectivity in a critical area of the GPNF’s 1.3 million acres. Clear Creek drains a portion of the high ridges and peaks of the GPNF’s legendary 55,000 acre Dark Divide roadless area. The project area is important for the recovery of anadromous and resident fish and will additionally benefit native wildlife that prefer roadless areas like wolves and wolverine. The Task Force supports the removal of priority roads in the GPNF to restore fish and wildlife habitat while adequately maintaining other roads that are important for the public in order to access fishing, hunting, camping, trails and other sites on national forestlands.

Unroading our Public Lands By Lisa Moscinski The Gifford Pinchot has previously reported on the serious threat roads crisscrossing our public lands pose for ecosystems and the opportunity that exists by removing unneeded roads to provide local quality jobs for contractors The Clackamas Stewardship Partners discuss the importance and adapt our lands to the of removing unneeded roads to improve aquatic habitat in the pressing needs of climate Clackamas River Basin on a recent field tour organized by the Task Force. change. The Mt. Hood National Forest has taken on this challenge and opportunity by working to assess the needs and leverage funding for action. The Mt. Hood National Forest has 3,464 miles of road on over 1 million acres. Roads pose a variety of problems to our ecosystems, and one is the creation and transportation of sediment that dirties our drinking water and degrades fisheries. The Mt. Hood National Forest is working to remove unneeded roads to improve hydrologic function and reduce adverse impacts to aquatic habitats as well as reduce road maintenance costs. The Task Force is helping coordinate the Clackamas Stewardship Partners input into the road restoration process by developing an efficient collaborative process that takes into account a diversity of interests. Over the coming years we plan to take on more of the unneeded road system by looking at additional watersheds. The end result is to have a road system that meets the needs of the ecosystem as well as the Forest Service budget and user access needs. We are excited the Mt. Hood National Forest has taken on the challenge of the road system and we look forward to continuing to partner with them. In addition, we hope to replicate this process throughout the region and in particular, the Gifford Pinchot National Forest, which has over 4,000 miles of roads on the 1.37 million acres and a $50-$60+ million road maintenance backlog that grows each year.

Critical Habitat for Threatened Bull Trout at Risk By Jessica Walz

Advising the Mount St. Helens Advisory Committee By Jessica Walz

A recent story in the Oregonian stated that former assistant secretary of Fish, Wildlife, and Parks, Julie MacDonald, manipulated decisions involving a dozen species including the bull trout. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Pine Creek in the GPNF is critical habitat to threatened bull made an initial recommendation trout and increased development in the area could further imperil the fish. to include large areas of the Lower Lewis Watershed including Pine Creek in the Bull Trout Critical Habitat Plan (CHP), but MacDonald influenced the decision to exclude these areas. Several field biologist and managers indicated that MacDonald’s level of interference in the bull trout Critical Habitat Designation (CHD) was improper, stating that the final rule “defied logic.” This story prompted the Gifford Pinchot Task Force to again advocate for the inclusion of Pine Creek in the bull trout CHD.

As a result of the continued obstacles facing Mount St. Helens a congressional advisory committee was established in January of 2008 by U.S. Representatives Baird and Dicks, and U.S. Senators Cantwell and Murray. The advisory committee was tasked with exploring “the community’s vision for the Monument’s future” and to eventually make recommendations to Congress regarding the best course of action for ensuring the future of Mount St. Helens.

The bull trout population in Swift Reservoir is known to spawn in several tributaries to the Swift including Pine Creek. In fact, the numbers on Pine Creek from the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife show that in 2000 41 fish were present reaching a high in 2004 of 293 fish. In 2006, a large tract of development began in the area adjacent to Pine Creek and contributed to sediment impacts which occurred during the 1996 flooding episode. Increasing development and higher than normal flood occurrences are relentlessly impacting bull trout habitat. The decision to exclude Pine Creek from the bull Trout CHD is not founded on the best available science. According to the Forest Service and WDFW surveys, bull trout are found in Pine Creek and use it regularly for spawning and migratory behavior. All scientific records from the original recommendations indicate that Pine Creek is critical habitat for the bull trout as defined by the ESA and should be included in the final rule. Without adequate protection, habitat for the bull trout in Pine Creek will be severally impacted and the resulting loss of bull trout will significantly reduce the overall population.

On March 2, 2009, The Mount Helens Advisory Committee released draft recommendations. The Task Force Conservation Director made two presentations to the committee in 2008 regarding recreation and conservation and a few of our members attended almost every committee meeting. We are pleased that the draft recommendations include a recommendation to maintain the restricted areas for recovery and integrity of the features, dedicating the Monument scientist to science, expanding science funding, encourage partnerships with voluntary organizations, and maintaining habitat protection. Unfortunately, the recommendations also encourage the expansion of roads near the monument, increased development in and around the monument, and fails to ask for national park status. We need to encourage the committee to acknowledge that Mount St. Helens deserves the respect, funding, and effort that are given to other national icons.

What You Can Do The committee will be holding two public hearings—we encourage our members to attend and to submit public comments to the committee on the draft recommendations for Mount St. Helens. The first hearing was on March 30th in Kelso, but the second hearing will be held on Monday, April 13th in the Camas Police Department Community Room, 2100 NE 3rd St. Camas, WA from 6- 9 p.m. You can also e-mail written comments before May 7, 2009 to [email protected]. For more info or to let us know that you took action please contact Jessica at [email protected] or 503-221-2102 x101.

Responding to Climate Change

By Lisa Moscinski Human society is faced with an unprecedented challenge to respond to climate change. Dominick DellaSala, chief scientist for the Ashland-based National Center for Conservation Science and Policy, recently testified before a congressional subcommittee saying that “Climate change is not just an environmental problem, it is a growing moral dilemma of national and economic security requiring a sea change in management and conservation of water, forests and the very air we breathe.” There is broad scientific consensus that climate change is occurring and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which was established to provide decision-makers and others interested in climate change with an objective source of information about climate change, have determined that the “warming of the climate system is unequivocal, as is now evident from observations of increases in global average air and ocean temperatures, widespread melting of snow and ice and rising global average sea level” (IPCC 2007).

The Task Force’s Restoration Plan for the Gifford Pinchot National Forest is serving as our foundation to identify adaptation opportunities although we soon hope to have more specific local climate data to overlay our existing plan. For example, we used our restoration plan to identify and raise funds for 7.9 miles of road removal that will expand the Spencer Butte Roadless Area by 3,000 acres, restore natural flow patterns and improve habitat for salmon and steelhead, and native wildlife populations including gray wolves and elk. Restored habitat connectivity will facilitate the ability of species to move between areas or to new habitats. Many actions need to be taken in the coming years. The “federal agencies need to build resistance and resilience to climate change by protecting old forests, roadless areas and flood plains,” DellaSala commented, “these systems hold the life-giving natural resources we will increasingly need to adapt to the climate change impacts.” No one is exactly sure of what all the impacts of climate change will be so it is imperative that we build resilience into our ecosystems and manage for biodiversity so we can be better prepared for whatever changes may come.

We have an opportunity to respond to climate change and halt some of the costs to present and future generations. The Gifford Pinchot Task Force is combating climate change on federal lands by developing and implementing strategies to help ecosystems and communities adapt to changes that are well underway. The impacts of climate change vary regionally. One example in this region is that warming in the mountains is expected to cause decreased snowpack and more winter flooding, both of which we’ve begun to see already (IPCC 2007). The Task Force has considered the latest research and is therefore working to: 1) Reduce existing stressors like habitat fragmentation and harmful management practices; 2) Manage for ecological function and protection of biological diversity because healthy, biologically diverse ecosystems may be better able to withstand some impacts of climate change; 3) Establish habitat buffer zones and wildlife corridors as species and habitats change; 4) Gather data on the range of potential local impacts of climate change

The Task Force’s work over the last several years working with the Forest Service to make restoration and conservation of our ecological systems their top priority is exactly the type of work recommended by the scientific community. Please support our work to implement adaptation strategies to combat climate change.

Amphibians are one species expected to decline with climate change because of their lack of mobility, unique habitat, and susceptibility to temperature and habitat change.

If you are interested in learning more about any of these projects please contact Lisa Moscinski at [email protected].

Skamania County Victory! By Jessica Walz Skamania County was seeking to amend the text and maps of its zoning code. The amendments were intended to apply to all lands within unincorporated Skamania County that are not designated as Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area. The new zoning sought to allow large scale wind energy facilities and bio-energy facilities to be allowed with limited to no public involvement in the planning process and with limited environmental review. The State Environmental Protection Act (SEPA) document undertaken by the County to change their zoning did not analyze the impacts of this zoning change and inclusion of large scale wind and biomass facilities would have on the environment and listed threatened and endangered species within the county limits. The Gifford Pinchot Task Force joined a suit with Friends of the Columbia Gorge and Columbia Riverkeeper to overturn the County in favor of a comprehensive Environment Impact Statement (EIS) for the change in zoning code in Skamania County. We argued that: • An EIS must be prepared for non-project actions that may lead to significant adverse impacts; • The County failed to consider cumulative impacts; • The County failed to consult with other agencies; • The County failed to consider impacts to special and sensitive areas, wildlife, rare plants, native plant communities, and water resources. The hearing examiner issued a ruling on Feb 19, 2008 in our favor. The examiner stated that the County had not demonstrated that it had considered environmental factors to the extent required by SEPA. More significantly, the examiner stated that “the County did not consider County-specific environmental studies prior to developing the zoning text and map amendments and did not consider the types of development that might result from the amendments.” The examiner decision requires the County to prepare an EIS for both the zoning text and the map amendments.

Help Report Invasive Weeds on the GPNF The Forest Service and the Gifford Pinchot Task Force could use your help in monitoring invasive species on the Gifford Pinchot National Forest (GPNF). Invasive weeds are a problem on all our public lands. They can out-compete local plants and wildlife, and they even displace or replace native species. It is important to catch invasive species infiltration early before they have a chance to spread. Tracking invasive Herb Robert is one of many invasive plants on the GPNF that we need help monitoring. weeds on the 1.4 million acre GPNF is a challenge and every extra set of eyes looking for invasive weeds makes a difference. To learn more about how to identify invasive plants, please visit our website (www.gptaskforce.org) where you can download the Invasive Plants of the Gifford Pinchot National Forest booklet.

What You Can Do Here’s how you can help: if you are recreating in the GPNF and you notice a suspicious plant that you know or suspect to be an invasive species, you can take some simple steps to report your sighting. Take a picture if you can, take a sample if possible, download and fill out the Report a Weed form from the volunteer section of our website (www.gptaskforce.org), and send your picture, sample, and form to Emily Platt at: [email protected] Or Emily Platt Gifford Pinchot Task Force 917 SW Oak St. Ste. 407 Portland, OR 97205

Tough Times Call for Your Generous Support As many of you are aware, the economic pressures that are being felt across the country greatly impact the resources and capacity of non-profit groups like the Task Force to continue working towards their missions. This is a pivotal time for donors to give as generously as possible to help mitigate the impacts of reduced income from foundations and others who aren’t able to give as they did in the past. Your support will enable the Task Force to work in the exciting new political climate to continue to win important campaigns like the one to stop the proposed 3,000 acre Mt. St. Helens copper mine while also building a strong foundation for restored Northwest forest and river ecosystems, model public lands management, and revitalized rural communities. Thank you for continuing to partner with us in these challenging yet promising times!

Help the Gifford Pinchot Task Force Restore the Central Cascades! The best way to support the Task Force’s work is to become a Forest Guardian by donating $15 or more per month. The ongoing support of our monthly donors is truly the lifeblood of our organization. We appreciate any gift you can afford - we just ask that you give as generously as possible. Please mail in the inserted envelop with your credit or debit card info, or a check made out the Gifford Pinchot Task Force. If you are interested in volunteering with the Task Force, please let us know by indicating it on the volunteer portion of the remit envelop. You can also donate online by visiting www.gptaskforce.org or by calling our Membership Coordinator at 503-221-2102 x103. Thank you for your support!

Check out the Gifford Pinchot Task Task Force Board of Directors Force on Facebook! Just visit: David Jennings, Chair www.facebook.com and either log in Kim Erion, Vice Chair Cliff Ligons, Treasurer or start an account to sign up as a member of our group on Facebook. Carole Richmond, Secretary Heather Erickson, Director Task Force Staff Emily Platt, Executive Director Julia DeGraw, Membership Coordinator Derek Meinhard, Public Relations Director Lisa Moscinski, Deputy Director Jessica Walz, Conservation Director And we are very grateful to these generous members: Jan P. Vleck, Kevin and Michelle Miller, Ralph Staver & Amy O'Neill, Jeffrey Judkins, Rona Klueh, Jaymi and Francis Sladen, Thomas Huff, Doug Twitchell, John Kafrouni, Philip Dickinson, Tosten Larson, David Gowan, Mark Cheek, Sandy Farewell, Lillian Bier and Eric Bloch, Tom Wilburn, Michaela Jaquish, Stephanie Naas, Meaghan M. Doherty, Judy Leishman, Juanita Garnow, Judy Hayward, and Nicholas Reed. A special thanks to those who attended our Carnivore Tracker Training: Brain Denheyer, Kelli Denheyer, Patrick Shannon, Sally Schoolmaster, Jill Webster, Cheryl Devine, and Jim DeStaebler

Membership Outreach Team Ali Clarys, Sara Kasper, Scott Skiles, Paul Seif, Josh Gates, Kolin Leishman, and Shoshana Simonson