News

Returning Fishers to Olympic's Forests

(Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife photo)

A plan has just been released to return fishers to Olympic National Park. In September, after years of study and analysis, the National Park Service and Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife released an environmental assessment to reintroduce up to 100 fishers into the forested valleys of Olympic.

The fisher, a small, reclusive hunter of the old-growth forest, was extirpated from the Olympics in the early decades of the last century. Small populations persist only in a few isolated areas on the West Coast. Fishers have been listed as endangered in Washington state and are a candidate species for federal listing.

Reintroducing fishers to Olympic National Park will restore a critical native predator to a spectacular forest ecosystem. And it will be a major step in returning fishers to Washington state.

To voice your support for restoring fishers to Olympic, go to http://parkplanning.nps.gov:80/document.cfm?parkId=329&projectId=10586&documentID=20405, and click on "Comment on document." Or write: Superintendent, Olympic National Park, 600 East Park Avenue, Port Angeles, WA 98362

Deadline for your comments is October 10, 2007.

For more information on returning fishers to Olympic, go to: http://www.nps.gov/olym/parknews/upload/FisherQ&A%20EA.pdf