Contents
Correction: In an article on the non-native goat situation by Tim McNulty in our last newsletter, the following statement appeared: "To further sacrifice this area's ecological integrity in order to supply goats for trophy hunters on national forest lands is unthinkable, but that is the position of a vocal constituency of sport-hunters and animal rights activists.
The Fund for Animals, one of the animal rights organizations involved m the controversy, takes issue with this statement. According to Sidney Maddock, associate counsel for wildlife for The Fund for Animals, the Fund is against sport hunting and trophy hunting of any kind Mr. McNulty stands corrected.
Ancient Forests: Option 9 Revisited
by Tim McNulty
Although President Clinton's Forest Plan was promoted as a "balanced compromise" between timber interests and environmentalists, a close look reveals loopholes large enough, in the words of one analyst, "to drive tens of thousands of log trucks through."
Option 9, as the plan is known, will not protect the remaining old growth of Olympic National Forest -- or any of the twelve owl forests in the Pacific Northwest region.
The President's plan reduces timber sales from this region by only a third of the volume scheduled in national forest plans, leaving nearly 40% of the region's remaining old growth in the timber base Of the five points Olympic Park Associates insisted be incorporated into the President's plan, only two -- uphold existing laws and maintain citizen access to courts, and provide assistance to timber communities -- were met. No permanent preserves where cutting is prohibited were established the plan was not scientifically based but rather geared toward meeting a timber target of 1.2 billion board feet per year; and the plan will not protect the full range of old growth-related species including wild fish.
Option 9 does provide protection to sensitive riparian areas along streams and rivers, but for the most part these reserves are too narrow to offer much functional interior old growth habitat. Less than one third of the riparian reserves consist of old growth forest, and road building in roadless watersheds would still be allowed. Of the "late successional" old growth reserves in the plan, all are open to thinning and salvage sales. Sales may also be included, following watershed assessments, in riparian reserves as well.
A number of "adaptive management zones", including 145,000 acres in Olympic, were set up to allow timber dependent communities to have more control over how national forest lands are managed. This notion is reminiscent of Olympic National Forest's disastrous Shelton Cooperative Sustained Yield Unit agreement, and the community of Forks' previous support for removing State Department of Natural Resources' Hoh Clearwater lands from sustained yield management, allowing west end old growth to be liquidated in twenty years. In that light, OPA is doubtful that such zones can lead to much good for old growth forests. Conservationists on the Olympic Peninsula were particularly distressed to see that a ban on log exports from private lands was not part of Clinton's solution. Given the failures of the Clinton plan to ensure permanent, long-term protection for the remaining old growth ecosystem, OPA views the President's forest plan as a significant defeat for environmentalists.
Though the public comment period closed October 28, negotiations continue and old growth legislation is pending in Congress.
Your representatives need to hear from you on this issue!
New Timber Coalition To Join Forest Debate
by Eric Pryne
[Excerpted from Seattle Times, 11/18/93.]
A new three-state group, Citizens to Protect the Pacific Northwest and Northern California Economy, has formed to work for a "fairer, more comprehensive" solution to the long-running dispute.
Among those on the list of 60 founding members ... are Boeing chairman Frank Shrontz, Seattle University President Father William Sullivan, and state Labor Council President Rick Bender.
The timber industry instigated formation of the new group and is bankrolling its $1-million to $1.5-million budget.
The Clinton administration [proposal, according to James Bethel, co-chair of the new group and dean emeritus of the University of Washington's College of Forest Resources, is] "....biased on the side of reducing the area of land allocated to the production of timber products."
Other Washingtonians on the list of founding members include:
* Paul Schell, Seattle port commissioner and former mayoral candidate.
* Charles Piggott, PACCAR chairman.
* Thomas O'Leary, Burlington Resources chairman.
* John Clute, Gonzaga University law school dean
* Three newspaper executives: Seattle Times president Mason Sizemore, (Spokane) Spokesman-Review publisher William Stacey Cowles, and Longview Daily News publisher Ted Natt.
Face the Facts: Olympic Goats Must Go
by David Peterson and Andrea Woodward
[Excerpted from Seattle Times article.]
Let's look at some of the facts regarding mountain goats in Olympic National Park.
The Olympic Peninsula is virtually an island, surrounded on three sides by saltwater and on the fourth by the Chehalis River. This unique, isolated environment has resulted in unusual flora and fauna characterized by an abundance of rare plants and the absence of many mountain-dwelling animal species found in the Cascades.
Thousands of native animals and plants have inhabited the Olympic Mountains continuously since the last glacial ice sheet receded 12,000 years ago. Despite unsubstantiated anecdotal claims to the contrary, the mountain goat (as well as bighorn sheep and pikas, among others) is not one of them. This newcomer to the Olympic ecosystem was introduced in the 1920s. Mountain goats flourished in their new environment, and populations increased to over 1,100 by 1983.
Mountain goats, like their domestic cousins, do not have a discriminating diet. They happily consume most types of plants they encounter, including rare species such as the Olympic milkvetch. Grazing by goats is a recent influence that alters relationships among species that have developed over thousands of years, and may cause the loss of individual species. In addition to grazing, mountain goats harm vegetation by trampling and by destabilizing rocky slopes inhabited by many alpine plants. Like some other large mammals, goats erode soil by creating wallows -- they displace an average of over a ton of soil from each wallow in the Olympics.
Loss of alpine vegetation through grazing, trampling and erosion can reduce food and habitat for a variety of less charismatic native mammals such as mice, moles, mountain beavers and marmots. Alpine areas have short growing seasons, a harsh climate, low plant productivity and shallow soils, so vegetation recovery requires decades.
"Even small numbers of goats have a measurable and detrimental effect on many plant species."
Resource managers at Olympic National Park became interested in the impacts of mountain goats on the fragile alpine ecosystem in the 1960s and began a research program in 1977 to monitor impacts. Evidence of long-term damage to vegetation and soils led to an experimental management program of goat removal (1981-1987) and an operational management program (1988-1989), developed with input from the public.
Thousands of dollars and thousands of hours of human labor were expended in transporting goats via helicopter to other locations. But after two years, the program was stopped when it was determined that park personnel were literally risking their lives to capture the animals. In addition, live capture is very stressful for goats, and many of them died during capture and transport.
Fifteen years of research into goat management alternatives and effects of goats on vegetation by park scientists and other experts concludes that:
* Goats are not native to the Olympic Peninsula
* Even small numbers of goats have a measurable and detrimental effect on many plant species.
* Chemical contraception is not an effective long-term means of eliminating goat populations.
* Live capture is not an option due to safety considerations and goat mortality.
* Shooting is the most economical, if emotionally charged, means of removing goats.
After two decades of grappling with the problem of how to manage goats and protect park resources, Olympic National Park management has made a decision to make a decision. It would have been much easier to accept the status quo. Yes, the park is considering eliminating the goats. No, it is not the only potential solution. Public input will be solicited before a decision is made....
At the present time, there are only a few hundred mountain goats in the park. By eliminating or depleting their populations now, we could protect thousands of other plants and animals native to the unique Olympic ecosystem.
Should we manage national parks simply as collections of species, and take no action when these natural areas are threatened? Or should we manage park landscapes as intricate, interconnected ecosystems, whose integrity must be protected as a legacy for future generations?
David Peterson and Andrea Woodward are research biologists with the National Biological Survey, located at the University of Washington.
Goat EIS Delayed ... Again
The EIS on non-native goats, expected in January, has been delayed again. Release is now anticipated for the spring of 1994.
To obtain a copy, write: Interagency Goat Management Team, c/o Olympic National Park, 600 E. Park Ave., Port Angeles, WA 98362 -- 206-452-4501.
The North Shore of Lake Quinault: A Tribute to Polly Dyer
by Phil Zalesky
When I read Carsten Lien's Olympic Battleground, I found one story not told that needed to be told. Behind each conservation victory, more often than not, you will find one leader who persevered and carried the day for our cause. Here is one such story.
When Franklin Roosevelt toured the future Olympic National Park in 1936, he looked across Lake Quinault at the North Shore and indicated that the area must be included in the proposed park. And so it was; but in the process numerous private property inholdings were encircled within the park's boundaries, creating a preeminent management headache for the National Park Service and a challenge to park integrity.
In the period after the creation of Olympic National Park in 1938, the National Park Service failed to adopt adequate management procedures for the citizens of the North Shore of the Quinault valley. The original intent was to buy out the inholders on a willing seller basis and to restore the area, but the National Park Service year after year proved short on funds. So, following an initial period of euphoria, most of the inholders soured on their condition. Growing more and more contentious, the inholders continually used what political clout they tad to endeavor to remove themselves from the park by a change of boundaries.
Numerous attempts at this deletion have been made. In 1953 Governor Arthur Langlie's Olympic National Park Review Committee was appointed with the expectation that it would recommend the elimination of all of the west side forested valleys from the park. But public testimony overwhelmingly favored protecting the forests, and the Committee majority was thwarted. The Committee's minority report (drafted by Seattle Audubon Society's Emily Haig and the Mountaineers' Polly Dyer) advocated retention of all the forested valleys, including Lake Quinault's North Shore
In the mid- 1960's, Senate Interior Committee Chairman Henry Jackson, wishing to accomplish this deletion, appointed a three man Quinault Study Committee. Committee members were Gordon Marksworth, Dean of the University of Washington's College of Forest Resources; John Osseward, then President of Olympic Park Associates; and Irving Brant, who in the 1940's had studied the area for President Franklin Roosevelt.
Jackson miscalculated when he selected the members of the committee: Osseward and Brant were ardent park supporters, and their opposition scuttled Senator Jackson's attempt to delete the Quinault valley from the park. The Osseward Report suggested strong Park management policies to enable the Quinault to remain a part of the park. Because the report did not call for the Quinault deletion, Senator Jackson insisted that it remain buried.
The next chapter in the attempts to delete the North Shore of the Quinault opened in 1974. If it had not been for OPA's current president, Polly Dyer, we would have lost many acres of the park adjoining Lake Quinault and up river.
This chapter really begins in the waning months of the Evans administration. Olympic Park Associates had been working on a proposal for the addition to the park of Shi Shi Beach - Point of the Arches - Lake Ozette shore. The proposal had fallen through the cracks with Senator Jackson, and Governor Evans, an old Camp Parsons boy scout who had deep feelings for Olympic National Park, agreed to meet with John Osseward, Polly Dyer, and Pat Goldsworthy to discuss it.
OPA had mapped two possible boundaries for the addition, one of which went deeper back of the beach to the hydrographic divide, while the other was closer to the beach. Governor Evans's office began working on the proposal with OPA representatives from the Northwest Conservation Office, and the timber industry, eventually compromising on, the narrower coastal addition to the park.
With the timber companies agreeing, Governor Evans initiated the bill to be presented to Congress by Representative Don Bonker, assuring Bonker that there was no controversy since the timber land owners in the area agreed to the park addition.
However, at the last minute before passage, the Quinault inholders convinced someone in our Washington congressional delegation that there should be a trade-off: in exchange for the Shi Shi beach - Point of the Arches - Lake Ozette shore addition, we would have to give up the inholding area of the North Shore Quinault, to the tune of 2,000 acres.
A reduction of 2,000 acres in the Quinault valley was not acceptable to Olympic Park Associates: among other reasons, the reduction would impact key winter habitat for the Olympic elk, and possibly also anadromous fish spawning. Continued human habitation of the area would clearly be harmful, for even the use by the present inholders was having an impact.
Alas, President Franklin Roosevelt's concept of what was to be a great asset to the park was now under threat. Hope of saving it while also including the Shi Shi - Point of Arches - Lake Ozette addition seemed doomed.
Polly Dyer and I made arrangements to see Congressman Lloyd Meeds in his office in Everett to try to stop this trade-off We presented our case. Meeds was not easily convinced. Finally, after much discussion, Meeds agreed to arrange for a compromise to be part of the bill: the Quinault would go out of the park unless, within 90 legislative days, one house of Congress acted to stay its execution. The 90 days would start after Congress had received the recommendations of a study which was to be made by an impartial contractor.
This crack in the door was meant to appease us, but no more than that. Many of us, including the board members: of Olympic Park Associates, had a hopeless feeling that we had lost either the addition or the chance to prevent the deletion. Nobody anticipated the tenacity of Polly Dyer's resolve.
Hopes sank even further when the Regional Director of the National Park Service suggested that the required study be carried out by the U. of W. College of Forest Resources. Knowing their long record of opposition to Olympic National Park, Olympic Park Associates found this suggestion unacceptable.
Fortunately, Polly Dyer spotted an opening through which she was able to voice our vehement objections to the study team as originally proposed. In response, Regional Director Russell Dickinson and Glenn Gallison, Associate Regional Director (former Chief Naturalist of Olympic National Park) made a highly innovative decision: not only would they seek bids from private contractors for the Quinault Valley Impact Study, but they would allow the disputants to observe the selection of the contractor.
Gallison then established a broadly. representative advisory committee to the contractor, which included Polly Dyer representing Olympic Park Associates. As a member of this committee, Dyer drove to the Quinault and Montesano for numerous evening meetings, accompanied by board member Donna Osseward. They derived many of their strategies along the way. Dyer fought for any advantage available.
The study was completed in 1978 without making a recommendation. Based on the study, Regional Director Dickenson reversed his predecessor's deletion recommendation and found that the Quinault area was indeed of national park caliber.
However, Secretary of Interior Andrus then submitted the report to Congress without including a recommendation.
The 90-day legislative clock began to tick. Remember, now, that unless one house of Congress moved to save the 2,000 acres, the Quinault lands would automatically be deleted from the park.
Dyer lobbied feverishly to have the study report pulled back; but once it had been sent to Capitol Hill, there was no stopping it. Then, on day 57 of the 90 legislative days, Congress adjourned. Dyer worried that when Congress reconvened, with only 33 days remaining for action, the Quinault would be lost. But by a parliamentary maneuver, possibly encouraged by Dyer's lobbying and by her urging national conservation groups to lobby likewise, it was concluded that the study report would have to be resubmitted to the new Congress. This started a new 90-day clock, and bought valuable time for the conservationists.
Meanwhile, Russell Dickenson had now become Director of the National Park Service, and was ordered by Interior Secretary James Watt to prepare the Quinault report with a recommendation for deletion. Dyer made a couple of trips to the other Washington, pursuing efforts to sidetrack the resubmission of the report.
On the Senate side, Dyer sent a detailed letter to Senator Jackson, pointing out the merits of an undeveloped North Shore. In 1978 the 'significant' forests identified on the inholdings totalled 33%, these being large standing trees seventy or more years old; 40% was in woodlot, 6% clearcut.... The study contractor, Management and Planning Services, made the prediction based on five year intervals, culminating in 2000 A.D., there would be 0% significant forest, 20% clearcut, 48% woodlot."
In the end, aggressive lobbying by Dyer and other conservationists paid off. The bill was not pushed by either Jackson or Bonker, whose "uncontroversial" bill had become anything but! Nor did either of them request that Secretary Watt send the Quinault Valley Impact Study up to Congress possibly because Dickenson was able to persuade the Administration that it would lose. In addition, in an unrelated case, the U.S. Supreme Court declared that action by one house of Congress was unconstitutional
Thus, through a combination of some Houdini like magic, great leadership, and a bit of luck, the 2,000 acres in the Quinault escaped the axe.
Olympic Park Associates' mission statement says, "To preserve the integrity and wilderness of Olympic National Park." In preventing the Quinault deletion, OPA through its president has served its mission well.
Unstinting dedication is a sign of a great leader: Polly Dyer has proved worthy of that label.
The Incredible Candystick
by Ed Tisch
If I had to select a truly unusual Olympic wildflower, I'd be inclined to choose the candystick. For those who have never seen this oddity, let me forewarn- you: at first glance the candystick may appear to be some thing other than a true plant. One might guess it to be a tall, slender fungus, perhaps a faded asparagus gone wild; or some manmade gimmick set out to confuse people. For one thing, even at its prime the candystick is not green, but a pearly white, with distinct red stripes running lengthwise. The overall effect does approximate a Christmas candy cane.
The candystick is a true flowering plant, a member of the heath family. It belongs to a special subfamily (Monotropoideae) whose members have lost their chlorophyll and with it the capacity to photosynthesize. Unable to feed themselves, they depend instead on unique associations called mycorrhizae (literally "fungus roots"), which involve symbiotic bacteria living in close relationship with the shortened roots of the candysticks. These mutually beneficial arrangements result in the nourishment of the fungi as well as the candystick plants.
The ultimate food source appears to be decaying organic matter found in the forest soil immediately adjacent to the mycorrhizae. Candysticks are traditionally referred to as saprophytes (plants that live on decaying material). This term may go out of style as the true nature of the nutritional relationship is revealed.
In the Olympics, the candystick has several relatives, including the much taller pinedrop and the shorter but equally unusual Indian pipe, pinesap, and gnome plant. These come in assorted colors ranging from brown to pink, and vary somewhat in shape: however all have simple stems and very reduced leaves.
Folks wishing to find a candystick might concentrate their searchings in the northeastern Olympics, where rainfall is reduced and forest habitats tend to be drier. Candysticks often occur where Douglas fir is the climax tree and associated understory plants such as salal and Oregon grape are no taller than 10 inches. The presence of kinnikinnick, another member of the heath family, might indicate that candysticks are nearby. Be sure to search out the slopes of Blue Mountain, particularly along Deer Park road, and the Deer Ridge trail which approaches Deer Park from the Slab Camp area of Olympic National Forest.
Candysticks are about 12 inches tall and rather asparagus-like. The leaves are reduced to mere scales, each of which cradles one flower. Like their relatives, the plants blossom from the bottom up and therefore taper to a point. Late in the season they dry to a dull brown color and lose their unique appeal. I sometimes encounter them in midwinter, standing like stiff dark remnants of their former selves, barely visible amid the colorful foliage of their evergreen partners.
Mining Threat to Shi-Shi
by Norm Winn
Many years ago Olympic National Park acquired surface rights to 182 acres of Shi-Shi Beach from A. W. Hammond. The property includes almost a mile of beach stretching north and south of Petroleum Creek:, the prime portion of Shi-Shi Beach, and one of the most pristine and scenic sections of Olympic National Park's wilderness coast.
At the time of the park's purchase, Mr. Hammond and his heirs retained the mineral rights. Hammond's heirs have the right to remove minerals from the land at any time, to construct roads and buildings, and to sink shafts as necessary for the business of mining.
The Hammond estate is represented by Craig Gagnon and Kenneth Koenen, Peninsula entrepreneurs who have been active in mining activities in the past. They have met with the Park Service and presented an operating plan and a draft environmental impact statement for exploration and assessment of the tract. Olympic National Park has disallowed any exploratory activity pending verification of title, review of the operation plan, and a decision on the DEIS. Under federal law any DEIS would have to be circulated for public comment before a decision is made.
OPA will monitor this situation closely.
Book Review
Olympic: Ecosystems of the Peninsula
by Michael Smithson and Pat O'Hara. American and Worldwide Geographic Publishing, Helena, Montana. 1993. 104 p., $14.95.
Reviewed by Phil Zalesky
Any book that offers an opportunity to view the photography of Pat O'Hara is worth the money. This small coffee table book is one of those. O'Hara is a master of composition, lighting and mood. His photographs and the story give recognition that Olympic National Park and its environs are an important world resource and have been so named by UNESCO as a World Biosphere Reserve and World Heritage Site.
The title of the book promises more than it delivers. Michael Smithson, a ranger naturalist at Olympic National Park, lists three ecosystems: the oceans, the forests, and the high country. But what is described and cataloged here is a natural history litany of all the phenomenal resources in this biologically rich Olympic Peninsula. The book does not focus, as the title seems to imply, on the interwoven web of life and its inverted pyramid of dependencies. In reality the Olympic Peninsula, a virtual island, is but one great ecosystem where the high mountains depend on the ocean and the forests, and the ocean depends on the high mountains. Within this ecosystem, all forms of life are inextricably linked. Pull the string at one end of that web and you will find it attached to everything else.
The linkages in the ecosystem story remain for other books to provide. But in truth the ecosystem emphasis of today is still relatively new, and the science has not yet been provided to demonstrate this focus. The scientist that comes closest to showing this interwoven web is Arthur Krukeberg in his recent book, The Natural History of Puget Sound.
Buy the book. Seventy-eight photographs by O'Hara grace these pages. Treasure O'Hara's micro photographic view of, "A leaf from a big-leaf maple locked in ice." Treasure as well his macro view of the lake in the Mt. Skokomish Wilderness, and the study entitled, "The high winds of winter at Hurricane Ridge create sinuous snow patterns."
Draft Report Supports Removal of Elwha Dams
by Rick Rutz
A draft Report of the Secretary of the Interior to the U.S. Congress has determined that removal of both of the dams on the Elwha River is feasible and necessary to the full restoration of the ecosystem and fisheries of the Elwha River. The Secretary finds that there is an extraordinarily compelling case for removing the dams, and that we have an enormous opportunity for ecosystem restoration.
The cost of dam removal is a major consideration, and the Report finds that "the costs to fully restore the Elwha River ecosystem and native anadromous fisheries are generally on par with restoration activities elsewhere in the region."
This favorable report by Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt is another important step forward in the long campaign to restore the ecosystem and fisheries of the Elwha River basin and the Olympic National Park, but the fight is not over. Secretary Babbitt and your Congressional representatives and senators need to hear that you support the restoration of the Elwha River, and that it is a high priority to include funds to accomplish this in the next budget.
Write to:
The Honorable Bruce Babbitt
U.S. Department of the Interior
Washington D.C. 20140
The Honorable Slade Gorton
and separate letter to
The Honorable Patty Murray
U.S. Senate
Washington, D.C. 20510
The Honorable [your representative]
U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, D.C. 20515