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Flying Squirrel's Fate Still at Issue

Posted on: Sunday, 11 June 2006, 09:00 CDT

By Paul J. Nyden, The Charleston Gazette, W.Va.

Jun. 11--Environmental groups and outdoors advocates say that the West Virginia northern flying squirrel could face extinction if federal authorities remove it, as planned, from the government's endangered-species list.

Earlier this month, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced that it believes the squirrel no longer meets the definition of an endangered species as defined by the Endangered Species Act of 1973.

Shane Jones, a Fish and Wildlife spokesman in Elkins, said the announcement is only one step in a long process.

Last week, Jones said his agency reviewed "all relevant new information since 1985 about the squirrel and its habitat" and "determined that the squirrel no longer faces the threat of extinction."

To remove the squirrel from the list, Fish and Wildlife must first issue a "proposed rule" and then a "final rule" and solicit public comment.

A proposed rule will not be released until the fall, and the squirrel could not be removed from the list until the fall of 2007, Jones said.

"If it is removed from ESA [Endangered Species Act] protection," Jones said, "the service will continue monitoring the squirrel and its habitat for at least five more years to ensure that our decision to remove ESA protection was correct."

More than half the land where the squirrels live is owned publicly or managed to protect the squirrels, Jones said.

"Logging, the primary threat to squirrel habitat, has abated in the Monongahela National Forest, and the [U.S. Department of Agriculture's] Forest Service is practicing proactive conservation to restore the red spruce ecosystem," he said.

But Judy Rodd, director of the Friends of Blackwater environmental group, said she believes Fish and Wildlife "has not done adequate research or put the requisite measures in place" to ensure the squirrel won't go extinct.

The squirrel will face new dangers if it is removed from the list, especially from logging companies, said Rodd, whose group also advocates for environmental protections for the Blackwater Canyon.

Rodd specifically criticized the Petersburg-based timber company Allegheny Wood Products.

Jones, however, praised Allegheny owner John Crites for developing a "habitat conservation plan providing long-term protection" for the squirrel and three other endangered species: the Indiana bat, Virginia big-eared bat and Cheat Mountain salamander.

Other companies, agencies and organizations are also working to protect the area's environment, Jones said. He cited the Canaan Valley National Wildlife Refuge, Nature Conservancy, MeadWestvaco, Snowshoe Mountain Inc. and the Division of Natural Resources.

Fish and Wildlife is unlikely to remove any other species from the list in the near future, Jones said.

But it is assessing the status of three other endangered species: a plant called the northeastern bulrush, the flat-spired three-toothed snail and the clubshell mussel.

In 1985, when northern flying squirrel protections were instituted, biologists could find only 10 specimens, Fish and Wildlife stated in its June 3 press release. At the end of 2005, biologists had found more than 1,100 squirrels at 107 sites throughout much of its historic range, the agency said.

To contact staff writer Paul J. Nyden, use e-mail or call 348-5164.

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Copyright (c) 2006, The Charleston Gazette, W.Va.

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

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Source: The Charleston Gazette

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