the view from Seattle
Posted: Wed Feb 27, 2008 1:46 pm
from the Seattle Post Intelligencer
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/3 ... ion27.html
Protect, don't shoot, Northwest cougars
By JON NAIMON
GUEST COLUMNIST
Washington voters, recognizing the importance of cougars to Northwest ecosystems, have twice banned the use of dogs for recreational hunting.
Regardless, in 2004, the Washington Legislature approved a controversial three-year pilot project in five counties to kill cougars with the aid of dogs. House Bill 2438 now proposes to extend this "pilot" project for three more years and allow other counties to opt in.
Pilot projects are trials or experiments for testing an idea prior to investing in a full-blown operation. This pilot project has not delivered any improvements in public safety and runs counter to a significant body of scientific evidence.
The Department of Wildlife, ignoring the science, claimed that the pilot project's shooting of cougars -- whether or not they had ever been involved in a conflict -- would somehow make people safer.
However, even the department's published results from the pilot project conclude they were "not able to establish a cause-and-effect relationship between cougar population reductions and reduced human-cougar conflict." Perhaps the department was aware that the public does not support recreational hunting and felt a need to disguise the nature of the hunt along the lines of "scientific" whaling.
This issue takes on urgency because HB2438 is poised for consideration in the Senate. The Legislature should reject this thinly disguised sport hunting measure and ensure any new effort to encourage random killing of cougars is defeated.
In fact, there is a growing concern that this bill's idea of "recreationally" (randomly) killing cougars with hounds may actually increase conflicts between mountain lions and human interests. Indeed, states with the heaviest random removal of lions have had the highest incidence of attacks.
In 2005, a group of the most senior cougar researchers in the world created a wildlife management strategy document designed to capture what is known about cougars. The Cougar Management Guidelines, pointed out that the random shooting of mountain lions by recreational hunters -- either by boot or hound hunt -- did not accomplish the goal of reducing conflicts between cougars and humans.
A recent study out of Washington State University revealed cougar populations in the Northwest are decreasing even as sightings are increasing. The reasons for this relate to the building of second homes in prime cougar habitat as well as to the lack of education on ways to safely manage potential conflicts.
Mountain lions are an integral part of the Northwest ecology, and efforts to extirpate lions in the interest of public safety have a checkered past that is testament to the creativity of recreational hunters more than a deep concern for public welfare.
Perhaps the most insidious aspect of the proposed pilot project is that it can cause people to believe that randomly shooting cougars -- whether or not they have caused a conflict -- will in some way reduce the number of conflicts between humans and cougars. Not only could the bill encourage a false sense of security, it will also drain state resources that should be spent on conflict resolution methods that actually work.
State resources should instead be used to establish baseline cougar population metrics necessary to perform their keystone role in the Northwest's ecosystems we know and love. Wildlife habitat and linkages should be mapped and then protected.
Jon Naimon is the founder and president of Light Green Advisors, an environmental investment firm in Seattle. He is treasurer of the Mountain Lion Foundation. Information on the Living with Lions program, including the Cougar Management Guidelines, is available at mountainlion.org
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/3 ... ion27.html
Protect, don't shoot, Northwest cougars
By JON NAIMON
GUEST COLUMNIST
Washington voters, recognizing the importance of cougars to Northwest ecosystems, have twice banned the use of dogs for recreational hunting.
Regardless, in 2004, the Washington Legislature approved a controversial three-year pilot project in five counties to kill cougars with the aid of dogs. House Bill 2438 now proposes to extend this "pilot" project for three more years and allow other counties to opt in.
Pilot projects are trials or experiments for testing an idea prior to investing in a full-blown operation. This pilot project has not delivered any improvements in public safety and runs counter to a significant body of scientific evidence.
The Department of Wildlife, ignoring the science, claimed that the pilot project's shooting of cougars -- whether or not they had ever been involved in a conflict -- would somehow make people safer.
However, even the department's published results from the pilot project conclude they were "not able to establish a cause-and-effect relationship between cougar population reductions and reduced human-cougar conflict." Perhaps the department was aware that the public does not support recreational hunting and felt a need to disguise the nature of the hunt along the lines of "scientific" whaling.
This issue takes on urgency because HB2438 is poised for consideration in the Senate. The Legislature should reject this thinly disguised sport hunting measure and ensure any new effort to encourage random killing of cougars is defeated.
In fact, there is a growing concern that this bill's idea of "recreationally" (randomly) killing cougars with hounds may actually increase conflicts between mountain lions and human interests. Indeed, states with the heaviest random removal of lions have had the highest incidence of attacks.
In 2005, a group of the most senior cougar researchers in the world created a wildlife management strategy document designed to capture what is known about cougars. The Cougar Management Guidelines, pointed out that the random shooting of mountain lions by recreational hunters -- either by boot or hound hunt -- did not accomplish the goal of reducing conflicts between cougars and humans.
A recent study out of Washington State University revealed cougar populations in the Northwest are decreasing even as sightings are increasing. The reasons for this relate to the building of second homes in prime cougar habitat as well as to the lack of education on ways to safely manage potential conflicts.
Mountain lions are an integral part of the Northwest ecology, and efforts to extirpate lions in the interest of public safety have a checkered past that is testament to the creativity of recreational hunters more than a deep concern for public welfare.
Perhaps the most insidious aspect of the proposed pilot project is that it can cause people to believe that randomly shooting cougars -- whether or not they have caused a conflict -- will in some way reduce the number of conflicts between humans and cougars. Not only could the bill encourage a false sense of security, it will also drain state resources that should be spent on conflict resolution methods that actually work.
State resources should instead be used to establish baseline cougar population metrics necessary to perform their keystone role in the Northwest's ecosystems we know and love. Wildlife habitat and linkages should be mapped and then protected.
Jon Naimon is the founder and president of Light Green Advisors, an environmental investment firm in Seattle. He is treasurer of the Mountain Lion Foundation. Information on the Living with Lions program, including the Cougar Management Guidelines, is available at mountainlion.org