Road-Building a Direct Cause of Dwindling Bear Population
12/17/99
*******************************
RELAYED TEXT STARTS HERE:
Title: Bears Hate Roads; Timber Sales in Roadless Areas Continue
Source: Green Earth Journal
Status: Copyright 1999, contact source for permission to reprint
Date: December 17, 1999
When black bear populations decline, the usual explanation is "loss
of habitat." When it seems likely that the bears will be listed as a
threatened species, wildlife managers are urged to stop bear hunting.
Recent studies demonstrate that "loss of habitat" often means nothing
more than bulldozing a road or firebreak in a previously roadless
area. Bears avoid roads. A single new road divides a habitat in two.
Wildlife biologist Dr. Michael Peyton has been studying bears in the
southern Appalachians for more than thirty years. Bait stations in
selected locations have provided population data that correlates with
road density. Interestingly, he found that while all bears avoid
roads and clear cuts, females are less likely than males to come near
a road. Thus even unmaintained, untraveled logging roads divide
forests into tracts some of which have low breeding potential.
Studies of bear behavior in Rocky Mountain forests confirm Peyton's
observations.
Such data is enlisting hunters in support of President Clinton's
proposed ban on new roads in presently roadless National Forest
areas. In North Carolina they have joined forces with environmental
organizations campaigning for the 25,000-acre Southern Nantahala
Wilderness in western North Carolina and northern Georgia.
Most of the 380,000 miles of National Forest roads were built for
logging access. When logging ends, roads are virtually abandoned. The
Forest Service says it would cost $8.4 billions to repair or
reconstruct these roads. It would seem good sense, economically and
environmentally, to naturalize useless roads, reuniting fragmented
habitats for bears and other wildlife.
Timber Sales in Roadless Areas Continue
The Forest Service timber sale program in Idaho still concentrates on
roadless areas. The Idaho Conservation League found 47 new projects
initiated since the road-building ban was announced 20 months ago.
The League identified 95 prospective logging projects in roadless
areas currently as compared with 107 such projects two years ago.
Although such sales have been canceled or deferred in some National
Forests, elsewhere it's business as usual.
President Clinton's ban on road-building in National Forest roadless
areas is still only a proposal. The Forest Service has yet to
translate it into rules and regulations. Early drafts have many
loopholes and opportunities for delay. Meanwhile new roads are
opening more roadless areas for logging.