Humans Bringing Sage Grouse Back To North Dakota

Updates

March 12, 2014: a reader sent me this link. Nothing new. The Washington Examiner is reporting:

Now comes news federal officials are nearing a decision to add more than 700 new species to the endangered list between now and 2018.

Inclusion of two of the species involved — the Sage Grouse and Prairie Chicken, both found predominantly in western states, including Texas and the Dakotas — could halt the U.S. energy boom in its tracks. 

Why? Because putting the birds on the endangered species list empowers federal bureaucrats to limit use of millions of acres of privately owned lands, thus effectively taking them out of energy exploration and development.
Whether adding them to the endangered species list is the proper course of action is disputed in part because federal officials have yet to make public all of the underlying justifications on which they are basing their actions.

Original Post

The Bismarck Tribune is reporting:

Scientists say the sage grouse has lost half of its traditional range and also has been hit hard by the West Nile virus. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in 2010 determined sage grouse deserved federal protection but that other species were of higher priority. The agency has pledged to make a final decision on listing the sage grouse by late 2015.

Far southwestern North Dakota is on the edge of the sage grouse's historic range. The bird's population in that area peaked at 542 males in 1953, and has steadily declined in the past three decades. Sage grouse hunting was halted in the state in 2008 for the first time in nearly half a century after a steep population drop officials attributed to the West Nile virus.

This year's survey found only 50 males. Wildlife officials would like to see five times that number.

With help from a report the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service issued in March, North Dakota is beefing up its sage grouse conservation plan, though it's largely technical updates to its 2005 plan. It calls for measures ranging from limits on energy development to incentives for habitat conservation, and adds the proposed bird transplant from Montana.

We've talked about this before, I believe.