No. 343, October 30, 2003

ALASKA PROGRAM
   

BERING SEA BIODIVERSITY ASSESSMENT INITIATED

   
PRINCE WILLIAM SOUND ORCAS TO BE PROTECTED
   
LONG-TERM TIMBER CONTRACTS CHALLENGED
   
THREE ALASKA TIMBER SALES CHALLENGED

 

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BERING SEA BIODIVERSITY ASSESSMENT INITIATED

The Center for Biological Diversity has begun a year-long study of state of biodiversity in the Bering Sea. The two million square kilometer sea between western Alaska and eastern Siberia supports a phenomenal array of wildlife including the largest multinational cluster of seabirds in the world. Forty three percent of all U.S. breeding seabirds can be found there. It is also home to bowhead whales, sperm whales, humpback whales, grey whales, orcas, Steller sea lions, walruses, Spectacled eiders, auklets, salmon, sea otters and king crab.

Learn More About the Center's Alaska Program
Learn More About the Center's Science Program


PRINCE WILLIAM SOUND ORCAS TO BE PROTECTED

On 10-27-03, in response to a petition filed by the Center for Biological Diversity and seven other conservation groups, the National Marine Fisheries Service proposed to designate Alaska’s “AT1 population” of orcas as “depleted” under the Marine Mammal Protection Act. Though significantly less protective than the Endangered Species Act, the depleted listing will help North America’s most imperiled orca population to recover from a dramatic population crash.

The AT1 orca population ranges from Alaska’s Prince William Sound to the Kenai Fjords. It has declined from at least 22 animals to just nine over the past 13 years. Whether there is a single or multiple causes is uncertain, but the population was heavily exposed to crude oil during the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill. The Sound’s orcas rank among the most contaminated marine mammals ever measured. They are also subjected to underwater vessel noise disrupting their hunting patterns, and have suffered steep declines in their primary prey: harbor seals.

The Center will work to insure that the Fisheries Service finalizes the depleted listing quickly and that a conservation plan be designed and implemented immediately thereafter.

Learn More About the Center's Alaska Program
Learn More About the Center's Killer Whale Campaign


LONG-TERM TIMBER CONTRACTS CHALLENGED

The Center for Biological Diversity and five other conservation groups, filed suit to reverse a U.S. Forest Service decision to issue 10-year timber contracts in Alaska’s Tongass National Forest. The contracts allow timber companies to speculate by buying timber at dirt-cheap prices now and holding onto it in hopes that markets will improve over the next ten years. Long-term contracts like these dominated forest management on the Tongass for almost 50 years, but ended in the mid 1990's with the closure of the Sitka and Ketchikan pulp mills. The contracts resulted in a huge maze of logging roads and clearcuts across the once pristine Tongass and the loss of hundreds of millions of U.S. taxpayer dollars. The revival of long-term contracts is another example of the Bush Administration catering to timber interests to the detriment of wildlife, recreation and other forest values.

Joining the Center in the suit are Greenpeace, the Sitka Conservation Society, the Sierra Club, the Southeast Alaska Conservation Council and the Natural Resource Defense Council. Earthjustice is representing the plaintiffs.

Learn More About the Center's Alaska Program
Learn More About the Center's Ancient Forest Program


THREE ALASKA TIMBER SALES CHALLENGED

To increase the logging levels, the Bush Administration has been releasing a flood of new timber sales on Alaska’s Tongass National Forest. The Center for Biological Diversity has appealed three of them to protect wolves, goshawks, grizzly bears, deer, and old growth forests, subsistence cultures and recreation opportunities. The Cholmondeley Timber Sale is located in one of the last major intact forest areas on the heavily logged Central Prince of Wales Island. The Finger Mountain Timber Sale, located on Chichagof Island, will build 20 miles of new road, reconstruct 14 miles of road, construct two log-transfer facilities and clear-cut pristine old-growth. The Madan Timber Sale will punch almost 19 miles of new logging road into two pristine watersheds and build two log-transfer facilities. The Madan area has an extensive network of karst formations, including limestone caves that may pre-date the surrounding glaciers.

Learn More About the Center's Alaska Program
Learn More About the Center's Ancient Forest Program


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