Lawsuits seek to stop barred owl culling, including in Marin

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has drawn two federal lawsuits from animal welfare groups alleging that a plan to cull invasive barred owls in national parklands — including three in Marin — violates federal law.

The “barred owl management strategy” approved in August calls for hunting and killing nearly half a million barred owls over 30 years across Washington, Oregon and California. The plan is designed to reduce social competition with the threatened Northern and California spotted owls, which are more docile raptors than their bigger, bullying cousins, and they are native to the Pacific Northwest.

The three federal parks in Marin where the culling practice would be authorized include the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, Muir Woods National Monument and the Point Reyes National Seashore.

“FWS’s disastrous plan proposes to manage natural competition with a shotgun rather than address the root cause for declining populations of wildlife, namely habitat destruction and climate change,” said Jennifer Best, director of the Friends of Animals wildlife law program. The Connecticut-based organization filed a federal lawsuit in Oregon in November.

“It’s downright cruel and unethical,” Best said. “It demonstrates a blatant disregard for the lives of individual owls, and it is particularly dangerous as it sets a precedent for labeling all species who migrate and adapt to a changing environment as invasive.”

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has been ordered to file a response to the complaint by Jan. 27, Best said.

Separately, two East Coast organizations, Animal Wellness Action and the Center for a Humane Economy, filed a federal lawsuit in the state of Washington.

In that case, U.S. District Judge Tana Lin said Monday that initial disclosures are due Feb. 3, and a combined joint status report and discovery plan are due March 4.

“Barred owls have been protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act for more than 100 years, and this Fish and Wildlife Service labeling them as invasive is plainly wrong,” said Wayne Pacelle, president of Animal Wellness Action and the Center for a Humane Economy.

Pacelle said barred owls are “expanding their range to adapt to an ever-changing environment. All species live where they do after range expansion. Range expansion is a never-ending ecological process.”

Even if the targeted birds are killed, he said, what’s to stop barred owls from other parts of the country from migrating back into the “treated” areas?

“The idea that in-migration is going to undo the shooting is what makes this so wasteful and so pointless,” Pacelle said.

Both lawsuits argue that the wildlife agency is using the barred owl as a scapegoat for its mismanagement of spotted owl habitat. The suits say the destruction of old growth forests, including through human activities such as logging and development, as well as effects of climate change, are the true reasons for degradation of the spotted owl habitat.

Plaintiffs say barred owls are native to North America and the plan is a violation of the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. They also allege that the wildlife agency has violated the National Environmental Policy Act by not fully vetting alternative management options.

Plaintiffs in both suits say its worrisome that the hunting would be allowed to happen at night, which puts the threatened spotted owl at greater risk of being accidentally misidentified as its look-a-like barred owl cousin and killed.

Another concern is that the culling would be allowed in federally designated wilderness areas, which are supposed to be managed by the service in a limited way so the habitats remain unaffected by humans.

Pacelle said the Washington suit has amassed a coalition of more than 250 animal welfare and conservation groups supporting the cause.

The Marin Audubon Society is not one of them.

“We’re an organization that works to support our natural habitats,” said Barbara Salzman, president of the Marin Audubon Society. “Therefore we want to protect the Northern spotted owl. They are part of our natural ecosystem. Barred owls are not.”

Salzman said the Marin Audubon Society supports the federal culling plan.

“Although we rather have it be some other way, we didn’t see there was another way, and neither did they,” Salzman said.

In response, Pacelle said, “We do accept the idea that there is social competition, we just don’t accept the idea that the plan has any remote prospect of succeeding.”

Pacelle also faulted the wildlife agency for not including cost estimates in its plan.

He said that his organization estimated it could cost about $1.34 billion. The estimate was based on a recent $4.5 million grant from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation to the Hoopa Valley Tribe in Humboldt County to kill up to 1,500 barred owls. Taking that amount, Pacelle said it is estimated to cost about $3,000 per owl.

It’s a figure that prompted a bipartisan group of Oregon lawmakers to call on the incoming Trump administration to stop the kill plan. On Monday, the lawmakers sent a letter to Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, the heads of Trump’s government efficiency initiative, calling the plan “impractical.”

“The FWS is taking a radical action to kill some owls protected by the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, with no reasonable chance of success and with an eye-popping price tag,” the letter says. “We urge you to save American taxpayers more than a billion dollars by nixing this ill-considered scheme.”

Pacelle said his group has also asked superintendents of federal parks, including those in Marin, to opt out of the plan.

The Fish and Wildlife Service declined to comment citing the pending litigation. The National Park Service, which is not a named defendant in either case, also declined to comment.

In an August statement announcing that the plan would begin as early as spring, the wildlife agency said barred owls are native to eastern North America and moved westward in the 20th century.

Barred owls displace spotted owls, and in some instances have killed or interbred with spotted owls. Their population in California, Oregon and Washington now surpasses that of the native spotted owls, the service said.

“Because the spotted owl is already struggling due to its reduced habitat, the effect of the barred owl’s presence is an added stressor,” the statement said. “An already vulnerable population has a much more difficult time withstanding dramatic changes in the ecosystem such as the encroachment of a competitor.”