Finding middle ground
By Jessianne Castle EBS ENVIRONMENTAL & OUTDOORS EDITOR
BOZEMAN – For conservation champion Shane
Mahoney, wild animals define us. “They made us human because we had no other
way of knowing how to feel as a species except in comparison to them,” Mahoney
said at a recent forum in Bozeman. During his talk, Mahoney provided a stark
observation:
“If all 7 billion of our species
disappears tomorrow, there will be no gathering of the others to lament our
passing,” Mahoney said. “But as we lose them, and in particular, if we lose
some of those that have inspired us for so long, we begin to enter a world of
growing darkness and growing silence … At some point, we will have to admit
that we will have lost something essential to our humanness that we can never
manufacture or replace.”
A native of Newfoundland, Mahoney has more
than 30 years of experience working as a wildlife scientist, manager and
advisor, and currently serves as the international liaison for The Wildlife
Society, among other positions. He commanded an audience of nearly 170 on March
2 in the Ellen Theatre, speaking about history’s lessons for conservation.
“Wildlife does not exist by
accident anywhere, anymore, and never will again,” he said. “Think about your
responsibility here; think about mine. All species, everywhere now, their fate
is dependent upon the decisions we will make, the decisions we will not make,
and the positions and decisions we will defer.”
Speaking about the “great
bear”—the grizzly bear—but only saying the name a sparse handful of times, Mahoney
challenged the room to remain passionate in their beliefs, but to find a place
within themselves to come to an agreement.
“We need to put what
matters at the center,” he said. “The [wildlife] matter[s] the most. Our philosophy
should be simple: What matters to them, what works for them, should work for us
and what does not work for them, what is not in their best interest, should not
work for us. And what that means is that sometimes we have to accept things we
don’t like.”
Mahoney’s words came as the keynote
address during the event hosted by the Western Bear Foundation and “Right to
Roam” podcast, and aimed at presenting the science of past, present and future
bear management.
Titled “Can We Bear the Bias?”, the
evening was presented as a forum with Right to Roam’s Chris Sheets asking questions
to expert panel members from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S.
Geological Survey and Interagency Grizzly Bear Study Team, as well as Montana,
Idaho and Wyoming departments of fish and wildlife.
“For me, it’s rewarding to work with a
species that so many people care about,” Frank van Manen, of the U.S.
Geological Survey and IGBST, told EBS in an interview prior to the event. He
said he’s proud to provide the data to “help people develop their views in how
they think these bears should be managed.”
The panelist discussion, however, was
borne out of fears that popular opinion in recent years neglects to account for
the very science van Manen and other wildlife scientists have dedicated their
lives to.
“Our critics say we’re biased. My
argument is we’re not,” van Manen told the March 2 crowd. “We produce the
science, we produce the data, we produce the biologic evidence for that data.”
According to panelists, grizzly bear
research is extensive throughout Montana, Idaho and Wyoming, consisting of
daily monitoring with radio collars, population modeling and investigation of
every known mortality. Within the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem specifically,
this scientific program is conducted by IGBST, which is made up of individuals
from USGS, National Park Service, U.S. Forest Service, the Eastern Shoshone and
Northern Arapaho Tribal Fish and Game Department, and the state wildlife
agencies of Montana, Idaho and Wyoming, among other entities.
Of specific concern for Wyoming Game and
Fish Department’s large carnivore section supervisor Dan Thompson was the
September ruling by District Court Judge Dana Christensen to put the distinct
population segment of Yellowstone back on the endangered species list due, in
part, to a concern for genetic diversity within the isolated Yellowstone
population.
“Our biggest slam dunk was how good the
genetics are in the GYE and we all felt that way based on science,” Thompson
said. “I’m speaking for myself, but that was a major frustration that that was
seen as a reason to relist the population.”
In order to provide context to Thompson’s
statement, van Manen quickly jumped in. In 2016, he said, their research team
took a close look at genetic diversity in the Yellowstone region over the past
25 years. While the population’s genetic diversity is slightly less than other
grizzly populations in North America, van Manen said genetic diversity hadn’t
really declined over time.
“I think one really important thing to
keep in mind is that bears are telling us that they’ve been biologically recovered,”
van Manen said. “When you see population growth in the core slowing down,
that’s because of higher densities; they’re reaching that carrying capacity.”
Following the event, Joe Kondelis,
president of the Western Bear Foundation, and Sheets of Right to Roam, told EBS
they were glad to provide a platform to seriously discuss the science behind
North American grizzlies.
“We come from different sides, but we all
want the same thing: a restored grizzly population,” Kondelis said. “I think
people are just unsure of how to talk to each other.”
He added that while the Western Bear
Foundation does support hunting as a potential tool for the state agencies to
better manage grizzlies, hunting is just a small part of it. “That’s not what
conservation is about,” he said. “[It’s] ensuring a future for bears out here
in the West.”
