WILDLANDS CONNECTION

SPRING2016

RED WOLVES will once again go extinct in the wild unless we urgently address threats to this keystone species. After being removed from the wild in the mid-1970s, red wolves were reintroduced to eastern North Carolina by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (FWS) in 1987. The first 20 years of the recovery program went well, with the population growing to about 130 animals by 2006.

But over the last decade, a few anti-wolf agitators in North Carolina have mounted a formidable campaign of misinformation and fear-mongering against the red wolf and the Federal Government. As a result of growing intolerance and hatred for wild canids (wolves and coyotes alike), only 45–60 wolves are now thought to remain in the forests and fields of North Carolina.

Rather than standing up for what used to be one of their proudest recovery efforts, the FWS has dropped its tail between its legs and appears to be on the verge of terminating the program. Agency director Dan Ashe (no friend to wolves anywhere in the U.S.) apparently thinks the red wolf is a doomed

species that is too expensive and controversial to save. His southeast regional director, Cindy Dohner, likewise places the demands of the North

Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission above national interest in saving the red wolf.

Time is running out, but Wildlands Network is working furiously to save the red wolf recovery program. Our DC-based policy coordinator, Susan Holmes, is leading an effort to generate firm Congressional support for saving the red wolf. Meanwhile, our conservation scientist, Dr. Ron Sutherland, has initiated a camera-trapping project in the recovery zone, designed to quickly dispel landowner concerns that red wolves have caused some sort of wildlife disaster.

We’re posting photos from the camera project online at www.flickr.com/photos/redwolfreality/albums; with your help, we can ensure that local residents have a chance to see these images before it’s too late. Please tell your friends about our photos, and visit wildlandsnetwork.org to take action for red wolves.

Last Chance for Red Wolves

APEX CAMPAIGN

RED WOLVES

2 WILDLANDS CONNECTION SPRING 2016

THERE IS AN OLD ADAGE that says when you dig yourself into a hole, you should put down the shovel.

Today, we find ourselves in the midst of an extinction crisis driven by habitat destruction and climate change. Yet those who want to convert our public lands for private economic gain are hell-bent on firing up the bulldozers—and destroying our best hope for saving wild nature and ourselves.

Last winter’s armed occupation of Malheur National Wildlife Refuge raised pointed questions about the management of our public lands. In the eyes of the occupiers and their political supporters, our public lands are being wasted if they are not grazed, logged, mined, drilled, or otherwise exploited.

Too many people view the natural world with a selective myopia, forgetting that our future is inevitably tied to the ecological health of the landscapes we inhabit. Maybe it should come as no surprise, then, that when a gang of thugs “occupied” a “deserted” wildlife refuge in eastern Oregon, the mass media and many other Americans reflexively overlooked the fact that the refuge was neither unoccupied nor deserted.

For millennia, the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge has been occupied by wild nature—a rich biotic community that brings the landscape to life. The same holds true for all of our public lands, which comprise the greatest extent of intact habitat in the U.S.—and enjoy at least some measure of protection for the animals and plants relying on them.

In his new book, Half Earth: Our Planet’s Fight for Life, E. O. Wilson cautions that we must set aside half of the Earth’s surface from human development and exploitation to stave off the mass extinction of species—including our own. This is old news to the Wildlands Network community; our co-founder Reed Noss came to the same conclusion in a paper he published in Wild Earth almost a quarter-century ago. But Dr. Wilson brings this message to a fine point when he writes in his prologue: “For the first time in history a conviction has developed among those who can actually think more than a decade ahead that we are playing a global endgame.”

It is time to stop digging and reassess. Even our laws are sorely out of date, reflecting 19th-century vestiges of Manifest Destiny by treating the natural world like a limitless source of raw materials to be put to economic use. We need policymakers whose foremost priority is to protect wild nature.

In the months to come, we will work to create a National Conservation Strategy for the incoming administration in Washington. Grounded in science and the “wildeor” concept of self-willed land and wildlife that has infused Wildlands Network from the beginning, this strategy will frame public lands conservation in politically pragmatic terms—as a matter of long-term national and global security.

We are at a critical crossroads, where me must overcome our short-sighted self-interest to preserve creation as a whole. Put down the shovel and grab an oar (or a paddle). We are all in this together.

GREG COSTELLO NOTES FROM THE DIRECTOR

Celebrating Old and NewTHIS SUMMER, Wildlands Network will celebrate its 25th year as the leading organization working to achieve continental conservation in North America. Despite ongoing threats to the wildness we cherish and rely on for our own wellbeing, there is ample cause for celebration. Our promotion of rewilding as a partial remedy to the mass extinction crisis increasingly pervades the conservation movement, with our emphasis on protecting and connecting wild places and restoring native carnivores serving as a bold vision for the future. In recent years, we’ve successfully taken this vision to the ground, as illustrated by our growing accomplishments in the Eastern and Western Wildways and in wildlands policy.

But we believe we can do even better at telling our story by refreshing our brand and updating our tools for communicating with supporters. As we approach our silver anniversary—we

are a happy marriage of science and activism, after all—we are rejuvenating our look by tapping deeper into our organizational roots. Over the past few months, we have enlisted the services of our long-time friend and graphic artist, Kevin Cross (former art director of Wild Earth), to help us modify our visual style. Those of you who have known us since the beginning will recognize nods to the past in our redesigned logo, which will be introduced this spring.

We’ll soon unveil other achievements as well. Our new website will launch this autumn, highlighting our “apex campaigns” and other activities across the continent. We’ll be increasing our electronic communications in the future, allowing us to reach out more frequently and to save trees and money at the same time. And you’ll be seeing new films, books, and articles reflecting our work, too.

Most important, we will continue to engage our collective passion for rewilding North America—so that we have even greater cause for celebration 25 years from now!

WILDLANDS CONNECTION SPRING 2016 3

APEX CAMPAIGN GREATER GRAND CANYON HERITAGE NATIONAL MONUMENT

WHEN KIM CRUMBO and John Davis rendezvoused on the North Rim of Grand Canyon during TrekWest, they were unprepared for the heartbreaking evidence of recent logging they would encounter on the Kaibab Plateau: stumps of ancient ponderosa pines whose diameter extended beyond the edges of their hiking map, unfolded. They had crossed an indiscernible line—one printed boldly on their map—where wildlands of the watershed surrounding Grand Canyon left the protective embrace of the National Park.

Grand Canyon’s watershed is a biodiversity hotspot, where biologists are still discovering previously unknown species of insects and microorganisms. Here, travel routes of radio-collared mountain lions, mule deer, and the celebrated wolf, Echo, indicate still-functioning wildlife corridors between the Southwest deserts and the Rocky Mountains.

The proposed Greater Grand Canyon Heritage National Monument, ranging in elevation from 3,000 to 9,000 feet, contains the most intact, unprotected old-growth forest in the American Southwest. The region provides crucial habitat for numerous rare species, such as the Kaibab squirrel, Apache trout, northern goshawk, and California condor. With the Southwest facing an increasing probability of drought, preserving intact watersheds is critical for wildlife and humans.

Encircling the Park is the dire threat of uranium mining, which has already contaminated ground and surface water and destroyed wildlife habitat. In response, Arizona Congressman Raul Grijalva introduced the Grand Canyon Watershed Protection Act of 2011 “to protect Grand Canyon’s immediate watershed outside Grand Canyon National Park from additional uranium mining claims and subsequent mining impacts.” The legislation failed to pass, but in 2012, then-Secretary of Interior Salazar withdrew 1.1 million acres surrounding the Park from prospective mining for 20 years. So far, conservationists have been able to turn back lawsuits and congressional efforts to undo the withdrawal.

Late last year, Wildlands Network, Grand Canyon Wildlands Council, and a coalition of groups joined Grijalva and 11 tribal nations to announce the Greater Grand Canyon Heritage National Monument Act. With the act having little chance of passing in the current congress, Grijalva highlighted his intention to provide the President with a template for National Monument designation in the National Park Service’s centennial year. We must urge President Obama’s designation of this critical National Monument, supported by 80% of Arizonans polled. Please write a letter today by visiting tinyurl.com/WNTakeAction1.

Protecting the Grand Canyon Wildlife Corridor

Gunsight Point, Kanab Creek Wilderness—within the proposed Greater Grand Canyon Heritage National Monument. There are currently three active uranium mines in this area. Kanab Creek is the Grand Canyon’s largest tributary.

4 WILDLANDS CONNECTION SPRING 2016

THE WILDLANDS NETWORK COMMUNITY has recently lost several great friends. We mourn their departures, but we also celebrate their brave lives. We call special attention to wildlands champions Doug Tompkins and Ed George, who both passed in their early 70s—though we were counting on their wisdom for decades more.

In early December, Doug Tompkins succumbed to the stormy waters of a remote Patagonian lake. To the wildlands community, Doug was a leader, funder, and friend. With his equally dedicated wife, Kris McDivitt Tompkins, and other family members and friends, Doug saved more than 2.2 million acres of wildlife habitat in Chile and Argentina—much of which is to be protected as national park or other public land—and supported hundreds of grassroots conservation groups in North and South America. Doug was a co-founder of Wildlands Network 25 years ago, summoning the meeting that led to our founding.

In early March, we lost our trekking and filmmaker friend, Ed George, who died suddenly near his home in Flagstaff, Arizona. Like Doug, Ed explored much of and spoke for the wild

Friends Remembered

Kristine and Douglas Tompkins in Chilean Patagonia

Ed George with friends Cindy Tolle and John Davis atop Grand Teton

Wildlands Network biologist Maggie Ernest at one of three wildlife crossing structures along US64 in North Carolina. The structures were built to facilitate

wildlife movement on the Albemarle Peninsula, in particular for red wolves, black bears, and deer. Maggie and Wildlands Network’s Dr. Ron Sutherland are working with North Carolina transportation officials to identify critical wildlife crossings on major roads across the state.

SIGHTINGS WILDLANDS NETWORK ACROSS THE LANDSCAPE

Earth. Ed’s recent projects included a documentary about Ed Abbey (Wrenched), a short film to promote the Greater Grand Canyon Heritage National Monument (North Rim Notes), and a film about TrekWest due out in June of this year (Born to Rewild).

We miss you, Doug and Ed, but we will carry on your good work. May your spirits soar through the wild places you are still helping to keep forever wild.

The Markagunt Plateau rises to the east above Cedar City, Utah, and serves as an important byway for cougars and other wide-ranging wildlife. Wildlands Network organizer Kelsey Johnson leads efforts to protect more of Utah’s West Desert as Wilderness.

WILDLANDS CONNECTION SPRING 2016 5

WILDLANDS NETWORK has identified cougar recovery in the eastern U.S. as one of its apex campaigns. We’ve recently launched a Carnivore Working Group, and are collaborating with numerous partners to build critical support for these great and once-widespread cats. In 2016, we will speak for cougars in part by promoting Will Stolzenburg’s new book, Heart Of A Lion. Here is a passage from Stolzenburg’s book, conveying some of the formidable obstacles a dispersing cougar must overcome—and the importance of a little known pinch-point in continental habitat connectivity.

The lion was now heading into a country of farm and forest rich with deer and scarce of roads. He was traveling east through the peninsula, bound north and south by the Great Lakes Superior and Huron. Straight ahead, flowing between the twin cities of Sault Ste. Marie, Canada, and the United States, was the St. Mary’s River…. Either the twin city of Sault Ste. Marie or the Soo Locks was a lion accident waiting to happen. But there was a way around the rapids and across the river, and a certain parade of wildlife had over time figured it out. Twenty miles southeast of the Soo

APEX CAMPAIGN COUGARS

NOTE FROM THE HILL Experts Promote a Positive Vision for Wildlife Protection

A Powerful Plea for a Powerful CatLocks, the river braided itself around a cluster of islands, all of them partially forested, some of the crossings measuring no more than half a mile. Biologists flying over the winter archipelago had recorded the tracks of a host of big mammals not uncommonly doing so. Whitetail deer, coyotes, and red foxes had been using the islands as international stepping stones. Over the years, eyewitnesses had seen all the great northern mammals (moose, elk, deer, bear, and wolf) commuting here between countries. It was here also that some half century earlier, the coyote, the archetypal song dog of the western plains and prairies, was suspected of first helping himself into the forests of the East, on his way toward famously colonizing every state in the Lower 48. And soon it appeared that at least one lion was attempting the same thing. (146)

IT’S NOT EASY being green these days—especially if you’re a member of the Republican-controlled Congress. In this most recent session (as of early April), opponents of wildlife protection have already introduced more than 100 bills, floor amendments, and policy riders to weaken wildlife conservation.

But there are many members of Congress and hard-working staffers who care deeply about wildlife—and many who are interested in learning more. To begin seeding a proactive movement to protect wildlife, the Wildlands Network has joined with the Endangered Species Coalition to bring top scientists, conservationists, and other thought leaders to the U.S. Capitol to speak about some of our most pressing conservation issues. So far this year, we have initiated three events, with over 100 Congressional members and staffers attending each.

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ), and Representative Grijalva (D-AZ) hosted a February briefing titled, “Endangered Species Act, Military Readiness and Federal Projects.” In March, Wildlands Network’s Dr. Ron

Wildlands Network’s Dr. Ron Sutherland speaks at the U.S. Capitol.

Sutherland joined Representatives Debbie Dingell (D-MI) and Grijalva for a screening of Red Wolf Revival—an award-winning new film about the plight of endangered red wolves in the southeastern U.S. (cover). Last, Senators Whitehouse, Markey (D-MA), and Booker (D-NJ), along with Representatives Grijalva, DeFazio (D-WA), and Beyer (D-VA), hosted renowned wildlife photographer Tom Mangelsen and wildlife tracker David Moskowitz for an April event entitled, “Vital Ground: Grizzlies, Wolves and the Endangered Species Act.” The prestigious biologist Dr. E. O. Wilson will be speaking in May.

6 WILDLANDS CONNECTION SPRING 2016

AS WILDLANDS NETWORK leads the charge to ensure that all federal lands are managed for habitat connectivity, we continue to develop new strategies and tools for advancing our mission across the continent. In the Western Wildway, for instance, we have co-authored a comprehensive Planning for Connectivity Guide to better inform conservationists and other decision-makers about methods for connecting and conserving wildlife within and beyond the U.S. National Forest System. Other efforts include our Greater Grand Canyon Heritage National Monument campaign (page 3), our “Adopt Your Wildlife Corridor” initiative to protect priority corridors, and our work in the U.S.-Mexico borderlands region to implement wildlife crossing structures on Sonora Highway 2 while also halting the construction of new border walls—which hinder critical wildlife movement between the two nations (page 7).

Ensuring that our federal land managers meet their obligations to plan for and protect connectivity across the landscape is a difficult challenge for the conservation community. To help address this challenge, we have created a Public Lands Planning Atlas that further provides conservationists with the information they need to effectively advocate for habitat connectivity (visit www.westernwildway.org).

This on-line tool consolidates all relevant public comment opportunities into one interactive resource map that identifies individual forests, parks, monuments, and wilderness areas. Pop-up windows display comment

deadlines for new plans, contact information for planners, locations within priority wildlife corridors, and the names of local conservation groups spearheading response efforts. Most important, our new resource will create an ever-growing database of comments that will continually improve the connectivity planning process.

FROM EASTERN CANADA to the Gulf of Mexico, our movement is growing. Last autumn, Wildlands Network assembled more than 40 conservation leaders to build a coalition on behalf of natural communities in eastern North America. The resulting Eastern Wildway Network is working to reconnect, restore, and protect habitat to allow ecosystems to function properly, and to help native species move safely through the landscape and adapt to climatic change. We’re also striving to restore keystone species like wolves and cougars to keep natural communities in balance. This lofty vision unites conservation organizations, universities, and agencies across the region. Participants will share information, learn from each other, and collaborate to avoid redundancy in efforts, while creating synergy on projects impossible to achieve without the strength of teamwork.

One example of such synergy emerged recently in New Hampshire, just as our newsletter was going to press. When New Hampshire’s fish and game agency proposed a killing season on bobcats, grassroots conservationists—including leaders from Wildlands Network and Endangered Species Coalition—immediately responded by organizing petitions and letter-writing drives, and flooding public hearings surrounding the proposal. New Hampshire officials sensibly changed course when presented with powerful public support for bobcats and the likelihood that Canada lynx—another native felid that looks much like the bobcat and is protected as Threatened under the U.S. Endangered Species Act—would accidentally be trapped or shot. Thanks to our growing movement in the wild East, bobcats and lynx are now safer to roam the Granite State.

To learn more about or join the Eastern Wildway Network, contact maggie@wildlandsnetwork.org.

EASTERN WILDWAY FOCUS WESTERN WILDWAY FOCUS

Enhancing Connectivity on Federal Lands

Protecting the Wild East

Bobcats like this one hunting a Northeast beaver flow are safer now thanks to Wildlands Network, Endangered Species Coalition, and other conservationists who defeated a proposed killing season in New Hampshire.

WILDLANDS CONNECTION SPRING 2016 7

WE’D LIKE TO EXPRESS our gratitude to our friends at Biophilia Foundation for their long-standing and invaluable support. Biophilia Foundation’s primary mission closely parallels our own: “to protect, restore, enhance, and preserve wildlife habitat for all species of native plants and animals.” The Foundation not only funds bold organizations like Wildlands Network, but also leads restoration, conservation, and communications projects throughout the U.S. Their impressive efforts include donating a restored, 3,300-acre family ranch in New Mexico to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service; preserving wildlife habitat on privately owned farms abutting Chesapeake Bay; and advancing native plant propagation and important research on the interactions between pollinators, plants, and climate in Patagonia, Arizona.

Biophilia Foundation’s latest foray into film production resulted in American Dream, a documentary that examines the question of what, exactly, Americans are searching for in their pursuit of a dream that has become integral to our identity as a nation.

APEX CAMPAIGN BORDERLANDS

Hard Truths and Soft EdgesNOWHERE IS FRAGMENTATION more evident than where jurisdictions meet and fictional lines turn to physical barriers. It seems that humans love marking territories with ever harder boundaries, as if to say, we are not related—when, in fact, all life is related, and all natural processes are linked.

The borderlands dividing the U.S. and Mexico serve as a sad example. Once, this region enjoyed a “geographic osmosis” of sorts, where soft boundaries allowed for exchanges among families, businesses, governments, and, of course, wildlife. Now, open-pit mines, roads, and existing stretches of border wall increasingly hinder the flow of life. If certain divisive U.S. politicians have their way, the remainder of the Mexico-U.S. border will be walled off, too.

Wildlands Network recently inaugurated its Mexico Program to keep the borderlands region of Sonora and its neighbor state of Arizona wild and permeable to wildlife. We created and continue to lead the “Wild Linkages Binational Partnership,” a regional coalition of groups and individuals concerned with habitat connectivity. Our work has already spared 16 miles of sensitive riparian habitat from new road development, along the very same corridor presumably used by the jaguar, El Jefe*, to reach the U.S. We’re also coordinating stakeholders to craft fine-scale connectivity information that will advise decision-makers like transport authorities in Mexico City and border patrol in southern Arizona.

The social implications of trans-boundary conservation require that we creatively engage a diversity of partners to foster connectivity. By empowering groups in northern Sonora who are supportive of carnivore recovery, renewing our commitment to logging communities that protect thick-billed parrots in the Sierra Madre, and leveraging the Desert Landscape Conservation Cooperative with our expertise and leadership, Wildlands Network is building connections across the border in tangible ways that remind us, we’re all related.

* El Jefe is the name given by the Center for Biological Diversity to the only known jaguar currently inhabiting the U.S.

DONOR SPOTLIGHT Biophilia Foundation

Richard Pritzlaff, Founder of Biophilia Foundation

Riparian forestland in the Cocóspera River region, where some of Mexico’s northernmost jaguars have been recorded. This area was spared from development due to intervention from Wildlands Network and skilled volunteers.

WILDLANDS NETWORK1402 Third Avenue, Suite 1019Seattle, WA 98101

ADDRESS SERVICE REQUESTED

Nonprofit Org.US PostagePAIDPermit No. 1911Seattle, WA

Wildlands Connection is published by Wildlands Network, a nonprofit educational, scientific and charitable corporation. ©2016 by Wildlands Network. All rights reserved. No part of this periodical may be reproduced without permission. All images are the property of individual artists and photographers and are used by permission. Editors Paula MacKay and John Davis • Designer Kevin Cross Contributors Greg Costello, Juan Carlos Bravo, Kelly Burke, Tracey Butcher, Kim Crumbo, John Davis, Maggie Ernest, Susan Holmes, Kelsey Johnson, Ron Sutherland, Kim Vacariu

OFFICERS AND DIRECTORS President Steve Olson, Maryland Secretary David Johns, Oregon • Treasurer Tom Stahl, California Directors Karen Beazley, Nova Scotia • Barbara Dean, California Jim Estes, California • Diana Hadley, Arizona • Mark Higgins, California David Johnston, South Carolina • Richard Pritzlaff, Colorado John Terborgh, North Carolina • Directors Emeritus Harvey Locke, Ontario • Brian Miller, New Mexico • Michael Soulé, Colorado

STAFF Executive Director Greg Costello • Director of Operations in Mexico Juan Carlos Bravo • Director of Strategic Partnerships Kelly Burke • Director of Donor Relations Tracey Butcher • Western Conservation Director Kim Crumbo • Wildway Advocate John Davis • Landscape Conservationist Maggie Ernest • Development Associate Crystal Gartner • Northeast Wolf and Predator Organizer Kathy Henley • Policy Coalition Coordinator Susan Holmes • Southwest Utah Wildlands Organizer Kelsey Johnson Communications Consultant Paula MacKay • Conservation Scientist Ron Sutherland • Western Director Kim Vacariu

CREDITS Page 1: Wildlands Network • Page 3: Kristen Caldon Page 4: Logan Cundiff (top), Ron Sutherland (inset), Tompkins Conservation (bottom left) • Page 5: Susan Holmes • Page 6: Eddy Foundation/Wildlands Network • Page 7: Juan Carlos Bravo (top), Tracey Butcher • Page 8: iStockphoto.com/Andyworks

Non-chlorine bleached, 100% post-consumer recycled stock

Northeastern Field OfficeEssex, NY • 518-810-2189

Southeastern Field OfficeDurham, NC • 919-641-0060

Western Field OfficePortal, AZ • 520-558-0165

Mexico Field OfficeSonora, MX • 521-6621-87-38-10

info@wildlandsnetwork.org206-538-5363 1402 3rd Ave., Suite 1019 Seattle, WA 98101

www.wildlandsnetwork.org

Join Our Wild Pack Today!

Your monthly support will help us in our work to protect red, gray, and Mexican wolves; designate the Greater Grand Canyon Heritage National Monument; create wildlife corridors for cougars, grizzly bears, and other wide-ranging species; and so much more. Visit www.wildlandsnetwork.org/donate to start your monthly support today. Thank you for your vital support!

Join the Wild Pack at a monthly level of $25 or more and receive a copy of Keeping the Wild. Featuring essays from Eileen Crist, David Ehrenfeld, Dave Foreman, Lisi Krall, Harvey Locke, Curt Meine, Kathleen Dean Moore, Michael Soulé, Terry Tempest Williams, and other leading conservation thinkers, Keeping the Wild responds to those who claim that human-caused extinction is acceptable, and that “novel ecosystems” are an adequate replacement for natural landscapes.

ON THE COVER: A RARE RED WOLF WANDERS ALLIGATOR RIVER WILDLIFE REFUGE, NORTH CAROLINA

For a captivating introduction to the red wolf story, check out Roshan Patel’s award-winning new film, Red Wolf Revival—featuring our own Dr. Ron Sutherland’s red wolf research. Visit https://vimeo.com/ondemand/redwolfrevival.

Monthly giving is incredibly important, providing a steady stream of income to non-profits and making every penny count toward conservation. Everyone wins, especially wild nature!