Poisoning Ravens to Help Sage Grouse?

Wildlife officials will spend as much as $100,000 over two years to poison ravens in three areas of Idaho, but officials don’t know whether that kill will permanently boost sage grouse populations as intended. Ravens are a main predator of sage grouse eggs, and their numbers have increased throughout Idaho and the West, said Ann Moser, wildlife biologist for the state Department of Fish and Game. Fish and Game hopes to kill the ravens by placing poisoned chicken eggs in strategic locations, which will be easier than trying to shoot them, Moser said. “We tried that, but ravens are very smart, and they are not easy to shoot,” she said. On orders from the Legislature, Fish and Game secured a permit to kill as many as 4,000 ravens over two years near Idaho National Laboratory in Arco, the Curlew National Grasslands and in Washington County near the Oregon border. Sage grouse populations have declined more steeply in those areas than elsewhere in the state, Fish and Game reports. The raven poisoning starts this spring. “We can’t directly say that (sage grouse population decline) is from ravens, because we don’t have that information,” Moser said. “There’s anecdotal information.” The human-related activities that have allowed ravens to expand their territory and populations numbers are the same factors that have contributed to the sage grouse’s demise, she said. Power lines, houses, windmills and water towers provide nesting areas for ravens, and they get sustenance from roadkill, dead livestock and agricultural water...more

Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!' I shrieked upstarting -
`Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken! - quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,
And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted - nevermore!

And wouldn't Poe have fun with these Game & Fish types.  In the long run, it will be the Ravens cawing and laughing at the gov't folks trying to fool with mother nature. And their eyes will have all the seeming of a demon that is dreaming.