Feds on brink of make-or-break sage grouse decision

In September, the Obama administration will make what is arguably the biggest Endangered Species Act decision in history. At stake is the survival of an iconic bird whose numbers tumbled in the 20th century after settlers mowed down sagebrush with cows, plows and drill pads. But listing the greater sage grouse could tie up access to 165 million acres of the West, causing hardship for ranchers, farmers and energy producers...The Fish and Wildlife Service's decision will be the most scrutinized ESA verdict since 1990, when it listed the owl as threatened in the Pacific Northwest, decimating the region's timber industry. The conservation effort began in earnest in 2011, when FWS Director Dan Ashe ushered Western state wildlife officials to the Washington, D.C., office of then-Bureau of Land Management Director Bob Abbey, whose agency manages about 60 percent of the grouse's remaining habitat and will be key to the species' survival. "We are going to have to mount a planning effort like BLM has never done before," Ashe remembers telling Abbey. Spanning about 50 million acres, BLM's final conservation plans will be rolled out to the public within a few weeks and will be signed by BLM Director Neil Kornze in August. BLM's efforts are being matched by an estimated $750 million in federal, state and private investments to preserve ranchlands that provide key habitat for grouse chicks. "It's the biggest conservation effort I have been involved in in my entire career," Ashe said in an interview. "It's rather magnificent in its complexity and its significance for conserving the Western way of life and landscape."...more