A bi-partisan group of Senators has written a letter urging reform for the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF). The 35 Democrat and six Republican co-signees wrote to the Senate leadership explaining the importance of the fund and why action is needed during the lame-duck session.

The LWCF is funded by revenue from offshore oil and gas leases and is the federal government’s primary means of buying land for conservation purposes. The fund also serves as an important source of grants for states to purchase land for recreation and conservation. The fund is authorized to receive $900 million from these revenues each year, but Congress has only appropriated the full amount twice in its 50 year history. The LWCF is appropriated approximately $340 million on average each year.

Senators Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Richard Burr (R-NC), who spearheaded this effort, want to make the LWCF’s authorized $900 million mandatory spending and not subject to the annual appropriations process. Furthermore, the Senators contend that immediate action is needed to avert the fund’s pending expiration in September 2015.

Some fiscal conservatives are wary of mandatory funding for the LWCF and want to avoid additional federal land purchases. They argue that the backlog in maintenance projects on national parks, wildlife refuges, and other federally managed lands should be addressed before adding anymore to the federal estate. The anticipated incoming committee chairmen of the House Natural Resource Committee, Rob Bishop (R-UT), and the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), have both expressed criticism of LWCF funded land purchases.

For more information on LWCF and its importance to wildlife management, refer to the Land and Water Conservation Fund Policy Brief developed by the TWS Government Affairs Team.

Sources: Energy and Environment Daily (November 25, 2014)

Alberta’s wildlife regulations — rules that support the Wildlife Act in managing the province’s wildlife — are set to expire on June 30, 2015, and proposed revisions by the Alberta Environment and Sustainable Resource Development Ministry are generating controversy.

For instance, ministry officials have proposed to allow four new species of birds, Aplomado Falcon (Falco femoralis), Eurasian Sparrowhawk (Accipiter nisus), Saker Falcon (Falco cherrug), and Rough-legged Hawk (Buteo lagopus), to be used for falconry — a move that has stimulated controversy because three of the four species to be added are non-native species in Alberta. Opponents to the proposal argue that use of non-native species could lead to hybridization among species and potentially spread of disease if the trained birds escape.

Also under the proposed regulations, dogs would be allowed to accompany big game hunters. Currently big game hunters in Alberta are not allowed to take a dog on a hunt unless they’re hunting cougars. Although proposed regulations would not allow dogs to pursue big game while they are in the field, they can be used as pack animals. Some Albertans worry that the dogs will be used to track game illegally if allowed to be in the field during a hunt.

Further, restrictions on off-road vehicle use would be removed, generating discussion over potential disturbances to the landscape and fair chase considerations. Additional changes liberalizing the kinds of tools allowed to be used have further raised concerns about fair chase and the preservation of hunting traditions in the province.

The Alberta Environment and Sustainable Resource Development Ministry has created a confidential survey for Albertans to share their feedback on proposed revisions to the regulations. Albertans can also contribute to the discussion online on three of the proposed revisions; the number of landowner special licenses, allowing companion dogs when hunting big game, and falconry regulations. The Alberta Wildlife Regulations are open for comment until December 15, 2014.

Sources Calgary Herald (November 15, 2014), MindMixer

Parasites have notorious reputations for not only sapping their hosts of valuable resources, but also spreading disease and infection — a serious threat for hosts teetering on the brink of extinction. Unsurprisingly, scientists working to save endangered host species in captivity often kill parasites found on individual hosts. However, these efforts to save some species may drive others to extinction: According to a recent paper published in Conservation Biology, at least two louse species have likely gone extinct as a result of conservation efforts to save their hosts.

In the past, both the California condor and the black-footed ferret suffered such population losses that scientists tried to breed the endangered species in captivity to increase their numbers. As part of both breeding programs, conservationists killed parasites living on or in the individual condors and ferrets. For many species of parasites removal might not have been an issue — others of their kind would live to see another host another day. But for the louse Colpocephalum californianus and the ferret louse Neotrichodectes sp., which are species-specific and rely on those particular hosts to survive, the delousing spelled their doom. Scientists believe both species of parasites are now extinct. “It is unfortunate that these programs did not account for the parasite’s conservation,” wrote Dolly Jørgensen, an environmental historian from Sweden’s Umea University and the paper’s author. In addition, scientists estimate that about 40 species of lice are co-endangered with hosts listed on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) red list. And the threat isn’t specific to lice. Elizabeth Nichols, a biologist and parasite researcher from Brazil’s Sao Paulo University, estimated more than 1,000 species of parasitic worms called helminthes are endangered.

“Biodiversity conservation needs to account not only for the large fauna,” wrote Jørgensen, “but also for the small fauna along for the ride,” Unfortunately, parasites don’t have the largest fan following and, as a result, calling for their protection can be a difficult sell. Although they’re often viewed as organisms that inflict harm inside a single host, they tend to play a much more complicated role. Nichols thinks of parasites as ecosystem puppeteers. They pull the strings on the entire population, she explained. In general they separate the sick from the healthy, they determine how many individuals are part of the population, and they can control which individuals can reproduce and which cannot, among other things. Depending on which of these strings they pull, parasites can exert pressure that causes host populations to shift. In this way parasites drive evolution and keep host populations healthy, though at the expense of the infected individual hosts.

Historically, efforts to conserve threatened and endangered species have not often taken parasites into consideration, said Nichols, but a more nuanced approach is emerging. Jesús Péréz from Jaén University in Spain recommends conservationists pick species-specific lice off the endangered Iberian lynx and save them for when the lynx is reintroduced into the wild. Further, in 2013, the IUCN added an amendment to their relocation guidelines recommending wildlife managers consider re-establishing parasites that may also go extinct with their host species when feasible. The subtlety is important because saving parasites isn’t practical for every situation, explained Nichols. “No one is trying to do the wrong thing,” she said. “It’s just really unclear what the right thing is at the right time.”