So yesterday morning I received an action alert regarding EPIC’s plan to sue WS for trapping beaver in salmon habitat in California. The Western Environmental Law Center is assisting, just like they did in Oregon. Remember, this happened in Oregon at the beginning of this year. As a result WS agreed to issue a ‘moratorium’ on beaver trapping while their fish biologists decided how to respond. (In Washington there are already rules that keep them out of salmon streams). Wildlife services in Oregon ultimately decided not to decide, and still isn’t trapping beaver in salmon streams in Oregon.
I was sure California would follow suit, and surprised it took this long. Of course there are lots of ways to kill beavers besides APHIS, so why does this matter? This matters because it pushes the topic into the public discourse and drives home the point to everyone that beavers matter for salmon. If enough federal agencies are forced to address the importance of beavers to salmon, it’s not crazy to think that it ultimately could matter to where CDFW decides to grant depredation permits in the first place.
11 months later it has now happened in california. If you haven’t read the Letters of Intent to sue, you really should. Worth A Dam got together yesterday and donated 500 to the action. If you want to donate too you can donate through their website or by check to this address,
EPIC
145 G St., Ste. A
Arcata, CA 95521
To support WELC click below which will take you to their support page.
CLICK TO DONATE
Ben Goldfarb is already talking to his editors about getting a california article published on the topic. So stay tuned. On the news this morning, and I bet more will follow. This is about to get very interesting.
Sunday I did a little research for my upcoming SARSAS talk by checking out the references listed in the salmon-steelhead summary of the 
Fran Recht works for the Habitat program for the 
