ESA

Press Release: Ninth Circuit Upholds Conservationists’ Efforts to Stop Coastal Old-Growth Logging

August 1, 2025June 26, 2024 by kaley

June 26, 2024 — Today, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a 2022 ruling from the District Court of Oregon that prevents Scott Timber Co. from clearcutting old-growth forest within Oregon’s Elliott State Forest. The court held that the proposed logging of the 355-acre Benson Ridge parcel by the subsidiary of Roseburg Forest Products would harm threatened marbled murrelets in violation of the federal Endangered Species Act. The case marks the first time a private timber company has been held to account in court for potential violations of the federal Endangered Species Act in Oregon.

Press Release: Wolverines listed as “threatened” under Endangered Species Act after 20-year conservation effort

August 1, 2025November 29, 2023 by kaley

November 29, 2023 — Today, after more than 20 years of advocacy by wildlife conservation groups, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (the Service) found that wolverines warrant federal protections as a threatened species. Numbering only about 300 in the contiguous U.S., snow-dependent wolverine populations have suffered from climate change, habitat loss, trapping, and other anthropogenic pressures.

Press Release: Conservation Groups Challenge BLM’s “Big League” Logging Project Due to Impacts on Imperiled Spring Chinook Salmon Habitat and Other Values

August 1, 2025November 7, 2023 by kaley

November 7, 2023 — Today, conservation organizations Willamette Riverkeeper, Cascadia Wildlands, and Oregon Wild filed suit against the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), challenging the agency’s authorization of the approximately 4,600-acre Big League Project in the Calapooia and Mohawk River Watersheds northeast of Eugene. According to the groups’ complaint, the BLM violated the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) by failing to take the required “hard look” at the impacts that the Big League Project would have on a host of environmental values, including spotted owl habitat, carbon storage, stream flows, and water quality. Specifically, this project plans to clearcut the last and best older forest stands in the Calapooia and Mohawk River Watersheds.

Press Release: Court Rules Logging Project Violates Endangered Species Act

August 1, 2025October 4, 2022 by kaley

October 4, 2022 — Late Friday, a judge in the District Court for the District of Oregon ruled that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Service) justification for Bureau of Land Management (Bureau) timber sales totaling nearly 18,000 acres including in old growth forest violated the Endangered Species Act. The judge ruled against the Service’s claim that old-growth logging in the Poor Windy and Evans Creek timber sales on 15,848 acres of threatened northern spotted owl habitat would not harm the imperiled bird species.

Press Release: Conservationists Challenge Coast Range Logging Plan

September 8, 2022 by kaley

September 8, 2022 — Today, Oregon-based conservation organizations Cascadia Wildlands and Oregon Wild challenged the Bureau of Land Management’s (“BLM”) Siuslaw Field Office’s plan to log 13,225 acres of public forests in the coast range foothills west of Eugene. The agency’s Siuslaw HLB (“Harvest Land Base”) Project will clearcut these mature and old-growth forests that border many communities and residences west of Eugene. The BLM admits that this logging will increase fire hazard risks, slope instability and landslide risks, and drinking water contamination for these communities, but dismissed concerns raised about these impacts as insignificant.

Press Release: Court Halts Logging of Elliott State Forest Tract Sold to Private Timber Company

July 23, 2025June 28, 2022 by kaley

June 28, 2022 — Today, a U.S. District Court judge issued a ruling preventing Scott Timber from clearcutting old growth forest previously part of the Elliott State Forest. The court found that the proposed logging of the “Benson Ridge” parcel by the subsidiary of Roseburg Forest Products would harm and harass threatened marbled murrelets, in violation of the federal Endangered Species Act. The court’s ruling permanently enjoins logging of the occupied murrelet habitat.

Press Release: Conservationists Challenge Logging Plan

July 23, 2025May 26, 2022 by kaley

May 26, 2022 — Late yesterday, Oregon-based conservation organizations Cascadia Wildlands and Oregon Wild challenged the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) Siuslaw Field Office’s plan to log public lands west of Eugene across seven watersheds. The agency’s “N126 Late Successional Reserve Landscape Plan Project” is one of the largest logging proposals on public lands in Oregon in decades. The targeted forests are home to at least three federal Endangered Species Act (ESA) listed species: northern spotted owl, marbled murrelet, and Oregon Coast coho salmon, along with the red tree vole, which is currently a candidate for ESA listing. The agency failed entirely to consider impacts to these species, amongst other errors.

DeFazio Letter Requests Immediate Protections for Gray Wolves

August 1, 2025July 1, 2021 by kaley

July 1, 2021 — Earlier this week, Rep. Peter DeFazio sent a letter to Secretary of the Interior, Deb Haaland and Principal Deputy Director of the USFWS, Martha Williams urging emergency reinstatement of Endangered Species Act (ESA) protections for Northern Rocky Mountain gray wolves. With Idaho and Montana recently passing laws that will allow devastating … Read more

Lawsuit Filed to Protect Red Tree Vole

August 4, 2025March 30, 2021 by nsc425

March 25, 2021 — Conservation groups filed a lawsuit today challenging a decision by the Trump administration to deny the north Oregon coast population of red tree voles protection under the Endangered Species Act.

BLOG: A Week to Remember

August 4, 2025January 22, 2021 by kaley

by Bethany Cotton, Campaign Director What a wonderful week for Cascadia! TUESDAY On Tuesday, the proposed Jordan Cove liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal and 230-mile Pacific Connector pipeline was dealt what we hope is a fatal blow by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), which – in a surprise but welcomed move – denied the … Read more

Western Wolf Coalition Challenges Nationwide Wolf Delisting

August 1, 2025January 14, 2021 by nsc425

January 14, 2021 — The most recent data from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and its state partners show an estimated 4,400 wolves inhabit the western Great Lakes states, but only 108 wolves in Washington state (with only 20 outside of eastern Washington), 158 in Oregon (with only 16 outside of northeastern Oregon), and a scant 15 exist in California. Nevada, Utah, and Colorado have had a few wolf sightings over the past three years, but wolves remain functionally absent from their historical habitat in these states.

USFWS cuts northern spotted owl critical habitat by 42% in likely death sentence for species

August 1, 2025January 14, 2021 by nsc425

January 13, 2021 — Today, with six days remaining in the Trump administration, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service published a final rule eliminating 3.4 million acres of critical habitat for the northern spotted owl in Washington state, Oregon, and California. This decision comes one month after the Service announced that the species should be uplisted from threatened to endangered, but the agency is too busy to provide these desperately needed protections. The elimination of 42% of the endangered species’ critical habitat would likely result in extinction for the northern spotted owl in the U.S. This final rule results from a sweetheart settlement between the Trump administration and the timber industry.

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