May 29–BRIGHAM CITY — The ravens have apparently grown in number in Box Elder County to the point they are picking on the sage grouse and provoking the County Commission.
In a letter likely just now circulating in Washington, commissioners have asked Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell to let federal wildlife officials go after the ravens. They ask that ravens be delisted from the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, which bans harming or killing the birds.
“The Box Elder County commissioners believe the Greater Sage Grouse population, currently under consideration for listing under the Endangered Species Act, is severely impacted by common raven predation,” reads the letter.
It cites recent studies pointing to a 300 percent increase in raven populations nationally in the past three decades, up to 1,500 percent in areas of the West.
The commissioners propose the use of poisoned eggs that impact only ravens as part of an overall raven control program. “Unfortunately, the permitted number of treated eggs and other permitted control measures are severely limited due to the raven listing on the Migratory Bird Treaty,” reads the letter signed by the three commissioners, Ryan Tingey, Stan Summers and Jeff Scott.
A similar letter has also been sent to Secretary Jewell by Elko County officials in Nevada, the county adjacent to Box Elder to the west, which is having a similar raven-on-sage grouse problem, Summers said.
“They are protecting a bird that is going to kill a bird that’s going to be protected,” he said. “Which is confusing and makes me a little angry, to say the least.”
Sage grouse are known for a distinctive mating dance and ritual officials call the most unique in the continental U.S. performed at sites called leks.
“Box Elder County has dozens of leks,” Summers said. “What’s happening with the ravens is horrible, and not just here, but in Nevada and Colorado.”
“USU and BYU have research that shows ravens have learned to be quite effective at identifying and flushing sage grouse hens from their nests and feeding on those nests,” said Phil Douglass, state Division of Wildlife Resources spokesman for the division’s northern region.
Idaho wildlife officials are in the midst of a “lethal control” program for ravens in southern Idaho suspected of sage grouse depredation after a delisting process there last year. The program includes shooting the ravens on a limited basis in three locations for a two-year period begun in March.
“The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service issued a permit to Idaho Fish and Game to conduct the two-year study,” reads a March 17 statement by the fish and game department. “Raven numbers have risen dramatically in the Western U.S. and ravens are a primary nest predator of sage-grouse eggs and chicks.”
Lethal control may include shooting, it states, removal of raven nests and eggs, and poisoned bait in chicken eggs.
“USDA and Wildlife Services can use an EPA regulated poison, or corvicide, that affects ravens. Toxicity of this poison to other animals is negligible including to those that may eat poisoned ravens. Use of the poison will be highly selective and placed in areas designated by Idaho Fish and Game.”
Ravens are cousins to the crow and magpie, but much larger, with a three-foot wingspan and often more than two feet in length.
Contact reporter Tim Gurrister at 801-625-4238, [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter at @tgurrister