Gorton et al wrote:

> > b) To the contrary, we intended the requirement that a
> >threatened or endangered bird be "known" to be nesting to require
> >actual direct evidence of nesting, and does not allow an
> >inferential conclusion from possible occupancy. Actual direct
> >evidence would be observation of an active nest, fecal ring or
> >eggshell fragments.

On Thu, 3 Aug 1995, Don Baccus commented:

> The insidious thing about this, besides the fact that there's
> not enough money to climb every damned tree in every occupied
> territory in order to find a nest, is that it's probably too
> late for this year anyway. Even if the chicks aren't all
> fledged by now, getting a search effort organized and underway
> (and financed) would be impossible. I'm not aware of the
> actual details on murrelet surveys, but do know that a lot
> of the seasonal goshawk and spotted owl workers are done by
> end August/very early September.

My girlfriend does Murrelet surveys for an environmental consulting
company. This is the final week of the season for them. As for being
able to find nests by organizing a "search effort," well, I don't
think it works that way. Finding nests *is* a major priority, and its
still nearly impossible. They already climb many, many trees, have
four surveyors surveying at least 20 stands, and found no nests this
year. I read in a book recently that as of 1991 (horribly out of date, I
know) only three murrelet nests had been found *ever* on the Olympic
Peninsula. Surely, more are found in most years, but it's still, as Don
says, just a handful, and that's not likely to change. Using documented
nests from the past year as the only acceptable criterion for Marbled
Murrelet nesting in a given stand makes no sense. If you want to know
where murrelets nest, you have to use behavior, not nests as such, to
decide.

> Slimy in the extreme.

Indeed

Chris Hill
Seattle, WA
cehill at u.washington.edu