Hello All,
I read Stewarts post on introduced species and was some what taken back by his statement that "eastern Washington does not need anymore birds that can adapt to human altered landscapes such as Am Robin, Bewick's Wren, Dark-eyed Juncos, Northern Flicker and White-crowned Sparrows". First off the habitat here in eastern Washington will never be anything like that west of the mountains, we simply do not have the precipitation or the human population. We do however have massive landscape scale habitat losses where the native plant communities are entirely gone or cut into such tiny fragments that they are rendered of little value to grassland/shrub-steppe obligate bird species. Stewart states that when he comes east of the mountains he wants to see "Sage Sparrows and Sharp-tailed Grouse not Bewicks Wrens". Though the story of the Bewicks Wren east of the mountains is very interesting and on going. So that we are all talking about apples and apples and not apples and filberts the issue at hand is not whether eastern Washington needs anymore of anyone species, but rather do we as humans treat ALL invasive non-native plants with extreme prejudice and do all we can to wipe them out over huge areas despite great value to native protected bird species by some of those invaders? Or do we take a close look at the reality on the ground and instead of spending a lot of money tackling the massive invasive weed problem, do we protect small well defined areas and make habitat determinations based on data collected locally. Uniform policy based on broad landscape actions seldom works. I have seen several wildlife and land management agencies spend large sums of money and huge chunks of time in attempting to eliminate the Russian Olive. They hack and cut the trees down and then pile them into huge piles, let them dry and set the whole mass on fire. This is the once and forever approach. Well this has not been at all effective, in fact after the land managers walk away eight to ten years later the Russian Olives have returned with a vengeance and the trees are twice as thick and bare more fruits than ever. So if we know and have the data to support a different approach, why not? We collectively have so altered the landscape and allowed by our ignorance the spread and intrusion of many non-native weeds that native birds have had to adapt to survive. The yellow-star thistle is another prime example of a nasty invasive that now provides valuable winter forage to thousands of American Goldfinches and Pine Siskins here in southeastern Washington. Do we need to wipe these invasive plants out before some native bird species figures out how to utilize it? As for Stewart-come on over and lets go birding and talking.
Later Mike

********************************************************************
Mike & MerryLynn Denny
1354 S. E. Central Ave.
College Place, WA 99324
509.529.0080 (h)

IF YOU HAVEN'T BEEN BIRDING, YOU HAVEN'T LIVED!
*******************************************************************