ARIZONA DAILY SUN (Flagstaff) 02 July 05 Wildfires threaten desert tortoise
Salt Lake City (AP): Wildfires burning in the Southwest are threatening federally protected desert tortoises, further stressing a species that already has lost much of its population to drought.
At least two of the animals died this week and more could turn up as biologists search the charred landscape.
"I think these fires are going to put a lot of pressure on local populations and we're going to be faced with some challenges," said Roy Averill-Murray, desert tortoise recovery coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
The tortoise, which was placed on the federal threatened species list 25 years ago, roams across millions of acres in Arizona, California, Nevada and Utah and is considered an indicator of the health of the desert environment. Tortoise deaths have been linked to invasions of noxious weeds, drought, loss of desert land to development and predation by other animals.
A government report three years ago said it was difficult to come up with an accurate number of living tortoises, mainly because the habitat stretches across a four-state area. That also makes it difficult to know if the $100 million plus spent by the government to help the species make a comeback was working.
But wildfires are definitely not helping.
In Nevada, firefighters on Friday said huge blazes burning in a vast area inhabited by desert tortoise and bighorn sheep were about half contained.
Among the many fires that burned tens of thousands of acres in southwestern Utah in the last week was one that burned in the middle of the Red Cliffs Desert Reserve.
The 61,000-acre preserve in the southwestern corner of the state with scenic red rock cliffs and lava flows provides prime habitat for about 1,700 Mojave Desert tortoises, officials for the private reserve estimated.
Just three years ago, before drought took its hold on the state, there were an estimated 6,000 to 8,000 tortoises on the reserve.
The extent the 3,000-acre reserve fire will be difficult to measure. Biologists will scour the area, looking for survivors or remains.
Bekee Megown, a fire biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, said Friday two turtles were known to have died in the fire, but at least three survivors had been found.
"That's very encouraging," she said.
Animals that burrowed deep enough into the ground were probably safe from the fire, but tortoises in shallow burrows or out in the open had little chance of survival.
"The problem is when these big fires start they burn throughout the day," said Bill Mader, administrator of the Red Cliffs Reserve. "They burn real quickly and so if the tortoise is caught in that they're doomed."
Nonnative species such as cheatgrass, which spreads easily when seeds are blown by passing cars, have been overtaking areas in the West. The plants provide little nutrition for animals and grow rapidly, making for wide patches of quick-burning wildfire fuel.
Southwest Utah had an unusually wet spring and late snow melt, providing plenty of fuel as vegetation dried out in 90-degree June temperatures. The fires were usually started by lightning strikes.
"Lightning has been striking the Mojave Desert for longer than the tortoise has been there. The new factor are the grasses that lightning has sparked," Averill-Murray said.
U.S. Forest Service fire spokesman David Olson, who got a firsthand look at the damage at the reserve Thursday, said the fire burned thick swaths of tall cheatgrass in places on the reserve, but the persistent vegetation left plenty of seeds behind.
"On the ground, dirt level there was very thick concentration of seeds," Olson said. "If you were looking at reseeding your lawn or reseeding an area, you would be saying this is excellent. Unfortunately, this is the worst."
Wildfires threaten desert tortoise