Bird Advocates Question Raven-Killing Plans To Protect Sage Grouse

by Courtney Flatt 

March 21, 2019 11:15 a.m.

Deep in Oregon’s sagebrush country, there’s one county with an abundance of ravens. Biologists say those ravens like to eat sage grouse eggs, and they’ve come up with plans to take care of the raven problem.

That’s got bird advocates questioning whether killing one bird for the sake of another is the right move.

Sage grouse in Baker County are isolated. Their numbers have declined by 75 percent since 2005.

“The Baker (population) is the most imperiled in the state,” said Lee Foster, Oregon’s sage grouse coordinator. “We haven’t seen a similar decline anywhere else.”

A big problem in this county on Oregon’s eastern border: ravens. Foster said no other area in Oregon has so many ravens on the landscape. He said if sage grouse have trouble recovering because of predation, other habitat improvement projects won’t help.

To that point, the state has come up with plans to lethally remove up to 500 ravens in the area every year for three years.

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Controversial raven cull suspended for not being 'scientifically robust'

 Simon Johnson, scottish political editor

30 JULY 2018 • 1:57PM

A controversial licence to cull of hundreds of protected ravens to protect threatened wading birds has been suspended after officials found it was not scientifically "robust".

Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) granted the five-year research licence to the Strathbraan Community Collaboration for Waders (SCCW), in Perthshire, after curlew and lapwing numbers dropped by more than half in only two decades.

The initial licence allowed land managers to kill 69 ravens this year, with the total reviewed annually thereafter. SNH said it represented less than 0.5 per cent of raven numbers in Scotland.

But the natural conservation agency commissioned its scientific advisory committee to review the study following criticism from wildlife groups that it had no "scientific justification."

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