To protect spotted owls, US wildlife officials propose killing half-million barred owls

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is gearing up to help out northern and California spotted owls by dealing with those pesky barred owls in parts of Washington, Oregon, and California. They’ve been looking into how to handle these barred owls and are getting ready to put their plan into action.

Their favorite idea is to carefully take out a small number of barred owls each year—less than half a percent of all barred owls in North America. This plan is meant to support struggling populations of northern spotted owls, which are losing places to live and facing competition from invading barred owls. The same goes for California spotted owls, which could soon get tagged as endangered.

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The goal here isn’t about making one owl fight another, but about making sure northern spotted owls don’t disappear. This plan focuses on the conservation and recovery efforts that have been going on for a while now.

Under this plan, trained experts—not regular folks—will handle the job of removing barred owls in certain areas where spotted and barred owls hang out together. The idea is to stop barred owls from spreading into more areas where they could threaten California spotted owls. They won’t be using lead bullets, and they won’t let regular people hunt barred owls.

Taking care of barred owls is a big job, and it’s all about making sure the northern spotted owl stays safe and starts to bounce back. Barred owls are originally from eastern North America but have been moving west over the last hundred years or so because their homes have changed.

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If the plan gets the green light, the Service will work under a special permit to manage barred owls. They might get help from tribes, government folks, businesses, or landowners to put the plan into action while following local laws. And everyone involved will have to keep an eye on things and report back on how it’s going.