NEWS RELEASE

For Immediate Release

January 19, 2006

Contact:

Erik Molvar, Wildlife Biologist, Biodiversity Conservation Alliance · 307/742-7978
Clait E. Braun, former Avian Research Program Manager, Colorado Division of Wildlife
520/529-0365
Linda Baker, Upper Green River Valley Coalition · 307/367-3670
Mark Salvo, Director, Sagebrush Sea Campaign · 503/757-4221

Study Shows Major Impacts of Gas Development on Sage Grouse

LARAMIE - A ground-breaking study on greater sage grouse in western Wyoming has found that oil and gas development has major impacts on sage grouse populations under current Bureau of Land Management policies.

The study, funded by the BLM and the oil and gas industry, was completed last December by University of Wyoming doctoral student Matt Holloran, who studied sage grouse populations in western Wyoming where natural gas drilling has dramatically increased in the past three years.

"This study is going to change the debate on sage grouse and oil and gas development," said Erik Molvar, a wildlife biologist with Biodiversity Conservation Alliance. "The BLM won't be able to tell the public that their standard oil and gas practices and mitigation measures will protect the sage grouse anymore. New ideas and cutting-edge technologies must be implemented if oil and gas is to become compatible with sage grouse survival."

The study found that oil and gas development has a major impact on grouse behavior at lek sites, the traditional dancing grounds that sage grouse return to year after year to breed. Drilling activities within 3.1 miles of sage grouse leks caused declines of breeding males. And more surprising, the impacts continued even after drilling and construction activities ceased. The number of breeding males failed to recover within 1.9 miles of producing wells (which typically remain on site from 30 to 50 years) even after drilling is completed.

"Sage grouse biologists have been belaboring BLM and state agencies to adopt stronger measures to protect the sage grouse from oil and gas development for years, but these recommendations have fallen on deaf ears. Hollorans's study validates the 1977 and 2000 Guidelines published by the Western Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies in peer reviewed technical journals," said grouse expert Clait E. Braun. "The study by Holloran now provides irrefutable evidence that the scientific community was right, and that a fundamental change is needed in the way the oil and gas industry does business in sage grouse country if we are to maintain this majestic emblem of the West," Braun added.

The study covers sage grouse populations in the Pinedale Anticline and Jonah Fields, two major developing gas fields in western Wyoming's upper Green River valley. Leks affected by gas development showed an average population decline of 51 percent, while the three leks surround by development declined by an average of 89 percent. Two of these three leks were completely abandoned within 4 years. The study found that if the sage grouse continues to decline at the rates measured, local populations within these gas fields would become extinct within 19 years.

The study has West-wide implications, because most of the oil and gas development in the West is occurring in the sagebrush basins that are the core strongholds of remaining sage grouse populations. "The results of this study indicate that rapidly accelerating energy development could severely reduce sage grouse populations in the heart of the species' range," said Mark Salvo, director of the Sagebrush Sea Campaign. "If current trends continue, oil and gas development, in combination with other land uses, will likely drive the sage grouse toward extinction."

"The long-term declines of the sage grouse are serious, if this species is to remain viable and to occur within all states and provinces within its historical range," added Braun. "If major increases in oil and gas development occur within key habitats for sage grouse, Holloran's study clearly indicates that local extinction of populations will occur within the next 20 years. Extinction of local populations results in a highly fragmented distribution of sage grouse."

Holloran concluded that "greater sage-grouse in western Wyoming avoid breeding within or near the development boundaries of natural gas fields," (p. 56), and recommended establishing "refugia" areas adjacent to oil and gas fields. Here, sage grouse populations could be protected and enhanced to re-establish well-field populations after the eventual departure of the oil industry.

"During the upcoming revision of the Pinedale BLM Resource Management Plan, some areas in the valley like the Wind River Front must be considered as inappropriate for oil and gas leasing and development, to allow safe harbor for reservoir populations of sage-grouse, and to replace those grouse that no longer inhabit densely developed gas fields," said Linda Baker of the Upper Green River Valley Coalition.

"In the southern Red Desert, oil and gas fields already underway or currently being approved stretch across more than 2,750 square miles," Molvar said. "If these projects are approved by the BLM for full-field development, there will be no breaks in between them to provide refugia for sage grouse."

"This area encompasses one of the two largest sage grouse lek concentrations in Wyoming, in the proposed Creston - Blue Gap and Atlantic Rim project areas," Molvar added. "Even though all of this area is prime sage grouse habitat, I don't see how sage grouse will survive here unless the BLM takes a fundamentally different approach to oil and gas development than it has in the past."

The study, conducted by Matt Holloran through the Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit at the University of Wyoming, was funded by the Bureau of Land Management, the Wyoming Game and Fish Department, and the oil and gas industry. A brief synopsis of the study's findings follows.

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