Story Photos
 Photo Bill Wagner Cathlamet biologist Al Clark recently received national recognition for his work to rebuild populations of Columbian white-tailed deer. He holds a device that helps track down radio-collared deer. |
Deer Heart
Saturday, April 26, 2003 9:19 AM PDT
By Eric Apalategui
Printable version
E-mail this articleAl Clark has spent his entire 26-year career as a federal biologist trying to protect a species of small deer that hides in thick brush and pocket meadows along the lower Columbia River.
His employer, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, recently honored Clark's success in shepherding the Columbian white-tailed deer's comeback when it named him one of its "Recovery Champions."
Clark, 60, is a biologist at the Julia Butler Hansen Refuge for the Columbian White-tailed Deer, located on the mainland and islands near Cathlamet.
"He definitely is deserving," said his supervisor, Jessica Gonzales. She is deputy director of the Willapa National Wildlife Refuge complex, which includes Julia Butler. "He's an excellent biologist and he's literally put his life into the recovery of that species."
Clark is one of just two Washington-based USFW employees recently given Individual Achievement Awards for fiscal year 2002. The other is Tim Cummings, a Vancouver-based biologist working on bull trout recovery.
Clark also supervises other biologists in the Willapa complex and has worked with species ranging from birds to amphibians.
"You name it, we get involved with it. That's one thing that makes it such a good job," he said earlier this week. "But the deer have certainly been number one with me."
He and other biologists have studied the habitat that white-tailed deer need for forage and protection in a region vastly changed in the more than 150 years since white settlers started altering the landscape.
At the refuge, where Clark lives with his wife, Diane, the staff has been restoring habitat and native plants lost to diking, farming practices and invasive species.
Additionally, since 1999 they have relocated nearly 90 deer from private lands on Puget Island, near Westport and the refuge mainland to Crims, Fisher and Lord islands.
Today, there are 600 to 800 white-tails along the lower river. That population is large enough for their removal from a long list of threatened and endangered species protected under the Endangered Species Act.
In the United States, about 1,300 native species have been listed under the federal ESA law. Of those endangered or threatened species, just six animals -- including gray whales and peregrine falcons -- and two plants have been removed from the list due to recovery.
However, the Columbia's white-tails won't join that select list until their population is dispersed to more protected habitats, making them less vulnerable to natural or human-caused disaster. The only other Columbian white-tails are part of a larger population near Roseburg, Ore.
If the new island populations thrive and the deer overcome other hurdles, delisting could occur within five years, Clark said.
In addition to having secure habitat, one of the greatest threats to the deer is the growing number of coyotes, which prey on young deer.
"We didn't anticipate that to be quite such a problem," Clark said. "It's amazing how effective coyotes can be at hunting and catching fawns."
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