OLYMPIC NATIONAL PARK — The last batch of fishers transplanted from British Columbia in a three-year effort to reintroduce the species to the Olympic Peninsula were released into the wilderness Saturday.
After some encouragement, 13 of the weasel-like animals burst from their wooden crates to the delight of those who came to watch the final releases into Olympic National Park — one at the Boulder Creek trailhead near the Glides Canyon Dam and another in the Quinault Valley at the southwest end of the park.
State Department of Fish and Wildlife and Olympic National Park staff spearheaded the fisher reintroduction on the North Olympic Peninsula, which was budgeted at about $200,000 a year.
The Peninsula is intended to be one of three areas in the state where the animals will be reintroduced.
The animals — which are related to minks, otters and martens — are native to the forests of Washington state, including those of the North Olympic Peninsula, but became extinct statewide about 70 years ago.
“We’re thrilled that we have started the restoration effort here,” Harriet Allen, Fish and Wildlife endangered species section manager, told the crowd of about 60 people at Boulder Creek.
“The successful [release] here is leading the way.”
Eight people attended the release in the Quinault Valley, said park spokeswoman Barb Maynes.
A total of 90 fishers have been reintroduced into the park during the last two winters. Biologists, who have tracked via radio collars, believe 70 have survived.
Some have traveled as far away as Ocean Shores or Neah Bay.
Patti Happe, park biologist, said 17 are confirmed dead and another three are presumed dead.
“Several have been hit by cars on [Highway] 101,” she said. “Some we find dead in the park.”
Although they are predators, they can also become prey, Happe said.
Along with the fatalities, there have also been births.
Happe said the births of seven fishers kits have been confirmed.
The reintroduction of about 40 fishers this winter is expected to significantly increase the birth rate, Fish and Wildlife biologist Jeff Lewis said.
Their populations are expected to climb, he said, possibly in the future reaching 150 in the park itself.
But how fast they will grow and when their population will reach that mark is hard to determine, Lewis added.
Impacts
Their eventual impact on the ecosystem is also unknown, he said, although biologists expect the fishers to fit right into the niche they filled before they were killed off by trappers and habitat destruction.
“We’re still learning a lot,” Lewis added.
Known in British Columbia for attacks on porcupines, fishers have to make do with other prey in the Olympics, which lack porcupines.
They eat snowshoe hares, rats and mice, squirrels, shrew, deer and elk carrion, and birds.
Lewis said that fishers also might consider as prey such endangered species as the marbled murrelet and spotted owl, but biologists are not concerned about their impact on those populations, he said, since those species are bigger than the animals fishers usually kill, and fisher populations are typically not very dense.
Lewis said the state is involved in the reintroduction of fishers as part of its responsibility for wildlife restoration.
He said the Peninsula’s population can’t be relied on to repopulate the rest of the state so, depending on funding, state Fish and Wildlife intends to reintroduce fishers into the Cascade Mountains and northeast Washington state.
Organizations such as Conservation Northwest, Doris Duke Foundation, Washington’s National Park Fund, and Wildlife Conservation Society contributed funds. The Lower Elwha Klallam and Makah tribes also have provided assistance.
Fishers were listed as a state-endangered species in 1998 by the state Fish and Wildlife Commission and were designated as a candidate for federal listing in 2004 by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service under the Endangered Species Act.
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Reporter Tom Callis can be reached at 360-417-3532 or at tom.callis@peninsuladailynews.com.