From the relatively liberal Bay Area it's easy to scorn the great timber companies of the Pacific Northwest as they try their darndest to hack voraciously through the tiny remaining fragments of old growth redwood and Doug fir—spotted owls be damned. Dr. Suess' The Lorax always come to my mind as the quintessential, simple statement against the pillagers: those who with "super axe-whackers" cut and cut until the dull thud of the last Truffula Tree hitting the ground is heard in the distance. And all to make sneaths, sneaths, those wonderful things that everyone needs (for those who don't remember, sneaths were like sweaters). A classic tale of greed and ignorance's triumph over nature.

Luckily, the enlightened Silicon Valley isn't like those backwards timber towns dominated by a single industry, holding locals families hostage to corporate success. No, here we have San Jose's "Sustainable City" plan and the Manufacturing Group's (a powerful coalition of many of the Valley's high-tech firms) proud publication every year of "What We're Doing for the Environment."

Juvenile Burrowing Owl ©1997 Peter LaTourrette

Think again. As I write from the chapter offices, I've just received about my fifteenth call this year from a passionate lover of Burrowing Owls. The calls are depressingly similar: a bulldozer just ran over..., development stakes have gone up where once..., they've just disked the field at..., there's just no room for our owls anymore out here at....

They're clearcutting the Valley. They leave behind pavement instead of stumps , but the results are the same; in the cast of characters, only the names have changed. We have Councilpeople Fernandez of San Jose or Klietzman of Mountain View playing the role of the parochial local legislator, with their mantras of jobs and housing, jobs and housing, can't choose wildlife over people (as if that were the real choice).

Instead of Louisiana Pacific or Weyerhauser, we have the giant high-techies. Makers of the Silicon Sneaths (what everyone needs). Just as the big timber companies run picturesque adds of forests, lakes, and the children who enjoy them, our companies assure us that they are the most responsible (and Santa Clara County has more Superfund toxic sites than any other County in America), the most caring for their communities (but never mind that their employees go through hellish commutes on bigger and bigger freeways), the most concerned for the environment (except those pesky owls).

Of course, there are differences between our cities and the timber towns of the Northwest. Their owls have spots, ours burrow underground. Many of the northwest logging towns do truly rely on logging; if the mill can't get more timber, families really will suffer. I don't think we can say the same here. Unemployment is incredibly low; affluence surrounds us (granted, not everyone). As one of the chapter's Board members put it recently, our region is like a millionaire who, instead of thinking about how best to use his money, thinks solely of how to acquire more. In that way, we surely are worse than the clearcutters of the Northwest. We can more easily afford to make other choices.

If and when the Burrowing Owl is placed on the endangered species list, we will no doubt hear the same cries of "foul" that we have from the timber companies and timber towns. What do you mean SuperMicroSiliSystems can't build 2 million square feet of office space just because of a few owls? The environmentalists will be called unreasonable, extremists. However, if that day comes, it will simply be a testament to the incompetence of some of our corporate and community leaders—our home-grown clearcutters.

The Last of the Truffula Seeds
Just as in The Lorax there is a glimmer of hope on the last page (as the old Onceler hands a seed to the young narrator), so we have hope locally for our dwindling Burrowing Owl population. One year ago in the September '96 Avocet we announced a campaign to create a regional Burrowing Owl habitat plan. We can proudly report good progress in this effort.

Last fall a letter was sent to Doug Wheeler, Secretary for Resources in California, from SCVAS, Ohlone Audubon in Alameda County, and the Burrowing Owl Consortium, a group of scientists and policy makers. The letter asked him to direct the Department of Fish and Game (DFG) to develop a plan for owls in the South Bay. At first, we received no response. So we asked local legislators to join us in that request, and a couple of them did. Then, not surprisingly, we got a positive response.

Wheeler has directed that the creation of a habitat plan for our owls is a priority for DFG in this region. With the help of DFG biologist Martha Schauss and many others, the first regional meeting was held in April. Perhaps 60 people attended, representing a number of cities and local agencies. All heard a day long series of talks about owl biology, habitat needs, their current status locally and elsewhere, and the factors leading to their demise.

Those meetings will continue, with goals being set for numbers and distribution of owls and their habitats, and recommendations for changes needed in development patterns or land management practices to keep owls here long-term.

Meanwhile, San Jose, with the bulk of the remaining owl habitat, has embarked on its own planning process. Through pressure from our chapter largely, the City agreed to hire a half-time planner to focus on owl issues and to dedicate $85,000 to hiring consultants and paying other expenses towards developing a regional plan. Hopefully, San Jose's plan and that of the Department of Fish and Game will be coordinated.

Further, San Jose has begun to request that some developers leave some land, at least temporarily, for owl habitat. By all the qualifiers in that last sentence you can see how tentative a step this is, but they are moving slowly in the right direction.

In addition, the County Fire Marshall's office—which is responsible for a lot of fire abatement motivated disking and mowing of land—has agreed to create a plan for changing their practices and generally being more careful in areas of owl habitat.

It's a start. Our chapter has raised the public attention on this issue higher than at any time in the past. We may yet be a long way from seeing Burrowing Owl populations stabilize and increase. Then again, I imagine a Truffula Tree doesn't grow that quickly either.

Last modified on August 18, 2005.