Opinion ID: 3040620
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Ecological Setting

Text: [9] First, the Alliance challenges the Service’s finding that the North Cascades and the Puget Trough do not constitute unusual or unique ecological settings for the taxon.10 The North Cascades habitat is notable for its lack of oak trees, which are the main source of winter foods in most of the sub10 The Alliance does not dispute the Service’s finding that the South Cascades habitat is similar to habitats in Oregon, and therefore not unique. Final Finding, 68 Fed. Reg. at 34636. 1234 NORTHWEST ECOYSTEM ALLIANCE v. USFWS species’ range. Gray squirrels in the North Cascades, as noted, subsist primarily on the seeds of pine trees. The Alliance believes that the lack of oak trees compels the finding that the North Cascades habitat is a unique ecological setting. However, the Service offered reasonable grounds for its contrary conclusion. While recognizing that oak trees are absent from the North Cascades, the Service emphasized that “throughout their range, western gray squirrels consume a variety of types of tree seeds, including many conifer species.” Final Finding, 68 Fed. Reg. at 34,636. In other words, the North Cascades habitat is not unique, because the squirrels there consume conifer tree seeds just as they do in a variety of habitats. That reasoning is not arbitrary or capricious. [10] The Alliance also attacks the Service’s finding on the Puget Trough habitat. Unlike the North Cascades, the Puget Trough is notable for its concentration of oak trees, which makes the Puget Trough’s vegetation more homogenous than elsewhere in the subspecies’ range. In contrast, “[e]lsewhere in the subspecies’ range, Oregon white oaks occur in communities having a wider range of mast-producing tree species, including a variety of oak and pine species.” Id. at 34,636. While recognizing the concentration of oak in the Puget Trough habitat, the Service concluded that the difference between the Puget Trough and other habitats “are not so great” as to constitute a “unique or unusual ecological setting for the western gray squirrel.” Id. Although the Service could have explained its reasoning in more detail, it is clear in context that the Service had in mind the widespread persistence of the Oregon white oak throughout the subspecies’ range. Because it is undisputed that Oregon white oaks are not unique to the Puget Trough habitat, the Service’s conclusion was not arbitrary or capricious.