Land Swap Takes Root After Rare Orchid Protected Forest Service Keeps 40-Acre Parcel With Sensitive Flower In Deal With State

Idaho won’t have to bother taking care of a pesky rare orchid on land it wants to log.

The state Land Board on Wednesday approved a large land exchange with the U.S. Forest Service, minus the 40 acres on which the delicate, purple-and-green clustered lady slipper is growing.

Attorney General Al Lance was indignant that the Forest Service had proposed an agreement with the state asking Idaho to protect the flower, which he referred to as “this ruby slipper.”

“The local Forest Service representative decided that he wanted to put deed restrictions in it to request us to protect this species that’s not even listed in the Endangered Species Act,” Lance said.

He sent a letter to Idaho’s congressional delegation complaining about the proposal.

“The state could have ended up with some liability for this sensitive species,” Lance said.

The patch of orchids was actually only growing on 23 acres of the 2,270 acres of timber land that the Forest Service first proposed to swap to the state. The federal land is in the Floodwood area east of Clarkia.

The Forest Service proposed an agreement that the state wouldn’t log those 23 acres.

Land Board members were divided on the proposal when it came up in August, with then-Gov. Phil Batt arguing that it was just like any other easement or encumbrance that might come with a piece of land. “I don’t see much wrong with this myself,” he said then.

And state Controller J.D. Williams said the proposed agreement might let the state prove it could be a good environmental steward.

But Lance opposed the idea as a federal intrusion, and then-schools Superintendent Anne Fox suggested, “Someone could come in there some night and shoot every orchid they found with weed killer, and the problem would go away.”

State Lands Department real estate bureau chief Perry Whittaker said, “Both agencies felt it was probably best to pull the 40 acres out that contained that sensitive species, so that species is not in it.”

Now, the state will trade 1,880 acres of steep land located mostly in a federal grizzly bear management area about 20 miles northeast of Sandpoint. In return, it will get 2,680 acres of federal timber land, mostly in the Clarkia area but also including two parcels south of Cocolalla near Bayview.

The land on both sides of the swap was appraised at $6.24 million.

The state has been interested in the swap to get land that’s more suited to timber harvesting.

The 40-acre section that includes the orchids growing amid a grove of old cedar trees will now become a federal “in-holding” inside the new state land.

“They could secure an easement from the state of Idaho to use their 40 acres, or they could use a helicopter,” Lance said.

“I think Congress needs to take a look at it and figure out who’s making policy,” Lance said.

The Forest Service classifies the clustered lady slipper as sensitive - one step below listing it as threatened. The plant thrives in old-growth timber, and a Forest Service botanist called the Floodwood patch of it “an important find.”

This sidebar appeared with the story: LOCAL ROOTS The rare orchid once grew atop Fernan Hill, but was wiped out when the land was developed into subdivisions. Only six other small patches of the clustered lady slipper have been identified in North Idaho.