Ronald Reed: Washington’s public lands deserve better: Science, stewardship, and the path forward

By Ronald Reed

ProPublica and High Country News recently released a sweeping investigation into livestock grazing on public lands across the West. Their reporting revealed a system in trouble: environmental reviews skipped, scientific warnings ignored or edited out, understaffed agencies unable to monitor damage, and political pressure shaping outcomes from the top down. It’s a system that prioritizes private interests over healthy ecosystems, wildlife, and the public good – all subsidized by taxpayers.

Washington is not exempt from these failures. A newly filed lawsuit against the Colville National Forest shows this dysfunction has taken root here at home.

According to the Forest Service’s analysis, nearly 70% of acreage within existing Colville allotments is incapable of sustaining livestock. More than half provides little or no forage, and ecological conditions were documented as declining across vast areas – including riparian zones, high-elevation basins, and habitat vital to wolves, Canada lynx, grizzly bears and threatened bull trout. Under federal law, these findings should have triggered significant changes. Instead, the agency renewed grazing across nearly the entire landscape.

When cattle are turned into steep, forested, or fragile terrain, ecological damage and livestock–predator conflict follow as a matter of course. Yet when this predictable cycle unfolds, wolves – instead of the management failures responsible – are blamed and killed, leaving wildlife, watersheds, and the public to absorb the consequences.

This is the same pattern ProPublica documented across the West. Washington should not accept this as the status quo. We have the opportunity – and responsibility – to pursue a science-based approach that protects both working lands and wildlife.

Coexistence strategies have proven effective over more than two decades, and when appropriately implemented, nonlethal deterrents reduce conflict by more than 90%. But successful coexistence depends on more than isolated tools. It requires thoughtful implementation and management of those proven solutions to the ongoing conflict we’ve seen in Washington over the past decade.

Properly implemented, range riding is one of the most important foundations of responsible public-lands grazing. Skilled riders help ensure that:

• Cattle stay in areas with suitable forage rather than drifting into timber or riparian zones where environmental damage occurs, forage is limited, and predator encounters are more likely.

• Stocking levels match actual forage availability, not outdated assumptions that inflate the land’s capacity and set producers up for conflict.

• Predator-livestock interactions are avoided because cattle are monitored daily and kept away from den sites, rendezvous areas, and other high-risk terrain.

This is the model behind successful coexistence programs across the West – from Idaho’s Wood River Wolf Project to Montana’s Tom Miner Basin and proven successful efforts in Oregon. These communities have learned what Washington needs to institutionalize: range riding and other proven non-lethal tools are the backbone of a functional, science-based grazing system.

Responsible grazing requires honest assessments of habitat, transparent decision-making, and the willingness to adapt when the land is overstressed. The Colville lawsuit is not an effort to end grazing; it seeks to ensure it occurs where the landscape can sustain it, and in ways that protect the long-term health of our forests and wildlife.

Washingtonians care deeply about their public lands and native species. Polls show strong support for wolves and for science-based management. Our policies should reflect those values. We should insist that agencies follow their own science, modernize grazing practices, mandate adequate range riding, and make ecological integrity – not political expediency – the foundation of public-lands stewardship.

If we summon the will to make these changes, Washington can lead the West toward a model of stewardship rooted in science, coexistence and shared responsibility.

Our forests – and the generations who will inherit them – deserve nothing less.

Ronald D. Reed, of Spokane, is the retired CEO of PacifiCAD Inc. and an environmental advocate with over a decade of experience in conservation. He was a co-founder and former board member at Washington Wildlife First and has served on multiple advisory boards, including the Gonzaga University School of Communication and Leadership and Eastern Washington University College of STEM.