NORDMAN, Idaho — There appears to be no smoothing over the differences between two groups disagreeing over whether to stop grooming snowmobile trails to protect endangered caribou in northern Idaho.
"This has nothing to do with caribou," said Ken Wimer, owner of Priest Lake Yamaha Polaris, a snowmobile dealership. "It's about fund raising. It's to drive us out of the woods."
"These are public resources," said Mark Sprengel, director of the Selkirk Conservation Alliance. "They belong to 300 million Americans. They don't belong to a handful of yahoos up at Nordman."
In December, a federal judge in Spokane, Wash., barred snowmobile trail grooming for the rest of the season in some of northern Idaho's most popular snowmobiling areas to protect the last remaining caribou in the region. The order, in response to a lawsuit, did not prohibit snowmobiling, but ungroomed trails quickly become rough and impassable.
The ban halted grooming of trails on U.S. Forest Service land near Priest Lake. About 400 miles of trails on state land remain open, while about 77 miles of trails on Forest Service land are affected.
The Selkirk Conservation Alliance filed the lawsuit against the U.S. Forest Service with Defenders of Wildlife, Conservation Northwest, The Lands Council, Idaho Conservation League and the Center for Biological Diversity. The groups wanted snowmobiling restricted inside a 450,000-acre federally designated caribou recovery zone.
The suit also said the government failed to protect caribou in the region and ignored its own scientific reports that listed snowmobile harassment as one of the main threats to the caribou, only three of which were confirmed to be in far northern Idaho last year.
At the time of decision to ban grooming, Sprengel said suing the Forest Service was the last option after nearly two decades of pushing the agency to protect caribou.
Businesses who rely on snowmobilers say the ban is costing them money. Wimer said business at his snowmobile rental shop and dealership has been cut in half, and that he lost $120,000 in December because of the grooming ban.
"I can't withstand two seasons of this," Wimer said. "It will kill this business."
Randy Voltava, owner of Priest Lake Lodge, said skiers and snowshoers don't spend as much money as snowmobilers.
"They just want to come in and use the toilet," he said.
Some area snowmobile clubs and Priest Lake businesses have filed a countersuit in response to the caribou lawsuit.
They argue that the Forest Service should open all closed areas to snowmobiling, including 15,000 acres on the Selkirk Crest that have been closed since 1994.
But those who favor the ban say snowmobiles harm caribou either by direct harassment or by creating compact trails predators can use to reach the caribou. Caribou use large hoofs to walk atop deep snow to eat lichen off fir trees.
Wayne Wakkinen, a biologist with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game, said the lichen doesn't provide much nutrition but the snow protects the caribou from predators.
"They're not up there getting fat on lichen, but nobody's bothering them," Wakkinen said. "They get up pretty much as high as they can."
But lighter, more powerful snowmobiles have been able to penetrate those areas in recent years, causing the caribou to expend more energy and making it more difficult for them to withstand the winter.
Wimer said he was among the fewer than 10 percent of snowmobile riders he estimated went off the groomed trails.
Information from: The Spokesman-Review, www.spokesmanreview.com