The Hart Mountain Conservation Corridor

Author: Anne White and Mark Salvo  |  Published: October 29, 2024  | Category: Deep Dive

This article originally appeared in the Fall + Winter 2024 Desert Ramblings


The Oregon desert wildlands between two iconic national wildlife refuges offer some of the best remaining wildlife habitat and connectivity in the West.

The sharp and woody aroma of sagebrush, baked by the heat of the day, perfumes the air. Here in the high desert, it is so quiet you can hear the sun’s buzzing energy as it warms the air and births gusts of wind. By evening a seemingly endless expanse of sagebrush glimmers gold in the waning light of the setting sun, transforming to soft green with a hint of blue in the shadow of dusk.

This public land between Hart Mountain National Antelope Refuge and Sheldon National Wildlife Refuge—spanning more than 860 square miles in southeastern Oregon—provides essential, intact habitat for hundreds of species dependent on sagebrush ecosystems. The region’s wildlife includes three esteemed ambassadors of the sagebrush steppe: the quirky greater sage-grouse, the fleet-footed pronghorn and the diminutive pygmy rabbit, all of which thrive in this sagebrush stronghold—the Hart Mountain Conservation Corridor.

ONDA has launched a campaign to protect the Hart Mountain Conservation Corridor and its essential wildlife habitat. Here, we profile the charming ambassadors that are in need of urgent conservation action to sustain their survival.

Protecting the Quirky Greater Sage-Grouse
Photo: Barb Rumer

There is perhaps no species more emblematic of the Hart Mountain Conservation Corridor than the greater sage-grouse. These birds are well camouflaged in their high desert habitat, blending in with the sagebrush they rely on for cover, nesting and sustenance. However, each spring the males purposefully stand out as they perform their highly choreographed dance at leks in an attempt to impress potential mates. Young sage-grouse depend on the rich diversity of wildflowers—called forbs—and insects in the region, consuming as many as 34 species of forbs and 41 species of insects in spring and summer. Come winter, the diet for all sage-grouse is comprised solely of sagebrush, making healthy, robust sagebrush ecosystems critical to the survival of the species.

Sage-grouse populations have been declining in Oregon for decades, and the Hart Mountain Conservation Corridor represents one of the six core habitats remaining for the species in the American West. Protecting this large, intact expanse of sagebrush is crucial to conserving the grouse.

Connecting Habitat for the Fleet-Footed Pronghorn
Photo: Hayden Connor

Pronghorn are the fastest mammals in North America, capable of reaching speeds of more than 60 miles per hour. Poetically dubbed “prairie ghost,” pronghorn have been roaming the sagebrush steppe for 1 million years. Everything about pronghorn, from their oversized heart, lungs and trachea to their flexible spines and bulky leg muscles evolved to support high speed sprinting. Large protruding eyes allowing nearly a 360-degree field of vision and the equivalent of eight-times magnification allows pronghorn to easily detect danger from afar. These adaptations were key to escaping prehistoric predators such as the North American cheetah, saber-tooth tiger and hyena.

The wildlands in the Hart Mountain Conservation Corridor support a vital migration corridor for thousands of pronghorn each year as they move between their summer and winter ranges on Hart Mountain and Sheldon refuges. Pronghorn have been documented traveling as far as 100 miles during their seasonal migration here, browsing on the abundant grasses and forbs the region has to offer. More than 8,000 pronghorn have been counted in the Conservation Corridor, though recent censuses have estimated the population has declined by nearly half.

Preserving Core Habitat for the Diminutive Pygmy Rabbit
Photo: John Marshall

Few are lucky enough to glimpse the elusive pygmy rabbit, which spends much of its time hiding in its underground burrow system. Weighing between a half pound to just over a pound, pygmy rabbits are the world’s smallest rabbit and the only rabbit in the U.S. that industriously digs its own burrow—mainly doing so beneath sagebrush plants. Pygmy rabbits are highly dependent on intact sagebrush, which comprises virtually all of their winter diet and provides essential cover from predators.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is reviewing whether the rabbit should be listed under the Endangered Species Act. Recent research has identified the Hart Mountain Conservation Corridor as one of the most important core pygmy rabbit habitats in the West, providing a critical haven for this sensitive species.

A Landscape Worth Protecting

While the Hart and Sheldon refuges offer more than 840,000 acres of protected sagebrush habitat for wildlife, the 550,000 acres of desert public land connecting these sagebrush reserves, the Hart Mountain Conservation Corridor, is unprotected and vulnerable. The Corridor is currently available for mining, road construction and energy transmission. Should development proposals in this region gain traction, the refuges would become disconnected islands less capable of supporting wildlife. Protecting large landscapes is key to providing connected, climate resilient habitats wildlife need to survive. Proactive landscape-scale protections like those proposed for the Conservation Corridor are particularly important in a changing climate, where successful wildlife adaptation requires populations to move long distances to find food, water and needed habitat conditions.

Plans for Protection

ONDA has been advocating for protection of this vital corridor since the 1990s. Three decades of effort are now culminating in two major Bureau of Land Management planning processes: the Lakeview Resource Management Plan Amendment and the sage-grouse conservation strategy.

The Lakeview plan is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to finally protect the essential wildlife habitat in the Hart Mountain Conservation Corridor. The onset of this planning process is entirely the product of ONDA’s conservation advocacy, and our campaign is pressing the agency to protect the Conservation Corridor to support biodiversity, mitigate climate change impacts and ensure this rich ecological community thrives for generations to come.

ONDA is also advocating for conservation outcomes in the BLM’s sage-grouse conservation strategy, which overlays the same region. These agency efforts are complementary as the sage-grouse strategy could fill potential gaps in the Lakeview plan, specially designating sage-grouse habitat and restricting land use and development deemed harmful to the species.

ONDA is deeply engaged in both of these processes so that sage-grouse, pronghorn, pygmy rabbit and generations of desert lovers may enjoy this quintessential landscape. Your advocacy during this rare window of opportunity will ensure a healthy and vital future for the Hart Mountain Conservation Corridor’s compelling wildlands and wildlife.

 

 

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Wildflower Poetry Reading

Wildflower Poetry Reading

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Sage-grouse Mating Dance

Sage-grouse Mating Dance

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Michelle Frisella, member since 2017

Michelle Frisella, member since 2017

So proud of ONDA and its members and volunteers. Such hard work gets done. To use an overused word, this is patriotism!