New Mexico mouse becomes symbol of tension between conservation, industry

Jun. 21—The New Mexico meadow jumping mouse is a little creature with big friends.

The endangered species has advocates in environmental groups and protection provided by the federal government.

But the Arizona-based Center for Biological Diversity contends the federal government isn't adequately defending the mouse and its habitat from cattle ranching, and has informed the government it intends to sue this summer.

Organization co-founder Robin Silver said federal agencies have done "an incredibly poor job" of protecting the species. The mouse's numbers are too small to count in isolated pockets of New Mexico and Arizona, he said.

"Nobody knows for sure [how many are left] because the population is so fragile," Silver said.

The mouse also has a muscular adversary. Cattle ranchers say the protections granted to the species have blocked their access to some prime grazing areas and streams. The tension is one of many examples of the conflicting interests of industries and those advocating for various endangered and threatened species.

The plight of the New Mexico meadow jumping mouse also shows how the federal government gets squeezed between those competing interests.

"They would have the environmentalists attacking the Forest Service from one side," said Manuel Lucero, the head of a group of ranchers in the Jemez Springs area. "And they would have the ranchers attacking them from the other side."

A spokeswoman for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service wrote in an email: "The Forest Service and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service are committed to the protection of the New Mexico meadow jumping mouse. Using the best available science, we are working together to conserve [threatened and endangered] listed species and also provide for traditional forest uses."

Many ranchers say it defies common sense to protect species vigorously at the expense of those who provide food for the world.

"We're the ones that are becoming extinct," said Randell Major, president of the New Mexico Cattle Growers Association. "It's getting harder and harder to make a living in New Mexico."

The New Mexico meadow jumping mouse is about 8 inches long, but the majority of that length is in the tail. They live near streams, need long grasses and vegetation for food and protection, and they hibernate for eight or nine months a year. Cattle, elk and deer trample the grasses and make them uninhabitable for the mice.

Some environmentalists say the importance of the mouse stems in part from the role the species plays in revealing the decline of critical habitat along creeks and streams. And as the habitat is transformed, the watershed and water flow in the area also are affected. The federal government listed the mouse as endangered seven years ago.

"The two go together, the species and the habitat," said Teresa Seamster, Northern New Mexico conservation chairwoman for the Sierra Club. "It's all connected."

The Fish and Wildlife Service lists more than 125 mammals and birds nationwide as endangered, and there are more reptiles, amphibians and fish species listed. Endangered mammals include the Mexican gray wolf, jaguar and Florida panther, as well as many species of mice, rats, bats, rabbits and squirrels.

Endangered species generally are in peril of going extinct while threatened species are likely to become endangered soon.

Conflicts between endangered species and people dot the history of the nation's Endangered Species Act, which is credited with helping improve the prospects for survival of the whooping crane, bald eagle, grizzly bear and gray wolf. The law passed in 1973 under President Richard Nixon.

Nationwide, classic cases of the tension include the snail darter, a small fish that for years held up completion of the Tellico Dam in Tennessee. The northern spotted owl became famous 30 years ago for protections given to it that the timber industry said impaired business in the Pacific Northwest and elsewhere.

In 2019, a court fight over federal monitoring of the threatened Mexican spotted owl temporarily shut down all timber activity in national forests across New Mexico.

Protections for other endangered or threatened species in New Mexico — the meadow jumping mouse, lesser prairie chicken, dunes sagebrush lizard and Mexican gray wolf — have conflicted with the interests of ranchers, wind energy companies, and oil and gas producers.

Kelly and Spike Goss, cattle ranchers in the Lincoln National Forest in Southern New Mexico, say they have fought the federal government for cattle grazing rights for years in battles centered on protected species.

Spike Goss said of federal government officials: "They break you mentally, physically and financially." The Goss family, based in the town of Weed, clashed with the federal government in the 1990s over logging rights and protection of the Mexican spotted owl.

Since then it has been one fight after another over grazing, water rights, habitat and the mouse.

"They just keep taking and taking our most valuable water and forage," Kelly Goss said.

The family grazed about 550 cattle on the property 20 years ago but have been squeezed to about 410 now, they said.

The Gosses said they are willing to settle for a price, perhaps $12 million, with the government and give up.

"This is our culture, but at this point we're just spent," Kelly Goss said.

The couple said there is no way they would pass their rights to a roughly 120,000-acre grazing area down to younger relatives because they wouldn't inflict the headaches on them.

Mouse and habitat protections such as electric fences bar cattle from stream water. The Gosses contend elk in the region do far more harm to the critical habitat of the mouse than cattle.

Silver of the Center for Biological Diversity said there have been many dozens of situations over the past four years in which ranchers have committed federal grazing violations in the Sacramento Mountains of New Mexico's Lincoln National Forest.

Silver said the cattle are entering forbidden, supposedly fenced-off areas and grinding down the mouse's habitat.

The value of the mouse is clear to him, Silver added. The strength of the mouse's population represents the health of high-elevation mountain habitat and streams.

Further, he said, as a medical doctor, he knows species like the mouse "have some unique adaptations" that can help scientists understand, for instance, how species hibernate without suffering blood clots and other diseases.

And, he said, "it is not for us to decide what species lives and dies."

Bryan Bird, a Santa Fe-based program director for Defenders of Wildlife, said: "I would agree with the Center for Biological Diversity that the feds are just not doing enough to turn that situation around."

But Bird said he sees reason for hope in partnerships such as one involving a cattlemen's association in the Santa Fe National Forest. The goal is coexistence.

The San Diego Cattlemen's Association struggled with the U.S. Forest Service over grazing until Michael Lucero started working with Trout Unlimited a few years ago, said Manuel Lucero, who now is president of the association.

Trout Unlimited and the association worked together to replace damaged waterlines and install new waterlines above streams so cattle wouldn't have to drink from that stream and damage mouse habitat.

"Trout Unlimited has been a great partner to have," Manuel Lucero said, adding his association appreciates the fishermen group's "willingness to understand our livelihood."

Brian Riley, district ranger of the Santa Fe National Forest's Jemez Ranger District, said the cattlemen's group, Trout Unlimited and the Forest Service have been among the entities that have contributed volunteers and money to projects that enable the ranchers to keep their cattle off the streams. Those include fencing, water storage tanks and livestock tanks from which the cattle can drink.

Toner Mitchell of Trout Unlimited said the Luceros have been "very patient" and "willing to adapt their views" to allow partnership.

Trout Unlimited wants cold-water streams on which fishermen can practice their hobby, and ranchers want to graze their cattle nearby. "It's a conflict that has turned into a more innovative effort," Mitchell said.

Manuel Lucero said he doesn't want to sound like he knows how it's done. Cattlemen have different challenges. "This is what works for us," Lucero said.

A couple of years ago, the U.S. Forest Service honored the cattlemen's association and Trout Unlimited with an award for their partnership.

The award acknowledged fighting is a losing strategy, but working together is the way to get things done.