The American or Pine marten is one of Wisconsin's most beautiful and most endangered animals. For the Ojibway People, the pine marten is considered to be a clan animal. Clan animals are an important part of Ojibway culture which is reflected in the Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission’s leadership role in marten study and conservation. With only a few hundred of the cat-sized furbearers left in the state, the pine marten’s population rests dangerously close to extinction.

Pine marten are experiencing steep decline in Wisconsin. In the Nicolet National Forest, WDNR mammalian tracking surveys have shown declines and timber harvest is planned in the middle of the only two core marten habitats in Wisconsin. On the Chequamegon side of the CNNF, 150 marten were released into the forest by 1990. Today, the best estimates suggest fewer than 50 animals remain. Virtually no young marten are being found on the Chequamegon. This indicates that there is not a viable breeding population in at least one of the two marten populations found in Wisconsin.

Of major importance for marten is finding standing living hollow trees for their birthing dens. Yellow birch are perhaps the most important tree for the marten. These birch grow big, often have hollow wound spaces and can stay alive with these wounds. This makes for a den tree that won't fall over as easily in a storm like the standing dead trees or snag that wood peckers like. In 1986, Wisconsin's DNR commented to the U.S. Forest Service that managing for yellow birch is important for marten recovery. Meanwhile yellow birch are in decline.

"Yellow birch are not doing well in Wisconsin's national forests. The short rotation logging practiced by the Forest Service boosts deer populations, and these deer eat most yellow birch seedlings. When the occasional birch tree escapes browsing, it is felled before it can die a natural death and fall to the forest floor. These large, fallen yellow birch become critical nurse log habitats for the next generation of yellow birch,..." -, Tom Rooney, Ph.D. Botany Researcher, UW Madison.

HEC was quite concerned with what we found in the Forest Service documents surrounding the Northwest Howell timber sale. Yellow birch were removed in marten habitat through a single tree species selection harvest called high grading. Hiking through the Howell we found virtually no yellow birch. Hiking through the Cayuga, the timber sale in the only other habitat core for marten, we found a great percentage of yellow birch marked to be cut down. Thankfully HEC was sucessful in our lawsuit, and for now, these trees are still standing. Below are pictures of yellow birch marked to be cut down in the Cayuga marten habitat. These are copyrighted 2005 Ricardo Jomarron and HEC. Please ask for permission to use these. Much larger print size ones are available.

READ: October 24th Ashland Daily Press Article featuring pine marten le.

Below are interview clips with Wisconsin's leading scientist studying Wisconsin's Pine marten, Jon Gilbert, Ph.D. of the Great Lakes Indian fish and Wildlife Commission or GLIFWC.