OFF PAGE ONE
Saturday, December 11, 2021
East Oregonian
Digital:
Continued from Page A1
Ben Lonergan/East Oregonian
An Oregon Department of Transportation snowplow clears slush from the highway shoulder Friday, Dec. 10, 2021,
along Interstate 84 near Meacham. ODOT is advising a lack of road maintenance employees could create delays in
removing snow this winter in Eastern Oregon.
Safety first
Winter:
Continued from Page A1
“It is hard to recruit when everybody
is paying more. It is hard to compete,”
Clark said.
ODOT’s problem is compounded by
the fact the road maintenance employ-
ees it needs must be skilled drivers with
commercial driver’s licenses. ODOT
will provide the training needed to earn
a CDL, but Clark said he would rather
hire drivers who have experience oper-
ating heavy equipment before they start
working in bad weather conditions.
Clark noted all inexperienced driv-
ers will be paired with experienced
ones initially to help them develop
skills.
“We will be taking them on training
rides,” he said.
He said it is possible the transpor-
tation department could bring in road
maintenance employees from other
parts of the state this winter to help with
snow removal.
Another concern of Clark’s is keep-
ing a supply of replacement parts avail-
able for snowplows. This is important
because replacement parts may be diffi-
cult to get quickly due to supply chain
issues.
“We have been trying to stock up,”
he said.
Clark said he has talented workers
who have multiple skills and is optimis-
tic things will go relatively smoothly
this winter.
“We are very fortunate because we
have very good employees,” Clark said.
Deer:
Continued from Page A1
The research showed
little interaction with the
other two carnivore species
in the study — black bears
and bobcats. Based on
photos, kill site investi-
gations and the lack of elk
found in their scat, Starkey
bobcats never scavenged on
cougar kills.
Ruprecht said bears
visited half of the cougar
kill sites monitored, but
only about one-third of the
bear scat surveyed contained
elk. No bears were found
killed by cougars, lead-
ing researchers to believe
there was little competition
between those two preda-
tors.
“They are scaveng-
ing, but not like coyotes,”
Ruprecht said. “My guess
is because they use so many
other food sources there is
less motivation to incur the
risk by potentially encoun-
tering a cougar.”
One of the takeaways,
Ruprecht said, was why
certain species do scavenge.
“There is risk involved
and decisions are made
under imperfect knowl-
edge of the proximity of a
cougar,” Ruprecht said.
In some cases the coyote
knows the cougar is there,
Ruprecht said, incurring a
lot of risk.
“An animal who is starv-
ing is going to take more
risk to get a meal,” Ruprecht
said.
noted it is never a good idea to pass a
Sipp said anyone interested in snowplow, especially because ODOT
working for ODOT this winter should now has winged plows with blades on
both sides. He said drivers who find
contact the department.
“We want people to look to us for themselves behind plows are actually
employment,” he said. “We want people in a good position.
“The best place you can be in a
who will enjoy doing this every day.”
Ken Patterson, area manager for storm is behind a snowplow,” Strand-
ODOT’s Region 5, said motorists berg said, adding one caveat — drivers
should be patient this winter since should never get too close to snowplows
there may be times when snow will not because they do make stops.
be cleared as quickly as expected. He
This winter, ODOT crews again
encourages people to
will be following
avoid driving when
the agency’s Winter
“WE WANT
conditions are poor.
Levels of Service
He said drivers should
guidelines, which
PEOPLE
monitor ODOT’s road
prioritize the roads
TO LOOK
cameras on its Trip
that receive the most
Check website to
service. The guide-
TO
US
FOR
make sure road condi-
lines indicate I-84
tions are good before
EMPLOYMENT. receives the high-
they start a trip.
est priority in Union
WE WANT
Patterson noted many
County, Strandberg
additional cameras on
PEOPLE WHO
said.
Interstate 84 between
Regardless of
WILL ENJOY
La Grande and Pend-
where
one is driv-
leton have been
DOING
THIS
ing
in
this region,
installed within the
Patterson
said it is
past two years.
EVERY DAY.”
important to under-
Strandberg also
— Craig Sipp, manager
stand state road
pointed out the
of ODOT’s Region 5
department main-
de pa r t me nt t he
tenance employees
past two years has
“take personal pride
added about a dozen
message boards between La Grande in what they are doing” and care enor-
and Pendleton. The message boards mously about safety.
“We all have friends and family who
alert drivers to upcoming conditions,
including the presence of snow, ice, are also traveling and we want them to
fog, slow traffic and accidents. Strand- get to where they are going safely,” he
berg also urged drivers to be patient and said.
turns scavenging and take
turns keeping watch — and
they communicate to alert
others of a potential risk or
hazard.”
Levi said the study is part
of a larger body of work the
Oregon Department of Fish
and Wildlife and the U.S.
Forest Service are conduct-
ing that includes population
dynamics and nutrition as
well as the drastic culling
of Starkey’s three elk herds,
through hunting and trans-
planting.
Mike Wisdom, Star-
key ungulate ecology team
leader with the Forest
Service, said the predator
research related to earlier
research from the 1990s and
2000s that indicated inter-
ference competition between
deer and elk.
“One species might
intimidate another into
being displaced,” Wisdom
said.
A series of analyses and
publications indicated elk
used the landscape in a way
that met their needs while
mule deer were avoiding elk.
Over time, elk changed their
use of the landscape, and
mule deer moved to other
areas elk were not using.
“It became a concern in
the fact that mule deer are
declining in large areas at
Starkey, throughout Eastern
Oregon, and across other
areas of the U.S.,” Wisdom
said.
Increasing elk popu-
lations might be causing
This is a problem, Moss
stated, because of the “uncer-
tainty of COVID-19 variants
and the possibility of a future
date when people once again are
pressed to depend on the inter-
net for school, medical services
and more.”
Angie Hanson, a grand-
mother of two boys, was among
the people who noticed the prob-
lems resulting from unreliable
internet access. Local children
were not able to attend online
school from their homes, so she
organized a home school in the
Gilliam and Bisbee Building in
Heppner. There, around a dozen
local children, including her
grandsons, could connect with
classes online.
These students, Hanson said,
would work on their online
classes from 7:30 a.m. to noon
on school days. A former educa-
tional assistant, she would help
them.
“I couldn’t see these kids slip
through the cracks,” she said.
All of these children were
neighbors or family members
with one another, she explained,
so they already were in close
contact with one another and
their communal schooling was
not increasing their chance
of coronavirus exposure. Not
everyone, then, was able to be
part of Hanson’s solution to the
connection problem.
Moss credited County
Commissioner Melissa Lind-
say for playing a major role in
supporting digital inclusion
and understanding the trou-
bles. Lindsay acknowledged the
inability for students to connect
virtually to their classes.
“A lot of kids were learn-
ing from cars in a parking lot,”
she said.
Others, such as Hanson’s
class, were meeting together
with adult leadership, she said.
Such students would have been
better served if they had access
to reliable internet, as enjoyed in
other cities, she said.
Lindsay also said she heard
from elderly people who were
leery of going to in-person
doctors. Virtual appointments
could have helped them, she
said, but they skipped appoint-
ments because, in addition to
not wanting to visit a doctor
face-to-face, they could not
connect to the internet. There-
fore, they went without medi-
cal care, the commissioner
said.
This is why, Lindsay said, the
county started a broadband task
force that included the Morrow
School District superintendent
and other experts and affected
local individuals.
Moss said a “backorder of
fiber” is causing delays, but he
anticipates work to start early
next year with the laying of new
line.
Eventually, he said, he will
be looking for volunteers to help
with this project, but for now he
and others will be working with
local chambers of commerce,
electric cooperatives, inter-
net service providers and city
governments to create new infra-
structure.
He added that another part of
the plan involves raising aware-
ness of the emergency broad-
band benefit.
“There are a lot of afford-
ability programs out there that
currently are unknown by people
in the county,” he said.
Also, he said, he antici-
pates public classes to educate
people on working from home
and seeing doctors online.
These efforts, however, are
likely to happen after infra-
structure is underway.
Aaron Moss/Contributed Photo
At a broadband town hall Nov. 10, 2021, in Hepper, people discuss
the need for better internet. Aaron Moss, center, introduces his
work on expanding broadband access.
Jim Ward/Contributed Photo, File
Research at the Starkey Experimental Forest and Range in the Blue Mountains of Northeast-
ern Oregon is looking into the predation on deer and elk. Mike Wisdom, Starkey ungulate
ecology team leader with the U.S. Forest Service, suggests reducing the prey base of elk there
could mean cougars switch to eating more mule deer.
displacement and reduction
of mule deer populations as
well as the carrying capacity
of the landscape to support
them nutritionally.
Now that the elk popula-
tion is a fraction of what it
was a few years ago, Wisdom
said there are a lot of differ-
ent possible outcomes —
improved nutrition and
body condition, behavioral
use of the land, direct inter-
action with elk and changes
in predation.
“Predators could dissi-
pate and lessen their use,
particularly cougars, but if
we reduce that prey base of
elk there may not be a posi-
tive response — cougars
may just switch to eating
A9
mule deer,” Wisdom said.
Darren Clark, Starkey
Wildlife Research Program
leader with the Oregon
Department of Fish and
Wildlife, said for the last
seven years the big picture
has been to assess competi-
tion between elk and mule
deer. Over the last three
years the elk herd was
reduced from 550 head to
75 to see how the mule deer
respond.
According to previous
work, Clark said, the forage
available to the Starkey mule
deer doesn’t have sufficient
calories to meet a doe’s ener-
getic demands during peak
lactation, resulting in poor
body condition.
“If deer shift habitat use,
will their body condition and
fawn survival increase?”
Clark asked.
With the el k herds
reduced by 80%, Clark said
Fish and Wildlife will gather
its first data set next year
from fawns collared in 2021.
Study expands on
previous Starkey
research
Another reason coyotes
may be more prone to scav-
enge is they are a pack
animal while bears and
bobcats are not.
“It’s the ‘many eyes,
many ears’ hypothesis,”
Ruprecht said. “They take
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