Abstract:

"We obtained 137 records dating from 1894-1991. Martes pennanti still occurs in the Cascade Range and Olympic Mountains and in portions of the Okanogan Highlands, but is apparently very rare.

"We predict the available habitat for fishers would be enhanced by minimizing forest fragmentation, maintaining high forest-floor structural diversity, preserving snags and live trees with dead tops, and protecting swamps and other forested wetlands.

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"According to Suckley and Cooper (1860), M. pennanti was plentiful in forested habitats both east and west of the Cascades in the mid-19th century." (69)

"Martes pennanti... clearly prefers dense, lowland forests with an extensive, continuous canopy (Powell 1982)." (74)

"Our data suggest that widespread clearcut logging, which resulted in the removal or fragmentation of once-extensive forest canopies at lower elevations, may have reduced or eliminated suitable habitat for M. pennanti in the northwestern Cascade Range." (75)

"The scarcity of recent sighting reports and, in particular, of incidental trappings of M. pennanti is sets made for other furbearers strongly suggest that densities are precariously low in Washington." (75)

"Relatively few natal dens of M. pennanti have been described, but all have been located in cavities in either dead or living trees at heights generally exceeding 6 m (Powell 1982, Paragi 1990)... Obviously, only relatively large trees can provide cavities of adequate size for a female M. pennanti and her kits." (76)