Removal of Pinyon-Juniper Woodlands

April 12, 2023 — Advocates for the West reached a court-approved settlement agreement, requiring the Bureau of Land Management to abandon the Pinyon-Juniper Categorical Exclusion Rule and issue a new decision by September 30, 2024.

June 30, 2022 — Advocates for the West filed a lawsuit challenging the Bureau of Land Management over a Trump-era decision authorizing extensive destruction of native pinyon-juniper habitats across the American West without requiring prior analysis and public disclosure of possible environmental impacts.

The so-called “Pinyon-Juniper Categorial Exclusion Rule” allows the agency to approve eliminating entire forests of pinyon pine and juniper by mechanical means—including cutting and masticating with heavy equipment—without prior environmental review. The rule allows the Bureau to approve individual projects up to 10,000 acres in size and contains no limit on the number of these projects that the agency may approve.

Pinyon-juniper woodlands provide important habitat for many native sensitive and imperiled wildlife species, including the pinyon jay, greater sage-grouse, and mule deer.

Scientific data show that use of pinyon pine and juniper woodlands by pinyon jays declines after mechanical treatments, and that vegetation thinning within nesting sites can cause the birds to abandon treated areas altogether. The pinyon jay already has experienced a population collapse of 83.5% since the late 1960s and is a Bureau-designated sensitive species covered under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act.

Greater sage-grouse rely on healthy and well-distributed sagebrush habitat, which is intermingled with native pinyon pine and juniper in many western states. Once numbering in the millions across the western U.S and Canada, loss and fragmentation of their native habitats have caused sage-grouse populations to decline by 90% over the last century.

Similarly, loss of sagebrush and other habitats have contributed to mule deer population declines in many western states in recent decades. Historically, the Intermountain West was the epicenter of mule deer distribution among native sagebrush and other habitats, including pinyon-juniper woodlands.