Conservationists again sue U.S. Fish and Wildlife for denying Oregon red tree voles protection

Conservation groups are again going to court as part of a nearly two-decade-long fight to protect a small forest-dwelling rodent native to the Oregon Coast.

The Center For Biological Diversity, Cascadia Wildlands, Oregon Wild and the Bird Alliance Of Oregon sued the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on July 17 in U.S. District Court in Portland over the agency’s decision not to provide the north Oregon Coast red tree vole federal Endangered Species Act protections. The suit names the agency’s director, Paul Souza, and Doug Burgum, head of the U.S. Department of the Interior, as defendants.

The suit is the latest in an ongoing effort since 2007 to protect red tree voles, which live in the canopy of old growth conifer forests and feed on the needles of Douglas fir, Sitka spruce and western hemlock trees.

The small, mouse-sized animals with reddish-brown fur traditionally lived in forests along the coasts of Northern California and all along the Oregon Coast. But they’ve seen their habitat reduced by roughly 65% since 1986 due to logging and wildfires in the forests they depend on, according to a 2023 study from the U.S. Forest Service’s Pacific Northwest Research Station, which Trump officials announced they will close. The protections conservationists seek are for a distinct population of red tree vole that now only lives in northwestern Oregon.

https://washingtonstatestandard.com/2025/08/13/conservationists-again-sue-u-s-fish-and-wildlife-for-denying-oregon-red-tree-voles-protection/