Wildlife Management on Military Installations: A Critique of Army Policy

Abstract

With the Department of Defense controlling increasingly larger segments of land in the United States, civilian conservation agencies have urged natural resource management on military lands. Federal legislation and recent Defense Department policy statements provide a basis for the individual military services to proceed with such wildlife-management programs. Although the Air Force and Navy have taken positive action to insure adequate long-range wildlife-resource planning, the Army has yet to adopt a similar policy. The Army has recognized the need for wildlife management from only the land-management standpoint and has largely ignored recreational values. Nevertheless, basically sound programs have been developed on a limited number of Army installations, as at Fort Riley, Kansas. The success of the Fort Riley program is attributed to the fact that the value of wildlife-resource management was demonstrated to, and consequently supported by, post authorities; in 1961, only 2 of 13 recreational activities on the installation were more popular than hunting and fishing. Civilian conservation agencies have encouraged the Army to manage the wildlife on the land which it controls and to permit civilian participation in the removal of surplus fish and game. But neither the Army nor civilian conservation agencies have given adequate consideration to the recreational value of fish and game resources on military lands for military personnel. If this fact was recognized, greater progress would be assured in the future. Land controlled by the defense agencies in the continental United States increased from 2.5 million acres (this figure does not include Alaska) in 1940 (U. S. Department of Agriculture 1958:87) to 28.7 million acres as of June 30, 1963 (U. S. General Services Administration 1964:16). Concurrently, demands for public use of fish and game resources on military lands also increased. Consequently, state and federal conservation agencies and sportsmen's groups have voiced concern regarding resource management on military lands. While no serious challenge can be made of the necessity to give priority to national security in the use of Defense Department lands, civilian conservation agencies have urged that these lands be managed so that their inherent natural resource values can make other contributions toward meeting national needs, wherever possible. The author wishes to thank Dr. Thomas G. Scott, Department of Fisheries and Wildlife, Oregon State University, for his advice and encouragement in the preparation of this paper. William R. Edwards, Ronald F. Labisky, G. G. Montgomery, Dr. Glen C. Sanderson, Helen C. Schultz, and Dr. John E. Warnock, all of the Illinois Natural History Survey, critically read the manu-