The plan has divided conservationists, with some accusing the agency of recklessness, while others say the large-scale owl hunt is necessary to save a species that is increasingly being pushed out.

Robin Bown, a biologist with the Fish and Wildlife Service, said coming up with a plan was not easy.

“We don’t usually go into this work with that in mind,” Bown told The Washington Post about killing animals. “But we also see the need to protect. And we have a legal responsibility to do what we can to help our native and endangered species continue to exist on this Earth.”

The Fish and Wildlife Service said in December 2020 that northern spotted owls should be reclassified as endangered after their population declined by about 75 percent in two decades. Some areas that held about 200 spotted owls in the early 2000s now hold two or three of the birds, Bown said.

Wildlife officials considered several options to save the spotted owls, but said none would be effective. Sterilizing the spotted owls would take at least a decade before the population would decline significantly; caging them would be expensive and difficult; and relocating them was not an option because wildlife officials on the East Coast said they do not have room for the birds.

According to the Fish and Wildlife Service, killing the tawny owls will have the greatest impact.

The agency has at least 30 days to decide whether to proceed with the plan to shoot the owls, which would be just the latest project to kill invasive species in hopes of protecting other animals. Federal and state agencies have also killed Burmese pythons, wild boars, coypu and barn owls.

Bown said that gun-savvy people have been walking through woods in the middle of the night with shotguns, flashlights and bullhorns, mimicking the call of a barred owl in hopes of attracting them. Once an owl settles on a nearby tree, shooters must identify it by the bar-shaped markings on its brown-and-white feathers and its call, which has been known to sound like, “Who’s cooking for you? Who’s cooking for you?”

If the shooter is within about 100 feet of the owl and has a clear shot, he can shoot. The carcasses can be buried on site or used for research, Bown said. Officials said they aim to kill about 15,000 barred owls a year, starting in the fall.

The plan calls for recruiting environmental organizations, wildlife groups, landowners, timber industry workers, tribes and state and local government agencies to help kill the barred owl. Shooters must provide documentation of training and experience in owl identification and firearms use to participate, the Fish and Wildlife Service said.

Bridget Moran, a field supervisor at the Fish and Wildlife Service’s Bend, Oregon, office, said she has confidence in the operation after the agency experimented with a similar plan in California, Oregon and Washington between 2013 and 2021. Spotted owl populations stabilized in areas where barred owls were killed, the agency said, but they continued to decline in regions where the barred owls were left alone.

According to the Fish and Wildlife Service, barred owls began migrating from the eastern United States to west of the Mississippi in the 1950s. The agency said humans likely paved the way for the barred owls’ migration when they learned to suppress wildfires and planted trees in the Great Plains and the Canadian boreal forest. The owls established themselves in British Columbia, Canada, before moving south to Washington and Oregon in the 1970s, where they came into contact with native spotted owls, the Fish and Wildlife Service said.

The owls look similar: They are brown and have small beaks. Barred owls are slightly heavier and longer than spotted owls, but they were quick to disturb their relatives’ nests in old-growth forests, eating their food sources — flying squirrels, salamanders, wood rats, voles and mice — and sometimes killing them, according to the Fish and Wildlife Service.

When the northern spotted owl was listed as endangered in 1990, conservationists identified the barred owl as a potential threat to their population, Bown said. The barred owl population continued to increase in the Pacific Northwest until invasive species and habitat loss were identified as the primary threats to the spotted owl in 2008, Bown said.

Still, some animal welfare activists still believe the agency’s plan is misguided.

Animal Wellness Action, an animal welfare nonprofit, said 135 wildlife organizations signed its letter to Interior Secretary Deb Haaland asking her to rescind the plan. Wayne Pacelle, the group’s founder, said he believes barred owls will continue to migrate west after the project, allowing their populations to rebound. He said the agency is “trying to play God.”

Claire Catania, executive director of Birds Connect Seattle, a bird conservation group, said she thinks the Fish and Wildlife Service’s plan is necessary. While the spotted owl was once an iconic species in Washington, Catania said, most new residents of the state have only seen barred owls.

“We are deeply saddened that it has come to this,” Catania told The Post.

Moran, the Fish and Wildlife Service field supervisor, said she wants Pacific Northwest residents to have the opportunity to see both owl species.

“This isn’t about one owl versus the other,” Moran said. “This is about having spotted owls. If we don’t do something, we’ll only have barred owls. If we do something, we’ll have both.”