By Pepper Fisher

OLYMPIC NATIONAL PARK – Dr. Patti Happe, who retired in June after 28 years as the Wildlife Branch Chief at Olympic National Park, has received the National Park Service Director’s Award for Professional Excellence in Natural Resource Stewardship. This national honor recognizes outstanding contributions of individuals in understanding, protecting, and managing national park resources.

Dr. Happe began her career at Olympic National Park as a Ph.D. student studying elk populations in the mid-1980s. In 1996, she returned to the park as a wildlife biologist and Branch Chief.

Park officials say over the course of her career, Dr. Happe made tremendous contributions to restoring native wildlife and ecological balance on the Olympic Peninsula. One of the programs we spoke with her about was the reintroduction of the Pacific fisher to Olympic National Park, the first such effort in Washington State where the species was believed to be wiped out. When the project of releasing fishers began, no one knew if it work, but in February of 2018, she hosted a presentation to tell the public that the fishers were breeding and spreading out on the peninsula.

“It’s kind of exciting to be able to come back to the public with this presentation. You know, I gave presentations early on, before we even started, saying about what we wanted to do, what our hopes and plans were for the project. So I’m really happy to have this opportunity to come back and say, this is how it was, what we thought was going to happen, and this is how it all worked out. And it’s still a developing story, but we have some information that is fun to share right now.”

Happe also was a leader in the successful removal of over 500 non-native mountain goats from the park, with over 300 of those reintroduced to their native habitat in the North Cascades. This was another pioneering project involving tribal, federal, state, non-profit, and many volunteers. Again, no one knew for sure if it would work. We asked her in August of 2020 about her confidence level for success.

“I do believe that it’s going to be attainable. We don’t expect that we’re going to get a 100% of the goats, but we’re going to get enough, like 90%, that the remaining population just, there won’t be enough left to rebound. So, it’s not required for us to get every last goat.”

Dr. Happe and other honorees will be recognized at an event in Washington, DC, sometime next year.

(Staff photo)