U.S. District Judge Ann Aiken sharply criticized the agency in a Sunday opinion, calling its decisions arbitrary and capricious and finding it failed to meaningfully protect the threatened coastal marten and its habitat. “The Forest Service is imbued with the duty to conserve listed species and critical habitat,” Aiken wrote. The coastal marten, also known as the Humboldt marten, was once thought extinct after losing 95% of its range to logging and wildfires but was rediscovered in 1996. Aiken rejected those arguments, finding the events were likely to recur and had clear impacts on marten habitat, including vegetation damage, noise from riders and campers and habitat fragmentation. The two parties were ordered to discuss an interim remedy for injunctive relief for the coastal marten on Monday.