The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is proposing Endangered Species Act protections for the Pacific fisher, a relative of the weasel that persists in small numbers in forests of southwest Oregon and Northern California. The agency’s proposal, set to be published Thursday in the Federal Register, come days after the U.S Fish and Wildlife Service entered into agreements with five timber companies and the state of Oregon to protect the Pacific fisher on nearly 2 million acres of forestland in Oregon. The proposal to extend “threatened” status to Pacific fishers prohibits activities that bring harm, injury or death to the carnivorous mammals. It provides exceptions — essentially allowing the inadvertent killing of these protected animals — if it happens during activities like habitat management or “forestry management activities for the purposes of reducing the risk or severity of wildfires.”