FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

ENDANGERED SPECIES: FWS to review status of sage grouse subspecies

Apr 28, 2008

by Allison Winter, E&E News PM reporter

The Fish and Wildlife Service will reconsider a sage grouse subspecies in the western United States for possible protection under the Endangered Species Act, the agency announced today.

FWS officials will conduct a status review of the Western sage grouse -- which is found in Northern California, eastern Oregon, eastern Washington and possibly parts of Idaho -- to examine whether it is a subspecies of the larger population of greater sage grouse. And if so, the agency wants to determine whether or not it merits ESA protection.

The court-ordered review of the Western birds is connected to a larger assessment of the greater sage grouse population across up to 11 states in the West. The agency said in February it would review the entire greater sage grouse population for potential listing under ESA.

FWS is also looking at whether the Mono Basin sage grouse -- in eastern California and western Nevada -- merits protection. The Center for Biological Diversity, the Sagebrush Sea Campaign, the Western Watersheds Project and Desert Survivors sued the service last year to protect the birds.

The agency will announce the review of the Mono Basin and Western grouse populations in tomorrow's Federal Register and extend the public comment deadline for the greater sage grouse to bring the three assessments in line.

"The timing is right, so we can look at these all of the pieces," FWS spokeswoman Jodie Delavan said. "It's worth doing it all at once to make sure all the information is in front of us at one time."

The grouse -- a brown, black and white ground-nesting bird -- is found in deserts and sagebrush plains from Colorado to California and north into southern Canada.

Key to development

The fate of grazing, mining and energy industries across the Intermountain West has been tied to the status of the chicken-sized birds.

The birds return each spring to breeding and nesting locations called leks, areas with brush and grass that provide food and cover. Wildfires and energy development have cut into that habitat. The Interior Department has estimated that more than 16 million acres of habitat have been burned in the last 17 years.

Environmental groups have protested that Bureau of Land Management energy leases have led to more rampant destruction of grouse habitat.

Absent federal action, several Western states have issued their own conservation plans in an attempt to conserve the bird and pre-empt an ESA listing. Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, South Dakota and North Dakota issued their own set of recommendations for conservation of the animal earlier this year.

The review of the Western grouse is in response to a 2006 court order from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that asked the agency to take a second look at the bird after denying it protection. In response to a petition from the Institute for Wildlife Protection, FWS determined that the Western grouse did not merit protection as a subspecies of distinct population segment in 2003.

Since that time, a new, more extensive genetic study was released in 2005. The study did not specifically address the subspecies question but identified genetic "clusters" of sage grouse, "leading to enough uncertainty in the minds of some experts to suggest further review of the bird's taxonomy is appropriate," according to FWS.

###