The Arizona Game and Fish Department on Tuesday reported that it disagrees with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s announcement that both the roundtail and headwater chub warrant listing as threatened species under the Endangered Species Act.
The department is concerned that the species status assessment used by the Service did not fully include the department’s species experts and scientific data that show the significant improvements the fish have made over the past 20 years. The department is committed to working with the Service to address these concerns prior to the rule being finalized.
“While we agree these fish are in need of additional conservation, the Service’s decision didn’t take into account the very successful conservation programs in place since 2005,” said Chris Cantrell, Arizona Game and Fish Department chief of fisheries. “It is unfortunate that litigation-imposed deadlines constrained the time the Service had to conduct a full and comprehensive evaluation of the improvement of these fishes population trend and to fully engage department experts.”
The Service faced a court-ordered deadline of Oct. 1 to make a decision on listing the two species as a result of a suit filed by the Center for Biological Diversity in 2011.
The department and its partners have been working for more than 10 years to bolster and bring back the native roundtail and headwater chub. In 2006, the department led an unprecedented conservation effort in Arizona toward removing threats to six unlisted native fish species, including the roundtail and headwater chub. This effort, combined with others directly aimed at recovery of roundtail and headwater chub, has led to a 32 percent increase in the places where the fish are found, and removed or reduced numerous threats to their recovery. Currently the fish occupy over 1,400 miles of rivers and streams in the state, which is more than 50 percent of their historical range.
“It is conservation efforts like the ones we have in place that ensure the long term existence of native species, not the Endangered Species Act,” said Cantrell. “Only one percent of species listed under the act have resulted in recovery.”
Arizona Game and Fish also developed a Candidate Conservation Agreement with Assurances for roundtail and headwater chub. This agreement is an important tool used to work with landowners to promote conservation of a species on private land while allowing continued land-use practices. The agreement was submitted in 2015 and is awaiting the Service’s acceptance.
The Service will be accepting comments on the proposed listing for 60 days. The proposed listing and comment instructions can be found at www.fws.gov/southwest/es/arizona.
The impact of this listing in Arizona will have a potential negative economic impact as industry, water development, agriculture, recreation, and cattle will be subject to further federal regulations and likely result in mitigation.