December Marks ESA's 35th Anniversary

The Endangered Species Act (ESA or the Act) will be 35 years old on December 28th.

In the years since Congress passed the visionary law called for by President Richard Nixon, our knowledge of the ecological role of species has grown enormously. The Act has been amended several times, but remains the nation’s most powerful wildlife conservation tool.   Renowned Stanford population biologist Paul Ehrlich said it clearly: “Scientists know we must protect species, because they are working parts of our life-support system.”  

Species listed under the ESA are usually classified as either endangered or threatened. The Act can account for more subtle distinctions, listing subspecies or distinct vertebrate population, experimental populations that may be designated for reintroductions, and populations protected because of their similarity of appearance to closely related species.

Other designations such as candidate, proposed or delisted and monitored generally have less protection under the ESA on most federal lands.

However, National Park Service 2006 Management Policies set a high standard for all rare species on park lands.  In addition to federally listed species, NPS manages for state and locally listed species as well as other native species and their habitat that are of special management concern to parks, such as those considered rare, declining, sensitive, or unique.  All species of management concern and their habitats are managed in the spirit of the ESA with the goal of not just preventing take, but also maintaining their natural distribution and abundance.   As of November 2008, the Service manages for nearly 470 species of plants, mammals, birds, fish, invertebrates, reptiles, and amphibians with populations in NPS units. 

When a species is listed under the ESA, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service or the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Marine Fisheries Service (the two regulatory agencies that administer the ESA) must develop and implement a recovery plan to protect the species from extinction.  Most of the recovery plans are hundreds of pages in length. The NPS Endangered Species Program Office has distilled these recovery plans into one- to four-page summaries.  They are intended to provide park managers and staff a quick reference to use in planning, managing, and implementing projects that involve a listed species or its critical habitat.  The summaries list the key management documents and outline the species ESA status, threats, biology, geographical distribution, critical habitat (if designated), presence or historic occurrence in an NPS unit(s), and the management actions to aid recovery of the species.  The summaries will be updated as new information about a species becomes available. 

Species recovery plan summaries will soon be available online at the Endangered Species Program website (http://www1.nrintra.nps.gov/BRMD/Endangered_Species/index.cfm).  Information on NPS reporting of threatened and endangered species expenditures, recovery trends, and status in park units can also be found here.

For more information about the recovery plan summaries or to report an update for a species, please contact Nancy Brian at nancy_brian@nps.gov or 970-267-2103.