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\ SOUTHWEST BIODIVERSITY ALERT
#135
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6-5-98
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\ SOUTHWEST CENTER FOR
BIOLOGICAL DIVERSITY
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1.
PETITION FILED TO LIST RARE FROG AND FISH AS ENDANGERED-
GROUPS
DECLARE CAMPAIGN TO END CATTLE GRAZING ON SW RIVERS
2. TWO TIMBER SALES
APPEALED TO PROTECT NORTHERN GOSHAWK
3. FOREST SERVICE AGREES TO E.I.S.
ON GRAZING IN THE
GILA RIVER BASIN- PLAN EXCLUDES MANY IMPERILED
SPECIES
PLEASE WRITE OR CALL
ASAP!
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PETITION FILED TO LIST RARE FROG AND FISH AS ENDANGERED-
GROUPS
DECLARE CAMPAIGN TO END CATTLE GRAZING ON SW RIVERS
On 6-5-98, the Southwest
Center and Sky Island Watch filed
formal petitions with the U.S. Fish &
Wildlife Service to
list the Chiricahua leopard frog and the Gila chub
as
endangered species. Both species are endemic to the Gila
River
Basin.
The Gila chub has been entirely extirpated from New Mexico.
It
remains in less than 15 streams in Arizona. The Chiricahua
leopard frog
used to occur in streams, pools, and ponds
throughout the Gila Headwaters,
Mogollon Rim, and Sky Islands.
It is now reduced to about 90 highly scattered
populations.
Overgrazing, dam building, water diversions, and
exotic
species are the major causes of declines of both species.
The
Southwest Center and Sky Island Watch simultaneously
announced a campaign to
end all livestock grazing along streams
in the Gila Headwaters/Sky Island
Bioregion and throughout the
Southwest. Overgrazing is the single most
destructive force on
Southwest ecosystems today. It is the most common cause
of
species endangerment in Arizona and New Mexico. Earlier this
year, the
Southwest Center, Sky Island Watch, Southwest Trout,
and other groups
petitioned to list the Rio Grande cutthroat
trout and the Yellow-billed
cuckoo as endangered. Both are
threatened by overgrazing throughout their
ranges.
______________________________
TWO TIMBER SALES
APPEALED TO PROTECT NORTHERN GOSHAWK
The Southwest Center has appealed two
Arizona timber sales which
threaten the northern goshawk. The Wiggins timber
sale on the
Mogollon Rim in the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forests
would
cut between 2.8 and 4.6 million board feet of ponderosa pine.
Since
losing a 1995 suit to the Southwest Center for ramping up
the timber volume
after signing a decision notice, the Apache-
Sitgreaves has refused to
acknowledge how much timber they will
cut.
The Scott "Ecosystem
Management Area" timber sale would log
1 million board feet of ponderosa pine
on the southern boundary of
Grand Canyon National Park. This is the second
attempt to
log the Scott Sale- in 1997 the Southwest Center
successfully
appealed the sale because it lacked a reasonable range
of
alternatives.
In both sales, the Forest Service is violating the
Southwest
region's goshawk guidelines which prohibit cutting of large
tree
when less than 40% of the timber area is in mature or old
growth
forests. Both sales will cut thousands of trees over 18"
dbh
although the surrounding area is extremely deficient in
large
trees.
________________________
FOREST
SERVICE AGREES TO E.I.S. ON GRAZING IN THE GILA
BASIN- PLAN EXCLUDES MANY
IMPERILED SPECIES- PLEASE WRITE OR
CALL ASAP!
On 6-1-98, the Forest
Service announced it would conduct an
Environmental Impact Statement (E.I.S.)
on the adequacy of its
plan to protect 14 riparian and aquatic species
in
the Gila Headwaters/Sky Island Bioregion from livestock grazing.
The
Southwest Center previously filed Endangered Species Act
petitions for six of
the 14 species and threatened to sue the
Forest Service for failing analyze
the cumulative effects of
grazing on the seven National Forests within and
around the
bioregion on all 14. The agency previously announced it
would
not do an EIS, but changed course after strenuous
objections that the plan is
too weak and must be fully analyzed
through an E.I.S.
The E.I.S. seeks
to codify a plan concocted by the Forest Service
and approved by the Fish
& Wildlife Service. It would ban cattle
from all habitats for the Apache
trout, Gila trout,loach minnow,
spikedace, razorback sucker, Little Colorado
River spinedace,
Chihuahua chub, and Gila top minnow. It is very weak,
however, on
protections for the Southwestern willow flycatcher,
Cactus
ferruginous pygmy owl, Sonoran tiger salamander, and Pima
Pineapple
cactus. Even worse, it completely ignores many
endangered and imperiled
species including the Sonora chub, Canelo
Hills ladies' tresses, Huachuca
water umbel, Yellow-billed cuckoo,
Chiricahua leopard frog, Rio Grande
cutthroat trout, Huachuca dock,
and Gila chub.
Please write or call
the Southwest Regional Forester. Tell her the
E.I.S. should address all
endangered and sensitive species, and
should remove all livestock from all
streams in the National
Forests in Arizona and New Mexico:
Ellie Towns, Regional Forester
U.S. Forest Service
517 Gold
Ave. SW, Albuquerque, NM 87102
505-842-3300 (phone)
505-842-3800
(fax)
_____________________________________________________________________________
Kieran
Suckling
ksuckling@sw-center.org
Executive
Director
520.623.5252 phone
Southwest Center for Biological
Diversity 520.623.9797 fax
http://www.sw-center.org
pob 710, tucson, az 85702-710