ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT PROFILE

PROTECTION STATUS: Not listed

PETITIONED: 2011

RANGE: Historically ranged from California’s Sierra Nevada Mountains northward into Oregon’s Cascade Mountains; today confined to two relict populations near Lassen Peak and Sonora Pass

THREATS: Habitat destruction through logging, grazing, fire suppression, off-road vehicles and road building; poaching, predation, disease, genetic vulnerability and climate change

POPULATION TREND: While the exact population number of Sierra Nevada red foxes is unknown, a rapid reduction in its size over the past century is likely to have corresponded to sharp range contractions witnessed during the same period, as well as genetic evidence of decline. Likely fewer than 50 individual foxes — or even fewer than 20 — remain.