|
The golden sedge is specially adapted to inhabit an uncommon ecosystem on the Atlantic coastal plain boasting both open conditions and calcareous soil deposits — a tough ecological niche. Richard LeBlond, who officially discovered the plant back in 1991, described its North Carolina habitat as part of “a small archipelago of phytogeographic islands” that form a refuge for a number of rare and unique plant species — all known from less than a dozen sites worldwide. But of these plants, golden sedge is one of the rarest: despite extensive searches along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts, only eight populations of the species have been found to exist.
ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT PROFILE
PROTECTION STATUS: Endangered
YEAR LISTED: 2002
CRITICAL HABITAT: None
RECOVERY PLAN: None
RANGE: The northeast Cape Fear River watershed in Onslow and Pender counties, North Carolina
THREATS: Habitat alteration resulting from fire suppression; residential, commercial, and industrial development; highway and utility expansion; right-of-way management with herbicides; mining; and wetland drainage activities associated with silviculture, agriculture and development projects
POPULATION TREND: Although little is known about natural population fluctuations in this species, severe population declines exceeding 83 percent were noted between 1992 and 1996 at three of the plant’s eight remaining sites.
|
SAVING THE GOLDEN SEDGE
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service made the golden sedge a candidate for listing under the Endangered Species Act in 1998 and proposed to list it as endangered in 1999. But it wasn’t until 2002, after reaching a legal agreement with the Center and our allies to expedite the protection of the sedge and 28 other imperiled species, that the Service actually declared the plant to be officially endangered. Even at this point, the agency declined to designate critical habitat with the excuse that this would “increase the vulnerability of the species to collection.”
Of the eight golden sedge populations known to exist, seven grow on privately owned — that is, unprotected — land. One population is on a roadside, and at least one is on a power-line right-of-way. All the known sites have been damaged to some degree by ditching and drainage, mining, logging, road building, bulldozing, or right-of-way maintenance. Needless to say, the golden sedge needs federally protected land in order to recover. Accordingly, the Center is now pressuring the Service to designate critical habitat for the plant.
ACTION TIMELINE
+ CAMPAIGN LINKS
NATURAL HISTORY
+ MEDIA
Contact:
Ileene Anderson
|
