Missing, delayed, and old: The status of ESA recovery plans

Malcom, Jacob; Li, Ya‐Wei

doi:10.1111/conl.12601

Cited by 25 publications

(24 citation statements)

References 18 publications

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“…Globally, the ESA is considered one of the most powerful environmental laws to prevent the loss of biodiversity (Gerber et al, 2018;Malcom & Li, 2018). Many nations around the globe have implemented federal policies to protect imperiled species (e.g., Canada's Species At Risk Act of 2002, United Kingdom's Wildlife and Countryside Act of 1981, Australia's Endangered Species Protection Act of 1992, and New Zealand's Conservation Act of 1987).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Many nations around the globe have implemented federal policies to protect imperiled species (e.g., Canada's Species At Risk Act of 2002, United Kingdom's Wildlife and Countryside Act of 1981, Australia's Endangered Species Protection Act of 1992, and New Zealand's Conservation Act of 1987). Globally, the ESA is considered one of the most powerful environmental laws to prevent the loss of biodiversity (Gerber et al, 2018;Malcom & Li, 2018). Species that face threats from habitat loss, speciesspecies interaction and environmental stochasticity (especially with regard to climate change) depend on protections from the ESA and require large-scale conservation efforts at both the national and international level.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Temporal analysis of threats causing species endangerment in the United States

Leu

Haines

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et al. 2019

Conservat Sci and Prac

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Understanding temporal variation of threats that cause species endangerment is a key to understand conservation strategies needed to improve species recovery. We assessed temporal variation in the threats to species listed under the United States Endangered Species Act (ESA) as identified by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) and National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS). Based on initial review of ESA listing decisions and literature, we identified six overarching threat categories: habitat modification, overutilization, pollution, species-species interaction, demographic stochasticity, and environmental stochasticity. We screened listing decision documents to determine threat occurrence (i.e., presence/absence of a given threat in a listing decision) for each threat category for all species listed between 1975 and 2017. We evaluated how the number of threats and specific threat occurrences changed over the past four decades. We found that the number of threats per listing decision increased more than twofold from an average of 1.5 (95% CI: 1.3-1.7) threats in 1975 to 3.7 (95% CI: 3.4-4.0) threats in 2017. Threat occurrence increased for habitat modification, environmental stochasticity and species-species interaction, while it decreased for overutilization since 1975 and for demographic stochasticity and pollution since the mid-2000s. The documented increase in number of threats at time of listing may be due to a growing human population exerting increased pressure on species persistence, improved scientific advancement in understanding factors influencing species endangerment, or prolonged time taken for more recent species to be listed under the ESA. We believe that key federal and state governmental regulations have resulted in a documented decrease in overutilization, demographic stochasticity, and pollution, and we recommend large-scale strategies combined with local planning efforts to address the growing threats of habitat loss, environmental stochasticity, and species-species interaction. K E Y W O R D SEndangered Species Act, environmental regulations, policy, temporal, threats Authors after Haines are listed in alphabetical order

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Temporal analysis of threats causing species endangerment in the United States

Leu

Haines

Check

et al. 2019

Conservat Sci and Prac

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…), practitioners highlight important shortcomings that must be addressed for more effective recovery planning (Bottrill et al. ; Malcom & Li ). Species distribution models (SDMs) can help overcome these limitations by establishing sound statistical relationships between the occurrence of a species and the environmental conditions in the sampled units (Rodríguez et al.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Recovery plans are key components of the conservation initiatives funded by governments to halt biodiversity loss and contribute to the biodiversity targets established by the Convention on Biological Diversity. Despite the importance of recovery plans for the conservation of endangered species worldwide (Taylor et al 2005), practitioners highlight important shortcomings that must be addressed for more effective recovery planning (Bottrill et al 2011;Malcom & Li 2018). Species distribution models (SDMs) can help overcome these limitations by establishing sound statistical relationships between the occurrence of a species and the environmental conditions in the sampled units (Rodríguez et al 2007).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Integrating intraseasonal grassland dynamics in cross‐scale distribution modeling to support waterbird recovery plans

Regos

Vidal

Lorenzo

et al. 2019

Conservation Biology

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Despite much discussion about the utility of remote sensing for effective conservation, the inclusion of these technologies in species recovery plans remains largely anecdotal. We developed a modeling approach for the integration of local, spatially measured ecosystem functional dynamics into a species distribution modeling (SDM) framework in which other ecologically relevant factors are modeled separately at broad scales. To illustrate the approach, we incorporated intraseasonal water‐vegetation dynamics into a cross‐scale SDM for the Common Snipe (Gallinago gallinago), which is highly dependent on water and vegetation dynamics. The Common Snipe is an Iberian grassland waterbird characteristic of European agricultural meadows and a member of one of the most threatened bird guilds. The intraseasonal dynamics of water content of vegetation were measured using the standard deviation of the normalized difference water index time series computed from bimonthly images of the Sentinel‐2 satellite. The recovery plan for the Common Snipe in Galicia (northwestern Iberian Peninsula) provided an opportunity to apply our modeling framework. Model accuracy in predicting the species’ distribution at a regional scale (resulting from integration of downscaled climate projections with regional habitat–topographic suitability models) was very high (area under the curve [AUC] of 0.981 and Boyce's index of 0.971). Local water‐vegetation dynamic models, based exclusively on Sentinel‐2 imagery, were good predictors (AUC of 0.849 and Boyce's index of 0.976). The predictive power improved (AUC of 0.92 and Boyce's index of 0.98) when local model predictions were restricted to areas identified by the continental and regional models as priorities for conservation. Our models also performed well (AUC of 0.90 and Boyce's index of 0.93) when projected to updated water‐vegetation conditions. Our modeling framework enabled incorporation of key ecosystem processes closely related to water and carbon cycles while accounting for other factors ecologically relevant to endangered grassland waterbirds across different scales, allowed identification of priority areas for conservation, and provided an opportunity for cost‐effective recovery planning by monitoring management effectiveness from space.

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“…Many others have static, outdated recovery plans (i.e., 8-36 years old)-the status of many recovery plans, in general (Malcom & Li, 2018)-that do not consider recent projections of hurricane threats (Appendix S1B, Table S3). (Hoeppner & Hughes, 2018).…”

Section: Need For a Proac Tive Climate Chang E Adap Tation Pl Anmentioning

confidence: 99%

Seeking shelter from the storm: Conservation and management of imperiled species in a changing climate

Walls

Barichivich

Chandler

et al. 2019

Ecology and Evolution

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Climate change is anticipated to exacerbate the extinction risk of species whose persistence is already compromised by habitat loss, invasive species, disease, or other stressors. In coastal areas of the southeastern United States (USA), many imperiled vertebrates are vulnerable to hurricanes, which climate models predict to become more severe in the 21st century. Despite this escalating threat, explicit adaptation strategies that address hurricane threats, in particular, and climate change more generally, are largely underrepresented in recovery planning and implementation. We provide a basis for stronger emphasis on strategic planning for imperiled species facing the increasing threat of catastrophic hurricanes. Our reasoning comes from observations of short‐term environmental and biological impacts of Hurricane Michael, which impacted the Gulf Coast of the southeastern USA in October 2018. During this storm, St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge, located along the northern Gulf of Mexico's coast in the panhandle region of Florida, received storm surge that was 3.0–3.6 m (NAVD88) above sea level. Storm surge pushed sea water into some ephemeral freshwater ponds used for breeding by the federally threatened frosted flatwoods salamander (Ambystoma cingulatum). After the storm, specific conductance across all ponds measured varied from 80 to 23,100 µS/cm, compared to 75 to 445 µS/cm in spring 2018. For 17 overwashed wetlands that were measured in both spring and fall 2018, posthurricane conductance observations were, on average, more than 90 times higher than in the previous spring, setting the stage for varying population responses across this coastal landscape. Importantly, we found live individual flatwoods salamanders at both overwashed and non‐overwashed sites, although we cannot yet assess the demographic consequences of this storm. We outline actions that could be incorporated into climate adaptation strategies and recovery planning for imperiled species, like A. cingulatum, that are associated with freshwater coastal wetlands in hurricane‐prone regions.

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Missing, delayed, and old: The status of ESA recovery plans

Cited by 25 publications

References 18 publications

Temporal analysis of threats causing species endangerment in the United States

Temporal analysis of threats causing species endangerment in the United States

Integrating intraseasonal grassland dynamics in cross‐scale distribution modeling to support waterbird recovery plans

Seeking shelter from the storm: Conservation and management of imperiled species in a changing climate

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