8012

• UCREFRP Catalog Number: 8012
• Author: Grand Canyon Trust.
• Title: Colorado River Workshop, issues, ideas, and directions ‎(February 26-28, 1996 Phoenix, Arizona)‎ An open forum for discussion of management issues between managers, water users, and stakeholders of the Colorado River basin.
• USFW Year: 1996.
• USFW - Doc Type: 1996.
• Copyright Material: NO

nelmouth sucker, the bluehead sucker, the woundfin,
and the speckled dace. Each of these big river fishes is
also in serious decline.

Two major reasons are cited for the decline of these
fishes. First, dam construction over the past century
has fragmented their habitat and has reduced or altered
flows for significant reaches of river, which has disrupt-
ed their natural life cycles. See Figure 1. Second, the
introduction of a wide variety of non-native fishes into
the system and their proliferation in reservoirs and
warm water habitats is also thought to be a very signifi-
cant factor in the decline of the native, big river fishes.
The introduced non-natives both compete with and
prey on the native fishes.

This paper will first review the principal features of the
Endangered Species Act (ESA) which have been applied
to the squawfish, razorback, and the two chubs. Many
of these features are currently being scrutinized by
Congress and could be amended in the near future.
This paper will then examine the two programs that
have been developed in the Upper Colorado River
Basin, and the one that is emerging in the Lower Basin,
for implementing the recovery of the Colorado River
fishes that have been listed under the ESA and for com-
plying with the regulatory features of the ESA. These
programs are organized around the regional jurisdic-
tions of the most responsible federal agencies - the
Upper Basin Program falls within the purview of
Region 6 of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS)
and the Upper Colorado Region of the U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation (BOR); the San Juan Program is the con-
cern of Regions 2 and 6 of the FWS and the Upper
Colorado Region of the BOR; and the Lower Basin is
mostly within Region 2 of the FWS and the Lower
Colorado Region of the BOR. This paper addresses the
relatively recent development and policies of these

44

recovery implementation programs and is not a com-
plete history.

This paper's main concern is that the recovery of the
listed fishes may be frustrated by the split in the
regional jurisdictions of the most responsible federal
agencies, by the inattention to the recovery goals set for
the full geographic range of these fishes, or the absence
of such goals in the case of the razorback, and by a
consequent but not always apparent divergence of
opinion as to how recovery should be defined. This
paper's most important conclusion is that the range-
wide recovery planning and goal setting for these fishes
should be invigorated, reconciled and consolidated.
Such recovery planning then should guide the imple-
mentation and compliance programs in the subbasins,
which can still be customized.

LEGAL FRAMEWORK:
THE ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT

SECTION 4
listing and Critical Habitat Designation
The complex process and criteria for listing species as
threatened or endangered, which triggers the protec-
tions of the ESA, are governed by its Section 4. The
Colorado squawfish and humpback chub were listed by
the passage of the ESA in 1973, and the bonytail was
listed in 1980. Since 1978, the critical habitat for an
endangered species is to be designated under Section 4
within 2 years of its listing, but the FWS had been
unable or unwilling to designate critical habitat for the
squawfish and the two chubs, and had held back on
listing the razorback sucker. The final listing of the
razorback sucker was published in October 1991 in
response to a petition and subsequent lawsuit filed by
the Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund (SCLDF) on behalf
of a number of conservation groups. Once the razor-