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00"2436 ..;....;.."" EXECUTIVE SUMMARY This management plan assists in the recovery of four endangered fish species as water depletions from the Y ampa River Basin continue to serve human water needs in Colorado and Wyoming. The plan anticipates that depletions will increase to meet projected future human needs. In this plan, we quantify current depletions, as well as future depletions projected through 2045. The plan describes specific management actions to promote recovery ofthe listed species in the face of those depletions and criteria by which to measure the success of management actions. The U.S, Fish and Wildlife Service (Service) lists the humpback chub (Gila cypha), bonytail (G. elegans) Colorado pikeminnow (Ptychocheilus lucius). and razorback sucker (Xyrauchen texanus) as endangered under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). Endemic to the Colorado River Basin, populations of these fishes had declined throughout their historic range due largely to habitat loss or degradation and introduction of competitive and predatory nonnative fish species. The ESA requires that "recovery goals" be developed which provide "objective, measurable criteria which, when met, would result in a detennination...that the species be removed from the list" and that site-specific recovery measures be developed. Each of the endangered fish species can be downlisted and subsequently delisted when all of the species-specific recovery criteria have been met. Final recovery goals for these species were published in August 2002. These goals include both numerical population criteria and habitat criteria and specifically address five Iistingldelisting factors: (1) present or threatened destruction, modification, or curtailment of its habitat or range; (2) overutilization for commercial, recreational, scientific, or educational purposes; (3) disease or predation; (4) inadequacy of existing regulatory mechanisms; or (5) other natural or manmade factors affecting its continued existence, It is the policy of the Services to "[ d]evelop cooperative approaches to threatened and endangered species conservation that restore, reconstruct, or rehabilitate the structure, distribution, connectivity and function upon which those listed species depend." Moreover, this policy requires the Services to "[ d]evelop and implement agreements among multiple agencies that allow for sharing resources and decision making on recovery actions for wide-ranging species" (59 FR 34274; USFWS and NMFS 1994). Consistent with this intent, the Upper Colorado River Endangered Fish Recovery Implementation Program (Recovery Program) was established in 1988 with the goal of recovering the endangered fishes in the face of current and foreseeable future water depletions from the Upper Colorado River Basin. The Recovery Program developed and periodically updates a Recovery Action Plan that identifies specific measures to benefit the endangered fishes. These measures address the listing factors by providing and protecting instream flows, acquiring and managing habitat, constructing fish passage facilities, managing competitive and predatory nonnative fish, propagating and stocking endangered fishes into their historic habitats, and monitoring the status of endangered fish populations and their habitats. The Yampa River is important to these endangered fishes, and the Service designated critical habitat for all four species within its lower reaches. Razorback sucker and Colorado pikeminnow spawn in the lower reaches of Yampa Canyon, which also harbors one of five remaining populations of humpback chub in the Upper Colorado River Basin. Peak flows are particularly important in creating and maintaining spawning habitats for the endangered fishes in the Yampa River, as well as nursery habitats for Colorado pikeminnow and razorback sucker in the Middle Green River downstream from the Yampa River confluence. Management Plan for Endangered Fishes in the Yampa River Basin XVIl