2008-03-18_PERMIT FILE - C1981047

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J.E. Stover & Associates, Inc • September 3, 2007 Page 3 Habitat within the mine permit boundary was evaluated during an August 11, 2007 site visit. Habitat descriptions and occurrence determinations outlined in Table 1 are based on professional experience, personal communication with experts, and published resources, including Colorado Breeding Bird Atlas,4 Mammals of Colorado,5 CDOW habitat maps,s U.S. Forest Service (USES) habitat maps,' Colorado Herpetofaunal At/as,8 Amphibians and Reptiles in Colorado,9 and the Colorado Rare Plant Field Guide.10 Physical and Ecological Setting The Blue Ribbon Mine is an inactive underground coal mine approximately 6.5 miles northeast of the Town of Paonia, in Delta County, Colorado (Figure 1). The mine's permit boundary encompasses 340.8 acres within Section 35, Township13 South, Range 91 West of the 6t" Principle Meridian, and includes a total of 34 acres where surface disturbance is permitted (Figure 2). Within the permitted area of surface disturbance, 16.9 acres were disturbed by Blue Ribbon mining operations. Approximately 170.8 surface acres within the mine boundary are privately owned and 170 surface acres are public lands administered by the USES (Figure 1). National Forest lands bound the mine permit area on the north, and U.S. Bureau of Land Management lands bound the mine permit area on the south. The areas of permitted surface disturbance lie on privately owned lands. The mine boundary encompasses a 0.6-mile reach of Hubbard Creek and the flanks of the steeply sloping foothills rising to the east and west. Forest Road 407 (open to the public) traverses the mine • permit area roughly parallel to and west of Hubbard Creek (Figure 2). The creek's narrow floodway and historic floodplain are composed of undifferentiated Holocene and Pleistocene surficial deposits.11 The steep slopes within the mine permit boundary are in the upper Cretaceous Mesaverde formation (coal-bearing sandstone, siltstone, and shale). The lowest elevation within the mine permit boundary is approximately 6,300 feet above mean sea level at Hubbard Creek. The highest elevation is 7,880 feet on a knob in the east portion of the mine permit area. The' mine's surface disturbance (reclaimed) and above-ground activities occurred at elevations below 6,600 feet in the historic floodplain of Hubbard Creek and at the base of the steep hills to the east (Figure 2). Two small sediment ponds related to the operations of Blue Ribbon Mine remain in the locations shown on Figure 2. The total estimated evaporative loss from the ponds is 0.57 acre-feet per year, representing a loss of surface waters from the upper Colorado River basin. Other surface disturbances within the Blue Ribbon permit boundary (and visible on Figure 2) are related to the ventilation and methane drainage operations of the Elk Creek Mine, operating DRMS permit C- 1981-022. a Kingery, H.E. (Editor). 1998. Colorado Breeding Bird Atlas. Denver: Co. Bird Atlas Partnership & Co. Division of Wildlife. 636 pp. 5 Fitzgerald, J.P., C.A. Meaney, D.M. Armstrong. 1994. Mammals of Colorado. Niwot, Colorado: Univ. Press of Co. 467 pp. o Habitat maps available at http://ndis.nrel.colostate.edu/index.html U.S. Forest Service. 2006. Grand Mesa, Uncompahgre, Gunnison National Forests Lynx Habitat Map. Updated February, 2006. a Colorado Herpetofaunal Atlas. Available online at http://ndis.nrel.colostate.edu/herpatlas/coherpatlas/ s Hammerson, G.A. 1999. Amphibians and Reptiles in Colorado: A Colorado Field Guide. 2nd Ed. Denver: University Press of Colorado & CDOW. 494 pp. 1o CRPTC (Colorado Rare Plant Technical Committee). 1999. Colorado Rare Plant Field Guide. Available at http://www, cnh p. colostate.edu/rareplants/cover. html. • 11 Ellis, M. S., D. L. Gaskill, and C. R. Dunrud. 1987. Geologic map of the Paonia and Gunnison area, Delta and Gunnison counties, Colorado. U.S. Geological Survey Coal Investigations Map C-109. © Rare Earth Science, LLB