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United States Department of the Interior <br />IN REPLY REFER TO: <br />ES/GJ-6-CO-04-F-012-YPO29 <br />TAILS 65413-2010-F-0070 <br />FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE R!ECi111E® <br />Ecological Services <br />764 Horizon Drive, Building B 11AY 0 4 2010 <br />Grand Junction, Colorado 81506-3946 <br />ui r-Q?ci2stt€iA' <br />Minng ,id d Satty <br />April 23, 2010 <br />Memorandum <br />To: Office of Surface Mining, Reclamation, and Enforcement, Denver, Colorado <br />From: Acting Western Colorado Supervisor, Fi h d Wildlife Service, Ecological <br />Services, Grand Junction, Colorado S-- -mac <br />Subject: Sage Creek Coal Company's Sage Creek Mine Mining Plan Modification (Permit <br />C-2009-087) <br />This responds to your March 11, 2010, request for formal consultation under section 7 of the <br />Endangered Species Act (ESA) of 1973, as amended. Your request is for the Sage Creek Mine <br />located in several sections of T. 5 and 6N, R. 87W, Routt County, Colorado. The subject project <br />will expand underground mining and will cause about 300 acres of surface disturbance from <br />mining facilities. The subject project will cause an average annual depletion of 4.6 acre-feet/year <br />to the Yampa River, which may affect the endangered Colorado pikeminnow (Ptychocheilus <br />lucius), razorback sucker (Xyrauchen texanus), humpback chub (Gila cypha), bonytail (Gila <br />elegans), and their designated critical habitat. <br />Please see the attached position paper on greenback cutthroat trout (Onchorhynchus clarki <br />stomias) (GB) in western Colorado. To date, GB lineage fish have not been found in the Yampa <br />River drainage. Therefore, your "no effect"' determination (page 5 in your letter) is appropriate. <br />Concurrence is not required for "no effect" determinations. The determination of "not likely to <br />jeopardize" for the yellow-billed cuckoo (Coccyzus americanus) only applies to species that are <br />proposed for listing, not candidate species. The greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus <br />urophasianus) was recently designated as a candidate species in a March 23, 2010, Federal <br />Register notice (75 FR 13910-14014). We encourage you to continue to work to minimize or <br />avoid effects to the sage-grouse to support their conservation. <br />A Recovery Implementation Program for Endangered Fish Species in the Upper Colorado River <br />Basin was initiated on January 22; 1988. The Recovery Program was intended to be the <br />reasonable and prudent alternative to avoid jeopardy to the endangered fishes from impacts of <br />water depletions to the Upper Colorado River Basin. In order to further define and clarify the <br />process in the Recovery Program. a section 7 agreement was implemented on October 15. 1993. <br />by the Recovery Program participants. Incorporated into this agreement is a Recoverv