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McClane Canyon Mine Expansion and Fruita Loadout Facility . Biological Assessment <br />• Minimize subadult and adult entrainment in diversion canals. <br />• Ensure protection from overutlilization. <br />• Ensure protection from diseases and parasites. <br />• Regulate non - native fish releases and escapement. <br />• Control problematic non - native fishes. <br />• Minimize hazardous materials spills in critical habitat. <br />• Remediate water quality problems. <br />• Provide for long -term management and protection of populations and their habitats. <br />Critical habitat. FWS (1994) designated critical habitat in the Colorado River and its 100 -year <br />floodplain from the Colorado River Bridge at exit 90 north of Interstate -70 near Rifle in Garfield <br />County, downstream to Lake Powell. Designation of critical habitats for all listed fish in the <br />Colorado River Basin was based on the presence of primary constituent elements (PCEs) — <br />water, physical, and biological features — that are needed for species' continued survival. <br />Briefly, PCEs include (FWS, 1994). <br />1. Sufficient quantity and quality of water delivered to a location with appropriate <br />hydrologic regime necessary for a stage of the species' life cycles. The water PCE <br />includes a quantity of water of sufficient quality — temperature, dissolved oxygen, lack <br />of contaminants, nutrients, and turbidity — that are necessary for each life stage; <br />2. Physical habitat in the Colorado River system inhabited or potentially inhabited by <br />species and providing life functions including spawning, nursery, feeding, rearing, and <br />passage for access between those areas including those activities within the 100 - <br />year floodplain. The physical PCE includes river channels, bottom lands, side <br />channels, secondary channels, oxbows, backwaters, and other areas in the 100 -year <br />floodplain; and <br />3. Biological environment including food supplies, predation, and competition during <br />each life stage for the different species. In particular, listed species have been <br />adversely affected by predation and competition from introduced non - native fish <br />species. <br />4.3.1.2 Environmental Baseline <br />Current Status in the Action Area. The Colorado River mainstem within the Grand Valley is <br />occupied habitat from Palisade, Colorado downstream to Lake Powell (FWS, 2002a). The 18- <br />mile reach of the Colorado River (Loma to the Gunnison River), which includes the confluence <br />of Reed Wash (Action Area), is important habitat for various life stages of Colorado <br />pikeminnows (Osmundson et al, 1998). The confluence of Reed Wash with the Colorado River <br />is within the 18 -mile reach while the confluence of Salt Creek (formed by Mack Wash, East Salt <br />Creek and West Salt Creek) is just downstream from the 18 -mile reach. <br />Populations of Colorado pikeminnows in the Colorado River were estimated for the period 1991 <br />to 2005. Population estimates of pikeminnows in the Colorado River Upper Reach (Westwater <br />Canyon to Palisade) in larger size classes generally increased between 1991 and 2005 <br />(Osmundson and White, 2009). During the period from 2003 to 2005, the pikeminnow <br />population in the Upper Reach of fish >250 mm long averaged 371 fish. Actual use of Reed <br />Wash and the Action Area by pikeminnows is unknown. Likewise, actual use of the Salt Creek <br />confluence with the Colorado River and vicinity is unknown. <br />Critical Habitat. There is designated critical habitat for the Colorado pikeminnow in the Action <br />Area. The physical habitat PCE provides spawning, nursery feeding and rearing habitats, or <br />access to those habitats and is found in river channels as well as bottom lands, side channels, <br />secondary channels, oxbows, backwaters, and other areas within the 100 -year floodplain, which <br />20 <br />