Endangered species recovery: A resource allocation problem

Understanding temporal variation of threats that cause species endangerment is a key to understand conservation strategies needed to improve species recovery. We assessed temporal variation in the threats to species listed under the United States Endangered Species Act (ESA) as identified by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) and National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS). Based on initial review of ESA listing decisions and literature, we identified six overarching threat categories: habitat modification, overutilization, pollution, species-species interaction, demographic stochasticity, and environmental stochasticity. We screened listing decision documents to determine threat occurrence (i.e., presence/absence of a given threat in a listing decision) for each threat category for all species listed between 1975 and 2017. We evaluated how the number of threats and specific threat occurrences changed over the past four decades. We found that the number of threats per listing decision increased more than twofold from an average of 1.5 (95% CI: 1.3-1.7) threats in 1975 to 3.7 (95% CI: 3.4-4.0) threats in 2017. Threat occurrence increased for habitat modification, environmental stochasticity and species-species interaction, while it decreased for overutilization since 1975 and for demographic stochasticity and pollution since the mid-2000s. The documented increase in number of threats at time of listing may be due to a growing human population exerting increased pressure on species persistence, improved scientific advancement in understanding factors influencing species endangerment, or prolonged time taken for more recent species to be listed under the ESA. We believe that key federal and state governmental regulations have resulted in a documented decrease in overutilization, demographic stochasticity, and pollution, and we recommend large-scale strategies combined with local planning efforts to address the growing threats of habitat loss, environmental stochasticity, and species-species interaction. K E Y W O R D SEndangered Species Act, environmental regulations, policy, temporal, threats Authors after Haines are listed in alphabetical order

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Temporal analysis of threats causing species endangerment in the United States

Leu

Haines

Check

et al. 2019

“…Project prioritization tools represent a vast improvement over ad-hoc allocation of conservation funding (Evans et al, 2016;Gerber et al, 2018;Joseph et al, 2009). As such, the management stream-based structure of the SoS program is progressive.…”

Section: Box 2 An Example Of a Transitional Management Arrangement: Kmentioning

confidence: 99%

Planning for success: Why conservation programs need a strategic program for recovering species

Adams

O’Donnell

Burley³

et al. 2019

A substantial amount of money has been spent globally on threatened species management. While the number of threatened species continues to increase, we would expect to observe a portion of those receiving active management to respond positively and recover over time. Management of these recovering species requires a different approach to those which are declining. In particular, recovering species may require active monitoring as the primary management activity, once the threats causing their initial decline have been managed such that populations are stable or increasing. When prioritizing funding actions to improve species persistence (in particular with species prioritization approaches such as cost-effectiveness rankings), we demonstrate that monitoring species to track their continued improvement would only occur in the (unlikely) scenario of comprehensive program funding.We provide one easily implemented solution to this-the establishment of a separately funded transitional management stream within which recovering or recovered species are prioritized for monitoring from a dedicated monitoring budget. We present a set of criteria to assess recovering species eligible for this management arrangement and demonstrate the successful application of this approach in New South Wales, Australia in the Saving our Species program. K E Y W O R D S

“…Limited funding and resources are often a constraint in designing and implementing a recovery plan for an endangered species (Gerber et al, ). One common conundrum is how to allocate resources between populations residing in the bulk of a species' range versus geographically peripheral populations, particularly if those peripheral populations are found in small and distant geographic areas relative to the main range.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Contrasting Ozark and Great Lakes populations in the endangered Hines emerald dragonfly (Somatochlora hineana) using ecological, genetic, and phylogeographic analyses

Walker

Mahoney

Templeton

et al. 2020

The federally endangered species Hine's emerald dragonfly (Somatochlora hineana) is found in fens surrounding the Great Lakes region and in a small portion of the Missouri Ozarks. Most previous work has focused on the populations in the Great Lakes region. We present mark/recapture studies and genetic surveys to address the status of the Ozark populations. The densities and genetic diversity tend to be higher in the Ozarks than in the Great Lakes region. A phylogeographic analysis indicates that the Ozarks, with its unglaciated fens, is the likely source for the populations currently inhabiting the formerly glaciated Great Lakes region, and genetic diversity decreases with increasing distance from the Ozarks. This work illustrates the inadequacy of using geography alone to identify a population as marginal and of less conservation concern. We also reanalyzed genetic data on the Great Lakes populations, where several populations have been extirpated over the last several decades. We show that the populations in the Great Lakes region have already lost more than 30% of their genetic diversity over just several decades, and the phylogeographic analysis indicates that increased fragmentation is a possibility in this region due to local extirpations. Ecologically and genetically, the Ozark populations should have a high priority in management plans, and the high rate of loss of genetic diversity and potential fragmentation indicates that continued monitoring and management is needed in the Great Lakes region for this highly endangered dragonfly.