Improving species status assessments under the U.S. Endangered Species Act and implications for multispecies conservation challenges worldwide

Reed F. Noss, Jennifer M. Cartwright, Dwayne Estes, Theo Witsell, Gregg Elliott, Daniel Adams, Matthew Albrecht, Ryan Boyles, Patrick Comer, Chris Doffitt, Don Faber-Langendoen, Jo Vonn Hill, William C. Hunter, Wesley M. Knapp, Michael E. Marshall, Jason Singhurst, Christopher Tracey, Jeffrey Walck, Alan Weakley

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

17 Scopus citations

Abstract

Despite its successes, the U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA) has proven challenging to implement due to funding limitations, workload backlog, and other problems. As threats to species survival intensify and as more species come under threat, the need for the ESA and similar conservation laws and policies in other countries to function efficiently has grown. Attempts by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) to streamline ESA decisions include multispecies recovery plans and habitat conservation plans. We address species status assessment (SSA), a USFWS process to inform ESA decisions from listing to recovery, within the context of multispecies and ecosystem planning. Although existing SSAs have a single-species focus, ecosystem-based research can efficiently inform multiple SSAs within a region and provide a foundation for transition to multispecies SSAs in the future. We considered at-risk grassland species and ecosystems within the southeastern United States, where a disproportionate number of rare and endemic species are associated with grasslands. To initiate our ecosystem-based approach, we used a combined literature-based and structured World Café workshop format to identify science needs for SSAs. Discussions concentrated on 5 categories of threats to grassland species and ecosystems, consistent with recommendations to make shared threats a focus of planning under the ESA: (1) habitat loss, fragmentation, and disruption of functional connectivity; (2) climate change; (3) altered disturbance regimes; (4) invasive species; and (5) localized impacts. For each threat, workshop participants identified science and information needs, including database availability, research priorities, and modeling and mapping needs. Grouping species by habitat and shared threats can make the SSA process and other planning processes for conservation of at-risk species worldwide more efficient and useful. We found a combination of literature review and structured discussion effective for identifying the scientific information and analysis needed to support the development of multiple SSAs. Article impact statement: Species status assessments can be improved by an ecosystem-based approach that groups imperiled species by shared habitats and threats.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1715-1724
Number of pages10
JournalConservation Biology
Volume35
Issue number6
DOIs
StatePublished - Dec 2021
Externally publishedYes

Funding

The SSA workshop was funded by the U.S. Geological Survey Southeast Climate Adaptation Science Center, which is managed by the U.S. Geological Survey National Climate Adaptation Science Center. We thank P. Beier, N. Greenwald, T. Jones‐Farrand, and an anonymous reviewer for constructive comments on earlier drafts of this manuscript. Any use of trade, firm, or product names is for descriptive purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the U.S. Government. The SSA workshop was funded by the U.S. Geological Survey Southeast Climate Adaptation Science Center, which is managed by the U.S. Geological Survey National Climate Adaptation Science Center. We thank P. Beier, N. Greenwald, T. Jones-Farrand, and an anonymous reviewer for constructive comments on earlier drafts of this manuscript. Any use of trade, firm, or product names is for descriptive purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the U.S. Government.

Keywords

  • conservación del ecosistema
  • ecosystem conservation
  • endemic species
  • especie endémica
  • grasslands
  • multispecies planning
  • pastizales
  • planeación multiespecie
  • southeastern United States
  • sureste de los Estados Unidos
  • 多物种规划
  • 特有物种
  • 生态系统保护
  • 美国东南部
  • 草地

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