Six Native American conservation projects in California and Nevada will receive $658,622 in grant funding through the National Tribal Wildlife Grant Program administered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The grants provide technical and financial assistance for the development and implementation of efforts that benefit fish and wildlife resources.

The National Tribal Wildlife Grant conservation projects in California include: grants to three tribes totaling $293,225 for projects addressing the Clear Lake hitch, a culturally significant native fish in Clear Lake. This multi-tribal effort will seek to accelerate the recovery of this fish and to provide stock to other streams in the watershed. The three tribes and their individual grant awards are: The Big Valley Rancheria Band of Pomo Indians in California, $49,791 for the Big Valley Rancheria Clear Lake Hitch Study; Habematolel Pomo of Upper Lake, $48,498 for the Clear Lake Hitch Study and Recovery Project; and the Robinson Rancheria , $194,936 for the Clear Lake hitch study.

A grant to the Yurok Tribe of the Klamath River Reserve in northern California for $200,000 to study the feasibility of reintroducing California condors to the Yurok Ancestral Territory. The condor is listed as an endangered species by Federal and State agencies.

A grant to the Karuk Tribe for $100,000 for the Bluff Creek Habitat Protection-Road Decommissioning Implementation Project will improve salmon habitat by decommissioning a road that is a primary source of sedimentation negatively impacting salmon spawning habitat.

In Nevada the Moapa Band of Paiutes will receive $97,397 for the Muddy River Habitat Enhancement Project (Stream Bank Restoration). This project will restore and enhance the fishery and wildlife habitat of the Moapa River and other important wetland habitats on the Moapa Indian Reservation. The Tribe will restore stream channel and stream bank characteristics so that a riparian component made up of native plants can be established.

More than $34 million has gone to Native American tribes through the Tribal Wildlife Grants program in the past six years, providing funding for 175 conservation projects administered by 133 participating Federally-recognized tribes. The grants have enabled tribes to develop increased management capacity, improve and enhance relationships with partners including State agencies, address cultural and environmental priorities, and heighten interest of tribal students in fisheries, wildlife and related fields of study. Some grants have been awarded to enhance recovery efforts for threatened and endangered species.

The grants are provided exclusively to Federally-recognized Indian tribal governments and are made possible under the Related Agencies Appropriations Act of 2002, and through a component of the State Wildlife Grant program.

During the current grant cycle, tribes submitted a total of 110 proposals that were scored by panels in each Service Region using uniform ranking criteria. A national scoring panel recommended 38 proposals for funding.