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Critical Habitat for the Steller's EiderQuestions & Answers |
Q. What is critical habitat?
A. Critical habitat is a term used in the Endangered Species Act (ESA). It refers to specific geographic areas that are essential for the conservation of a threatened or endangered species and that may require special management considerations. These areas do not necessarily have to be occupied by the species at the time of designation.
Q. What is the purpose of designating critical habitat?
A. Section 7 of the ESA requires Federal agencies to consult with the Service on actions they carry out, fund, or authorize that may affect threatened or endangered species or their critical habitat. The purpose of consultation is to ensure that Federal actions do not jeopardize the continued existence of a listed species or result in the destruction or adverse modification of designated critical habitat. A critical habitat designation has no effect on situations in which a Federal agency is not involved--for example, a landowner undertaking a project on private land that involves no Federal funding or permit.
Q. What are the effects of critical habitat designation?
A. Critical habitat only affects Federal lands and activities funded, permitted, or carried out by the Federal government. It has no regulatory impacts on private actions conducted on private lands. Although designation of critical habitat is not anticipated to result in any additional regulatory consequences beyond the existing consultation responsibilities outlined in section 7 of the ESA, actions involving the Federal government may experience increased public scrutiny of proposed development activities in relation to spectacled eider critical habitat.
Q. Do listed species in critical habitat areas receive more protection?
A. Designation of critical habitat provides a means by which habitat essential for the conservation of a listed species can be protected from adverse modification or destruction resulting from Federal activities or projects. Designation of an area as critical habitat does not create a nature preserve or refuge, and does not affect ownership of land in the area. It does not allow Federal or public access to private lands, and does not change the rights of private landowners. It does not limit private, local or State actions unless Federal funding or authorization is involved. Listed species and their habitats are protected by the Endangered Species Act whether or not they are in an area designated as critical habitat.
Q. What protection does a species receive when it is listed as threatened or endangered?
A. The Endangered Species Act forbids the import, export, or interstate or foreign sale of protected animals and plants without a special permit. It also makes Atake@ illegal B forbidding the killing, harming, harassing, possessing, or removing of protected animals from the wild. Federal agencies must also consult with the Service to conserve listed species on their lands and to ensure that any activity they fund, authorize, or carry out will not jeopardize the survival of a listed species.
Permits may be issued to carry out otherwise prohibited activities involving endangered wildlife species for scientific purposes, to enhance the propagation or survival of the species, or for incidental take in the course of certain otherwise lawful activities.
In addition, the Endangered Species Act requires that Federal agencies not only take action to prevent further loss of a species, but also pursue actions to recover species to the point where they no longer require protection and can be delisted.
Q. Do Federal agencies have to consult with the Service outside critical habitat areas?
A. Yes. Even when there is no critical habitat designation, Federal agencies must consult with the Service to ensure any action they carry out, fund, or authorize is not likely to jeopardize the continued existence of a listed species.
Q. What is the impact of a critical habitat designation on economic development?
A. The vast majority of human activities that require a consultation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proceed with little or no modification.
Q. How does the Service determine what areas to designate?
A. Biologists consider physical or biological habitat features needed for life and successful reproduction of the species. These include, but are not limited to:
Q. Are all areas within critical habitat boundaries considered critical habitat?
A. Only areas that contain the primary constituent elements required by the species are considered critical habitat. Primary constituent elements are those physical and biological features of a landscape that a species needs to survive. Some areas within the eider critical habitat boundaries may not contain primary constituent elements. For example, towns, villages, roads and oil platforms are not considered critical habitat.
Q. For how many species has the Service designated critical habitat?
A. To date, the Service has designated critical habitat for 134 of the 1,234 species listed as threatened or endangered.
Q. Why hasn't the Service designated critical habitat for more species?
A. After a Congressional moratorium on listing new species ended in 1996, the Service faced a huge backlog of proposed species listings. At that point, the Service assigned a relatively low priority to designating critical habitat because it believed that a more effective use of limited resources was to place imperiled species on the threatened and endangered species list. Recent court decisions, however, have indicated that the Service must in most cases designate critical habitat for listed species.
Q. Why didn't the Service designate critical habitat when the Steller's eider was listed?
A. When the Steller's eider was listed as threatened in 1997, the Service generally did not designate critical habitat because it believed that most conservation benefits for the species were accrued as a result of listing, and that very few, if any, additional benefits were afforded by designating critical habitat. Consequently, the Service generally opted to focus its limited resources on listing species that were imperiled rather than designating critical habitat. However, recent federal court rulings have clearly signaled that designation of critical habitat for listed species must be the rule rather than the exception.
Q. Why are we designating critical habitat now?
A. On March 10, 1999, the Southwest Center for Biological Diversity and the Christians Caring for Creation filed a lawsuit in Federal District Court in the Northern District of California against the Secretary of the Department of the Interior for failure to designate critical habitat for five California species and Alaska's spectacled and Steller's eiders. In September 1999, the plaintiffs and the Departments of Justice and Interior entered into an agreement in which Interior agreed to re-evaluate its critical habitat determinations for spectacled and Steller's eiders. We carefully reviewed the best scientific and commercial data available, including new information that had been gathered since the species was listed. On March 13, 2000, we proposed the designation of nine areas as critical habitat for the Steller's eider totaling about 25,428 square miles. Following a public comment period of 197 days, and after careful deliberation and consideration of all available information, we have identified five areas that we are certain are essential to the conservation of Steller's eiders and may require special management considerations. These five areas consist of approximately 2,830 square miles of lands and waters and 852 miles of shoreline.
Q. Where are we designating critical habitat?
A. We are designating critical habitat in 5 areas. About 65 percent of the designated area is within Federally managed lands or waters, and about 26 percent of the designated area is within waters managed by the State. The remaining critical habitat is on Native-owned lands.
Unit 1. Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta - includes the Avegetated intertidal zone@ of the central delta from the Askinuk Mountains to northern Nelson Island. It encompasses 989 square miles of lands.
Unit 2. Kuskokwim Shoals- includes a portion of northern Kuskokwim Bay from the mouth of the Kolavinarak River to near the village of Kwigillingok, extending approximately 11-24 miles offshore. This unit encompasses approximately 1,472 square miles of marine waters and about 115 miles of shoreline.
Unit 3. Seal Islands- includes all waters enclosed within the Seal Islands lagoon and marine waters 1/4 mile offshore of the islands and adjacent mainland. It encompasses 24 square miles and 65 miles of shoreline. This unit was originally proposed as a subunit of the North Side of the Alaska Peninsula unit but is now identified separately.
Unit 4. Nelson Lagoon- includes all of Nelson Lagoon and portions of Port Moller and Herendeen Bay and marine waters 1/4 mile offshore of the islands and adjacent mainland.. This unit encompasses 205 square miles and 149 miles of shoreline. This complex was originally proposed as a subunit of the North Side of the Alaska Peninsula unit but is now identified separately.
Unit 5. Izembek Lagoon- includes all waters of Izembek Lagoon, Moffett Lagoon, Applegate Cove, and Norma Bay and marine waters 1/4 mile offshore of the islands and adjacent mainland. It encompasses 140 square miles of marine waters and 186 miles of shoreline. This unit was originally proposed as a subunit of the North Side of the Alaska Peninsula unit but is now identified separately.
Q. Why did we designate less critical habitat than you proposed?
A. In determining what warranted designation as critical habitat, we considered scientific information, the opinions of eider experts, traditional Native environmental knowledge, and public comment. We have refined the final critical habitat designations to more specifically and precisely identify the areas we believe are essential to the conservation of the Alaska- breeding population of Steller's eiders. We eliminated proposed critical habitat areas that the best available information indicates are not essential to the conservation of this species. We did not designate critical habitat on the North Slope. While we believe some portion of the North Slope contains habitat features that are essential to the conservation of Steller's eiders and therefore meet the definition of critical habitat, we did not designate critical habitat here because the benefits of excluding the area from critical habitat designation outweigh the benefits of designating critical habitat.
Q. Are all areas within critical habitat boundaries considered critical habitat?
A. Only areas within critical habitat boundaries that contain Aprimary constituent elements@ are considered to be critical habitat. Primary constituent elements are those aspects of habitat that are essential to the conservation of a species. In the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta critical habitat unit the primary constituent elements are lands within the vegetated intertidal zone (lands inundated by tidally influenced water), along with all open-water inclusions within that zone. In the Kuskokwim Shoals critical habitat unit the primary constituent elements include marine waters up to 9 m (30 ft) deep and the underlying substrate, the associated invertebrate fauna in the water column, and the underlying marine benthic community. In the Izembek Lagoon, Nelson Lagoon, and Seal Islands critical habitat units, the primary constituent elements include waters up to 9m (30 ft) deep, the associated invertebrate fauna in the water column, the underlying marine benthic community, and where present, eelgrass beds and associated flora and fauna. There are many areas within Steller's eider critical habitat boundaries that do not contain the constituent elements and are not considered critical habitat. For example, marine waters deeper than 9 meters (30 feet) and existing structures such as docks are not considered critical habitat.
Q. Are all Steller's eiders protected by the Endangered Species Act?
A. No. There are three populations of Steller's eiders. Two breed in Russia and one breeds in Alaska. Only the Alaska-breeding population is classified as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.
Q. Where does the Alaska-breeding population of Steller's eiders occur?
A. The Alaska-breeding population of Steller's eiders nests in two general areas: on the North Slope where hundreds or low thousands occur; and on the Yukon- Kuskokwim Delta, where an extremely small but unknown number remain. After nesting, Steller's eiders move from their terrestrial nesting areas to shallow, nearshore marine waters, where they spend the remainder of the year.
The range of the Alaska-breeding population during the non-nesting season remains poorly understood. Over a hundred thousand Steller's eiders that nest in Russia move to Alaska and winter in a huge area including the north and south sides of the Alaska Peninsula, the eastern Aleutian Islands, and southcoastal Alaska including the Kodiak Archipelago and parts of southern Cook Inlet. It is believed that the threatened Alaska-breeding population likely also occurs within this area during winter, but it is not known whether they occur in specific portions or throughout this broad range.
Q. Why have Alaska-breeding Steller's eiders declined?
A. The Alaska-breeding population of Steller's eiders was listed as threatened because its range in Alaska contracted substantially and its population size declined, increasing the vulnerability of the remaining population to extirpation. Causes of the decline remain unknown but possible contributing factors include over-hunting, lead-poisoning from ingesting spent lead shot while feeding, changes in the number or diet of predators, and changes in the marine ecosystems where Steller's eiders molt and winter.
Call or write:
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Northern Alaska Ecological Services
101 12 th Ave. Box 19, Room 110
Fairbanks, AK 99701
(907) 456-0203