WildEarth Guardians

Friday, August 8, 2008
New Mexico Backs Off on Controversial Prairie-Chicken Hunt

New Mexico Game Commission announced that they will not issue permits to hunt lesser prairie-chickens while the bird is being considered for federal Endangered Species Act protection
Contact: WildEarth Guardians

Santa Fe, NM - The director of the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish (Department) and the chairman of the New Mexico Game Commission (Commission) announced yesterday that they would not issue permits to hunt lesser prairie-chickens while the bird is being considered for federal Endangered Species Act (ESA) protection. The lesser prairie-chicken has been a candidate for ESA protection for over ten years and has declined by over 90% across its five-state range in the past century.

At its July 23 meeting, the Commission approved a proposal by the Department to allow up to 100 lesser prairie-chickens to be hunted in New Mexico. The decision caused a stir among conservationists, sportsmen, and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). The BLM had sent a letter to the Department in early July urging them not to approve the hunt given the efforts underway to conserve the bird.

“We are relieved that the hunt won’t proceed, as the lesser prairie-chicken cannot afford any backslides in protection,” said Nicole Rosmarino of WildEarth Guardians. Rosmarino further noted that, “This incident shows just how important it is to take management of this species out of state hands by listing it under the federal Endangered Species Act.”

WildEarth Guardians released a report on June 9, the decade anniversary of the lesser prairie-chicken’s designation as a species that warrants ESA listing but is precluded by higher priorities. This “warranted but precluded” status earns the lesser prairie-chicken a place on the formal candidate list, alongside nearly 300 other species awaiting ESA protection.

In the decade that the lesser prairie-chicken has been an ESA candidate, there have been continued declines of the bird, particularly in Oklahoma and Colorado, and new documented threats, including climate change and hybridization with greater prairie-chickens. The WildEarth Guardians report is entitled Lesser Prairie-Chicken: A Decade in Purgatory.

“What we need are steps forward, not steps back in order to rescue this bird from the brink of extinction,” continued Rosmarino.

WildEarth Guardians and other groups are in federal court in DC challenging the Fish and Wildlife Service’s failure to list the lesser prairie-chicken and other species that have been designated warranted but precluded and thus denied federal protection.

For a copy of Lesser Prairie-Chicken: A Decade in Purgatory, contact nrosmarino@wildearthguardians.org or visit www.wildearthguardians.org.

To learn more about the New Mexico lesser prairie-chicken hunt issue, contact New Mexico Game Commissioner Sandy Buffett at: 505-270-5743.