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 Winkler’s cactus (Pediocactus winkleri) is listed federally as a threatened species and occurs in and around Capitol Reef National Park. A recent partnership between land management agencies near the park has increased surveys in the area for rare plants.
Tom O. Clark |
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 By Tom O. Clark At first glance, this landscape looks barren, stretched and folded into colorful canyons that seem home to nothing but stone. Look closer and the landscape begins to share its secrets. Scattered among the sandstone, tenacious plants are tucked in rocky pockets. South-central Utah’s Capitol Reef National Park and surrounding lands contain populations of more than 40 rare and endemic plant species. New plant species and varieties continue to be found in these underexplored landscapes. Capitol Reef’s eight federally listed plants and one candidate for listing as threatened or endangered, representing almost half of the listed plants in Utah, make it the unit with the most in the National Park System outside Hawaii and California. Capitol Reef shares management responsibilities for these species under the Endangered Species Act with the Bureau of Land Management and two national forests. In 1999 the agencies agreed to hire an interagency botany technician. In the past, each agency addressed rare plant work on its land as funds became available, resulting in a piecemeal approach to species management. Since the agencies share the burden of protecting these species, surveying and monitoring across agency boundaries provide essential information necessary for proper management. Each agency understands that information from another agency’s land is just as valuable as information from its own land. This realization has been the key to generating support for the program by agency managers. Opportunities for leveraging federal dollars with nonfederal partners have also been increased through establishment of this agreement. Each agency can use funds provided by another agency to leverage funding within its agency or through matching funds from nongovernmental organizations. By pooling scarce funds for threatened and endangered plant species, each agency obtains more complete information and increases personnel services for each individual agency dollar spent. The partners in this agreement are Capitol Reef National Park, the Richfield Field Office of Bureau of Land Management, and the Fishlake and Dixie National Forests. In 2000, Capitol Reef successfully competed for Natural Resource Challenge funds that established a nucleus of nonrecurring funds for inventory of listed and rare species. This funding was the catalyst that brought the partnership to a higher level of involvement from all agencies. In 2001, Capitol Reef National Park received $53,000 of Natural Resource Challenge funds from the Natural Resource Preservation Program supplemented by donations of $4,000 from Capitol Reef Natural History Association and $1,000 from the Utah Native Plant Society. Through the agreement, the Bureau of Land Management and USDA Forest Service were able to cost-share these funds and pool $40,000 to extend surveys for the plant species onto lands adjacent to Capitol Reef. In addition to the funds provided in 2001, the Fishlake and Dixie National Forests had three biological technicians assist with survey work during peak blooming times. Each agency is proud of the accomplishments this partnership has generated and believes this program embodies Congress’s intent for rare species management as articulated in the Endangered Species Act. Information gathered from inventories will allow agencies to focus future funding and management on protection of rare species and, because of that protection, avoid the necessity of listing them in the future. |
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This material is from Natural Resource Year in Review--2001, published by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior, in May 2001 (publication D-2255) /YearInReview/yir/yir2001/07_collaboration/07_6_clark_CARE.HTML Last Updated: |
