Candidate species

What are candidate species? Candidate species are plants and animals for which the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) has sufficient information on their biological status and threats to propose them as endangered or threatened under the Endangered Species Act (ESA), but for which development of a proposed listing regulation is precluded by other higher priority listing activities. The current list of FWS candidate species is available at http://www.fws.gov/endangered/what-we-do/index.html. The National Marine Fisheries Service, which has jurisdiction over most marine species, also maintains a list of “species of concern” for which more information is needed before they can be proposed for listing.