At-Risk Species Finder
The Conservation Effort
More than three petitions to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s (Service) from conservation entities beginning in 2010 brought attention to the conservation crisis centered in the Southeast. Just under 500 species were called out for evaluation on whether protection was warranted under the Endangered Species Act. This triggered a call to action, not just to address the incredible workload but also to find better solutions for conserving, recovering, and sustaining wildlife and its habitat in the southeast. We needed a better strategy, even if petitioners continued to file, continued declines in species were not acceptable. The Southeast Region is working in five action areas to accomplish the goal of conserving at-risk species.
Prioritize species in need of conservation;
Promote voluntary conservation actions;
Build partnerships with key stake holders;
Improve data collection and sharing; and
Share our stories of success and talk about the champions of conservation.
As of 2021, the Service’s Southeast Region has roughly 50 percent of the agency-wide workload to evaluate these species.
Defining At-Risk Species
The Service’s Southeast Region (Legacy Region 4) defines at-risk species as: species that have been (a) proposed for listing, (b) are candidates for listing, or (c) have been petitioned to be evaluated for listing under the Endangered Species Act. The Southeast currently has over 200 species that have been proposed for listing, are candidates for listing, or have been petitioned to be evaluated for listing under the Endangered Species Act. Thus, we are focusing our conservation efforts on these species before expanding to additional State species of concern.
Purpose of the Finder
The Southeast’s At-Risk Species Finder (Finder) was developed to track the status and our progress of evaluating at-risk species on the National Workplan and allows the user to explore other information on these species. The Finder is intended to promote collaborative pro-active conservation amongst the Service and our conservation partners. The Finder includes species on the current and previous workplans with a range that overlaps the Southeast (i.e., Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, Puerto Rico, South Carolina, Tennessee, and U.S. Virgin Islands) regardless of which Region leads the Species Status Assessment Report or who is the species lead within the Service. The Finder allows the user to sort on a variety of information including workplan year, taxa, and petition status, as well as develop State lists of at-risk species. In addition, you will find links to species specific information hosted on other platforms such as our Environmental Conservation Online System ( ). The total number of species in the table will continue to increase as new species are petitioned or brought into the workplan for discretionary review. Improvements to the Finder will look to expand and support our ability to identify proactive opportunities to implement conservation with our partners.
Southeast Conservation Adaptation Strategy (SECAS) Blueprint
SECAS is a regional conservation initiative that spans the Southeastern United States and Caribbean. SECAS was started in 2011 by the states of the Southeastern Association of Fish & Wildlife Agencies and the federal agencies of the Southeast Natural Resource Leaders Group. SECAS emerged as a response to the unprecedented challenges facing our natural and cultural resources, like urban growth and .
A Conservation Planning Atlas (CPA) is a science-based mapping platform where conservation managers and LCC members, and private citizens can go to view, retrieve, and perform analyses on spatial information with specific conservation goals in mind. Users can also upload their own datasets to the CPA. The following portals have been created for the LCC network across the Southeast:
Data from Landscape Conservation Cooperatives across the Southeast have been integrated into the SECAS Blueprint.
