The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will host a public hearing on Wednesday, December 7, 2005, at The Inn on Lake Superior, 350 Canal Park Drive, Duluth, Minnesota. The hearing will run from 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. and provides an opportunity for the public to comment on a proposal by the Service to designate critical habitat for the lynx in northeastern Minnesota and other parts of the species’ range in the lower 48 states. The hearing will be preceded by an informational open house from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. with a presentation and question-and-answer session from 7 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.
The Service proposed critical habitat for the Canada lynx on November 9 in compliance with a court order. The proposal encompasses approximately 26,935 square miles of land in portions of northern Maine, northeastern Minnesota, the northern Rocky Mountains (northwestern Montana and a small portion of northern Idaho), and the Okanogan area of the northern Cascades in north-central Washington. The area in Minnesota under consideration includes approximately 3,546 square miles in portions of Cook, Koochiching, Lake, and St. Louis Counties.
The Canada lynx was listed in 2000 as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) throughout its range in the contiguous United States. The lynx currently lives in boreal forests in five geographic regions: the Northeast, the Great Lakes, the Northern Rocky Mountains, the Southern Rocky Mountains, and the Cascade Mountains. The Service is proposing to designate areas in four of these regions as critical habitat.
Areas proposed as critical habitat for the Canada lynx include boreal forest landscapes that provide beneficial habitat elements for the lynx, including snowshoe hares for prey and sufficient woody debris for use as den sites. All proposed areas have recent verified records of lynx occurrence and reproduction and thus are considered occupied.
Public comments on the proposed rule will be accepted until February 7, 2006. Written comments can be submitted via e-mail to FW6_lynx@fws.gov or mailed to Montana Field Office, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 100 N. Park Avenue, Suite 320, Helena, Montana 59601.
Oral and written comments will also be accepted at the public hearings in Duluth.
A copy of the proposed rule and other information about the Canada lynx is available on the Internet at http://mountain-prairie.fws.gov/species/mammals/lynx or by calling the Service’s Minnesota or Wisconsin field offices at 612-725-3548 or 920-866-1737, respectively.
The Service is preparing a draft economic analysis of the proposed critical habitat that will be released for public review and comment at a later date.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is the principal federal agency responsible for conserving, protecting and enhancing fish, wildlife and plants and their habitats for the continuing benefit of the American people. The Service manages the 95-million-acre National Wildlife Refuge System, which encompasses 545 national wildlife refuges, thousands of small wetlands and other special management areas. It also operates 69 national fish hatcheries, 63 Fish and Wildlife Management offices and 81 ecological services field stations. The agency enforces federal wildlife laws, administers the Endangered Species Act, manages migratory bird populations, restores nationally significant fisheries, conserves and restores wildlife habitat such as wetlands, and helps foreign governments with their conservation efforts. It also oversees the Federal Assistance program, which distributes hundreds of millions of dollars in excise taxes on fishing and hunting equipment to state fish and wildlife agencies.
