Phoenix – The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service [Service] is seeking public comments on a draft recovery plan for the Canelo Hills ladies’ tresses (CHLT) (Spiranthes delitescens), which is an orchid native to southeastern Arizona’s ciénega habitats. The 60-day comment period begins December 14, 2021 .
Recovery plans aren’t regulatory, but provide a framework for the recovery of a species with criteria and conservation actions necessary for its recovery, or delisting, under the Endangered Species Act. They also establish a framework for agencies and cooperators to coordinate their recovery efforts and provide estimates of the cost of implementing recovery tasks. The draft recovery plan for the CHLT was developed in partnership with species experts and land managers to provide site-specific management actions, objective and measurable recovery criteria, and estimates of time and cost to recover the species.
The CHLT was listed as endangered in 1997, and is threatened by a variety of causes, including loss or reduction of ciénega or desert wetland habitat, herbivory or seed predation, pollinator decline, low numbers and limited distribution, and drought and climate change climate change
Climate change includes both global warming driven by human-induced emissions of greenhouse gases and the resulting large-scale shifts in weather patterns. Though there have been previous periods of climatic change, since the mid-20th century humans have had an unprecedented impact on Earth's climate system and caused change on a global scale.
Learn more about climate change . It’s especially vulnerable because it occurs only in four groundwater-fed ciénegas in southern Arizona.
Since the 1997 listing, the Service has worked with partners including The Nature Conservancy, the U.S. Forest Service, the Desert Botanical Garden and private landowners to periodically monitor populations. In addition, several projects are underway to better understand water supply at two of the ciénegas, to grow seeds collected for conservation, and to detect populations that may be dormant underground.
Members of the public are invited to submit comments through February 11, 2022. Copies of the draft recovery plan are available online https://www.fws.gov/southwest/es/arizona/. Public comments may be submitted via email to incomingazcorr@fws.gov.
