The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has released a yearly status appraisal of plants and animals that are candidates for Endangered Species Act protection. Twenty-two species from Hawaii and one species of bird historically from American Samoa were added to the candidate list, one species was removed, and one has changed in priority from the last Candidate Notice of Review conducted in November 2013.
There are now 146 species recognized by the service as candidates for ESA protection. With the addition of this year’s candidate species, there are now 34 candidate species in the Pacific Islands — 29 for Hawaii and five for American Samoa. Seven additional species are proposed for protection under the ESA in Guam and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands.
The service is soliciting information on these species and others that may warrant ESA protection to assist in preparing listing documents and future revisions or supplements to the review.
Candidates are plants and animals for which the service has enough information on their status and the threats they face to propose as threatened or endangered, but for which a proposed listing rule is precluded by other, higher priority listing actions. This review helps landowners and natural resource managers understand which species need most to be conserved, allowing them to address threats and work to preclude ESA listing.
Among the species being added to the candidate list is the maomao bird (Gymnomyza samoensis), native to Tutuila Island, American Samoa, and the islands of Upolu and Savaii, Independent Samoa, but now only found in small populations on Savaii and Upolu.
The other species added are: nine Maui plant species (Cyanea kauaulaensis, Cyperus neokunthianus, Phyllostegia brevidens, Schiedea diffusa ssp. Diffusa, Deparia kaalaana, Hypolepis hawaiiensis var. mauiensis, Phyllostegia stachyoides, Sanicula sandwicensis and Portulaca villosa), two Molokai plants (Cyrtandra hematos and Phyllostegia stachyoides), three Hawaii Island plants (Exocarpos menziesii, Sanicula sandwicensis and Phyllostegia stachyoides), nine Kauai plants (Kadua haupuensis, Labordia lorenciana, Lepidium orbiculare, Phyllostegia helleri, Santalum involutum, Wikstromoemia skottsbergiana, Asplenium diellaciniatum, Dryopteris glabra var. pusilla and Sicyos lanceoloideus), four Oahu plants (Pritchardia bakeri, Stenogyne kaalae ssp., Sherffii and Sicyos lanceoloideus), and one Nihoa plant (Portulaca villosa).
Although candidate species do not receive ESA protection, the service works to conserve them and their habitats using several tools. Candidates are assigned a listing priority number based on the magnitude and imminence of threats faced. When adding species to the list of threatened or endangered species, species with the highest listing priority are first. Changes in priority for one species — Sprague’s pipit — occurred based on a reduction in the imminence of the threat from conversion of habitat on the bird’s breeding grounds.
More information can be found online at fws.gov/endangered/what-we-do/cnor.html.