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The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service last week proposed drastically expanded critical habitat for the Canadian lynx. The new proposal calls for 42,753 square miles to be categorized as critical habitat, more than 20 times more than the agency's 2006 proposal of 1,841 square miles.

The dramatic change can be attributed to FWS efforts to review habitat designations for many species made under the tenure of former Interior Department deputy assistant secretary Julie MacDonald. The former official was found to have exerted inappropriate political influence into the scientific process of determining critical habitat (Land Letter, Nov. 29, 2007).

The Canadian lynx population has suffered from over-trapping, habitat destruction and habitat fragmentation in the United States. As a result, the lynx, whose habitat previously spanned the northern regions of the country from coast to coast, is down to a population of 1,000 animals, according to estimates by Shawn Sartorius, a spokesperson for FWS. In 2000, the lynx was placed on the endangered species list following a lawsuit filed by environmental groups.

According to Sartorius, the new critical habitat is ample for the Canadian lynx's recovery but only when addressed in tandem with lynx habitats and populations in Canada. "The lynx in the lower 48 [states] are not a stand-alone population, even without any negative human influence," Sartorius said. "There aren't enough lynx here for a stable population unless they connect with the population [in Canada] that they need for genetic diversity."

The lynx may be moving into a bigger home but not immediately. FWS will seek public comment on its proposal until April 28 and may not officially designate habitat until next year.

Controversy in Colorado

While the new critical habitat proposal includes land in Idaho, Maine, Minnesota, Montana, Washington and Wyoming, it is the state left off the list, Colorado, that is generating the most controversy.

The Canadian lynx once thrived in the South Rockies, but its populations collapsed by the middle of the 19th century and disappeared completely in the 1970s. Beginning in March 1999, the Colorado Division of Wildlife began capturing lynx in Canada and releasing them at high altitudes in the San Juan Mountains of southwestern Colorado. Many of the 41 cats initially released starved, but in subsequent years, as the division refined its release techniques, the big cats survived and reproduced at higher rates, according to Colorado wildlife spokesman Joe Lewandowski.

Since 1999, the Divison of Wildlife has spent $4.5 million to release and track 218 lynx. 2003 through 2006 were banner years for the lynx, as 166 kittens were born during the period and mortality rates were low. Lewandowski estimates the current Canadian lynx population at 150, after the program hit a snag in 2007 when no cats were born, but the spokesman said this may be due to a natural, cyclical downturn in the snowshoe hare population.

But FWS was not convinced that the Canadian lynx could survive in the South Rockies. "It's not clear that Colorado has enough habitat to support a stable lynx population. We didn't want to prematurely designate and require what critical habitat designation requires when we think that the long-term viability of the population is unknown," Sartorius said.

Joshua Pollock, conservation director at the Center for Native Ecosystems, was unimpressed by that logic. "Critical habitat is about recovery, so it is supposed to include habitat for a species that is not fully occupied at the time, but necessary for the species to survive. If we want to see Canadian lynx off the [endangered species] list, we should be protecting habitat into which it can expand," he said.

Pollock refuted claims that the lynx population in Colorado was uncertain. "It's already here. It was gone a couple of decades ago, but now it is back, and it is breeding and spreading here," he said. "Tremendous effort by the Colorado Division of Wildlife and other nonprofits was put into re-establishing the species here, and to see Colorado excluded flies in the face of all that effort."

The exclusion of Colorado is not necessarily a permanent one, according to Sartorius. "We looked at habitat in Colorado extremely carefully," he said. "If the lynx population does rebound in the next few years, then it bodes well for long-term prospects," he said, adding that the measure could be reviewed.

But Pollock is skeptical. "Reviewing the habitat would be great except that the track-record for [FWS] voluntarily revisiting critical habitat is pretty weak," he said. "Right now the Fish and Wildlife Service has a pretty long backlog -- there are designated species without protection and several hundred waiting to be listed. I'm not holding my breath."

Currently, the Colorado wildlife division plans to continue its efforts to re-establish the Canadian lynx. "This is Colorado -- our population is growing rapidly, and there is more and more development pressure on the lynx. We're confident that we've got the habitat. and we believe we can manage wildlife on the ground by working with agencies and private land managers" Lewandowski said. "But can the cat survive here? Well, that's a question that everyone is waiting for the answer to."

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