Filing For Fins, Feathers

Threatened species

Conservation groups are putting the pressure on the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to give protective status to westslope cutthroat trout and mountain quail.

Five conservation groups and a fly fishing guide have filed a 60-day notice of intent to sue the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service over the agency’s decision not to list the westslope cutthroat trout as a threatened species.

The notice was filed by American Wildlands, the Madison-Gallatin Chapter of Trout Unlimited, Idaho Watersheds Project, Montana Environmental Information Center, Clearwater Biodiversity Project and guide Bud Lilly.

In its April decision not to list westslopes, the Fish and Wildlife Service cited some 700 projects under way to protect the fish under the Endangered Species Act. They range from keeping cattle out of streams to a proposal to poison all fish in 77 miles of the Cherry Creek drainage near Bozeman and replace them with westslopes.

The petitioners contend many of the projects are not fully funded and in place, and have no track record of success.

Mountain quail advocates - including Robert Kavanaugh of Olympia; the Idaho Watersheds Project of Hailey, Idaho; the Committee for Idaho’s High Desert based in Boise; and the Spokane Audubon Society - also have given the Fish and Wildlife Service 60-days notices of intent to file a lawsuit to win threatened status for the bird.