Tiny Fish, Small Space

November 14, 2006

Release from: Whitney Royster
Casper Star-Tribune (Wyoming)

PINEDALE - When an animal or plant is placed on the endangered species list, typically its habitat has dwindled or outside influences have dramatically threatened its survival.

But in a remote lake outside Pinedale, there is a different endangered tale. The Kendall Warm Springs dace, a 1- to 2.5-inch fish, is thriving in its habitat. Still, it is listed on the endangered species list.

The problem? Its habitat is about 900 feet of water on the entire planet.

"Nine hundred feet in the whole world is not a good place to be," said Joe Neal, fisheries biologist for the Bridger-Teton National Forest's Pinedale office. "The springs are 1,200 feet, and they only live in the bottom 900 feet."

Still, there are several thousand dace "doing quite well" in the warm springs.

The fish are now up for review by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The agency gathers new information pertinent to the fish, and evaluates its habitat to determine if listing is still warranted.

When the dace was listed as endangered in 1970, it wasn't listed because its range is so limited, according to Mary Jennings, a biologist with the Fish and Wildlife Service. Instead, the fish was listed because of threats to its habitat -- much as something with a wider range would be, if threats existed to most of its habitat.

Those threats included people bathing and doing laundry, and cattle moving through the springs.

Now, the U.S. Forest Service has fenced off the warm springs.

Neal said elk, deer and moose still move through the area, but dace evolved with those animals present. There are signs posted indicating no bathing or wading because of the endangered fish.

Discussions periodically come up in Pinedale whether to erect signs telling people about the fish, to bring attention to their plight.

"We go with the pretense that the least attention we give to it, the better," Neal said. "We're not hiding it, but not promoting it, either."

The Fish and Wildlife Service will gather water quality data and look at continued threats to the dace. Jennings said impacts of oil and gas development will likely be assessed.

"Its habitat hasn't been diminished, but it's the narrowness of its habitat (that) just causes us to consider that when looking at the threats," Jennings said. "It's not a species that has 50 populations out there, so we can't say, 'This threat is just in one area.' Any threats that exist, exist across its habitat."