Annual Report
2005 Middle Rio Grande Endangered Species Collaborative Program Annual Report
Date: 2005/01/01
Author(s): MRGESCP
Publication: Middle Rio Grande Endangered Species Act Collaborative Program Annual Report, 34 p.
Abstract:
The Middle Rio Grande Endangered Species Act Collaborative Program (Program) is a partnership created to protect and improve the status of listed endangered species, specifically the Rio Grande silvery minnow (silvery minnow) and the southwestern willow flycatcher (flycatcher), in the Middle Rio Grande (MRG) of New Mexico while simultaneously protecting existing and future water uses in the area. The MRG is defined for purposes of the Program as the Rio Grande from the Colorado/New Mexico state line to the northern end of the high water mark at Elephant Butte Reservoir, New Mexico. This report contains the Program’s 2005 fiscal and project summaries and highlights its accomplishments in 2005.
During 2005 Congress appropriated $5,374,020 of ‘write-in’ funding for Program activities, which included addressing many of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s (Service) 2003 Biological Opinion’s Reasonable and Prudent Alternative (RPA) activities necessary to avoid jeopardy. Although this funding level was significantly less than the proposed Program’s budget, the Program succeeded in funding a number of important projects, including several innovative habitat restoration projects, acquisition of supplemental water through voluntary leases, and expansion of its captive silvery minnow propagation and augmentation program. The Program signatories continued their work on authorizing legislation and completing a draft version of a long-range plan. The river overflowed its banks throughout the MRG in 2005 (photos courtesy of Erich Schweller, Tetra Tech.)
Above average spring runoff conditions in 2005 provided both opportunities and challenges within the MRG. Sustained spring flows of over 6000 cubic feet per second (cfs) below Cochiti Reservoir created extensive overbanking from the river channel into the surrounding Bosque. This provided an opportunity for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) to complete its Overbank Flooding Study and for researchers to investigate the effects overbank conditions may have on spawning and recruitment of silvery minnow and regeneration of native plant species.