Fish and Wildlife Service October 6, 2008 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Service) proposes to issue itself an enhancement of survival permit pursuant to section 10(a)(1)(A) of the Endangered Species Act of 1973, as amended (Act), for a programmatic Safe Harbor Agreement (Agreement). The proposed term of the Agreement is 15 years, and the proposed term of the permit is 25 years. In accordance with regulation, the Service is completing the application process for this proposed permit. The requested permit would authorize the Service to extend incidental take coverage with assurances to eligible landowners who are willing to carry out habitat management measures that would benefit the federally-listed endangered Fender's blue butterfly (Icaricia icarioides fenderi) and the threatened Kincaid's lupine (Lupinus sulphureus ssp. kincaidii) by enrolling them under the Agreement as Cooperators through issuance of Certificates of Inclusion. The covered area or geographic scope of this Agreement includes the known and potential range of the Fender's blue butterfly, which occurs on prairie habitat within Benton, Lane, Linn, Marion, Polk, and Yamhill counties of Oregon. We request comments from the public on the permit application, proposed Agreement and related documents, which are available for review (see ADDRESSES below).

We, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Service) initiate 5- year reviews of three wildlife species and eight plant species under the Endangered Species Act of 1973, as amended (Act) (see Table 1 under SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION ). We request any new information on these species that may have a bearing on their classification as endangered or threatened. Based on the results of these 5-year reviews, we will make recommendations as to whether each of these species is properly classified under the Act.