[Federal Register Volume 75, Number 208 (Thursday, October 28, 2010)]
[Notices]
[Pages 66387-66388]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2010-27340]
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DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
Fish and Wildlife Service
[FWS-R5-ES-2010-N216; 50120-1113-0000-C2]
Endangered and Threatened Wildlife and Plants; Assisting States,
Federal Agencies, and Tribes in Managing White-Nose Syndrome in Bats;
Draft National Plan
AGENCY: Fish and Wildlife Service, Interior.
ACTION: Notice of document availability for review and comment.
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SUMMARY: The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) announces the
availability for public review of a draft national plan to assist
States, Federal agencies, and tribes in managing white-nose syndrome in
bats. This draft plan was prepared by representatives of the U.S.
Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service
and Forest Service; U.S. Department of Defense's Army Corps of
Engineers; U.S. Department of the Interior's Bureau of Land Management,
National Park Service, and FWS; St. Regis Mohawk Tribe; Kentucky
Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources; Missouri Department of
Conservation; New York State Department of Environmental Conservation;
Pennsylvania Game Commission; Vermont Department of Fish and Wildlife;
and Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries. The FWS is
requesting review and comment on the draft plan from all interested
parties.
DATES: Comments on the draft plan must be received on or before
November 29, 2010.
ADDRESSES: An electronic copy of the draft plan is available at http://www.fws.gov/WhiteNoseSyndrome/. The document is also available by
request from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, New York Field Office,
3817 Luker Road, Cortland, NY 13045 (phone: 607-753-9334). Requests for
copies of the draft plan and written comments regarding this plan
should be addressed to Dr. Jeremy Coleman, National White-Nose Syndrome
Coordinator, at the New York Field
[[Page 66388]]
Office. In addition, FWS is accepting electronic comments on the draft
plan at the following e-mail address: [email protected].
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Dr. Jeremy Coleman, National White-
Nose Syndrome Coordinator, at the New York Field Office. See ADDRESSES
above.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: White-nose syndrome (WNS) is a fungal
disease responsible for unprecedented mortality in hibernating bats in
the northeastern United States. It has spread rapidly since its
discovery in January 2007, and poses a potentially catastrophic threat
to hibernating bats throughout North America, including several species
listed as endangered or threatened under the Endangered Species Act
(ESA). Listed bats include the Indiana bat (Myotis sodalis), Virginia
big-eared bat (Corynorhinus townsendii virginianus), Ozark big-eared
bat (Corynorhinus townsendii ingens), and gray bat (Myotis grisescens).
The mobility of bats, the potential for human-assisted
transmission, and the severe consequences of WNS make it imperative
that a national effort be mounted to avoid irreversible losses to bat
populations and associated ecological impacts throughout North America.
This effort requires collaboration among State, Federal, and tribal
wildlife management agencies with stewardship responsibilities for bat
populations and among nongovernmental organizations and the scientific
community. Collaboration at the international level is also needed,
because the threat of WNS crosses international borders.
In June of 2008, an effort to formalize a coordinated approach for
addressing WNS was initiated among Federal and State wildlife
management agencies. More recently, a multiagency WNS National Plan
Writing Team was formed to prepare a draft national plan that details
the elements that are critical to the investigation and management of
WNS, identifies key actions to address stated goals, and outlines the
roles of Federal and State agencies and other entities.
The WNS response strategy outlined in the draft national plan
includes general practices, as well as seven program elements. These
elements and their associated goals are:
1. Communications: Provide target audiences with relevant
information about WNS as a wildlife health issue and the efforts taking
place to control and manage WNS, including contact information for key
team members and agency personnel.
2. Scientific and Technical Information Dissemination: Create a WNS
database that can both be used by individual agencies and act as a
central data repository.
3. Diagnostics: Develop diagnostic and sample quality standards,
establish laboratory testing capacity, and report test results to
resource management agencies.
4. Disease Management: Provide management recommendations to slow
the spread of WNS, reduce morbidity and mortality rates to sustainable
levels, and limit adverse impacts of management actions.
5. Research Coordination: Conduct a critical review of previous and
ongoing research projects; investigate disease etiology, WNS
pathogenesis and epidemiology, interaction of disease and host ecology,
and human dimensions and ecological consequences of WNS; and
disseminate research findings.
6. Disease Surveillance: Create a nationwide early detection
program, coordinate sample collection and submission, and support
epidemiological investigations.
7. Conservation and Recovery of Affected Species: Develop rapid
assessment population monitoring techniques, establish criteria for
prioritizing conservation activities, and determine best practices for
maintaining and recovering populations.
The national plan will be followed by an implementation plan that
will identify sub-actions, the agencies responsible for implementation
of each action/sub-action, and cost estimates. Also, the national plan
will help individual agencies develop response plans tailored to their
WNS-related needs and circumstances.
Request for Public Comments: We request written comments on the
draft national plan. All comments received by the date specified in
DATES will be considered in preparing a final plan.
Before including your address, phone number, e-mail address, or
other personal identifying information in your comment, you should be
aware that your entire comment--including your personal identifying
information--may be made publicly available at any time. While you can
ask us in your comment to withhold your personal identifying
information from public review, the FWS cannot guarantee that we will
be able to do so.
Authority: As a number of federally listed bat species are
threatened by WNS, the FWS is issuing this notice primarily under
the authority of the ESA of 1973 (16 U.S.C. 1531). This plan is
intended to guide recovery of listed bats. It was developed so that
it can be easily adopted or incorporated into existing or future
recovery plans.
Dated: September 27, 2010.
Kyla J. Hastie,
Acting Regional Director, Region 5, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
[FR Doc. 2010-27340 Filed 10-27-10; 8:45 am]
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