Georgia DNR gets ready to update protected species list

Published 8:35 am Monday, April 24, 2006

ATHENS — The Georgia Department of Natural Resources is getting ready to put together a new list of endangered plants and animals in the first comprehensive update since 1992.

“There are a lot of species that have not been seen in the last 10 or 15 years,” said the update’s coordinator, aquatic zoologist Brett Albanese.

The “protected species list” includes animals and plants that are considered rare or threatened for a variety of reasons, such as destruction of their habitat, spread of disease or lack of regulation. State officials say the list helps the state decide where to spend on conservation.

“We’ve got a lot of biological diversity intact, and the challenge is to conserve it,” said Jon Ambrose, assistant chief of the DNR’s Nongame Wildlife and Natural Heritage Section.

When it comes to biodiversity, Georgia is in for good news and bad news, according to a 2002 study by the Arlington, Va.-based nonprofit conservation organization NatureServe.

With 4,436 species, Georgia ranks sixth in the nation in biodiversity. Only North Carolina has more variety of amphibians and only Alabama and Tennessee have a more diverse range of fish.

But the state also ranks fifth in the country in the number of species lost to extinction and 13 percent of its wildlife is considered at risk, according to the study.

Nominations for the updated list have been coming in from DNR staff and the public since February. At the end of the month, department biologists plan to start reviewing them. They’ll announce the final list at the end of June, when the public will able to comment on it before it goes to the DNR Board for approval at the end of August.

Once animals and plants make the list, they’re earmarked for legal protection, meaning that, on public land, animals can’t be harassed, captured or killed and plants can’t be cut or removed without a DNR permit.

The protection doesn’t extend to private land, but state officials say they look at the list when determining what land to buy to protect at-risk habitat and where to issue recommendations for development.

The biggest threat for wildlife is development and urban sprawl across the state, from the coast to Columbus and especially Atlanta — “a lot of the species in decline and a lot of the most endangered are in the most rapidly developing part of the state,” Albanese said.

While most people have little contact with many of the species on the list — from the threatened Georgia Blind Salamander to the endangered Rock Gnome Lichen — biologists say all must be conserved because they’re part of the larger ecological system.

“You may not care about a freshwater mussel or a little bitty fish you can’t catch and eat, but if they are disappearing, then something is not right in that aquatic system,” said Sandy Tucker, a biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Athens. “If we find that our lists keep getting longer and longer, and the average person recognizes more and more of the animals on that list, that should concern them.”

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On the Net:

Georgia DNR, Wildlife Resources Division: http://www.georgiawildlife.com

NatureServe: http://www.natureserve.org