'No benefit' to designating habitat area for cuckoo

'No benefit' 
to designating habitat area 
for cuckoo

‘No benefit’ 
to designating habitat area 
for cuckoo

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Yellow-billed cuckoo. Photo special to the Sentinel/USFWS

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By Gary Harmon
Sunday, July 12, 2015

The federal government should make no special efforts in Colorado to protect the Western yellow-billed cuckoo, two federal legislators said.
Designation of critical habitat for the threatened species in the state “clearly offers no benefit to the species” and would harm affected Colorado communities, U.S. Rep. Scott Tipton and U.S. Sen. Cory Gardner, both Republicans, wrote to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service last week.
Colorado “is on the fringe” of the bird’s habitat “and cannot make a significant contribution toward conservation of the species,” the Colorado Department of Natural Resources wrote, the legislators noted in their letter. They also cited the department’s comment that the bird is at best an occasional visitor to the state.
In any case, protections already are in place for other species that also would afford protection to the cuckoo, the legislators said.
Areas such as the Walter Walker State Wildlife Area afford protection for the migrating birds, Gardner and Tipton said.
Restrictions on lands designated as critical habitat “would certainly do demonstrable harm” to nearby communities, the letter said, citing the need for gravel for construction projects, such as hospitals and schools.
“These are not unfounded concerns — proposed critical habitat in Colorado is already having a negative effect, though the rule is not yet final. Aggregate production companies have indicated that while a final rule is pending, federal, state and local agencies are hesitant to approve any activities along waterways” that are on lands proposed to be designated critical habitat, the letter says.
Such a designation also could hamper efforts to eradicate invasive species such as tamarisk.
“We fully recognize the good intentions of the Endangered Species Act, but this issue represents yet another instance in which it would behoove (the Fish and Wildlife Service) to pause and consider whether the proposed action would in fact result in more harm than good,” Tipton and Gardner wrote.
Grand Junction also has raised concerns about the possible effects the designation could have on the development of Las Colonias Park south of downtown.