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Federal Register / Vol. 86, No. 103 / Tuesday, June 1, 2021 / Proposed Rules Supporting Documents An SSA team prepared an SSA report for the lesser prairie-chicken. The SSA
team was composed of Service biologists, in consultation with other species experts. The SSA report represents a compilation of the best scientific and commercial data available concerning the status of the species, including the impacts of past, present, and future factors both negative and beneficial affecting the species. The Service sent the SSA report to six independent peer reviewers and received four responses. The Service also sent the SSA report to the five State fish and wildlife agencies within the range of the lesser prairie-chicken Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas and the four primary Federal agencies with whom we work to deliver conservation actions that could benefit the lesser prairiechicken: The Bureau of Land Management BLM, the Natural Resources Conservation Service NRCS, Farm Service Agency FSA, and U.S.
Forest Service USFS. These partners include scientists with expertise in management of either the lesser prairiechicken or the habitat upon which the lesser prairie-chicken depends. We received responses from USFS, BLM, and all five of the State wildlife agencies. Comments and feedback from partners and peer reviewers were incorporated into the SSA report as appropriate and have informed this proposed rule.

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I. Proposed Listing Determination Background Below is a summary of the taxonomy, life history, and ecology of the lesser prairie-chicken; for a thorough review, please see the SSA report version 2.2;
Service 2021, pp. 514.
The lesser prairie-chicken is in the order Galliformes, family Phasianidae, subfamily Tetraoninae; it is generally recognized as a species separate from the greater prairie-chicken Tympanuchus cupido pinnatus Jones 1964, pp. 6573; American Ornithologists Union 1998, p. 122.
Most lesser prairie-chicken adults live for 2 to 3 years and reproduce in the spring and summer Service 2021, pp.
1012. Males congregate on leks during the spring to attract and mate with females Copelin 1963, p. 26; Hoffman 1963, p. 730; Crawford and Bolen 1975, p. 810; Davis et al. 1979, p. 84;
Merchant 1982, p. 41; Haukos 1988, p.
49. Male prairie-chickens tend to exhibit strong breeding site fidelity, often returning to a specific lek many times, even in cases of declining female
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attendance and habitat condition Copelin 1963, pp. 2930; Hoffman 1963, p. 731; Campbell 1972, pp. 698
699, Hagen et al. 2005, entire, Harju et al. 2010, entire. Females tend to establish nests relatively close to the lek, commonly within 0.6 to 2.4 mi 1
to 4 km Copelin 1963, p. 44; Giesen 1994, p. 97, where they incubate 8 to 14 eggs for 24 to 27 days and then raise broods of young throughout the summer Boal and Haukos 2016, p. 4. Some females will attempt a second nesting if the first nest fails Johnsgard 1973, pp.
6364; Merchant 1982, p. 43; Pitman et al. 2006, p. 25. Eggs and young lesser prairie-chickens are susceptible to natural mortality from environmental stress and predation. The appropriate vegetative community and structure is vital to provide cover for nests and young and to provide food resources as broods mature into adults Suminski 1977, p. 32; Riley 1978, p. 36; Riley et al. 1992, p. 386; Giesen 1998, p. 9. For more detail on habitat needs of the lesser prairie-chicken, please see the SSA report Service 2021, pp. 914.
The lesser prairie-chicken once ranged across the Southern Great Plains of Southeastern Colorado, Southwestern Kansas, Western Oklahoma, the Panhandle and South Plains of Texas, and Eastern New Mexico; currently, it occupies a substantially reduced portion of its presumed historical range Rodgers 2016, p. 15. Estimates of the potential maximum historical range of the lesser prairie-chicken e.g., Taylor and Guthery 1980a, p. 1, based on Aldrich 1963, p. 537; Johnsgard 2002, p.
32; Playa Lakes Joint Venture 2007, p.
1 range from about 64115 million acres ac 2647 million hectares ha.
The more recent estimate of the historical range of the lesser prairiechicken encompasses an area of approximately 115 million ac 47
million ha. Presumably, not all of the area within this historical range was evenly occupied by lesser prairiechicken, and some of the area may not have been suitable to regularly support lesser prairie-chicken populations Boal and Haukos 2016, p. 6. However, the current range of the lesser prairiechicken has been significantly reduced from the historical range at the time of European settlement. Estimates as to extent of the loss vary from greater than 90 percent reduction Hagen and Giesen 2005, unpaginated to approximately 83
percent reduction Van Pelt et al. 2013, p. 3.
Lesser prairie-chicken monitoring has been occurring for multiple decades and have included multiple different methodologies. Estimates of population abundance prior to the 1960s are
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indeterminable and rely almost entirely on anecdotal information Boal and Haukos 2016, p. 6. While little is known about precise historical population sizes, the lesser prairiechicken was reported to be quite common throughout its range in the early 20th century Bent 1932, pp. 280
281, 283; Baker 1953, p. 8; Bailey and Niedrach 1965, p. 51; Sands 1968, p.
454; Fleharty 1995, pp. 3844; Robb and Schroeder 2005, p. 13. For example, prior to 1900, as many as two million birds may have existed in Texas alone Litton 1978, p. 1. Information regarding population size is available starting in the 1960s when the State fish and wildlife agencies began routine lesser prairie-chicken monitoring efforts. However, survey methodology and effort have differed over the decades, making it difficult to precisely estimate trends.
The SSA report and this proposed rule rely on two main population estimates. The two methodologies largely cover different time periods, so we report the results of both throughout this proposed rule in order to give the best possible understanding of lesser prairie-chicken trends both recently and throughout the past decades.
The first of the two studies used historical lek surveys and population reconstruction methods to calculate historical trends and estimate male abundance from 1965 through 2016
Hagen et al. 2017, pp. 69. We have identified concerns in the past with some of the methodologies and assumptions made in this analysis, and others have also noted the challenges of using these data for long-term trends for example, Zavaleta and Haukos 2013, p. 545; Cummings et al. 2017, pp.
2930. While these concerns remain, including the very low sample sizes particularly in the 1960s, this work represents the only attempt to compile the extensive historical ground lek count data collected by State agencies to estimate the number of males at both the range-wide and ecoregional scales, and represents the best available data for understanding historical population trends.
Following development of aerial survey methods McRoberts et al. 2011b, entire, the second summary of lesser prairie-chicken population data uses more statistically rigorous estimates of lesser prairie-chicken abundance both males and females. This second study uses data from aerial line-transect surveys throughout the range of the lesser prairie-chicken; these results are then extrapolated from the surveyed area to the rest of the range Nasman et al. 2020, entire. The results of these
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