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Federal Register / Vol. 86, No. 155 / Monday, August 16, 2021 / Rules and Regulations in bud and sometimes provides support for petals when in bloom are green and inconspicuously three-veined, and the white petals usually have five green veins. The fruit is a 3- to 3.5-mm-long 0.12- to 0.14-in ovoid capsule containing numerous reddish-brown reticulated having the form or appearance of a net seeds that are 0.5
to 0.7 mm 0.02 to 0.03 in long.
The mild conditions of the sheltered habitat where Cumberland sandwort occurs allow rosettes circular arrangement of leaves to persist through winter and produce abundant, leafy stems in the spring Winder 2004, p. 5. The species flowers from May through August, with some flowers persisting as late as November Wofford and Kral 1979, p. 259; Winder 2004, p.
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Habitat Cumberland sandwort inhabits finegrained, sandy soils that comprise the floors of the interior of rockhouses cave-like recesses produced by differential weathering of sandstone.
These habitats are typically behind the dripline of overlying cliffs, ledges, and solution pockets of cliffs, where these features are found in Pennsylvanian sandstones on the Cumberland Plateau in southern Kentucky and northern Tennessee Horton 2017, entire. The species occupies sites that generally share characteristics of high levels of shade, moisture, and humidity, and relatively constant, cool temperatures Wofford and Smith 1980, p. 7, although some smaller occurrences occupy drier and warmer sites. Few other species are directly associated with Cumberland sandwort microsites, but the following species are important indicators that suitable habitat conditions are present within a given rockhouse or bluff site: Silene rotundifolia round-leaved catchfly;
Thalictrum clavatum mountain meadow-rue; Heuchera parviflora little-flowered alumroot; Ageratina luciae-brauniae Lucy Brauns snakeroot; Stenanthium diffusum diffuse feather-bells; and the bryophytes Vittaria appalachiana Appalachian shoestring fern, Bryoxiphium norvegicum Norway bryoxiphium moss, and Scopelophila cataractae cataract scopelophila moss Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation TDEC 2011b, p. 5.
Distribution When Cumberland sandwort was listed as endangered 53 FR 23745; June 23, 1988, the species was known from 11 occurrences Wofford and Smith 1980, pp. 918, which were treated as
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5 populations. Of these occurrences, 1
was in McCreary County, Kentucky, and 10 were distributed among four Tennessee counties Fentress, Morgan, Pickett, and Scott. The species recovery plan Service 1996, pp. 68 reported that 28 occurrences were extant including the 11 from the June 23, 1988, listing rule, 27 of which were partly or entirely located on publicly owned conservation lands. One of these 28 occurrences was in McCreary County, Kentucky, and the remaining 27
were distributed among the four Tennessee counties reported in the listing rule. All occurrences reported in the listing rule and species recovery plan were located in the South Fork Cumberland River drainage. Of these 28
occurrences, all but 3 were extant as of 2017 TNHID 2018.
As explained below, documentation to verify past or present existence is lacking for two of the three occurrences we did not determine to be extant as of 2017, raising questions regarding their validity. The Middle Creek 2
occurrence reported in the recovery plan was apparently based on an observation reported by a National Park Service NPS archaeologist, but staff of the TDEC Division of Natural Areas TDNA were unable to confirm the presence of Cumberland sandwort at the mapped location, which they attribute to a mapping error when the occurrence was reported. The Morgan County, Tennessee, occurrence reported in the recovery plan, with only the site name Sunbright given for location information, also cannot be verified. No citation was provided in the recovery plan for this record, and no record existed for this site in the Tennessee Natural Heritage Inventory Database TNHID 2018, maintained by the Natural Heritage Program at TDNA. A
search of herbarium records for Cumberland sandwort from Morgan County, Tennessee, produced no specimens from the vicinity of Sunbright SERNEC Data Portal 2018.
However, a new extant occurrence record was documented in TNHID for Scott County, based on the label for a specimen collected in 2002 from a site not previously known to be occupied by Cumberland sandwort.
The Big Branch occurrence reported in the recovery plan was not recorded in the TNHID 2018, so no attempts have been made to relocate this occurrence. Staff from NPS reported the occurrence in comments provided after reviewing the draft recovery plan NPS
1995. We provided information to TDNA on the Big Branch occurrence reported by NPS, and there is now a
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historical record for this occurrence in the TNHID.
In order to evaluate the current status of Cumberland sandwort, we used data from Natural Heritage Programs in Kentucky KNHP 2018 and Tennessee TNHID 2018 to determine the location and condition of mapped element occurrences. An element occurrence E.O. is a fundamental unit of information in the NatureServe Natural Heritage methodology, and is defined as an area of land and/or water in which a species . . . is, or was present NatureServe 2004. There were 64
extant occurrences of Cumberland sandwort reported in the 2013 5-year review. As of 2018, there were 71 extant occurrences, distributed among the five counties where the species was reported to be extant when the recovery plan was published: 1 in McCreary County, Kentucky Kentucky Natural Heritage Program KNHP 2018; 1 in Morgan County, 26 in Fentress County, 38 in Pickett County, and 5 in Scott County, Tennessee TNHID 2018. Of these occurrences, 12 occur within the Obey River drainage in Tennessee; 11 of these occurrences have been discovered since 2005 on recently acquired, State-owned conservation lands, and 1 on privately owned lands in 2016. The remaining 59
occurrences lie within the South Fork Cumberland River drainage, and all but 1 of these occurrences is in Tennessee.
Four of the occurrences in the South Fork Cumberland River drainage are located on privately owned lands in Tennessee; the remainder are located on State or Federal conservation lands. In addition to these 71 natural occurrences of Cumberland sandwort, one introduced occurrence has been established in McCreary County, Kentucky, on the Daniel Boone National Forest DBNF Pence et al. 2011, entire.
Population Genetics In a study of populations in Tennessee, Cumberland sandwort was found to possess fairly high levels of genetic variation Winder 2004, pp. 16
19. Observed levels of heterozygosity were consistent with expected effects of frequent mating among closely related individuals, or inbreeding Winder 2004, p. 19, a common phenomenon in small populations due to the greater likelihood that most or all individuals in the population will be closely related Allendorf and Luikart 2007, p. 306.
Greater genetic similarity was found among populations within about 4
kilometers km 2.5 miles mi of one another, but a wide range of values were observed at distances of 4 to 25
kilometers 2.5 to 15.5 mi, beyond
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