Anacapa Island Restoration Project Purpose and Need
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. CHANNEL ISLANDS NATIONAL PARK . FINAL ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENT . ANACAPA ISLAND RESTORATION PROJECT Chapter one CHAPTER ONE PURPOSE AND NEED Need Chapter Contents INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................................... 2 GENERAL MANAGEMENT PLAN DIRECTION........................................................................... 2 PROPOSED ACTION AND PURPOSE & NEED ......................................................................... 3 Purpose...................................................................................................................................... 3 Need For Action........................................................................................................................ 3 Introduced Species and Island Ecosystems......................................................................................3 Introduced Commensal Rats ............................................................................................................4 Impacts of Introduced Rats on Island Ecosystems ...........................................................................5 Rats on Anacapa Island....................................................................................................................5 Proposed Action ........................................................................................................................ 6 Anacapa Rat Eradication ................................................................................................................6 Emergency Response Plan ...............................................................................................................7 Prevention ........................................................................................................................................7 SCOPE OF THE PROPOSED ACTION......................................................................................... 8 DECISIONS TO BE MADE............................................................................................................. 8 CHAPTER ONE - 1 ANACAPA ISLAND RESTORATION PROJECT FINAL ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENT Channel Islands National Park General Management Plan (GMP) provides direction for Introduction management of the Park. Decisions and direction identified in these documents are incorporated by Channel Islands National Park has prepared reference. This EIS is “tiered” to the GMP as this Final Environmental Impact Statement to permitted by 40 CFR 1502.2. document environmental impacts that would be associated with eradication, prevention, and emergency response management actions associated with non-native rat (Rattus) species. General Management Plan Specifically, this FEIS will cover proposed management actions in the following three areas: Direction 1) Eradication of the Black Rat (Rattus rattus) on Anacapa Island; 2) An emergency response plan The General Management Plan (GMP) for dealing with accidental introductions of rats completed in 1985 defines management direction on Anacapa, Santa Barbara, Prince, and Sutil for the natural resources within the Park. In this Islands; and 3) A prevention strategy to reduce GMP specific objectives are stated for Anacapa, the potential for rats to be accidentally introduced San Miguel, and Santa Barbara Islands. to Park islands. This FEIS includes analysis of Objectives from the GMP which support the effects for six alternatives, including the Anacapa Island Restoration Project include: consequences of not eradicating the Black Rats from the Island, or not reacting to or preventing Restore altered ecosystems as nearly as possible to conditions they would be in today rat introductions to Park islands. had natural ecological processes not been This Final EIS is based on direction contained disturbed. in the National Environmental Policy Act Develop an awareness of threats that impact (NEPA), Council on Environmental Quality or have the potential to impact Park resources. (CEQ) regulations 40 CFR 1500-1508, and the Actively respond, as a land management National Park Service NEPA implementation agency, to these potential threats. guideline (NPS-12). In addition to stating general management The Final EIS will also document the Park’s objectives, the plan identifies specific objectives obligation to meet other federal laws including: for island resources. Management guidelines to The National Historic Preservation Act; Federal meet objectives were also described in the Plan. Water Pollution Control Act (Clean Water Act); Black Rats are specifically mentioned in the Clean Air Act; Coastal Zone Management Act; GMP. The objective stated for Black Rat Marine Mammal Protection Act; and the management is “eradication”. The action to meet Endangered Species Act. this objective calls for the Park to initiate an eradication program on East Anacapa Island. CEQ regulations require a Notice of Under the criteria established by the GMP for rat Availability (NOA) be made to the Federal eradication, such a program must: Register that a final EIS has been completed. The a) Be effective Park will wait at least 30 days from the Federal Registers publishing of the NOA before signing a b) Be selective for rats record of decision. c) Have the least possible effect on native mouse populations and other forms of plant and animal life CHAPTER ONE - 2 ANACAPA ISLAND RESTORATION PROJECT FINAL ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENT d) Present the lowest risk to visitors and staff anthropogenic extinctions can be roughly e) Be economical and simple to maintain divided into four broad categories: non- sustainable use of resources, habitat destruction, Alternatives proposed in this analysis meet pollution, and introduction of non-native these criteria to varying degrees. species. The Resources Management Plan (RMP) also Problems in the first three categories are identifies this project as a necessary action to often acute and can directly affect human perpetuate natural processes and resources within welfare on an observable time scale. These the Park. The RMP flows from the General qualities have made them the focus of public Management Plan (1985) and Statement for environmental concern. The introduction of Management (1991). The RMP is the Park’s non-native species has received less publicity strategic plan for the long-range management of and professional attention (Coblentz 1990, its resources and a tactical plan identifying short- Soulé 1990); however, introduced species are term projects. responsible for 39% of all recorded animal extinctions since 1600 for which a cause could be attributed (World Conservation Monitoring Purpose & Need and Centre 1992). Thus, some impacts of introduced species are irreversible (reviewed Proposed Action by Groves and Burdon 1986; Mooney and Drake 1986; and Hengeveld 1989) and at least Purpose as devastating as the other categories (Atkinson 1985, 1989, Soulé 1990). Once The purpose of the proposed action is to established, introduced species often become eradicate rats from Anacapa Island and keep it and permanent in ecological time unless all Park islands rat-free. Eradicating rats from intentionally removed (Tershy and Croll 1994). Anacapa Island would improve seabird-nesting Island ecosystems are particularly habitat and could aid in the recovery of some vulnerable to both extinctions and the impacts species such as the Xantus’ Murrelet and Ashy of introduced species (Diamond 1985, 1989, Storm-Petrel. Olson 1989). Of the 484 recorded animal extinctions since 1600, 75% have been island Need for Action endemics (World Conservation Monitoring Centre 1992). Introduced species were Introduced Species and the completely or partially responsible for 67% Importance of Island Ecosystems these extinctions (based on the 147 island species for which the cause of extinction is It is now widely accepted that current rates known, calculated from World Conservation of species extinctions are dramatically higher Monitoring Centre 1992). than background rates (Raup 1988), that most current extinctions can be directly attributed to Islands are important to the conservation of human activity (Diamond 1989), and that for biodiversity for four reasons: ethical, cultural, aesthetic, and economic 1) A large percentage of their biota are reasons, this current rate of extinction is cause endemic species and subspecies (Darwin for considerable concern (Ehrlich 1988, Ledec 1859, Elton 1958); and Goodland 1988). The causes of CHAPTER ONE - 3 ANACAPA ISLAND RESTORATION PROJECT FINAL ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENT Figure 1: Location Map of Anacapa Island. 2) They are important breeding areas for seabirds, pinnipeds, and sea turtles, Introduced Commensal Rats which forage over thousands of square There are three species of rats in the genus kilometers of ocean but are dependent on Rattus which are commensal with humans and relatively small amounts of protected which have been introduced to islands land on islands for breeding and nesting; throughout the world. In order of decreasing 3) Many islands are sparsely inhabited or size they are: the Norway or Brown Rat (R. uninhabited by humans, keeping norvegicus), the ship or Black Rat (R. rattus), socioeconomic costs of protection low; and the Pacific or Polynesian Rat (R. exulans). 4) the species and ecological communities They have different dietary preferences, on islands have evolved in natural distributions and histories of introduction, but all fragments,