Wildlife advocates push USFWS to list pygmy rabbits

Laura Lundquist

(Missoula Current) One of the tiniest rabbit species in the world is struggling to survive in disappearing regions of the West, so wildlife advocates want the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to give it federal protection.

On Wednesday, three nonprofit organizations - Center for Biological Diversity, WildEarth Guardians and Western Watersheds Project - gave the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service a 60-day notice prior to filing a lawsuit to get the Service to list the pygmy rabbit under the Endangered Species Act.

“We’re watching the slow-motion extinction of these adorable rabbits while the Fish and Wildlife Service drags its feet,” said Randi Spivak, Center for Biological Diversity public lands policy director, in a release. “Endangered Species Act protection is desperately needed for these little creatures before more of their sagebrush sea habitat is lost to fossil fuel extraction and grazing. Time is of the essence.”

Pygmy rabbits are small enough to fit in the palm of your hand but depend on large sagebrush habitat extending from lower river valleys to high mountain slopes of Wyoming, Utah, Idaho, Nevada, Montana, Colorado, California and Oregon. In Montana, they’re limited to a region including the Big Hole Valley south of Anaconda and southeast to the mountains and valleys surrounding Dillon down to the Idaho border.

Due to threats to sagebrush habitat such as wildfire, non-native grasses, livestock grazing, oil and gas extraction and other development, Montana has designated pygmy rabbits as a species of concern meaning they are “at-risk due to declining population trends, threats to their habitats, restricted distribution, and/or other factors.” Disease, in the form of rabbit hemorrhagic disease, can also pose a threat.

In 2003, wildlife advocates first petitioned the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to list the pygmy rabbit. That same year, a small isolated population in western Washington state called the Columbia Basin Pygmy Rabbit was listed as endangered.

Years of legal wrangling followed. In 2010, the Fish and Wildlife Service issued a finding that listing wasn’t warranted based on a petition that had less information. Most recently, the three groups plus Defenders of Wildlife submitted a new petition on March 6, 2023, which included evidence of emerging threats, shrinking habitat, and a lack of adequate regulatory mechanisms to prevent the extinction of the species. According to the groups, the Service had 12 month from the date of their petition to issue a finding.

This past January, the agency published 90-day findings for 10 species, including the pygmy rabbit across its range, that may warrant an endangered species listing, and it initiated status reviews for the species. The Fish and Wildlife Service said it needed the information from the species status review before it could issue a 12-month finding.

But the groups minus the Defenders of Wildlife say they intend to sue because the Fish and Wildlife Service didn’t issue a 12-month finding in March. The groups say that, after two decades, the Service has delayed the listing long enough.

“Under the law, the Service has 12 months to respond to petitions from the public with a determination about whether a species is eligible for Endangered Species Act protection,” said Earthjustice attorney Michael Freeman. “The agency has blown that deadline by many months and is failing pygmy rabbits by not stepping up to protect them.”