Rare Rio Grande Silvery Minnow Released In Texas
In a big step toward ensuring the survival of the rare Rio Grande silvery minnow, which was listed as endangered in 1994 due to its plummeting population, a team of experts at the Albuquerque Biological Park loaded thousands of endangered minnows into trucks for a 12-hour trip to Texas, where the tiny fish will be released into the Rio Grande near Big Bend National Park.
The minnow used to be abundant in the Rio Grande and some of its tributaries from northern New Mexico down to the Gulf of Mexico. Due to pressures on the river and changes in habitat, the minnow today only occupies about 5% of its historic range — a stretch of the Rio Grande in central New Mexico.
Between 400,000 and 500,000 minnows were being taken from the breeding facility at the biopark and a fish hatchery in southeastern New Mexico to the Big Bend area.
The goal of the reintroduction is to one day be able to downlist the minnow and eventually remove it from the threatened and endangered species list altogether. [Via]
Pic via here.
