Middle Rio Grande Endangered Species Collaborative Program Receives Award
The Middle Rio Grande Endangered Species Collaborative Program has been selected as the 2008 recipient of the New Mexico Society of Professional Engineers Outstanding Engineering Project. Collaborative Program Executive Committee Federal Co-Chair Dave Sabo accepted the award during a ceremony at the Albuquerque Marriott Pyramid on Friday June 18.
The Collaborative Program is a partnership involving 20 current signatories organized to protect and improve the status of endangered species along the Middle Rio Grande in New Mexico while simultaneously protecting existing and future regional water uses. Two species of particular concern are the Rio Grande silvery minnow and the southwestern willow flycatcher. The Collaborative Program is managed by the Bureau of Reclamation. Program activities include habitat restoration, fish passage, endangered species monitoring, silvery minnow propagation and rescue, water acquisition and management and water quality studies.
Some noteable Collaborative Program activities include a refugium for the silvery minnow that is currently under construction in Los Lunas, New Mexico to raise minnows that will be released into the Rio Grande to augment wild populations. This facility is being constructed by the New Mexico Interstate Stream Commission through Collaborative Program funds.
restoration area along Rio Grande
The Collaborative Program is also funding habitat restoration projects along the Rio Grande. These projects physically manipulate the Rio Grande channel and adjacent bosque areas to re-create the traditional shallow pools, side channels, and vegetation habitat of the Rio Grande silvery minnow and southwestern willow flycatcher.
For more information, visit the Middle Rio Grande Endangered Species Collaborative Program web site.