Snow from the Beaverhead Mountains feeds the Big Hole River in southwestern Montana, which snakes through forested mountains, grasslands and sagebrush steppe. But in 1988, drought hit the watershed hard. Water ceased flowing through the town of Wisdom for more than three weeks. The drought was bad for ranchers, bad for anglers and bad for fish — including the Arctic grayling, an iridescent silvery blue salmonid with a sail-like dorsal fin.
Hot and dry conditions returned in the summer of 2021. But this time, the river didn’t run dry. To Big Hole rancher Cal Erb, the improved conditions were “a win” — and a sign that voluntary efforts to keep more water in the river for the grayling are working.
The Montana population of the Arctic grayling was designated as a candidate for protection under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) in 1994. Today, Erb and about 30 of his neighbors are committed to improving grayling habitat under the Big Hole Arctic Grayling Candidate Conservation Agreement with Assurances, or CCAA. CCAAs incentivize conservation work by promising participating landowners that if a candidate species eventually requires ESA protection, they will be exempt from additional regulation. If the Arctic grayling is listed under the ESA, for example, landowners who are part of the CCAA may not have to curtail the amount of river water they use for irrigation.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service created CCAAs as a policy option in 1999. Today, 63 CCAAs are active nationwide, designed to benefit species from the black-tailed prairie dog in Wyoming to the spotted frog in Idaho and the Sonoran Desert tortoise in Arizona. When successful, they can protect species from endangerment. But there’s a risk: If they fail and listing becomes necessary, the agreement may make recovery even harder.
ARTIC GRAYLING WERE ONCE found throughout the Upper Missouri River drainage, but due to habitat degradation, overfishing and competitive nonnative species, southwestern Montana is now home to the only native population in the Lower 48. (The Arctic grayling that are plentiful in Canada and Alaska are genetically distinct from those in Montana.)
The Biodiversity Legal Foundation, now part of the Center for Biological Diversity, petitioned to list the Montana grayling population under the Endangered Species Act in 1991. Since then, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has periodically reconsidered the grayling for listing, most recently after a 2018 ruling by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ordered it to do so.
The grayling’s chronically uncertain legal status led state and federal agencies to work with landowners to develop the Big Hole Arctic Grayling CCAA, which took effect in the summer of 2006. More than 165,000 acres and at least 258 stream miles are currently covered by it, and participants have partnered with nonprofits and state and federal agencies on some 500 projects designed to improve stream flows, protect and enhance riparian habitat, and reduce barriers to fish migration.
Projects have included drilling wells for stock tanks as an alternative water source for cattle and planting willows on streambanks to stabilize the soil and shade the water. Most benefit landowners as well as fish. “It’s not just something we want,” said Katelin Killoy, a Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks riparian ecologist. She monitors riparian zones in the agreement and plans and manages projects and permitting, among other things. “It’s often something they want as well.” While participation is voluntary, those who join agree to water-use monitoring and compliance checks by state agency staffers.
Rancher Erb was one of the first to participate. “Doing what you can without breaking the bank will always be a high priority,” he said. “There’s other generations that are going to be coming up, and that river means a lot.” He’s never considered dropping out, even when meeting CCAA flow targets during the 2021 drought cost him over $100,000 in hay. “It was horrible,” Erb said. “But we survived.”
Dean Peterson, who runs a ranch in the Big Hole with his brother, joined the agreement but left after about a decade. “To us, the cost wasn’t worth the assurance they were giving us,” Peterson said. If the grayling is ever listed, he may face regulations more stringent than those in the conservation agreement. “From anybody’s perspective, that’s a gamble,” he said. “And in a sense, I’m rolling the dice.”
WHILE THE NUMBERS FLUCTUATE from year to year, the average number of breeding grayling that live in the Big Hole has increased slightly since the CCAA went into effect. Matt Jaeger, a Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks fisheries biologist, calls the program “unquestionably a success.” Genetic studies indicate that the population has enough diversity to remain viable for the long term, he said, a concern given the downward trend at the onset.
“To us, the cost wasn’t worth the assurance they were giving us.” If the grayling is ever listed, ranchers may face regulations more stringent than those in the conservation agreement.
But as climate change increases the frequency of drought, shrinks summer river flows, and raises water temperatures, that viability isn’t guaranteed. Western Watersheds Project, the Center for Biological Diversity and a Butte resident filed a lawsuit against the Fish and Wildlife Service in early 2023 challenging the agency’s decision not to list the grayling, arguing that the voluntary approach doesn’t compel sufficient reductions in water use by private owners or address the management of public lands in the watershed’s upper reaches. “We need a more comprehensive look,” said Josh Osher, Western Watersheds Project’s public policy director. “Voluntary conservation on private lands is one component, but it’s not the whole story.”
No CCAA has restored a species to its former abundance, but several have kept species off the endangered and threatened list, including the lesser and greater Adams Cave beetle in Kentucky and the fisher in Oregon. On the other hand, some species with conservation agreements have continued to decline and are now either listed or proposed for listing, including the dunes sagebrush lizard, the yellowcheek darter, the spring pygmy sunfish and the lesser prairie chicken. In some cases, the no-further-regulation guarantees given to private landowners with CCAAs may limit the federal government’s power to protect and recover a species after listing.
Some agreements need more vigorous oversight to ensure compliance: Defenders of Wildlife found in 2013 that the oil and gas company ConocoPhillips disturbed the habitat of the dune sagebrush lizard while enrolled in a CCAA in Texas — despite claiming otherwise on monthly monitoring reports administered by a third party. Other conservation agreements lack the state and federal funding and staff needed to enroll all the landowners interested in participating. Tim Male, executive director of the Environmental Policy Innovation Center, said voluntary conservation efforts are often the first thing to lose funding in thin times. They could be more effective, he said, “if the agency would let them.”
Jonathan Wood, vice president of law and policy at the Property and Environment Research Center, called proactive agreements like CCAAs “absolutely critical and one of the most valuable innovations for the Endangered Species Act,” but said the process for entering into a CCAA can burden landowners.
In the Big Hole watershed, the difficulties may increase with climate change; declining snowpacks and stream flows could make it even tougher for landowners to meet a CCAA’s requirements. As the future becomes less predictable, assurances of any kind may be harder to offer.
This story is part of High Country News’ Conservation Beyond Boundaries project, funded by the BAND Foundation.
Kylie Mohr is a correspondent for High Country News writing from Montana. Email her at kylie.mohr@hcn.org or submit a letter to the editor. See our letters to the editor policy.
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Staving off endangerment.
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