Arctic Grayling Winter Habitat

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This is a Notice of Intent to award a Cooperative Agreement to Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, for the purpose of providing valuable information and data useful to the Fish and Wildlife Service in the forthcoming determination of whether or not to list the Arctic graying as a threatened or endangered species. The recipient, Montana Fish Wildlife and Parks will conduct a two year M.S. study to address information gaps for above purpose to accurately determine winter habitat availability; winter oxygen concentrations, and arctic grayling habitat selection and survival in response to those factors. This investigation requires the use of state of the art equipment and techniques (e.g., radio transmitters implanted inside fish) to provide relevant data helpful in determining the status of the grayling population in the vicinity of the Red Rock Lakes National Wildlife Refuge. This Single Source Award is being made in accordance with Department of the Interior Policy 505 DM 2.14 B Unique Qualfications which allows for award without competition to an applicant ¿ The applicant is uniquely qualified to perform this activity based upon a variety of demonstrable factors such as location, property ownership, voluntary support capacity, cost-sharing ability, if applicable, technical expertise, or other such unique qualifications which allows for award without competition to an applicant. These studies will be conducted and overseen by some of the most knowledgeable and capable biologists with the State of Montana, the U.S. Geological Survey¿s Fish and Wildlife Coop Unit at Montana State University, and by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service personnel at Red Rock Lakes National Wildlife Refuge. These professionals are highly experienced in working on and sticking to budgets formed from various grants and other external funding sources. This project has a high reliability of producing the project objective within budget. No other agency or organization has the management experience, or organizational capacity to provide this service. This funding is to assist the Montana Department of Fish Wildlife and Parks in their efforts to provide US FWS the necessary information to make an informed decision regarding the determination whether to list this species.

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