Carbaryl, Carbofuran, and Methomyl - National Marine Fisheries ...

of competitors or predators for salmonids. These conditions will influence the population
structure and abundance for all listed Pacific salmonids.
The baseline also includes human activities resulting in disturbance, injury, or mortality
of individual salmon. These activities include hydropower, hatcheries, harvest, and
habitat degradation, including poor water quality and reduced availability of spawning
and rearing habitat for all 28 ESUs/DPSs. As such, these activities degrade salmonid
habitat, including all designated critical habitat and their PCEs. While each area is
affected by a unique combination of stressors, the two major impacts to listed Pacific
salmonid critical habitat are habitat loss and decreased prey abundance. Although habitat
restoration and hydropower modification measures are ongoing, the long-term beneficial
effects of these actions on Pacific salmonids, although anticipated, remain to be realized.
Thus, we are unable to quantify these potential beneficial effects at this time.
Listed Pacific salmonids and designated critical habitat may be affected by the proposed
registration of carbaryl, carbofuran, and methomyl in California, Idaho, Oregon, and
Washington. These salmonids are and have been exposed to the components of the
environmental baseline for decades. The activities discussed above have some level of
effect on all 28 ESUs/DPSs in the proposed action area. They have also eroded the
quality and quantity of salmonid habitat – including designated critical habitat. We
expect the combined consequences of those effects, including impaired water quality,
temperature, and reduced prey abundance, may increase the vulnerability and
susceptibility of overall fish health to disease, predation, and competition for available
suitable habitat and prey items. The continued trend of anthropogenic impairment of
water quality and quantity on Pacific salmonids and their habitats may further compound
the declining status and trends of listed salmonids, unless measures are implemented to
reverse this trend.
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