Activities in Texas
With an area equal to one twelfth of the entire United States, Texas is able to support a level of biodiversity that is second only to California. It has the highest number of bird species and the second highest number of plants and mammals in the US. That level of diversity, combined with the 22 major river basins, nine major bays estuaries, and 367 miles of coastline on the Gulf of Mexico, helps to explain why the state is also home to 51 wildlife areas and 80 state parks, as well as more than 2 million hunters and anglers. All of this natural resource-based activity is also an essential part of the Texas economy and one of the many reasons habitat conservation is so important to its overall health. By building and maintaining partnerships – with local and state agencies, private landowners, and organizations like SARP – the state wildlife action plan seeks to conserve Texas’ rich diversity of wildlife and habitats.
Texas State Wildlife Action Plan
Learn more about conservation in Texas here and here.
SARP Contact: Dave Terre, Texas Parks and Wildlife Department
Key Focus Area:
AQUATIC NUISANCE SPECIES (ANS)
TEXAS ANS Management Project
Current Status of ANS Management Plan: Under final revisions.
SARP ANS Contact: Earl Chilton, Texas Parks & Wildlife Dept.
For more information: http://www.tpwd.state.tx.us/huntwild/wild/species/exotic/
SARP ANS Coordinator: Jeffrey Herod
Program Activity:
SOUTHEASTERN INSTREAM FLOW NETWORK (SIFN)
Texas Instream Flow Project
Current Instream Flow Policy: Water is managed at the regional level in Texas. State statute, TX Water Code 11.147, requires that water use permits (water rights) include measures protective of instream flows and freshwater inflows to bays and estuaries. Over the past few years, three acts of the state legislature defined that requirement in detail. Implementation has been established through the Texas Instream Flow Program and the Texas Bays and Estuaries Program. The Instream Flow Program focuses on the environmental needs of inland rivers while the Bays and Estuaries Program concentrates on the beneficial freshwater flowing from rivers and coastal basins into bays and estuaries. Both programs are based upon defined assessment methodologies developed through scientific analyses. One of these, the Texas Hydrologic Assessment Tool, analyzes hydrologic, water quality and geological data in a GIS framework. The agencies cooperatively responsible for these two programs are the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, and the Texas Water Development Board.
SIFN State Team participant organizations (under development):
- Texas Parks & Wildlife Department
- Environmental Institute of Houston
- The Nature Conservancy
SARP Contact: Kevin Mayes, River Assessment Team Leader, Texas Parks and Wildlife Department
SIFN Coordinator: Mary Davis
Instream Flow Updates:
- Texas SIFN Update – Fall 2011
Texas Environmental Flows Process
The Environmental Flows Process continues its trek across the state of Texas. Recently, two more stakeholder committees released environmental flow recommendations (instream flows and freshwater inflows to bays and estuaries) reports (see links below). Their recommendations take into account water needs for humans and environmental flow needs identified by their expert science teams. The process will move into rulemaking in 2013 to set the flow standards. Flow standards were previously codified for the Sabine-Neches-Sabine Lake and the Trinity-San Jacinto-Galveston Bay basins. Stakeholder committees are meeting and expert science teams are preparing analyses and draft reports in three additional basin and bay areas:
· Rio Grande, Rio Grande Estuary, and Lower Laguna Madre
· Brazos River and Associated Bay and Estuary System
· Nueces River and Corpus Christi and Baffin Bays
Colorado and Lavaca Rivers and Matagorda and Lavaca Bays Basin and Bay Stakeholder Committee Report (BBASC)
Expert Science Team Report
Guadalupe, San Antonio, Mission, and Aransas Rivers and Mission, Copano, Aransas, and San Antonio Bays Basin and Bay Stakeholder Committee Report (BBASC)
Expert Science Team Report (BBEST)
More information about the Environmental Flows Process can be found on the web at: http://www.tceq.texas.gov/permitting/water_rights/eflows
Texas Instream Flow Program
Work continues in the three basins initially identified as priority basins for comprehensive instream flow field studies: lower San Antonio River, middle and lower Brazos River, and the lower Sabine River.
An interim report for the Lower San Antonio River was recently released to provide best available science to the Guadalupe-San Antonio science team and stakeholder committees.
The interim report will be updated with additional data on fish and mussel habitat use, fish life history information, and geomorphology (sediment transport). Efforts on the Brazos River are focused on fish-habitat utilization, water quality, mussel surveys, and riparian assessments. The draft study design for the lower Sabine River is under review.
More information on the TIFP can be found on the web at: http://www.twdb.state.tx.us/instreamflows/
- 2009: Using a multidisciplinary approach defined by the Texas Instream Flow Program, scientists are developing a flow regime composed of several flow components for specific river systems. Research is underway on several rivers and reservoirs in the state. The goal is to develop an integrated flow regime that specifies subsistence and base flows, high flow pulses, and overbank flow components. Projects are described at http://www.twdb.state.tx.us/InstreamFlows/index.html
- Mayes is sharing the Texas Hydrologic Assessment tool with all SIFN teams.
- 2010:
Texas’ flow allocation process to set standards for instream flows and freshwater inflows for bays and estuaries is continuing. Two expert science teams have submitted recommendations (Sabine-Neches and Trinity-San Jacinto) and three other science teams have begun their work (Guadalupe-San Antonio, Colorado-Lavaca, and Nueces). The Department has continued to support the work of the Science Advisory Committee which has developed guidance documents to help the teams and stakeholder groups in the process. Information can be found at http://www.tceq.state.tx.us/permitting/water_supply/water_rights/eflows
The second Instream Flow Council was announced. FLOW 2011: Instream Flow Valuation in Public Decision-Making will be held in Nashville, TN May 2-4, 2011, hosted by TWRA. Opening day will feature four workshops on science (linking hydrology and biology), policy (federal programs for instream flow protection), public dialogue (social marketing), and valuation (emergy). http://www.state.tn.us/twra/pdfs/2011flowconference.pdf
The Texas Insteam Flow Program is currently conducting studies on the Sabine, Brazos and San Antonio River Basins. Also, TX is conducting an online expert opinion habitat survey on fishes to develop habitat suitability criteria.