29th Annual Meeting and Symposium of the
Desert Tortoise Council, February 20-23, 2004
Abstracts

Desert Tortoise Management and Recovery Actions Within the National Park System

Ross Haley
Lake Mead National Recreation Area

The National Park Service (NPS) manages four large areas in the Mojave Desert. They include the largest National Park in the continental U.S., Death Valley, with 3,336,000 acres, Joshua Tree National Park with 1,017,748 acres, the Mojave National Preserve with 1,589,165 acres and Lake Mead National Recreation Area with 1,495,664 acres. The primary management objective for NPS lands as stated in the Organic Act of 1916 is to conserve resources in a manner that leaves them unimpaired for future generations. Consequently, management of park lands to benefit tortoise recovery is completely compatible with the broader goal for which these lands have been set aside. The NPS has engaged in a number of conservation activities on these lands since the tortoise was listed, and was actually engaged in management which was largely compatible with the tortoise recovery plan before the tortoise was even listed. Still, each unit of the NPS, although managed under one set of general policies, can also be managed somewhat differently as provided for in the enabling legislation passed by Congress when it creates each new unit. As a result, some park lands have been, and are still, subject to a variety of uses that are not generally compatible with tortoise recovery. Changes have been occurring to remedy these situations, progress has been made, but more work remains to be done.