Coastal Wren Won’t Be Put on Endangered Species List : Wildlife: The decision angers many conservationists. However, there is disagreement among ornithologists on whether the birds are a true subspecies.

Citing disagreement within the scientific community about the coastal cactus wren and whether it is a unique subspecies, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service decided Friday not to put the songbird on the endangered species list.

Federal officials released a report containing the findings of several ornithologists who said the bird found primarily in Southern California coastal sage scrub is similar to other subspecies of wrens found in large numbers in Baja California and throughout the Southwest.

Experts estimate there are 2,000 pairs of coastal wren living in Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and San Diego counties. The Fish and Wildlife Service’s decision not to include the coastal wren on the endangered species list was also made easier by the refusal of the influential American Ornithologists’ Union to recognize the bird as a separate subspecies.

Most observers viewed the agency’s ruling as a victory for developers. However, both builders and scientists said the decision will have little impact on the wrens found in Southern California because most of them live alongside the California gnatcatcher, which is already protected as an endangered species.

Dawn McCormick, a spokeswoman for the Irvine Co., Orange County’s largest private landowner, said the Fish and Wildlife Service’s ruling, while welcomed, “does not really impact us a whole lot.”

The Irvine Co. played an influential role in the creation of state’s Natural Communities Conservation Planning program in 1991, which encourages landowners to voluntarily set aside habitat for the gnatcatcher and other rare plants and animals. The program calls for “comprehensive habitat planning that deals with habitat as a whole rather than individual species,” said McCormick.

“We’re treating the gnatcatcher and cactus wren all the same as part of the (planning) process,” said McCormick. “We’re treating the cactus wren as if it was on the (endangered species) list.”

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However, some scientists criticized the Fish and Wildlife Service’s action and blasted the American Ornithologists’ Union’s refusal to recognize the coastal wren as a subspecies.

“The AOU’s recognition of the gnatcatcher as a distinct subspecies and their rejection of the cactus wren seems in opposition to the decision I would expect from them,” said Dennis Murphy, director of the Center for Conservation Biology at Stanford University.

Officials at the American Ornithologists’ Union in Washington could not be reached for comment.

Murphy, who was the chief author of the conservation guidelines for the state’s conservation planning program, also expressed disappointment over the refusal by federal wildlife officials to recognize the coastal wren as a distinct and endangered species.

“This coastal population of wren is one of the most distinct subspecies you’re ever going to find,” he said. “I assure you that if you gave me a box full of coastal wrens and inland wrens, I could separate every last one of them.”

The coastal wren is about eight inches long, with black and buff feathers spotted with dark splotches. The bird’s distinctive sound is a staccato churring that experts describe as unharmonious and even annoying.

But Fish and Wildlife Service spokesman Richard Zembal said there is still not enough scientific evidence available to list the coastal wren as a separate subspecies.

“There is nothing unique about the Southern California wren. . . . They are common in many kinds of habitats all over the southwestern United States,” said Zembal. “The question is one of distinctness. We just can’t say that the Southern California cactus wren is a unique population.”

Other kinds of cactus wrens, which are non-migratory, are found throughout the Southwest, from Texas to California and south to Mexico. The bird makes its home in the cholla and prickly pear cactus, about three feet off the ground.

Amadeo Rea, a San Diego ornithologist who led the effort to put the coastal wren on the endangered species list, said the songbird has a call different from the other wrens.

“Anyone can see there is a difference unless they’re blind in both eyes,” said Rea. “The desert and coastal birds sound different. There are also obvious physical differences between the continental and coastal birds.”

However, Rea acknowledged that the coastal and Baja California birds have similar characteristics.

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The Fish and Wildlife Service’s report also said that the coastal wren’s numbers in Southern California are declining as “coastal sage scrub habitats are becoming increasingly depleted” and encouraged the conservation of the bird’s shrinking habitat.

Kimball Garrett, ornithology collection manager at the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History, said the bird should be listed as an endangered species because “it’s losing its habitat.”

“They’ve got to look at this as a habitat issue too,” Garrett said. “Unless the (coastal) wren is listed as an endangered species, we will have no viable means of habitat protection. And if the bird’s habitat can’t be protected, we can’t protect the bird.”