U.S. Is Asked to Help Save Imperiled Pocket Mouse

Three environmental groups on Monday petitioned the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to designate critical habitat for the imperiled Pacific pocket mouse.

Such a designation could become the biggest environmental obstacle to a proposed 16-mile toll road in south Orange County.

“There are only three known populations of the Pacific pocket mouse,” said David Hogan of the Center for Biological Diversity’s San Diego office. “There could be no justification for the loss of any of those populations.”

There are thought to be as few as eight surviving mice in a single population at the Dana Point Headlands. In the two other populations, there are about 50 mice on both sides of San Mateo Creek, which is in the path of the proposed toll road, and 1,000 mice in Camp Pendleton, Hogan said.

There may already be good news for the pocket mice at the Dana Point Headlands. The site’s owners are in “advanced negotiations” with state and federal wildlife officials to set aside a 24-acre preserve there.

The smallest of all pocket mice--four to six inches long, including tail--lives in sandy coastal bluffs up to two miles inland from the Pacific Ocean. Its range once stretched from Marina del Rey almost to the Mexican border.

The Center for Biological Diversity, the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Endangered Habitats League jointly filed the petition for critical habitat--land considered crucial for the survival of an endangered species. They are asking that 20 spots in Orange and San Diego counties be included. A preliminary decision is expected within 90 days.

Critical habitat includes not only land already occupied by a species but also suitable land to expand into. Such a designation means that landowners who receive federal funding or need a federal permit must receive approval from the Fish and Wildlife Service before they destroy or alter habitat.

The Pacific pocket mouse was listed as endangered in 1994. The service did not designate critical habitat then because staffers said they had heard from an unknown person who said he would destroy the only known population at that time--on the Dana Point Headlands. Critical-habitat maps would have allowed him and others to find that population, they said. But since then, the location of the mice has been repeatedly pinpointed in studies and maps.

“That rationale no longer holds water,” said Andrew Wetzler, an attorney with NRDC’s Los Angeles office.

The Dana Point population may get a boost soon. The landowner is prepared to preserve a 24-acre nature park for the remaining pocket mice. The park would be fully endowed to fund maintenance, ongoing Pacific pocket mouse studies and remedial measures to help expand the population.

The co-owner of land there, Sanford Edward of Headlands Reserve LLC, said, “There’s nothing that constrains me legally or even economically to do this.”

But he believes such a park could be a selling point for homes he plans to build nearby.

The fate of the mice near San Mateo Creek is more questionable, environmentalists say. The mouse is one of several endangered species that could interfere with the proposed Foothill South toll road. Lisa Telles, spokeswoman for the county Transportation Corridor Agencies, said the agencies have always worked with wildlife officials to compensate for environmental damage, and they would do the same in this case.

But environmentalists say that may not be possible because the proposed road would bisect San Onofre State Park.

“There are certain environmental impacts that can’t be mitigated for, and destroying a state park is one of them,” Wetzler said.