2010-9736. Endangered Species; File No. 14510

AGENCY:

National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Commerce.

ACTION:

Issuance of permit.

SUMMARY:

Notice is hereby given that NMFS Southwest Fisheries Science Center, 3333 North Torrey Pines Court, La Jolla, CA 92037-1023, has been issued a permit to take green (Chelonia mydas), loggerhead (Caretta caretta), olive ridley (Lepidochelys olivacea), and leatherback (Dermochelys coriacea) sea turtles for purposes of scientific research.

ADDRESSES:

The permit and related documents are available for review upon written request or by appointment in the following office(s):

Permits, Conservation and Education Division, Office of Protected Resources, NMFS, 1315 East-West Highway, Room 13705, Silver Spring, MD 20910; phone [phone]; fax [phone]; and

Southwest Region, NMFS, 501 West Ocean Blvd., Suite 4200, Long Beach, CA 90802-4213; phone [phone]; fax [phone].

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:

Kate Swails or Amy Hapeman [phone].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

On November 18, 2009, notice was published in the Federal Register (74 FR 59525) that a request for a scientific research permit to take had been submitted by the above-named applicant. The requested permit has been issued under the authority of the Endangered Species Act of 1973, as amended (ESA; 16 U.S.C. 1531 et seq.) and the regulations governing the taking, importing, and exporting of endangered and threatened species (50 CFR parts 222-226).

The purpose of the proposed research project is to initiate a baseline study of the status of sea turtles in the San Gabriel River and Alamitos Bay in Long Beach, California. Researchers would also opportunistically take samples and potentially track sea turtles incidentally taken in coastal power plants off California and that strand live in the marine environment. Researchers may annually capture, measure, weigh, photograph/video, flipper tag, passive integrated transponder tag (PIT), tissue biopsy, blood sample, scute scrape, lavage, ultrasound, oral swab, cloacal swab, inject tetracycline, and release up to: ten green, one olive ridley, and three loggerhead sea turtles taken in power plant entrainments; four green, one olive ridley, one loggerhead, and two leatherback sea turtles that strand in the marine environment; and 35 green, six loggerhead, and six olive ridley sea turtles during captures as part of the San Gabriel and Los Alamitos Bay California project. Some turtles may have satellite transmitters, sonic tags, or camera attached. Researchers would also have authority to authority to salvage, necropsy, and sample animals that die as a result of entrainments or strandings. The permit is issued for five years.

Issuance of this permit, as required by the ESA, was based on a finding that such permit (1) was applied for in good faith, (2) will not operate to the disadvantage of such endangered or threatened species, and (3) is consistent with the purposes and policies set forth in section 2 of the ESA.

Dated: April 21, 2010.

P. Michael Payne,

Chief, Permits, Conservation and Education Division, Office of Protected Resources, National Marine Fisheries Service.