Willamette Valley Prairie Flower Is Latest Endangered Species Act Success

PORTLAND, Ore.— The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced today that Bradshaw’s desert parsley, a wet-prairie wildflower found in Oregon’s Willamette Valley and adjacent southwestern Washington, has fully recovered and can be removed from the endangered species list.

The plant was protected under the Endangered Species Act in 1988 due to threats from habitat loss. After more than 30 years of recovery efforts, the plant has increased from around 25,000 flowers in 11 populations to more than 11 million flowers today, in 24 populations. The Service proposed removing the species from the list of endangered species in November 2019.

“We’re thrilled that after so many years of hard work, Bradshaw’s desert parsley is again a beautiful fixture in the Willamette Valley,” said Noah Greenwald, endangered species director at the Center for Biological Diversity. “It’s the latest example of how species on the brink can effectively recover when they’re put under the care of the Endangered Species Act. Without it, this plant would have been consigned to the history books years ago as one more lost flower.”

Urban and agricultural development across the Willamette Valley pushed Bradshaw’s desert parsley close to extinction in the late ’80s. Land conservation played a critical role in the plant’s recovery, as roughly 70% of its known populations are now found on sites with some degree of protection from development.

Bradshaw’s desert parsley is the second recovered species to be removed from the endangered species list in 2021; the interior least tern was removed in January. So far, in the history of the Act, 49 species have been successfully delisted upon recovery.

Bradshaw’s desert parsley is also called Bradshaw’s lomatium. Its scientific name is Lomatium bradshawii.