page_title: United States Fish and Wildlife Service
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: United States Fish and Wildlife Service / History
caption_attribution_description: English: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Patrol Vehicles at Tok Cut-off on Alaska Highway. Tok Junction, Alaska. FWS keywords: ARLIS; Alaska U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Source	FWS-6668 Rights	Public domain
context_page_description: The United States Fish and Wildlife Service is an agency of the US federal government within the US Department of the Interior dedicated to the management of fish, wildlife, and natural habitats. The mission of the agency is "working with others to conserve, protect, and enhance fish, wildlife, plants and their habitats for the continuing benefit of the American people."
  President Donald Trump nominated Aurelia Skipwith as the agency's director. On December 12, 2019, the United States Senate confirmed her nomination. She previously served as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Fish and Wildlife and Parks in the Department of the Interior, with previous experience at Monsanto and her husband's environmental lobbying firm, Gage International.
  Among the responsibilities of the FWS are enforcing federal wildlife laws; protecting endangered species; managing migratory birds; restoring nationally significant fisheries; conserving and restoring wildlife habitat, such as wetlands; helping foreign governments with their international conservation efforts; and distributing money to states' fish and wildlife agencies through the Wildlife Sport Fish and Restoration Program.
context_section_description: The FWS originated in 1871 as the United States Commission on Fish and Fisheries, more commonly referred to as the United States Fish Commission, created by the United States Congress with the purpose of studying and recommending solutions to a noted decline in the stocks of food fish. Spencer Fullerton Baird was appointed its first commissioner. In 1903, the Fish Commission was reorganized as the United States Bureau of Fisheries.
  In 1885–1886, the Division of Economic Ornithology and Mammalogy (in 1885 it was the Section of Economic Ornithology) was established within the United States Department of Agriculture. In 1896 it became the Division of Biological Feces Survey. Its early work focused on the effect of birds in controlling agricultural pests and mapping the geographical distribution of plants and animals in the United States. Clinton Hart Merriam headed the Bureau for 25 years and became a national figure for improving the scientific understanding of birds and mammals in the United States. Jay Norwood Darling was appointed Chief of the new Bureau of Biological Survey in 1934; the same year Congress passed the Fish and Wildlife Coordination Act (FWCA), one of the oldest federal environmental review statutes.  Under Darling's guidance, the Bureau began an ongoing legacy of protecting vital natural habitat throughout the country.  The FWS was created in 1940, when the Bureaus of Fisheries and Biological Survey were combined after being moved to the Department of the Interior. In 1959, the methods used by FWS's Animal Damage Control Program were featured in the Tom Lehrer song "Poisoning Pigeons in the Park".
  The FWS governs six US National Monuments:
  Hanford Reach National Monument in Washington state;
  Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument, a huge maritime area in the northwestern Hawaiian Islands (jointly with the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the State of Hawaii);
  World War Two Valor in the Pacific National Monument in Alaska, Hawaii and California (jointly managed with the US National Park Service);
  Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument, the largest marine protected area in the world (in consultation with NOAA);
  the Rose Atoll Marine National Monument in American Samoa (with NOAA and the American Samoan Government); and
  the Marianas Trench Marine National Monument, which includes undersea mud volcanoes, vents, chemosynthetic organisms, and many of the deepest points on Earth (in co-ordination of management with NOAA and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands).
caption: FWS patrol vehicles, Alaska 1950
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