Wildlife management agencies across the United States are employing diverse conservation strategies to address threats to native species while controlling invasive populations in waterways and ecosystems.

Federal officials are considering cool water releases for the third consecutive year at Glen Canyon Dam in Northern Arizona this summer to protect the humpback chub, a federally protected fish species. The releases, while beneficial to the endangered fish, come at a cost to hydropower generation at the facility.

Meanwhile, wildlife officials around the Chesapeake Bay region are recommending an unconventional solution to combat invasive snakehead fish: high-powered compound bows. The invasive snakeheads have been proliferating in waterways from New York to Florida, prompting officials to encourage bow hunting as a control method.

In the Southeast, conservation efforts are focused on the critically endangered frosted flatwoods salamander through an intensive campaign involving significant human resources. The species faces extinction, requiring painstaking conservation work to prevent its disappearance from American ecosystems.

These varied approaches highlight the complex challenges facing wildlife managers as they balance protection of endangered native species with control of invasive populations, often requiring trade-offs between conservation goals and other interests such as energy production.