California Fully Protected Animals

Note: the following text is England|Ecology’s standard legal text used for biological reports. The primary purpose of this text’s existence on this website is to provide a landing page for hyperlinks in footnotes in smaller documents, where there may not be adequate space for explanations of the laws and policies that underpin the report.

CDFW describes the Fully Protected (FP) animals list as “the State's initial effort in the 1960s to identify and provide additional protection to those animals that were rare or faced possible extinction. Lists were created for fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals. Fully Protected species may not be taken or possessed at any time and no licenses or permits may be issued for their take except for collecting these species for necessary scientific research, relocation of the bird species for the protection of livestock, or if they are a covered species whose conservation and management is provided for in a Natural Community Conservation Plan.”

The White-tailed Kite (Elanus leucurus) is a Fully Protected animal. Photo by Marcus C. England of England|Ecology.