S2E15: 2.15 – Extreme Botany: Colorado's Rare Plants
From Colorado Outdoors - the Podcast for Colorado Parks and Wildlife by Colorado Parks & Wildlife
August 1, 2025 · 44 min · Season 2 · Episode 15
About this episode
This episode discusses Colorado's rare plants and the efforts of Colorado Parks and Wildlife to conserve them.
Colorado Parks and Wildlife now has the authority to study and conserve the state’s native invertebrates and rare plants in a comprehensive manner, which has strengthened Colorado’s ability to protect biodiversity. In 2024, Colorado passed House Bill 24-1117 which placed the management of invertebrates and rare plants under CPW’s wildlife umbrella. The bill defined rare plants to mean a plant species that is indigenous to the State of Colorado and that is at risk of extinction or elimination across the entirety of their distribution due to restricted range, few populations or occurrences, steep declines or severe threats. In the second part of our two-part series on this topic, we transition to talking about these rare plants. There are more than 2,800 native plants in Colorado, and 125 of those are endemic to our state, which means they only are found here. Of those, 90 are classified as rare. As Colorado updates its State Wildlife Action Plan, 195 rare plants are included in that plan. In this episode, we are going to chat with CPW Natural Areas Program Manager Raquel Wertsbaugh about her program’s longstanding work with rare and native plants, while we also talk with Savanna…
People in this episode
Guests: Raquel Wertsbaugh, Savanna Smith
Topics covered
- rare plants
- biodiversity
- native plants
- conservation
- Colorado
- invertebrates
Keywords
- rare plants
- Colorado
- biodiversity
- conservation
- native plants
- House Bill 24-1117
- monitoring
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: Colorado Parks and Wildlife
Places: Colorado
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- S3E2: 3.2 – Corners for Conservation · April 17, 2026 · 37 min
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