United States Fish and Wildlife Service - Definition and Overview

The USFWS logo

The United States Fish and Wildlife Service is a unit of the United States Department of the Interior that is dedicated to managing and preserving wildlife. It began as the U.S. Commission on Fish and Fisheries in the United States Department of Commerce and the Division of Economic Ornithology and Mammalogy in the United States Department of Agriculture and took its present form in 1939.

Units in the Fish and Wildlife Service include:

• National Wildlife Refuge System
• Bird Habitat Conservation
• Federal Duck Stamp
• National Fish Hatchery System
• Endangered Species program

Also see: List of U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service lands

External links

• Official web site (http://www.fws.gov/index.html) of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.