[7][page needed] Blowouts are sandy, bowl-shaped interruptions in the shinnery oak sand dune system which look like small meteor craters.

While herbicide spraying has been outlawed in the dunes sagebrush lizard's New Mexico distribution, development for the oil industry has not ceased.

[11] In May 2024, the Fish and Wildlife Service published a final rule to list the lizard as an endangered species, citing future energy development, sand mining and climate change as the biggest threats to its survival.

[3][12] The Fish and Wildlife Service estimates that 35% of the lizard's approximately 520,161 acres (2,105.02 km2) of shinnery oak habitat has been degraded to the point it is no longer likely to have viable populations of the species, and that 47% of the species' geographic range has experienced habitat loss to the point of causing significant population declines.

[3]: 43764–43765  Rangewide population data was not available at the time of listing, but the Fish and Wildlife Service concluded that "the risk factors acting on the dunes sagebrush lizard and its habitat, either singly or in combination, are of sufficient imminence, intensity, and magnitude to indicate that the species is in danger of extinction throughout all of its range.