December 23, 2023 marks the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Endangered Species Act (ESA) by President Richard M. Nixon. The statute has put enormous power into the hands of bureaucrats at the two federal agencies that administer it – the Interior Department’s U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) and the Commerce Department’s National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS). It has also been adroitly used by environmental groups who have sued the federal government under the ESA to stop projects not of their liking through the broadest possible designation of a “critical habitat” for a plant or animal said to be either threatened or endangered.
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U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to Help Recovery Efforts for Fish That Resides in Tennessee Rivers
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service recently announced a $5.1 million investment initiative for endangered species recovery implementation efforts for four focal species groups.
Read the full storyWisconsin Lawmakers Push to Remove the Gray Wolf as an Endangered Species
A bipartisan group of lawmakers, including Wisconsin Senators Ron Johnson (R-WI) and Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), are pushing to remove the gray wolf from the list of endangered species.
The group of lawmakers introduced legislation to return the management of the species to state and local government organizations, arguing the animals have made a recovery in western Great Lakes states.
Read the full storyScientists Work to Save Wild Puerto Rican Parrot After Maria
Biologists are trying to save the last of the endangered Puerto Rican parrots after more than half the population of the bright green birds with turquoise-tipped wings disappeared when Hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico and destroyed their habitat and food sources. In the tropical forest of El Yunque, only two of the 56 wild birds that once lived there survived the Category 4 storm that pummeled the U.S. territory in September 2017. Meanwhile, only 4 of 31 wild birds in a forest in the western town of Maricao survived, along with 75 out of 134 wild parrots living in the Rio Abajo forest in the central mountains of Puerto Rico, scientists said. And while several dozen new parrots have been born in captivity and in the wild since Maria, the species is still in danger, according to scientists. “We have a lot of work to do,” said Gustavo Olivieri, parrot recovery program coordinator for Puerto Rico’s Department of Natural Resources. Federal and local scientists will meet next month to debate how best to revive a species that numbered more than 1 million in the 1800s but dwindled to 13 birds during the 1970s after decades of forest clearing. The…
Read the full storyEfforts to Pull the Northern White Rhino from the Brink of Extinction Intensify as the Last Living Male Declines in Health
In Kenya, the last male northern white rhino (Ceratotherium simum cottoni) in the world isn’t faring well – the animal is past its prime and in declining health. With time running out, a global team of scientists and conservationists are trying to save the subspecies from extinction with help from the last two surviving females. Angalifu,…
Read the full storyFOUND: 1.5 Million Penguins Discovered on Remote Antarctic Islands
A thriving “hotspot” of 1.5 million Adelie penguins, a species fast declining in parts of the world, has been discovered on remote islands off the Antarctic Peninsula, surprised scientists said Friday. The first bird census of the Danger Islands unearthed over 750,000 Adelie breeding pairs, more than the rest of the area combined, the team reported in the journal Scientific Reports.
Read the full storyNew Genetically Engineered American Chestnut Will Help Restore the Decimated, Iconic Tree
American chestnut trees were once among the most majestic hardwood trees in the eastern deciduous forests, many reaching 80 to 120 feet in height and eight feet or more in diameter. The “then boundless chestnut woods” Thoreau wrote about in Walden once grew throughout the Appalachian mountains. They provided habitat and a mast crop for wildlife, a nutritious nut crop for humans and a source of valuable timber. The species has a sad story to tell. Of the estimated four billion American chestnut trees that once grew from Maine to Georgia, only a remnant survive today. The species was nearly wiped out by chestnut blight, a devastating disease caused by the exotic fungal pathogen Cryphonectria parasitica. This fungus was accidentally introduced into the United States over a century ago as people began to import Asian species of chestnut. It reduced the American chestnut from the dominant canopy species in the eastern forests to little more than a rare shrub. After battling the blight for more than a century, researchers are using the modern tools of breeding, bio-control methods that rely on a virus that inhibits the growth of the infecting fungus, and direct genetic modification to return the American chestnut…
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