National News

Pressure Mounts to Change Endangered Species Act. “Fifty years ago, the bald eagle was on the brink of extinction in the 48 contiguous states. Habitat destruction, illegal shooting and decimation of its food supply from the pesticide DDT had put the bird in peril. While there might have been as many as 100,000 nesting bald eagles across what is now the U.S. in 1782, when the bird was named the national emblem, there were only about 490 breeding pairs decades ago, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The eagle was listed as threatened in 1967 under a federal law that preceded the 1973 Endangered Species Act and was listed as endangered — meaning at risk of extinction — in 1978. Thanks to its federal protections under the law, the bald eagle’s population grew to more than 9,700 pairs by 2006 and was removed from the endangered list a year later. Now, as the nation prepares to celebrate the 45th anniversary of the Endangered Species Act on Friday, conservative Republicans in Congress are saying the law — credited with saving the bald eagle and numerous other animal and plant species — is outdated, and they are taking steps to change it in ways that conservationists argue would drastically weaken it. The changes likely would have an effect in New Mexico, home to dozens of protected species and several more still waiting to be listed. If the proposed changes pass, they could affect a decades-old controversial recovery program for the Mexican gray wolf that pits ranchers against wolf advocates.” [Santa Fe New Mexican, 12/26/18 (=)]

Endangered Species Observers Have Spotted the First Right Whale Calf of the Season. “There is a happy corner of the Internet today, and it is celebrating the first North Atlantic right whale calf sighting of the season. The news is a big deal, considering the fact that the North Atlantic right whale is critically endangered, its total population is only about 450 and not a single right whale calf was spotted last season…On top of a lack of births, the right whale population has experienced an unsettling number of deaths. A technical memorandum issued by NOAA in September said that as of August, 19 right whales had died in 2017 and 2018. Only 5 calves were born during that same period.” [National Public Radio, 12/29/18 (=)]

These Species Went Extinct in 2018. More May Be Doomed to Follow in 2019. “They've been on our planet for millions of years, but 2018 was the year several species officially vanished forever.  Three bird species went completely extinct this year, scientists say, two of which are songbirds from northeastern Brazil: The Cryptic Treehunter (Cichlocolaptes mazarbarnetti) and Alagoas Foliage-gleaner (Philydor novaesi), according to a recent report from the conservation group BirdLife International.  According to BirdLife, the other extinct bird is Hawaii's Poo-uli (Melamprosops phaeosoma), which has not been seen in the wild since 2004 (the same year the last captive bird died). A disturbing trend is that mainland species are starting to go extinct, rather than island species: ‘Ninety percent of bird extinctions in recent centuries have been of species on islands,’ said Stuart Butchart, BirdLife’s chief scientist and lead author on the paper. ‘However, our results confirm that there is a growing wave of extinctions sweeping across the continents, driven mainly by habitat loss and degradation from unsustainable agriculture and logging,’ he said.” [USA Today, 1/1/19 (=)]