Grizzlies Doing What Grizzlies Do
Naturalist and photographer Brad Josephs left a GoPro by a stream in Alaska and caught some amazing footage of grizzly bear behavior, including one bruin that thought the camera might be something to eat. Here's his footage.
Wood Storks Off the Endangered List
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has announced it is down-listing the wood stork from endangered to threatened under the Endangered Species Act, reflecting a successful conservation and recovery effort spanning three decades. "The down-listing of the wood stork from endangered to threatened demonstrates how the Endangered Species Act can be an effective tool to protect and recover imperiled wildlife from the brink of extinction, especially when we work in partnership with states, tribes, conservation groups, private landowners, and other stakeholders to restore vital habitat," U.S. Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell said. "From the Cypress swamps of Georgia, to the inland waterways of Florida, wetlands and their wildlife are emblematic of the American Southeast. Through important conservation partnerships, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is working to rebuild a healthy wetland ecosystem, which, in turn, is helping restore the wood stork's habitat, double its population since its original listing and keep the bird moving in the right direction toward recovery."
The ESA has been enormously successful in conserving imperiled wildlife, preventing the extinction of more than 99 percent of the species listed as threatened or endangered since 1973. In addition, 27 species have been delisted due to recovery, including the bald eagle, American alligator and peregrine falcon. Others, such as the whooping crane and the California condor, have been pulled back from the edge of extinction. Meanwhile, 30 species have been down-listed from endangered to threatened.
Under the ESA, a species is considered endangered when it is at risk of extinction throughout all or a significant portion of its range. It is considered threatened when it is at risk of becoming endangered throughout all or a significant portion of its range.
When wood storks were listed as endangered in 1984, their population was dropping by about 5 percent each year. Since then, the U.S. breeding population has shown substantial improvement in the numbers of nesting pairs as a whole and an expansion of its breeding range. Since 2004, the three-year averages (2003 to 2012) for nesting pairs ranged from 7,086 to 10,147, all above the 6,000 three-year average identified in the 1997 recovery plan as the threshold to consider reclassifying the species to threatened status. However, the five-year average of 10,000 nesting pairs, identified in the current recovery plan as the threshold for delisting, has not yet been reached.
When the service originally listed the U.S. breeding population, the wood stork's range included Florida, Georgia, South Carolina and Alabama. Breeding was primarily in Central and South Florida. Historically, the Florida Everglades and the Big Cypress ecosystems supported large breeding colonies. Since listing, its range has expanded north and west, and now includes portions of North Carolina and Mississippi, with significant nesting in Florida, Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina.
Bald Eagle Lawsuit
The American Bird Conservancy has filed suit against the U.S. Department of the Interior, charging the agency with multiple violations of federal law in connection with its Dec. 9, 2013, final regulation that allows wind energy companies and others to obtain 30-year permits to kill eagles without prosecution by the federal government.
"Eagles are among our nation's most iconic and cherished birds. They do not have to be sacrificed for the next 30 years for the sake of unconstrained wind energy," said Michael Hutchins, national coordinator of ABC's Bird Smart Wind Energy Program. "Giving wind companies a 30-year pass to kill bald and golden eagles without knowing how it might affect their populations is a reckless and irresponsible gamble that millions of Americans are unwilling to take."
The previous rule, adopted in 2009, provided for a maximum duration of five years for each permit to kill eagles. According to a statement issued at that time by FWS in the Federal Register, a permit of any longer duration "would be incompatible with the preservation of the Bald or Golden Eagle." Yet just four years later DOI has increased by six-fold the time during which eagles could be killed, without offering a strong scientific justification for this change. ABC believes wind energy and other renewable energy sources can be encouraged without putting bald and golden eagles at risk. "In the government's rush to expand wind energy, shortcuts were taken in implementing this rule that should not have been allowed," said Hutchins. "We understand that some bird mortality is inevitable. However, in this case, long-term, cumulative impacts to eagle populations were not properly assessed, and the 30-year take permit rule was adopted in the absence of the required NEPA analysis concerning impacts on eagle populations or any other species that share the eagles' range."
In 2009, 22,000 wind turbines were in operation in the United States, representing 25 gigawatts of installed capacity – a small fraction of the 300GW of production capacity needed to meet the 2030 federal goal of generating 20 percent of U.S. electricity from renewable energy. By 2030, wind energy project growth is expected to impact almost 20,000 square miles of terrestrial habitat and more than 4,000 square miles of marine habitat, some of that critical to threatened and other protected species.
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U.S. Congress Imperiling National Wildlife Refuge System
The steady decline in congressional funding for the National Wildlife Refuge System is threatening the economic vitality of hundreds of local communities that rely on the tourism and recreation dollars that refuges provide, according to the Cooperative Alliance for Refuge Enhancement. A new CARE report warned that without adequate funding for basic maintenance and repairs, refuges will be forced to reduce visitor services and wildlife habitat management. That in turn, will harm opportunities to hunt, fish and view wildlife on refuge lands.
"More than $2.4 billion generated in local economies is at stake," said David Houghton, president of the National Wildlife Refuge Association, which leads CARE. "National wildlife refuges are economic engines, but without sufficient funding from Congress, those engines are going to stall."
"National wildlife refuges are the only system of federal lands where by law, fish, wildlife and habitat conservation is the purpose, and hunting, fishing and other wildlife related activities are priority uses," said Dale Hall, CEO of Ducks Unlimited. "Every year, more than 47 million hunters, anglers and other outdoor enthusiasts visit wildlife refuges, bringing in $2.4 billion in sales revenue to the communities around the refuges, clearly demonstrating the economic value of these lands."
CARE estimates that the refuge system needs at least $900 million each year in operations and maintenance funding to properly care for its 150 million acres. At its highest funding level in FY 2010, the system received little more than half the needed amount, $503 million. Since then, congressional appropriations have not only failed to account for rising costs, but have been backsliding. To reduce costs, refuges have had to cut numerous staff positions and sacrifice habitat management, visitor services and maintenance activities.
The CARE coalition is comprised of 23 wildlife, sporting and conservation organizations that span the political spectrum, representing 16 million Americans who value outdoor recreation and wildlife conservation.