Bush Takes Aim at the Piping Plover

One of America's most charming and delicate shorebirds, the piping plover, is close to extinction. Yet the administration of President George W. Bush has permitted the reduction of the critical habitats for this endangered bird by 92 percent. The administration said that the amount of habitat needed for the protection of the species was grossly overestimated by the previous administration.

The Center for Public Integrity notes that the BNP Petroleum Company, seeking drilling rights near the South Padre Island National Seashore in Texas, petitioned the Bush administration to reduce the critical habitat area for wintering populations of the piping plover.

 

A Call to Action

Every schoolchild is taught about the extinction of the dinosaurs. But we may be on the verge of another great extinction. This time it is birds, the descendants of the dinosaurs which once dominated Earth.

A new report from Stanford University estimates that one in 10 bird species will be extinct by the year 2100. The report says that an additional 15 percent of bird species will be on the verge of extinction by the end of the century

 

Bush Threatens the Marbled Murrelet


Murrelet

The marbled murrelet is a threatened seabird that nests in the old growth forests of the Pacific Northwest. It frequently nests in forests that may be 30 miles from the ocean, but it returns to the ocean each day to feed.

Logging approved by the Bush Administration in old growth forests threatens the murrelet’s habitat. Environmental groups have determined that the bird will become extinct in the next century if logging is permitted to continue in old growth forests in the region.

The marbled murrelet has been protected since 1992. But on September 1, 2004 Bush’s Interior Department announced that it will no longer consider marbled murrelets in the Pacific Northwest as an isolated species from murrelets in Canada and Alaska. This reclassification paves the way for the administration to remove the murrelet from the “threatened” category of protection under the Endangered Species Act. Apparently the interests of the timber industry have prevailed.

 

It Took George W. Bush Only Nine Days to Stop the Government From Protecting the Spotted Owl

Nine days after he took office in 2001, George W. Bush’s Department of the Interior removed all 11 national forests in Arizona and New Mexico from the list of protected habitats for the threatened Mexican subspecies of the Spotted Owl. These forests are critical since they are home to over 90 percent of all known Mexican Spotted Owls.  

The same month, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service also announced that the California species of the Spotted Owl did not warrant protection under the Endangered Species Act.

Federal Judge David Bury called the reduction of critical habitat “nonsensical” and blasted the administration for knowingly violating the Endangered Species Act. On October 2, 2003, Secretary of Interior Gale Norton refused to obey the court order to protect the Mexican Spotted Owl, arguing that a “lean budget” has made the agency unable to comply with the order to designate critical habitat for the bird!

This is not an isolated case. Over the last year, the Department of the Interior in the Bush Administration has removed protection for endangered populations of other species of birds including the Trumpeter Swan, Mountain Quail, and the Sage Grouse.

- special thanks to Stephen Greenfield for submitting this information

Birds Listed as Either Threatened or Endangered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

 

Akepa, Hawaii
Akepa, Maui
Akialoa, Kauai
Akiapola`au
Albatross, short-tailed
Blackbird, yellow-shouldered
Bobwhite, masked
Cahow
Caracara, Audubon’s crested
Condor, California
Coot, Hawaiian
Crane, Mississippi sandhill
Crane, whooping
Creeper, Hawaii
Creeper, Molokai
Creeper, Oahu
Crow, Hawaiian
Crow, Mariana
Crow, white-necked
Curlew, Eskimo
Duck, Hawaiian
Duck, Laysan
Eider, spectacled
Eider, Steller’s
Elepaio, Oahu
Falcon, northern aplomado
Finch, Laysan
Finch, Nihoa
Flycatcher, southwestern willow
Gnatcatcher, coastal California

Goose, Hawaiian
Hawk, Hawaiian
Hawk, Puerto Rican broad-winged
Hawk, Puerto Rican sharp-shinned
Honeycreeper, crested
Jay, Florida scrub
Kingfisher, Guam Micronesian
Kite, Everglade snail
Megapode, Micronesian
Millerbird, Nihoa
Moorhen, Hawaiian common
Moorhen, Mariana common
Murrelet, marbled
Nightjar, Puerto Rican
Nukupu`u
`O`o, Kauai
`O`u
Owl, Mexican spotted
Owl, northern spotted
Palila
Parrot, Puerto Rican
Parrotbill, Maui
Pelican, brown
Petrel, Hawaiian dark-rumped
Pigeon, Puerto Rican plain
Plover, piping
Plover, western snowy
Po`ouli
Prairie-chicken, Attwater's greater
Pygmy-owl, cactus ferruginous

Rail, California clapper
Rail, Guam
Rail, light-footed clapper
Rail, Yuma clapper
Shearwater, Newell's Townsend’s
Shrike, San Clemente loggerhead
Sparrow, Cape Sable seaside
Sparrow, Florida grasshopper
Sparrow, San Clemente sage
Stilt, Hawaiian
Stork, wood
Swiftlet, Mariana gray
Tern, California least
Tern, least
Tern, roseate
Thrush, large Kauai
Thrush, Molokai
Thrush, small Kauai
Towhee, Inyo California
Vireo, black-capped
Vireo, least Bell’s
Warbler, Bachman’s
Warbler, golden-cheeked
Warbler, Kirtland’s
Warbler, nightingale reed
White-eye, bridled
White-eye, Rota bridled
Woodpecker, ivory-billed
Woodpecker, red-cockaded

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