Endangered species

29 June 2007 -- The U.S. government has taken the American bald eagle off the list of endangered species in the United States, saying the bird's population is now flourishing.

At a ceremony Thursday in Washington, Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne said there are now nearly 10,000 nesting pairs of the bald eagle in the contiguous United States, compared to some 400 nesting pairs in 1963.

He said that after years of careful study, public comment and planning, the Interior Department and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service are confident in the future security of the bird.    » read more »

June 28, 2007 -- Assistant Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Environmental Safety and Occupational Health Alex Beehler will represent the Defense Department in a ceremony today that marks the delisting of the bald eagle from the Department of the Interior’s Endangered Species List. Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne will host the ceremony at the Jefferson Memorial at 10 a.m. EDT.    » read more »

June 25, 2007 -- (Lincoln, NE) Nebraska Attorney General Jon Bruning today applauded a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that balances key state responsibilities under the Clean Water Act with the requirements of the Endangered Species Act.    » read more »

16 June 2007 -- Delegates from 171 nations have wrapped up a conference on endangered species by putting trade restrictions on ivory, several commercial timber species and some fish.

The meeting of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, known as CITES, ended in The Hague Friday. At the 12-day talks, the delegates also approved trade limits on red and pink coral used in jewelry, saying over-harvesting in the Mediterranean and Pacific threatens to wipe it out.    » read more »

BOISE, ID – (June 4, 2007) Conservation groups today filed a lawsuit in Idaho federal district court challenging the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s decision to eliminate Endangered Species Act protections for the Yellowstone area’s iconic grizzly bear population. The legal challenge asks the court to restore the threatened status of the Yellowstone grizzly population because of ongoing and threatened habitat destruction, insufficient bear numbers, and inadequate legal protections.    » read more »

Ruling Means State and Federal Water Projects May Be Required to Reduce Pumping to Protect Fish from Extinction, Say Conservation Groups

San Francisco, CA -- A federal judge ruled today that a government assessment of risk to threatened fish from massive pumps in the San Francisco Bay Delta is illegal and must be rewritten. State and federal water project managers relied on the "biological opinion" by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) to justify increased water exports to farms and cities south of the delta.    » read more »

May 18, 2007 -- "The United States Senate unanimously resolved that today, May 18, 2007, will be designated as the Second Annual “Endangered Species Day.”

It is my hope that this Second Annual event will bring attention to the more than 1,800 rare wildlife, fish and plant species that are protected under the Endangered Species Act.    » read more »

Biodiversity, Science Communities Unite Behind Epic Effort To Promote Biodiversity, Document All 1.8 Million Named Species on Planet

WASHINGTON (May 9, 2007) – Many of the world’s leading scientific institutions today announced the launch of the Encyclopedia of Life, an unprecedented global effort to document all 1.8 million named species of animals, plants, and other forms of life on Earth. For the first time in the history of the planet, scientists, students, and citizens will have multi-media access to all known living species, even those that have just been discovered.    » read more »

May 9, 2007 -- WASHINGTON (May 8, 2007)—The title of the May 9 House Resources Committee hearing poses a question: "Endangered Species Act Implementation: Science or Politics?"

The unfortunate answer is all too often "politics," according to the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS).    » read more »

Bottlenose dolphins off the southern coast of Spain will benefit from shipping lane shift recommended by Earthwatch scientists

Earthwatch Institute, Maynard, MA, 23 April 2007 — Scientists from Earthwatch, the global environmental organization, are celebrating this week after the International Maritime Organization (IMO) agreed to divert shipping lanes off the southern coast of Spain in order to avoid important bottlenose dolphin foraging grounds.    » read more »

April 20, 2007, Juneau, Alaska – Alaska Governor Sarah Palin today voiced her concerns about the implications of the proposed endangered species listing of Cook Inlet’s beluga whales. The Governor also encouraged the National Marine Fisheries Service to conduct public hearings on this important issue.    » read more »