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CENTER FOR BIOLOGICAL
DIVERSITY
<www.biologicaldiversity.org>
10-19-00
#256
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§
WATER USE REFORM SOUGHT FOR SAN PEDRO RIVER IN AZ
§ PETITION FILED TO
PROTECT RIGHT WHALE HABITAT IN AK
§ PETITION TO BE FILED TO PROTECT
KILLER WHALES IN WA
§ FEDERAL WOLF SLAUGHTER TO BE CHALLENGED IN
MT
§ SPOTTED OWL INCHES TOWARD FEDERAL PROTECTION IN CA
§ YOSEMITE
TOAD & YELLOW-LEGGED FROG MAY BE
PROTECTED IN SIERRA
NEVADA
WATER USE REFORM SOUGHT FOR SAN PEDRO RIVER
On 10-11-00, the
San Pedro Alliance filed a petition with the Arizona
Department of Water
Resources to designate the Upper San Pedro River
Basin an "Active Management
Area". This state designation requires that
a plan be developed and
implemented to ensure a hundred year water
supply. While most Arizona urban
areas were designated as Active
Management Areas by the state legislature,
Sierra Vista was exempted
after heavy lobbying by the growth industry. Urban
and suburban sprawl
is desiccating the San Pedro, the Southwest's largest
undammed river,
and will eventually destroy the West's largest remaining
contiguous
cottonwood-willow forest.
Lacking an Active Management
Area, there are essentially no restrictions
on drilling wells or withdrawing
groundwater in the Upper San Pedro
River Basin. From 1990 to 1998,
water companies increased the amount
of groundwater sold to their customers
by 23%. In spite of this dramatic
increase in deficit groundwater pumping,
local governments have
implemented no significant mechanism to control
deficit groundwater
pumping.
The Center for Biology is a founding
member of the San Pedro Alliance,
an international coalition of more than 50
organizations.
______________________
PETITION FILED TO PROTECT RIGHT WHALE HABITAT IN
ALASKA
On 10-4-00, the Center for Biological Diversity submitted a formal
petition
to designate critical habitat for the endangered Northern right
whale in
the southeast portion of the Bering Sea near Bristol Bay, Alaska.
The
Northern right whale is the most endangered whale in the world:
there
may be only 300 left in the Atlantic Ocean, and perhaps only 100 in
the
Pacific. It received its name from commercial whalers to indicate it
was
the "right whale" to hunt. And hunt it they did. The pacific population
was
so decimated during the 19th century that it was once thought extinct.
For
the past five summers, however, it has been found in the
southeast
Bering Sea.
There is still a chance to save this magnificent
whale. Although no longer
hunted, Northern right whales are killed by humans
every year. Collisions
with ships and entanglement with fishing gear are the
main causes of
right whale mortality, but it is also threatened by industrial
pollution and
habitat destruction.
To learn more about the right
whale, read the petition, and see a map of
the proposed critical habitat
area:
http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/swcbd/species/right/nprw1.html
________________
FEDERAL WOLF SLAUGHTER TO BE CHALLENGED IN MONTANA
On
10-10-00, the Center for Biological Diversity, Sierra Club, Natural
Resources
Defense Council, Humane Society of the United States, and
A Hunters Voice
filed a notice of intent to sue the U.S. Fish & Wildlife
Service and
Wildlife Services (formerly Animal Damage Control) for
killing endangered
wolves in northwest Montana. Though the Fish &
Wildlife Service has
invested millions in an attempt to undo a century of
wolf slaughter, it is
undermining those efforts by continuing to kill wolves
at the behest of the
very force that drove them to extinction's door in the
first place: the
livestock industry. The agencies have killed 41 wolves
since 1987. In
1996-97, they killed 18 wolves, representing approximately
25 percent of the
total population. Four wolves were killed in 1998, nine in
1999, and four so
far in 2000. Even wolves with no apparent involvement in
cattle deaths have
been killed and trapped.
The effect on wolf recovery has been
devastating. The recovery goal for
the Northwest Montana component of the
federal wolf recovery plan is
ten breeding pairs sustained over three years.
But recovery has been
stalled at only five breeding pairs for the past three
years. Wolf control in
response to livestock depredations is the leading
cause of wolf mortality.
The case will be argued by Tim Preso of the
Earthjustice Legal Defense
Fund.
_______________
PETITION TO BE FILED TO PROTECT KILLER WHALES IN
WA
MSNBC.com has posted an excellent story on the Center for
Biological
Diversity's research and plans to list the killer whales (i.e.
orcas) of
Washington State and British Columbia as endangered species.
Puget
Sound is home to a unique population of killer whales called
"southern
residents". These whales have declined due to historic capture
for
museum and commercial exhibits, loss of salmon and other prey
species,
exposure to high levels of PCBs, and harassment by commercial
and
private whale watchers.
In the last five years, the southern
resident population declined by 17%.
It was listed as a threatened species in
British Columbia in 1999 and
meets the international standard of endangerment
established by the
International Union for the Conservation of
Nature.
To read the MSNBC story: <http://www.msnbc.com/news/327797.asp>
__________________
SPOTTED OWL INCHES TOWARD FEDERAL PROTECTION IN
CA
On 10-12-00, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service published an initial
positive
finding on a petition by the Center for Biological Diversity and the
Sierra
Nevada Forest Protection Campaign to list the California spotted owl
as
an endangered species. The California spotted owl lives in old
growth
throughout the Sierra Nevada and sky island forests of
southern
California. It is declining by 7-10% annually as logging, urban
sprawl,
livestock grazing and road construction encroach on its
habitat.
Also joining the petition were the Sierra Nevada Forest
Protection
Campaign, the Center for Sierra Nevada Conservation,
Natural
Resources Defense Council, Defenders of Wildlife, Wilderness
Society,
Sierra Club, Friends of the River, Forest Issues Group, Plumas
Forest
Project, Yahi Group of the Sierra Club, Lassen Forest
Preservation
Group, John Muir Project, Yosemite Area Audubon, American
Lands
Alliance and the Sequoia Forest Alliance.
To learn more about
the spotted owl and the petition:
<http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/swcbd/species/cso/casowl.html>
_____________________
YOSEMITE TOAD & YELLOW-LEGGED FROG MAY BE
PROTECTED
IN SIERRA NEVADA
On 10-12-00, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife
Service published initial positive
findings on petitions by the Center for
Biological Diversity and the Pacific
Rivers Council to list the Yosemite toad
and Sierra Nevada population of
the mountain yellow-legged frog as endangered
species.
Both the Yosemite toad and the yellow-legged frog have
declined
precipitously because of habitat loss, pesticides and other
pollutants,
predation due to stocking of non-native fish, and environmental
stresses
which render amphibians susceptible to aquatic diseases. A
recent
survey found that the Yosemite toad has disappeared from 47%
of
historic locations throughout the high Sierra. Most remaining
populations
are small and greatly reduced in number from historical
occurrence.
Formerly one of the most common amphibians in the high Sierra
lakes
and streams, the Mountain yellow-legged frog has declined
precipitously
due to stocking of non-native fish, pesticide drift from
Central Valley
agribusiness, livestock grazing and habitat loss. It has
declined by up
to 90%, with only a few dozen large populations remaining. Two
of the
largest known populations crashed dramatically in the past few
years,
going from over 2,000 adults in 1996 to only 2 in 1999.
To find
out more about Center's campaign to protect the Yosemite toad,
yellow-legged
frog and other amphibians:
<http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/swcbd/species/herps/amphibians.html>
_____________________________________________________________
ENDANGERED
TOTEMS. Eleven of the twelve western states have adopted
imperiled species as
their state fish: New Mexico (Rio Grande cutthroat
trout), Arizona (Apache
trout), Colorado (Greenback cutthroat trout), Utah
(Bonneville cutthroat
trout), Nevada (Lahontan cutthroat trout), California
(Golden trout), Oregon
(Chinook salmon), Washington (Steelhead trout),
Idaho, Montana and Wyoming
(Cutthroat trout).
Kierán
Suckling
ksuckling@biologicaldiversity.org
Science and Policy
Director 520.623.5252
phone
Center for Biological
Diversity 520.623.9797
fax
<www.biologicaldiversity.org>
POB 710, Tucson, AZ
85702-0710
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