Extinction and Endangered Species - Species Loss—crisis Or False Alarm?

Environmental issues, which have a tendency to pit conservation against business or economic development, are often hotly debated. With respect to current threats to biodiversity, some critics argue that the scale of loss is not as great as we imagine. They point to uncertainty regarding the total number of species, as well as the geographic distributions of species. Other challengers claim that loss of habitat and disruption by human activity are not powerful enough to cause the massive extinction being documented. Still other challengers contend that extinction is inevitable, and that the Earth has experienced, and recovered from, mass extinctions before. They conclude that the current biodiversity loss, while huge, is not disastrous.

In addition, opponents of conservation frequently argue that "green" policies such as the U.S. Endangered Species Act place the needs of wildlife before those of humans. This was the central issue in one of the bitterest battles over an endangered species, that concerning protection of northern spotted owl habitat. (See Figure 1.4.) In 1990 declining populations resulted in the listing of the northern spotted owl as a threatened species. In 1992 the Fish and Wildlife Service set aside seven million acres of forestland in the Pacific Northwest—both private and public—as critical habitat for the species. Logging was banned on federal lands within these areas. Loggers protested this ban, arguing that jobs would be lost. Supporters of the ban, on the other hand, claimed that the logging industry in the area was already in decline and that continued logging would preserve existing jobs only for a short time. Eventually, a compromise was reached in which logging was limited to trees under a certain size, leaving the mature growth for owl habitat. By early 1993 almost all old-growth logging on federal lands had been stopped by court action.

TABLE 1.2 Count of endangered and threatened species and U.S. species with recovery plans, February 2006 "Summary of Listed Species: Species and Recovery Plans as of 02/01/2006," in Threatened and Endangered Species System (TESS), U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 2006, http://ecos.fws.gov/tess_public/Boxscore.do (accessed February 1, 2006)

TABLE 1.2
Count of endangered and threatened species and U.S. species with recovery plans, February 2006
	Group	Endangered		Threatened		Total species	U.S. species with recovery plansb
		U.S.	Foreign	U.S.	Foreign
Total U.S. endangered—997 (398 animals, 599 plants)
Total U.S. threatened—275 (129 animals, 146 plants)
Total U.S. species—1,272 (527 animalsc, 745 plants)
aThere are 1,868 total listings (1,300 U.S.). A listing is an E (endangered) or a T (threatened) in the "status" column of 50 CFR 17.11 or 17.12 (the Lists of Endangered and Threatened Wildlife and Plants). The following types of listings are combined as single counts in the table above: species listed both as threatened and endangered (dual status), and subunits of a single species listed as distinct population segments. Only the endangered population is tallied for dual status populations (except for the following: Olive ridley sea turtle; for which only the threatened U.S. population is tallied). The dual status U.S. species that are tallied as endangered are: California tiger salamander, chinook salmon, Coho salmon, gray wolf, green sea turtle, piping plover, Roseate tern, sockeye salmon, steelhead, steller sea-lion. The dual status foreign species that are tallied as endangered are: argali, chimpanzee, leopard, saltwater crocodile. Distinct population segments tallied as one include: Californi tiger salamander, chinook salmon, chum salmon, Coho salmon, Dugong, steelhead. Entries that represent entire genera or families include: Alabama lampmussel, Anthony's riversnail, argali, birdwing pearlymussel, black-footed ferret, bog (=Muhlenberg) turtle, Boulder darter, brown pelican, Cactus ferruginous pygmy-owl, California condor, California tiger salamander, catspaw (purple cat's paw pearlymussel), chimpanzee, chinook salmon, Chum salmon, clubshell, Coho salmon Colorado pikeminnow (=squawfish), Columbian white-tailed deer, copperbelly water snake, cracking pearlymussel, Cumberland bean (pearlymussel), Cumberland monkeyface (pearlymussel), Cumberlandian combshell, Delmarva Peninsula fox squirrel, desert tortoise, Dromedary pearlymussel, Dugong, duskytail darter, finerayed pigtoe, gopher tortoise, gray whale, gray wolf, green sea turtle, grizzly bear, Guam rail, leopard, marbled murrelet, Mariana fruit bat (=Mariana flying fox), mountain yellow-legged frog, olive ridley sea turtle, oyster mussel, piping plover, red wolf, Roseate tern, saltwater crocodile, shiny pigtoe, smoky madtom, sockeye salmon, Southern sea otter, spotfin chub, steelhead, steller sea-lion, straight-horned markhor, tidewater goby, Tubercled blossom (pearlymussel), turgid blossom (pearlymussel), Western snowy plover, whooping crane, winged mapleleaf, woodland caribou, woundfin, yellow blossom (pearlymussel), yellowfin madtom.
bThere are 553 distinct approved recovery plans. Some recovery plans cover more than one species, and a few species have separate plans covering different parts of their ranges. This count include only plans generated by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) or jointly by the USFWS and National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), and includes only listed species that occur in the United States.
c11 animal species have dual status in the U.S.
SOURCE: "Summary of Listed Species: Species and Recovery Plans as of 02/01/2006," in Threatened and Endangered Species System (TESS), U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 2006, http://ecos.fws.gov/tess_public/Boxscore.do (accessed February 1, 2006)
	Mammals	68	254	11	20	353	55
	Birds	77	175	13	6	271	78
	Reptiles	14	64	22	16	116	33
	Amphibians	12	8	9	1	30	16
	Fishes	74	11	42	1	128	98
	Clams	62	2	8	0	72	69
	Snails	24	1	12	0	37	29
	Insects	36	4	9	0	49	32
	Arachnids	12	0	0	0	12	5
	Crustaceans	19	0	3	0	22	13
	Animal subtotal	398	519	129	44	1090	428
	Flowering plants	571	1	143	0	715	584
	Conifers and cycads	2	0	1	2	5	3
	Ferns and allies	24	0	2	0	26	26
	Lichens	2	0	0	0	2	2
	Plant subtotal	599	1	146	2	748	615
	Grand total	997	520	275	46	1838a	1,043

In 1994 a group of federal agencies adopted the Northwest Forest Plan for management of old-growth forests in the Pacific Northwest. The plan has three goals:

• Manage federal forests so that sustainable timber production and biological diversity are achieved
• Coordinate actions by various federal agencies involved in forest management and ensure that they receive input from nonfederal parties
• Provide economic assistance and job retraining for displaced timber workers and other parties adversely affected by reduced timber harvesting

FIGURE 1.2 Number of U.S. species listed per calendar year, 1980–2005 "Number of U.S. Listed Species Per Calendar year, 1980–2005," in Threatened and Endangered Species System (TESS), U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 2006, http://www.fws.gov/endangered/stats/cy%20count_2005.pdf (accessed February 1, 2006)

TABLE 1.3 Number of U.S. species listed per calendar year, by category, 1980–2005 "Number of Endangered and Threatened U.S. Listed Species Per Calendar Year," in Threatened and Endangered Species System (TESS), U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 2006, http://www.fws.gov/endangered/stats/cy%20count_2005.pdf (accessed February 1, 2006)

TABLE 1.3
Number of U.S. species listed per calendar year, by category, 1980–2005
[Total listed (endangered & threatened)]
Calendar year	Mammals	Birds	Reptiles	Amphibians	Fish	Crustaceans	Snails	Insects	Arachnids	Clams	Plants	Calendar year total*
*Totals are not additive. Number of species listed fluctuate between years because of new listings, reclassifications, delistings, new information on taxonomy, and other reasons. For the 11 species that have dual status, only the endangered population is tallied except for one species for which only the threatened population is tallied.
SOURCE: "Number of Endangered and Threatened U.S. Listed Species Per Calendar Year," in Threatened and Endangered Species System (TESS), U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 2006, http://www.fws.gov/endangered/stats/cy%20count_2005.pdf (accessed February 1, 2006)
1980	36	61	25	8	47	1	7	14	0	23	59	281
1981	36	61	25	8	47	1	8	13	0	23	61	283
1982	36	61	26	8	49	3	8	13	0	23	67	294
1983	39	61	26	8	49	4	8	13	0	23	69	300
1984	42	69	26	8	51	4	8	13	0	23	82	326
1985	48	72	26	8	64	4	8	13	0	23	118	384
1986	49	75	28	8	70	5	8	15	0	23	141	422
1987	52	82	32	9	74	6	8	15	0	28	174	480
1988	56	81	32	9	77	9	8	18	4	31	201	526
1989	58	81	32	11	82	9	9	19	4	34	217	556
1990	61	83	32	11	86	10	9	21	4	39	240	596
1991	64	83	32	11	88	10	13	23	4	42	302	672
1992	65	84	33	11	91	11	18	25	4	42	369	753
1993	65	88	33	11	98	13	19	26	4	53	403	813
1994	66	90	33	12	105	17	22	28	4	54	510	941
1995	66	91	33	12	105	17	22	29	5	57	525	962
1996	66	90	33	13	107	17	22	29	5	57	614	1,053
1997	66	93	36	16	108	19	22	37	5	62	668	1,132
1998	69	93	36	16	119	20	28	37	5	69	702	1,194
1999	69	89	38	17	112	20	28	37	5	69	721	1,205
2000	72	93	36	18	114	21	31	42	12	69	736	1,244
2001	73	92	36	19	115	21	32	44	12	70	740	1,254
2002	74	92	36	22	115	21	32	44	12	70	745	1,263
2003	74	92	36	22	115	21	32	44	12	70	746	1,264
2004	78	93	36	22	115	21	32	44	12	70	748	1,271
2005	79	90	36	21	116	22	36	45	12	70	745	1,272

FIGURE 1.3 Number of endangered and threatened species, by state or territory, February 2006 "Listed Species Range by State/Territory as of Wed Feb 1 01:00:04 MST 2006," in Threatened and Endangered Species System, U.S. Department of the Interior, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, February 1, 2006, http://www.fws.gov/endangered/wildlife.html#maps (accessed February 1, 2006)

The compromise worked out in the Plan did not fully please either side in the controversy. In 2002 organizations representing the timber industry sued the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service claiming that northern spotted owl populations had recovered enough to remove the bird from the list of threatened species. The FWS conducted a status review and concluded in 2004 that the threatened listing should remain in place. The agency noted that the Northwest Forest Plan has successfully minimized habitat loss on federal lands. However, populations of northern spotted owls in Washington, Oregon, and California have continued to decline due to a combination of threats, including forest fires, bird and tree diseases, and competition for habitat from barred owls.