WildEarth Guardians petition for emergency protection of 32 species
June 20, 2008
Omaha, Nebraska (WiredPRNews.com) — One by one, plant, animal and insect species are being added to the threatened and endangered species lists of natural habitats are weakened and destroyed at the hand of industrialization and global warming. In a petition submitted to Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service director Dale Hall, environmentalist group WildEarth Guardians call for the emergency protection of 32 species of rare plants, animals and insects.
Included in the list is a wide variety of natural creatures including flowering plants and even the snail and the group states that all the species in question are at risk due to the destruction of their natural habitats and over dangers. The petition notes that many of the three dozen creatures’ homes have been limited to just one location only.
The petition warns, “The species we have chosen are all at the knife’s edge of extinction. Given the location of these species on either no or only one known site on earth, a single event — whether from drought, flood, habitat destruction, pollution, exotic species, or other factors — could literally erase them from the world.”
It is currently unclear as to whether the agency has received or acknowledged the petition. WildEarth Guardians chose to highlight the 32 species in the petition for a list of 674 species which they have previously sought endangered protection for last summer. In March, however, the group filed a lawsuit against the Fish and Wildlife Reserve stating that they had failed to take action on their first petition submitted.
John Horning, executive director of WildEarth Guardians said that the current and prior petitions are an effort to provide immediate protection to endangered wildlife since duration of the Bush administration has all but ceased to provide the necessary legal action for them.
Horning said, “These species deserve immediate, emergency protection under the Endangered Species Act. The Fish and Wildlife Service has the authority to save them from vanishing forever, and we’re urging them to use that authority.”
Wired Wildlife Reporter
