A study finds that 25% of all mammals are threatened with extinction (Photo courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service)
A new survey shows that at least
one fourth of the world’s wild mammal
species are at risk of extinction. Julie
Grant reports that scientists find human
activities are largely to blame:
Transcript
A new survey shows that at least
one fourth of the world’s wild mammal
species are at risk of extinction. Julie
Grant reports that scientists find human
activities are largely to blame:
The mammal survey took five years, and 1,700 experts in
130 countries to complete. Their results are just being
published in the journal Science.
Jan Schipper of Conservation International is a lead author.
He says the assessment paints a bleak picture.
“It was in fact surprising to find out that 25% of all mammals,
to which we currently have sufficient information, are
threatened with extinction, meaning they are either critically
endangered, endangered, or vulnerable.”
Schipper says hotbeds for extinctions are in Southeast Asia,
Africa and Central and South America – and it is largely
driven by consumers.
For example, if we demand bananas in the middle of winter,
it drives growers to cut down native forests for banana
plantations – but without those native forests, many
mammals are left without a place to live.
Ken Brunswick at the Limberlost marsh (Photo by Sam Hendren)
The Limberlost marsh was written about by Gene Stratton-Porter, a
popular novelist in the early 1900s. Stratton-
Porter was best known for her fictional accounts
set in and around an the swamp. (Photo by Sam Hendren)
A red-winged blackbird at the Limberlost marsh (Photo by Sam Hendren)
Biologists say we’ve lost about half
of the number of songbirds we had just 50 years
ago. Part of the reason is the loss of habitat.
Many birds need wetlands. Sam Hendren has the
story of one man’s love of those birds and his
work to save their home:
Transcript
Biologists say we’ve lost about half
of the number of songbirds we had just 50 years
ago. Part of the reason is the loss of habitat.
Many birds need wetlands. Sam Hendren has the
story of one man’s love of those birds and his
work to save their home:
When Ken Brunswick was a kid, he wanted
to study birds. Brunswick grew up near the
western Ohio town of St. Henry in the 1950s. He
says it didn’t take long to read all the books
about birds in the local library.
“I knew exactly where all the bird books were
because at that time that’s what I had my heart
set on, being an ornithologist,” Brunswick says.
One of the books that inspired Brunswick
was written by Gene Stratton-Porter. She was a
popular novelist in the early 1900s. Stratton-
Porter was best known for her fictional accounts
set in and around an Indiana swamp called the
Limberlost. She was also an amateur naturalist
and wrote several books about birds.
“I was in the eighth grade in that little two-room
schoolhouse reading ‘What I Have Done With
Birds’ by Gene Stratton-Porter, and the teacher
walked up to see what book I was reading, and
looked at it and the teacher said, ‘You know that
place isn’t very far from here.’ And I didn’t know
what she was talking about.”
The Limberlost actually was only a few miles
west across the state line. Stratton-Porter
moved to the area in 1888. But to the locals, the
trees were valuable lumber and the swamp was
a waste of land. Stratton-Porter wrote that
commerce attacked the Limberlost and began,
she said, its usual process of devastation. By
1910, two decades of destruction were
complete.
“This Loblolly Marsh was what I consider the
heart of the Limberlost area and this marsh was
actually the last thing that was drained in this
area so the farmers could start farming it,” says
Brunswick.
Brunswick became a farmer himself. He
started a dairy only a mile from the old Loblolly
Marsh. Through the years he learned more about
the swamp and the birds that lived there.
Later he formed the Limberlost
Remembered project. The group’s mission: to
bring Loblolly Marsh back to life. And they’ve
made a lot of headway.
Brunswick, who’s 63, is retried from farming.
He’s now an ecologist for the Indiana
Department of Natural Resources. He oversees
the Limberlost restoration.
We take a look at the changes aboard his ATV.
He’s maneuvering along a path near the edge of
the marsh. It’s thick with prairie cord grass,
switch grass and blue stem. Some of the grasses
have been planted here; other plant seeds have
lain dormant for decades and are now reclaiming
the ground on their own.
Out in the marsh the water is a gentle sea of
green and wildflowers abound around the edges.
But Brunswick’s love of the birds has not gone
away. And he’s thrilled to see them returning to
their marsh home.
“This is the area where we see American Bittern
once in a while. There’s been Virginia Rail, we
hear Sora Rail in here also. Sora is just a real
little bird that has just the dandiest sound when
it makes its call,” Brunswick says.
These birds and others like them are in
trouble. Most of the wetlands and prairies where
birds once thrived have disappeared.
Brunswick’s dream of becoming an
ornithologist never happened. But his work to
save the Limberlost has been his way of doing
something for the birds he loves.
“Actually when I think about this work I’m doing
it takes me back to that dream I had when I was
a kid in that two room schoolhouse. That dream
of being an ornithologist was taken away and
here, about 30 years later, seeing this land
flooding, I’m seeing birds that, some of them, I
never saw before.”
And the work of an old farmer has restored
the wetlands and natural areas that farmers
before him destroyed.
The research team collects several samples from each stop along the route to measure the chemical composition of the ocean water. (Photo by Ann Dornfeld)
It’s called Milking the Cow – the team drops bottles to the ocean floor to take samples... then they retrieve the bottles and pour the contents into lab bottles. (Photo by Ann Dornfeld)
We hear a lot about carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. But half of all man-made CO2 is stored in the world’s oceans. When CO2 mixes with water, it increases the oceans’ acidity. As Ann Dornfeld reports, that acidification is moving closer toward the oceans’ fragile coastal areas:
Transcript
We hear a lot about carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. But half of all man-made CO2 is stored in the world’s oceans. When CO2 mixes with water, it increases the oceans’ acidity. As Ann Dornfeld reports, that acidification is moving closer toward the oceans’ fragile coastal areas:
If you’ve ever wondered why sparkling water tastes tangy, instead of just bubbly – it’s because of carbonic acid. That’s what’s produced when carbon dioxide is added to water. Some of the CO2 in the world’s oceans is natural, from things like decaying algae. But the oceans also soak up CO2 produced by cars and factories. Once CO2 is absorbed into the ocean, it sinks to the coldest, deepest water for long-term storage.
Chemical oceanographers at Oregon State University are monitoring the chemical composition of the Pacific Ocean to see where the carbon is being stored. On a research vessel several miles off the coast, they lower a series of bottles down to the ocean floor on a winch.
(sound of winches)
Scientists have expected that upwellings would eventually bring some of that CO2 to the coastal zones that are home to a huge array of marine life. They thought it would take a century or more. But a recent study, published in the journal Science, found acidic water fewer than 20 miles off the Pacific Coast.
Grad student Rachel Holzer says that’s alarming.
“The ocean is normally at a very stable pH. It is a buffered system, which means it is not very easy for the pH to change. But recently there’s been evidence that ocean acidification is happening, meaning that the pH is dropping. And that can be very harmful to biological life of all different types.”
Corrosive water can dissolve the calcium carbonate shells of barnacles, mussels, oysters and clams. Coral reefs are also calcium carbonate. So are a lot of planktonic species, including terrapods. Those make up about half of the diet of young salmon.
Burke Hales co-authored the latest study. He’s an Associate Professor of Chemical Oceanography at Oregon State.
“The question is how are these organisms going to respond, you know? Do their shells dissolve, do they just not grow as quickly? If their shells are negatively impacted, are the organisms themselves negatively impacted? And if the organisms are negatively impacted, how does that cascade through the food web?”
Hales says stopping ocean acidification would be extremely difficult, if not impossible.
“There are people who have talked about going out in the ocean and spraying sodium carbonate pellets into the water, which would dissolve and neutralize some of the carbonic acid. Sort of like when you take a Tums, that’s the active ingredient in Tums is calcium carbonate. That’s one idea that’s been proposed. It’s really, really speculative that that would work.”
What’s more, Hales says the process of hauling all of that ocean antacid out to sea and dispersing it could produce as much CO2 as it would neutralize.
“It is depressing. We wish things weren’t this way and moving sort of irreversibly towards worse conditions. But we also know that the oceans do have a lot of ability to adapt. And what we don’t know yet is exactly how this is gonna play out.”
One thing scientists do know is that the acidification has just begun. The corrosive water they found right off the Pacific Coast was from carbon dioxide released about 50 years ago. And over the last half century, CO2 production has only increased.
Chet Meyers surveys the Cedar Creek Ecosystem Science Reserve for Red-headed Woodpeckers. He's heading up a study to identify the bird's preferred habitat, and to encourage landowners to let dead and dying trees stand, as woodpecker homes. (Photo by Stephanie Hemphill)
This red-headed woodpecker has just stored an acorn for use in the coming winter. The word for
this is cache. (Photo by Jim Williams)
Red-headed woodpeckers used to
be just about everywhere east of the Rocky
Mountains. But these days the number of
red-headed woodpeckers is about half of
what it was fifty years ago. Stephanie
Hemphill reports volunteers
are working on a new project to get people
to help red-headed woodpeckers. They’re
encouraging landowners to let dead or dying
trees stand rather than cut them down:
Transcript
Red-headed woodpeckers used to
be just about everywhere east of the Rocky
Mountains. But these days the number of
red-headed woodpeckers is about half of
what it was fifty years ago. Stephanie
Hemphill reports volunteers
are working on a new project to get people
to help red-headed woodpeckers. They’re
encouraging landowners to let dead or dying
trees stand rather than cut them down:
You can’t miss Red-headed Woodpeckers. They have long beaks,
bright red heads and snowy white breasts. And if you go to the right
place, you can find a lot of them.
“Somebody told me that there was Red-headed Woodpeckers up
here, so I walked five minutes, and there was a Red-headed
Woodpecker, and it flew into a hole in a tree, and I says, ‘wow, this is
easy.’”
Lance Nelson first visited the Cedar Creek Ecosystem Science
Reserve about a year ago.
“And then I came up this year and found 8 nests. But the young
make a lot of chattering, so you can usually tell where the nest is.”
Today they’re not hammering on trees – the sound most of us
associate with woodpeckers – but they’re doing plenty of chattering.
This reserve in southern Minnesota looks a lot like how much of the
Midwest used to look.
There are clumps of big oak trees here, separated by open areas of
native grasses, shrubs and wildflowers. The biologists call it an oak
savannah.
And there are Red-headed Woodpeckers everywhere – about fifty of
them on this 500-acre patch of ground.
“There’s a red-headed, and he’s got a baby with him. God, they’re
beautiful. They are so beautiful.”
That’s Chet Meyers. After a career as a college professor, he’s now
in charge of an effort to make more places where Red-headed
Woodpeckers can build their nests and raise their young.
If they can figure out exactly what the woodpeckers like so much
about this place, maybe they can come close to reproducing the
same conditions other places.
Chet Meyers is marking every tree where the woodpeckers have
nested.
“See these two trees to the left, go to the right-most one, it forks, and
there’s a broken-off snag up there, looks like a ‘Y’. That’s where the
babies were sticking their head out a couple weeks ago. It was really
cute.”
Once the trees are marked, the group will catalog exact descriptions
of each tree. They’re hoping to come up with a profile of the perfect
home for Red-headed Woodpeckers.
“And we’re going to measure the diameter of the tree, how high the
nest cavity is, the species of the tree, is it alive or is it dead, so we
can get some data on what seems to be the preferred habitat.”
Once they’re pretty sure they know what the woodpeckers like, they’ll
reach out to land owners. They’ll to try to get them to leave dead and
dying trees standing.
That could work on old abandoned farms, where there are trees and
open spaces. Or in cemeteries. Or around golf courses.
“If our theory – see, this is all theory – if our theory is correct, the golf
course replicates an oak savannah and there should be birds there.
So, that’s what we’re hoping.”
And Meyers says helping woodpeckers means helping other wildlife
too.
“The woodpecker is called a primary nester, it digs the cavity. But
flying squirrels, mice, snakes, bluebirds, tree swallows – there are lots
of other animals that are secondary nesters. They can’t drill the hole.
But they live there. So what we’re trying to do is preserve the habitat
so the woodpeckers drill the hole and when they leave, something
else will come in and live in it.”
The researchers think if you have dead or dying tree, that could be a
home for a Red-headed Woodpecker. But usually homeowners are
worried the tree could fall and damage something, Meyers says you
can cut off the top and some of the bigger branches and leave the
rest of the tree standing. They think the red-headed woodpecker will
be just as happy.
For The Environment Report, I’m Stephanie Hemphill.
Greg Seymour, with the Ohio Department of Natural
Resources, walking through Cranberry Bog (Photo by Christina Morgan)
Cranberry Bog is actually floating on top of a lake (Photo by Christina Morgan)
Cranberry Bog is made up of sphagnum moss (Photo by Christina Morgan)
It’s normal to want to protect special
places in nature. But in some cases, these
places are disappearing simply because of nature.
Christina Morgan reports on an ancient spot that
might disappear in our lifetime. The people who
love it want to save it, but they might have to
let it go:
Transcript
It’s normal to want to protect special
places in nature. But in some cases, these
places are disappearing simply because of nature.
Christina Morgan reports on an ancient spot that
might disappear in our lifetime. The people who
love it want to save it, but they might have to
let it go:
For four generations, J-me Braig’s family has visited a rare
site, a bog left behind by glaciers thousands of years ago.
“As a child, I used to go out there and play on it, with my
grandmother, and we would pick cranberries; my brother and I would play on it. ”
Braig says her grandmother used to take a boat out to the bog
in a lake in Ohio. Her grandmother made pies and wine with
the cranberries.
Braig is a lake historian who’s worried about the bog. That’s
because it’s shrinking.
But before we talk about why it’s shrinking, though, it’s important
to know what makes this tiny area special.
Webster’s dictionary defines a bog as soft, waterlogged
ground. This bog, Cranberry Bog, is soft and waterlogged.
But it’s not ground. There’s no dirt. The bog is a 10 acre
patch of sphagnum moss.
Most bogs surround a glacial lake. Instead, Cranberry Bog is
surrounded by a lake, and floating. Here’s what happened.
Nearly 200 years ago, crews digging in an ancient river bed
created a reservoir to feed the Ohio and Erie canal. The
reservoir filled, the mossy bog floated to the surface. How or
why it stayed, no one knows.
“An absolute oddity. It shouldn’t be here.”
Greg Seymour is with the Ohio Department of Natural
Resources. He says the ancient bog is home to likely the only collection
of plants of its kind in the world.
More than 150 plants, a
handful native to Canada. Nudged southward by the glacier,
the plants are tricked by the cool bog mat into thinking they
never left home.
The bog is shrinking for several reasons. Waves from passing
boats loosen the bog mat. Storms topple trees
which rip out chunks of the mat. But Seymour says the biggest
threat is the bog’s chemistry, which makes the site its own
worst enemy.
“The number one factor is going to be the chemical reaction
between the alkaline lake waters and the acidic bog.”
The pH balance is off – way off. Cranberry Bog is doomed to disappear, probably within 30
years.
But area historian J-Me Braig remains upbeat, saying ever
since she can remember, someone has had a scheme to save
Cranberry Bog.
And sure enough, there is a new group determined to preserve the
ancient bog.
George O’Donnell leads Friends of Cranberry Bog. He and
others think one way to generate interest in the site, is to inventory of all that the bog has to offer.
Such an inventory is being done by the bog’s neighbor 8 miles
to the north, Dawes Arboretum.
Tim Mason is the manager of natural resources there. He says even
if the inventory and other efforts to preserve the bog fail, they
have a plan B. Dawes created a restoration area where pieces
of Cranberry Bog that break off are placed.
“We can just hold on to what’s there. It takes thousands of
years for the peat moss material to grow; so to create that is something we would certainly not see in
our life times.”
Saving the bog – or just preserving its pieces – are a long shot.
Yet the efforts persist. Historian J-Me Braig is one of many people
who hope for success. But even Braig admits, after more than
10,000 years, Cranberry Bog has had a pretty good run.
Asian Carp can grow up to 110 pounds (Photo courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service)
There are invasive fish swimming their
way toward the Great Lakes. If they get in,
they could swallow up a multi-billion dollar
sport fishing industry. Mark Brush reports,
officials are investing millions of dollars
to keep Asian Carp out of the Great Lakes:
Transcript
There are invasive fish swimming their
way toward the Great Lakes. If they get in,
they could swallow up a multi-billion dollar
sport fishing industry. Mark Brush reports,
officials are investing millions of dollars
to keep Asian Carp out of the Great Lakes:
Asian Carp were imported by fish farms in Mississippi and Arkansas to control algae.
But the fish escaped during floods. They swam out of the fish ponds, and into the Mississippi
river. And they’ve been moving north ever since.
(sound of boats)
Thad Cook is on a tributary of the Mississippi River in Illinois. This river is more than
400 miles upstream from where Asian Carp first escaped the fish farms.
Cook is looking
for two types of Asian Carp known as Silver and Bighead Carp. It turns out t’s not hard to find them. He dips an electrified pole into the water – and the fish jump right out of the
river and into the boat.
(sound of fish flopping in boat)
Cook is with the Illinois Natural History Survey. His group, along with several others,
has been making trips like this one for years. They’ve been keeping a close eye on where
the fish are going. He takes a guess at how big this fish is.
“No he’ll go… uh.. he’s probably…”
“Hold him out there Jimmy!”
“Yep, six, seven, eight, nine, ten pounds.” (Laughter)
His fish story could have gone a lot further. Some types of these Carp can get up to a
hundred pounds. There aren’t many fish that can compete with an appetite like that.
Biologists are finding that these carp are pushing native fish species aside as they spread
north through the Mississippi River system. And some fear it’s only a matter of time
before they swim their way into the Great Lakes.
David Jude is a fisheries biologist with the University of Michigan.
“I’m very concerned about what impact they would have in the Great Lakes because
they’re planktovores which means they filter zooplankton from the water column. And, they’re just huge fish. And so they have the potential for having
a tremendous impact on our ecosystems.”
He says the silver and bighead carps are filter feeders. They pass up eating smaller fish –
and head straight for the bottom of the food chain.
Jude says if Asian carp get in, it’ll make a bad situation worse. The Great Lakes are
already losing zooplankton from other invasive species. Asian Carp could
destroy a 4 billion dollar a year sport fishing industry.
(sound of canal)
And here is where the battle line is being drawn. The fish have been spotted thirty miles
downstream from this spot on the Chicago Ship and Sanitary Canal. A century ago,
engineers blasted through solid rock to connect the Great Lakes with the Mississippi
River system.
Chuck Shea is with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
“Any type of fish that would want to move between Lake Michigan and the Mississippi
river basin – has to pass through the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal – there’s no other way to swim through. So, they have to come through this body of water we’re standing in front
of right now.”
Shea is in charge of the construction and maintenance of two electric fish barriers along this canal.
When this barrier is online, machines will pulse electricity into the water. The electric current shocks
the fish – making them swim away.
This barrier hasn’t been turned on yet. There have been delays due to funding shortages. And they’re still
doing safety testing with the Coast Guard.
Right now, the only thing that would keep the carp from getting into the Great Lakes is a temporary electric
barrier built six years ago.
The good news is that there still seems to be a little time. Biologists say, so far, Asian Carp haven’t moved any
closer than thirty miles from the barrier for the last couple of years.
A colony of tunicates in Guam (Photo by David Burdick, courtesy of NOAA)
Slimy, hungry invaders are moving through
the waters off the Northwest coast of the US.
They’re called invasive tunicates –
or sea squirts. And they’re the same invasive
species that devastated shellfish farms on Canada’s
east coast. If invasive tunicates aren’t controlled,
you could see a lot of seafood options disappear
from markets and menus. Ann Dornfeld has the story:
Transcript
Slimy, hungry invaders are moving through
the waters off the Northwest coast of the US.
They’re called invasive tunicates –
or sea squirts. And they’re the same invasive
species that devastated shellfish farms on Canada’s
east coast. If invasive tunicates aren’t controlled,
you could see a lot of seafood options disappear
from markets and menus. Ann Dornfeld has the story:
It’s a peaceful spring morning at this suburban marina. But beneath the water’s surface, a hunt is
underway.
(water sounds)
Professional divers – like Jesse Schultz with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife – are
combing the docks for invasive tunicates. They don’t have to look far.
“That’s one of the tunicates right there – that’s the guy right there.”
Schultz surfaces holding a jelly-like tube. Sea squirts compete with everything from clams to tube
worms for the plankton they all eat. The sea squirts usually win, because they don’t have native
predators. Three species came here from Asia, probably on boat hulls. Today, divers are cleaning
the hulls of local boats to keep the sea squirts from spreading.
Allen Pleus manages invasive species for the state.
“The whole intent right now is a containment action. We want to prevent any of these boats
from leaving this harbor with the tunicates attached to their bottom, going to another
harbor, and infesting that harbor or marina.”
When invasive tunicates get to a new harbor, they quickly become the dominant species. In the
warm part of the year, they spawn every 24 hours. And along with hogging the food supply, one
species of sea squirts forms a slimy mat that smothers mussels and other shellfish.
Pleus says if tunicates get out of hand, they could make a big impact on the seafood industry.
“It can definitely affect especially shellfishing in this area. Puget Sound, Western Washington is one of
the largest producers of shellfish in the nation. It could also affect other populations of
food fish, including salmon, by taking out a lot of the nutrients that juvenile salmon feed
on.”
Nova Scotia learned that lesson the hard way. Pleus says in Eastern Canada, entire shellfish
farms were recently wiped out by invasive tunicates.
“So the rap sheet is clear. They can grow to exponential sizes, quantities and smother
aquaculture facilities. They can’t even lift up their lines it’s so heavy with these critters on
it.”
To prevent the same thing from happening here, the state workers have to move quickly – and
they have to be thorough.
“Here’s another bag, Justin!” (splashing sound)
Back in the water, diving biologist Jesse Schultz has his hands full with a boat that has apparently
been docked for seven years. Its tabs show that’s the last time it was registered.
“This guy’s getting a free boat cleaning, sort of!”
The state is trying to scrape clean every infested boat in Puget Sound before the summer boating
season. But Schultz says because the docks are still covered with invasive tunicates, they’ll grow
back on this boat if the owner doesn’t keep it clean.
“That’s the biggest thing these guys can do to keep these things from spreading is have
their boats maintained.”
The state is still figuring out the best way to clean the docks. So far biologists have cleaned only
one entirely. When they were done, they’d removed ten tons of critters.
Unfortunately, Allen Pleus says only some of those were tunicates. In order to get rid of the
invasive sea squirts, they have to employ a sort of scorched earth policy.
“That is one of the hardest parts of this is that we have to basically take everything out.”
That means the good with the bad. We sift through a bucket of the creatures scraped from the
dock. Along with plenty of invasive tunicates, there are brightly colored sea cucumbers, scallops,
mussels, rock oysters, feather duster worms and chitons – exactly the kinds of animals the state
is trying to protect. They have to destroy the habitat in order to try to save it.
Zebra mussels were discovered 20 years ago, and have since spread across the country (Photo courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service)
Researchers say they’ve found something
that will kill invasive zebra and quagga mussels.
The mussels got into the US in the ballast of
foreign ships. Since then they’ve spread throughout
the country. Rebecca Williams reports:
Transcript
Researchers say they’ve found something
that will kill invasive zebra and quagga mussels.
The mussels got into the US in the ballast of
foreign ships. Since then they’ve spread throughout
the country. Rebecca Williams reports:
So, let’s say you have a nasty pest, an invasive species. Then someone says, we can get rid of that
pest and it looks like there’s no environmental downside.
“It kinda sounds like snake oil. But it’s true.”
That’s Dan Molloy with the New York State Museum lab. He’s come up with a
way to kill zebra and quagga mussels.
Molloy says a strain of common bacteria is toxic to zebra and quagga
mussels. And, even if the bacteria are dead, they can still kill the
mussels.
“You know maybe horror stories of people applying biocontrol agents. And it
had effects they didn’t anticipate. We’re applying dead cells. And they’re
just as effective live or dead.”
It’s great news for power plants, because the mussels clog up intake
pipes.
But it’s not clear if the bacteria can kill mussels in open water.
The polar bear is now listed as a threatened species (Photo courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service)
The federal government has announced that
it’s listing the polar bear as a threatened species.
Biologists say the rapid loss of sea ice from
the warming climate is putting the bears at risk.
Mark Brush reports the government is now facing
legal action from some conservative groups:
Transcript
The federal government has announced that
it’s listing the polar bear as a threatened species.
Biologists say the rapid loss of sea ice from
the warming climate is putting the bears at risk.
Mark Brush reports the government is now facing
legal action from some conservative groups:
In the announcement Secretary of the Interior Dick Kempthorne tried to make it clear –
the listing doesn’t mean the government is regulating greenhouse gases. He says the
listing can’t be used to stop oil and gas drilling or to go after industries for releasing
carbon dioxide.
Reed Hopper is the principal attorney for the Pacific Legal Foundation – a conservative
public interest group. He says he still expects lawsuits from environmentalists. And that
the Secretary can’t control how the courts will interpret the new listing.
“If the activists are able to use this as they intend, to challenge industrial activity in the
United States, the ultimate effect on the average person is going to be an increase in
energy costs, transportation, fuel, food and housing.”
Hopper says his group is planning to go forward with a lawsuit of their own – opposing the listing.
Scientists are reporting vast expanses of open water in polar bear habitat due to thinning and melting ice (Photo courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service)
Polar bear researchers off Alaska’s
northern coast found striking differences in
sea ice conditions recently. Lori Townsend
reports:
Transcript
Polar bear researchers off Alaska’s
northern coast found striking differences in
sea ice conditions recently. Lori Townsend
reports:
Dr. Steven Amstrup is a polar bear expert and USGS wildlife biologist.
“This is the first time in my 28 years working up here this time of year that we’ve seen anything like
this.”
Amstrup is conducting yearly research on polar bears in Alaska’s Arctic. He says getting out to pack ice usually means
flying over a narrow expanse of open water called a lead.
“But this year that lead is wide open, we have no idea really how wide it is, but its way too far for us to
fly across. So we’ve been limited to hunting in a fairly narrow band of ice that’s fairly near shore.”
Amstrup says the open water is consistent with warming conditions that result in
thinner ice. Polar bears rely on pack ice for hunting seals and other marine
mammals.
A study finds that 25% of all mammals are threatened with extinction (Photo courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service)
