Join Communications Specialist Jay Petrequin as he recaps the top news stories from the beginning of 2024! Still want more? Check us out at defenders.org!
Transcript:
Whales washing ashore. Wolves denied federal protections. And a fight to protect our National forests. I’m Jay Petrequin and this is your Wildlife News for February 2024.
2024 is off to a bleak start for endangered whales. On the east coast, a young female North Atlantic Right Whale washed-up dead on Martha’s Vineyard beach – the victim of fishing gear entanglement and the second dead right whale to be found in U.S. waters in 2024, underscoring the fragility of this critically endangered species. And, on the west coast, a Southern resident Orca calf born to the J-Pod at the end of December 2023 is presumed dead – another grim reminder that 37-50% of these magnificent animals don’t make it to their first birthday because of poor nutrition and starvation.
Moving from the seas to the mountains, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced Northern Rocky Gray Wolves will not be relisted as endangered. Without Endangered Species Act protections these wolves are at the mercy of state regulations and anti-wildlife policymakers who have proven merciless in their attempts to reduce wolf populations.
While the mighty are struggling, two small but powerful species are one step closer to ESA protections. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service determined that the Pygmy Rabbit – the world’s smallest rabbit – and the Hickory Nut Gorge Salamander – found only in North Carolina’s Blue ridge Mountains – may warrant Endangered Species Act protections.
And finally, a coalition of conservation groups filed a federal lawsuit against a U.S. Forest Service plan to log a sensitive area of the Nantahala National Forest – an ecologically important habitat for rare species like Green Salamanders and cerulean warblers, as well as federally listed species like the Northern Long-Eared Bat.
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