ESA blawg

• Essential ESA
  • ESA Statutory Text
  • U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service Endangered Species Program
  • NOAA Fisheries Policies
  • NOAA Fisheries Office of Protected Resources
  • U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service ESA Document Library
  • U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service listed species search
  • §10 No Surprises Rule
  • §4 Listing Regs
  • 5 Year Review Guidance
  • §7 Consultation Regs

• Notable ESA Summaries
  • Earthjustice on ESA
  • Endangered Species Bibliography
  • Hunton & Williams on ESA
  • National Wildlife Federation on ESA
  • Pathfinder to ESA Information
  • Federal Wildlife Laws Handbook
  • Perkins Coie LLP on ESA
  • U.S. Forest Service on ESA

• Administrative Law Sources
  • U.S. Code
  • U.S. Code of Federal Regulations
  • U.S. Federal Register
  • Federal APA & other administrative laws
  • FOIA
  • Data Quality Act
  • Data Quality Act OMB Regs
  • NEPA (via Council on Envtl. Quality)
  • NOAA on Data Quality Act
  • Regulatory Flexibility Act

• Courts & case law
  • Federal courts
  • Cornell Legal Information Institute (case law)
  • Federal courts ECF links
  • Fed. Rules Civ. Pro.

• State ESA Resources
  • California ESA
  • : Florida imperiled species info
  • Quick resource chart on state ESA's

• Wildlife Laws
  • Animal Welfare Act
  • Bald Eagle Protection Act
  • Fish & Wildlife Coordination Act
  • Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation & Management Act
  • Marine Mammal Protection Act
  • Wild Free-Roaming Horses & Burros Act
  • CITES

• Congressional Research Service
  • List of CRS biodiversity reports by NCSE
  • ESA & private property (1993)
  • ESA reauthorization? (2001)
  • California Drought: Hydrological & Regulatory Water Supply Issues (2009)
  • The ESA: A Primer (2007)
  • Delisting & Downlisting (2001)
  • Conflicting Values & Difficult Choices (2010)
  • Consideration of Economic Factors (2001)
  • Pacific Salmon (1999)
  • ESA & Sound Science (2002)
  • Grey Wolves, ESA, DPS and Experimental Populations (2008)
  • Habitat Modification & Sweet Home Decision (1995)
  • Listing Polar Bears (2007)
  • Polar Bear Proposed Listing (2007)
  • Red-cockaded woodpecker (1997)
  • Habitat Modification: Sweet Home v. Babbitt (1995)
  • Takings, Property Rights, & Court Decisions (2003)
  • Polar Bear Listing and Reduction of Greenhouse Gas Emissions (2008)

• ESA Reform
  • Heritage Foundation
  • NAHB on ESA & species habitat
  • National Endangered Species Act Reform Coalition
  • Save the ESA

• Federal ESA Links
  • EPA Pesticides
  • FEMA: Env't & Historic Program
  • NOAA: Northwest Regional Office (salmon HQ)
  • CWA & enhanced ESA consultation
  • FERC licensing & enhanced ESA consultation
  • FIFRA Counterpart Regs

• Historic News
  • On Extinction: Musings Inspired by a Quagga
  • CNN: ESA turns 30 (1/1/2004)
  • CSmonitor: ESA gets listed (9/29/2005)
  • DOI Press Release: ESA Broken (5/28/2003)
  • NPR on ESA (12/29/2003)
  • 100 Success Stories

• Scholarship
  • Nat'l Academy Science on ESA (1995)
  • Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise
  • Rebuilding the Ark

KEVIN S. PETTITT helped found this blawg. A D.C.-based IT consultant specializing in Lotus Notes & Domino, he also maintains Lotus Guru blog.

• About ESAblawg (12)
• Acronyms & Glossary (1)
• Case law (152)
• Deepwater Horizon (6)
• Endangered Species Act (84)
• ESA musing (1)
• ESA musings (166)
• Federal Register (360)
• Florida (28)
• Law Reviews (4)
• New Mexico (1)
• Plants (23)
• SCOTUS (6)
• Species Feature (1)
• Texas (1)
• Tweets (3)
• U.S. Court of Appeals (10th Cir.) (3)
• U.S. Court of Appeals (11th Cir.) (4)
• U.S. Court of Appeals (1st Cir.) (1)
• U.S. Court of Appeals (3rd Cir.) (1)
• U.S. Court of Appeals (4th. Cir.) (1)
• U.S. Court of Appeals (5th Cir.) (1)
• U.S. Court of Appeals (6th Cir.) (1)
• U.S. Court of Appeals (8th Cir.) (1)
• U.S. Court of Appeals (9th Cir.) (24)
• U.S. Court of Appeals (D.C. Cir.) (4)
• U.S. Court of Appeals (Fed. Cir.) (3)
• (1)

• Environmental News Network
• a conservation blog
• Conservation Blogology
• Animal blogs
• attorney.org
• Climate Change Blog
• FloridaEnvironments
• Ecosystem Marketplace
• Environmental Law Prof Blog
• Environmental Legal Blogs
• Mongabay
• Natural Resources Today
• NRDC's Switchboard
• Pacific Legal Foundation on ESA
• PawTalk
• Plenty Magazine's Extinction Blog
• Stop Extinction Blog

"The Congress finds and declares that -

(1) various species of fish, wildlife, and plants in the United States have been rendered extinct as a consequence of economic growth and development untempered by adequate concern and conservation;

(2) other species of fish, wildlife, and plants have been so depleted in numbers that they are in danger of or threatened with extinction;

(3) these species of fish, wildlife, and plants are of aesthetic, ecological, educational, historical, recreational, and scientific value to the Nation and its people."

16 U.S.C. §1531(a)

The purpose of the Endangered Species Act is "to provide a means whereby the ecosystems upon which endangered species and threatened species depend may be conserved."

16 U.S.C. §1531(b)

1. ECOLOGICAL: Species have a role in the web of life. Who knows which missing link causes the collapse?

2. ECONOMICAL: Species have actual, inherent, and potential value -- some as food, others as tourist attractions. As Congress said, these species have "aesthetic, ecological, educational, historical, recreational, and scientific value to the Nation." 16 U.S.C. §1531(a).

3. MEDICAL: Although perhaps a subset of economics, medical reasons for the ESA deserve special note, because today's listed species could be tomorrow's cure for cancer.

4. MORAL: With each extinction, we take something from others. We must prevent "the tragedy of the commons."

5. THEOLOGICAL: Even the Bible instructed Noah to save God's creatures, male and female, two by two.

1. ECOSYSTEM (MIS)MANAGEMENT. The ESA encourages selective review of individual species needs, even though nature pits species needs against one another. Furthermore, the ESA's single-species focus detracts from efforts to achieve environmental restoration and ecosystem management.

2. SCIENTIFIC UNCERTAINTY: While the ESA requires consideration of the "best available science," sometimes the best is not enough, forcing decisions under great uncertainty. The ESA, however, is generally proscriptive, regulatory, and absolute; as a result, it insufficiently allows for adaptive management.

3. LITIGATION: ESA implementation is at the mercy of the attorneys. Cases involving one listed species can serve as a proxy for hidden agendas, especially land use disputes, and regardless of actual species needs, litigation and judicial orders set agency priorities. In the end, realistic solutions disappear amidst court-filings, fundraising, and rhetoric.

4. PRIVATE LANDS: Up to 80% of ESA-listed species habitat is on privately owned lands. While the ESA can place reasonable restrictions on private property rights, there are limits. But the best alternatives have limits too, such as Federal land acquisition and the highly controversial "God Squad" exemptions.

5. FUNDING: Protecting species is expensive, but resources appropriated by Congress are limited. An overburdened handful of federal agency biologists cannot keep pace with the ESA's procedural burdens, nor court-ordered deadlines (see #3 above). Provisions requiring agencies to pay attorney's fees to victorious litigators -- who challenge the hastily written documents prepared by overworked bureaucrats -- simply exacerbate the problem.

• June 2012 (1)
• April 2012 (1)
• March 2012 (3)
• February 2012 (3)
• January 2012 (4)
• July 2011 (8)
• June 2011 (3)
• May 2011 (11)
• April 2011 (8)
• March 2011 (15)
• Full Archive

"Every species is part of an ecosystem, an expert specialist of its kind, tested relentlessly as it spreads its influence through the food web. To remove it is to entrain changes in other species, raising the populations of some, reducing or even extinguishing others, risking a downward spiral of the larger assemblage." An insect with no apparent commercial value may be the favorite meal of a spider whose venom will soon emerge as a powerful and profitable anesthetic agent. That spider may in turn be the dietary staple of a brightly colored bird that people, who are notoriously biased against creepy crawlers and in favor of winsome winged wonders, will travel to see as tourists. Faced with the prospect that the loss of any one species could trigger the decline of an entire ecosystem, destroying a trove of natural and commercial treasures, it was rational for Congress to choose to protect them all. -- Alabama-Tombigbee Rivers Coalition v. Kempthorne, 477 F.3d 1250, 1274-75 (11th Cir.2007), cert. denied, 128 S.Ct. 8775 (2008), quoting Edward O. Wilson, The Diversity of Life 308 (1992).

• Alligators and Litigators
• Casitas: Property Rights Trump Species Survival
• Exotic Species Invasions, and Pet Industry Evasions (published at PawTalk.net)
• Defining Professionalism
• Exotic Consequences (published at PawTalk.net)
• Phosphorus Standards in the Everglades
• Regulating watershed restoration: why the perfect permit is the enemy of the good project. 27 Nova L. Rev. 51-83 (2002)
• SFWMD's South Florida Environmental Report
• The Everglades Ecosystem, 13 St. Thomas L. Rev. 667 (2001)
• Toothless? The Endangered Manatee and the Florida Manatee Sanctuary Act

"This case presents a critical conflict between dual legislative purposes, providing water service for agricultural, domestic, and industrial use, versus enhancing environmental protection for fish species whose habitat is maintained in rivers, estuaries, canals, and other waterways that comprise the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta… This case involves both harm to threatened species and to humans and their environment. Congress has not nor does TVA v. Hill elevate species protection over the health and safety of humans... No party has suggested that humans and their environment are less deserving of protection than the species. Until Defendant Agencies have complied with the law, some injunctive relief pending NEPA compliance may be appropriate, so long as it will not further jeopardize the species or their habitat." -- The Consolidated Delta Smelt Cases, 2010 WL 2195960 (E.D.Cal., May 27, 2010)(Judge Wanger)(addressing the need for further consideration of the human consequences of ESA compliance).

• American Wildlands
• Audubon
• Bat Conservation Int'l
• Center for Earth Jurisprudence
• Caribbean Conservation Corporation & Sea Turtle Survival League
• Center for Biological Diversity
• Conservation Northwest
• Defenders of Wildlife
• Earthjustice
• Endangered Species Coalition
• Environmental Defense
• National Association of Home Builders
• National Wildlife Federation
• Natural Resources Defense Council
• Pacific Legal Foundation
• Sierra Club
• The Ocean Conservancy
• The Wildlife Society
• U.S. DOJ -- ENRD
• www.oceana.org
• WildEarth Guardians
• World Wildlife Fund

GENESIS, Chapter 6: [v 20] "Of the birds according to their kinds, and of the animals according to their kinds, of every creeping thing of the ground according to its kind, two of every sort shall come in to you, to keep them alive. [v 21] Also take with you every sort of food that is eaten, and store it up; and it shall serve as food for you and for them."

GENESIS, Chapter 9: [v12] "And God said, This is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations"

"The power of God is present at all places, even in the tiniest leaf … God is currently and personally present in the wilderness, in the garden, and in the field." – MARTIN LUTHER

• Creation care & religious views
  • Association for Religion, Ecology and the Environment
  • Biblical Verses
  • Buddhism and the environment
  • CNN All About EcoSolutions
  • COEJL Earth Aid
  • Environmental protection in Islam
  • Episcopal Ecological Network
  • ELCA Advocacy on Creation
  • Evangelical Environmental Network
  • Forum on Religion and Ecology
  • Green Faith
  • Hinduism, Jainism, and Ecology
  • Jewish Environmental Perspectives
  • National Council of Churches
  • National Religious Partnership for the Environment
  • Noah Alliance
  • Presbyterians for Restoring Creation
  • Quaker Earthcare Witness
  • religion and environment initiative
  • Restoring Eden
  • Saving God's Green Earth
  • Serve God Save the Planet
  • Soujourners
  • Unitarian Universalist Ministry for the Earth
  • U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops
  • Wicca and Witchcraft