Center for Biological Diversity
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Endangered Earth
No. 1232, February 15, 2024
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Petition Filed to Protect Sierra Nevada Red Foxes

This month the Center for Biological Diversity petitioned the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to protect Sierra Nevada red foxes in the Cascade Range of Oregon and Northern California. Thanks to a previous Center petition, the Service has protected the foxes in the Sierra Nevada — but in 2015 it withheld protection in the Cascades, claiming it didn’t have enough information.
Since then, research has shown that foxes in the Cascades are isolated, facing multiple threats, and down to critically small numbers. One population was recently estimated at fewer than 10 breeding adults.
Sierra Nevada red foxes are secretive hunters with thick coats and fur-covered foot pads to help them stay warm and travel over snow. They come in three color phases — classic red fur, black fur with silver tips, and a cross of the two.
“These precious mountain foxes need our help if they’re going to have any chance at survival in our rapidly warming world,” said Noah Greenwald, endangered species director at the Center.
Help our fight for these foxes and other rare wildlife with a gift to our Saving Life on Earth Fund.

… And Horseshoe Crabs Too

This month, we led 22 ally groups in petitioning NOAA Fisheries to protect American horseshoe crabs under the Endangered Species Act. Horseshoe crab populations have crashed because of habitat loss and overharvesting. They’re killed en masse for use as bait and taken from the wild to be drained of their blue blood, which the biomedical industry uses to detect toxins (even though a synthetic alternative exists).
Known for their massive beach orgies along the Atlantic Coast each spring, horseshoe crabs are brown, body-armored arthropods with 10 eyes and long, spiked tails.
Watch and share our video of these ancient animals in action on YouTube.

Court Halts Dicamba Spraying on Millions of Acres

In a sweeping victory for farmworkers and wildlife, a federal court just nixed the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s approval of the extremely volatile weedkiller dicamba. This drift-prone pesticide has damaged millions of acres of crops and wild plants and threatens dozens of imperiled species, including pollinators like monarch butterflies and rusty patched bumblebees. So the Center and allies sued in 2020.
“I hope the court’s emphatic rejection of the EPA’s reckless approval of dicamba will spur the agency to finally stop ignoring the far-reaching harm caused by this dangerous pesticide,” said Nathan Donley, environmental health science director at the Center.

Legal Victory for Imperiled Hawaiian Honeycreepers

Last week a Hawai‘i state judge ruled in favor of the Center and allies after we took legal action to protect Hawaiian honeycreepers from a bird-killing disease spread by invasive mosquitos.
The disease — avian malaria — is driving the extinction of Hawai‘i’s beautiful, imperiled forest birds. For some honeycreeper species, a single bite from an infected mosquito means certain death. So we went to court to defend a mosquito-control plan that involves releasing male mosquitos (who don’t bite) carrying a naturally occurring bacteria that can function as mosquito birth control.
Honeycreepers aren't the only critically endangered species in Hawai‘i — ask your members of Congress to secure urgently needed funding for Hawaiian plants too.

Forest Service Sued to Save Carolina’s Nantahala

The Center and allies filed suit against the U.S. Forest Service Tuesday over its plan to log a sensitive area of the beautiful Nantahala National Forest in North Carolina — a landscape of stunning waterfalls, towering oak trees, and critical habitat for rare species like Blue Ridge Escarpment green salamanders. The Southside timber sale is targeting an exceptional ecological community with some of the highest biodiversity in the state.
“The public strongly opposes logging this ecologically unique forest beside a trout stream and waterfall, but the Forest Service wants to cut it down anyway,” said Will Harlan, the Center’s Southeast director. “This is a clear and heartbreaking example of the conflicts we can expect to see under the new forest plan.”

Remembering J60

We made this graphic in loving memory of J60, the youngest member of the critically endangered Southern Resident orca population.
Born around Christmas, J60 dazzled beachgoers with sightings near the shoreline of Bainbridge Island. With only 74 Southern Resident orcas left, his birth was a symbol of hope, but his life was cut short after just one month.
Tragically the mortality rate among these orca calves is quite high, with researchers estimating that only about half survive to adulthood. This is largely due to the lack of their primary food source — Chinook salmon — leading to poor nutrition and starvation.
For years the Center has worked to prevent the extinction of Southern Resident orcas. J60, we'll keep fighting for your kin and kind.
You can share our memorial on Facebook or Instagram.

Get Our Population and Sustainability Newsletter

Through creative media, advocacy and outreach, the Center raises awareness about how unsustainable human population growth and consumption endanger wildlife — while we also push for solutions, from universal reproductive-healthcare access and gender empowerment to just, healthy food systems.
For actions you can take and the latest news from our Population and Sustainability program, subscribe to our monthly Pop X newsletter. It’ll be in your inbox Saturday.

The Revelator : Small but Mighty Sumatran Tigers

Sumatran tigers are the world’s smallest tiger subspecies and Indonesia's largest predators. Each individual Sumatran tiger has nearly 100 unique stripe patterns, like human fingerprints, which provide camouflage — but can’t protect them from habitat loss or poaching.
Learn more about these amazing animals at The Revelator.
And if you don't already, subscribe to the free weekly e-newsletter for more conservation news.

That’s Wild: How Plants Chat With Their Neighbors

Since the 1980s scientists have documented plants communicating alarms to neighboring plants. Now a team of researchers has used real-time imaging techniques to capture what these “conversations” look like.
Using a fluorescence microscope, molecular biologists in Japan showed what’s known as calcium signaling — basically an influx of calcium ions rippling through cells — in plant leaves in response to other plants experiencing stress or danger. It’s something human cells do too.
“We have finally unveiled the intricate story of when, where, and how plants respond to airborne ’warning messages’ from their threatened neighbors,” said Masatsugu Toyota, a senior author of the study.
See how it looks for yourself on YouTube.

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