Endangered Species Making Steady Progress Toward Recovery

The Endangered Species Act has fostered significant improvement in the well-being of many imperiled plants and animals, according to a joint report released today by the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) and the Endangered Species Coalition. The report documents population increases over time for a wide variety of species.

“Many endangered species are making steady progress toward recovery under the Endangered Species Act,” said Michael Bean, who heads EDF’s wildlife program. “Unfortunately, much of this progress is overlooked by those who want to judge the Act only by number of species that have fully recovered. Full recovery will come in time, but gradual progress must come first.”

“Our study shows that the road to extinction can be reversed, with species getting on the road to recovery instead,” said Brock Evans, who heads the Endangered Species Coalition.

Species as varied as the gray wolf in the Great Lakes states and the northern Rocky Mountains, the whooping crane in Texas, the Lange’s metalmark butterfly in California, and the Kemp’s ridley sea turtle in the Gulf of Mexico have all shown dramatic improvement since protective measures were taken under the Endangered Species Act, which was signed into law in 1973.

In Texas, the black-capped vireo has increased dramatically at both the Kerr Wildlife Management Area and Fort Hood Army base as a result of management measures. If similar efforts are implemented more broadly throughout this songbird’s range, its recovery is clearly attainable, according to the report.

The whooping crane has been the subject of what is perhaps the longest sustained conservation effort for any species in the US. Beginning more than a half century ago, when numbers of this tall, marshland bird had plummeted to fewer than twenty, an extraordinary effort has been undertaken to rescue this stately species from extinction. These efforts have boosted the number of whooping cranes living in the wild to over 250, which is likely more than at any time this century.

In the 1970s, the Kemp’s ridley sea turtle was virtually extinct. The dramatic decline in sea turtles was the result of the plundering of eggs on the beach and the drowning of adult and immature turtles in the nets of shrimp fishermen in the Gulf of Mexico and the south Atlantic. The Endangered Species Act required American shrimp fishermen to equip their nets with ‘turtle excluder devices’ or “TEDs.” Contrary to the claims of those who opposed the TED requirements, shrimp landings by American shrimp boats have remained high since the requirements have been in place, and numbers of Kemp’s ridley sea turtles are steadily growing.

The report does note, however, that species recovery will often take many decades to accomplish and will require active management, rather than a passive “hands-off” approach, and significant resources.