The National Marine Fisheries Service, the agency charged with the stewardship of the U.S.’s living marine resources, may be sued for failure to implement the 1998 Blue Whale Recovery Plan. Friends of the Earth, Pacific Environment and the Center of Biological Diversity have joined the notice of intent to sue submitted by the Environmental Defense Center last week.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposed to designate more than 128 million acres (200,541 square miles) of coastal lands and waters along the north coast of Alaska as “critical habitat” for the polar bear, the worlds largest carnivore species found on land and listed as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act since May 2008.
Of the three distinct populations of spotted seals, that inhabit the North Pacific Ocean, two total more than 200,000 individuals and are not currently in danger of extinction or likely to become endangered in the foreseeable future, but NOAA’s NMFS is proposing to list a third smaller population as threatened.
The Center for Biological Diversity, Oceana, and the Turtle Island Restoration Network reached an agreement with the federal government in a lawsuit over violations of the Endangered Species Act last week.
The National Marine Fisheries Service and the Fish and Wildlife Service have agreed to respond to the groups’ petitions for increased protections for both leatherbacks in the waters off California and Oregon as well as North Pacific and western North Atlantic loggerheads.
The Arctic sea ice has reached the third-lowest level ever recorded, and up to 200 walruses, which appear to be mostly new calves and yearlings, have been reported dead near Icy Cape on the north coast of Alaska – further evidence of global warming’s brutal transformation of the Arctic.
The Hawaiian Environmental Alliance has successfully petitioned the federal government to expand critical habitat for highly endangered Hawaiian monk seals.
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