COLUMBUS A federal agency is seeking public comment through Jan. 15 before it potentially authorizes the deaths of double-crested cormorants or destruction of their nests across Ohio.
The lanky, wiry bird is dark in color, but up close has yellow-orange skin paired with striking cobalt-blue eyes. The birds are known for their S-shaped necks. They can fly about 40 miles when foraging. When they find fish, they dive into the water and swim to retrieve the fish. They have powerful webbed feet that propel them. Double-crested cormorants can be extraordinarily beautiful. They are smart,
clever, really kind of funny birds, said Stanley Senner, vice president for bird conservation for the National Audubon Society. Here in the United States, they have gone through several real bottlenecks. One was the use of DDT for several decades that really greatly reduced cormorant populations.
“It’s sickening to see how wolves have been slaughtered in Idaho once federal Endangered Species Act protections were lifted,” Andrea Zaccardi, a senior attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity, said in statement. “If wolves are delisted nationwide, this cruelty could extend to all wolves within our country’s borders. This treatment of our nation’s wildlife is unacceptable.”
Wolves no longer have Endangered Species Act (ESA) protections in Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, and parts of Oregon, Utah, and Washington state but are still protected elsewhere. However, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Director Aurelia Skipwith told the
Associated Press last week that her agency is “working hard” to delist wolves nationwide by the end of the year, calling the policy change “very imminent.”
New Special Permit for Cormorant Management in Lower 48 States
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Service) announced a final rule and final environmental impact statement (EIS) to responsibly manage conflicts associated with double-crested cormorants in the United States.
The final rule establishes a new special permit for state and federally recognized tribal wildlife agencies in the contiguous 48 United States to undertake additional cormorant control activities when permissible under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act (MBTA). States and tribes must use nonlethal methods before resorting to lethal control. The activities allowed under the special permit include controlling cormorants to help reduce conflicts with wild and publicly stocked fisheries within state or tribal-jurisdictions. States also will have additional flexibility to manage cormorants at state or tribal-owned hatcheries and release sites.
Environmental News For The Week Ending 20December 2019
This is a collection of interesting news articles about the environment and related topics published last week. This is usually a Tuesday evening regular post at
GEI (but can be posted at other times).
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Note: Because of the high volume of news regarding the coronavirus outbreak, that news has been published separately:
Some of the COVID-19 graphics presented in the above articles have been updated below.
Also, mentioned in two articles near the end of the disease collection is that there is a new strain of the virus circulating in southeast England that is 70% more infectious than the common strain. Since these news collections were assembled, England has locked down London and several European countries have restricted travelers from the country. I expect that we ll have more news on that in this coming week.
A new federal rule gives states and tribes greater flexibility to kill double-crested cormorants for management purposes.
Under the new rule, up to 121,504 double-crested cormorants may be killed per year nationally in areas under the jurisdiction of state and federally recognized tribal wildlife agencies that may have been off limits before. Conservation groups worry about the overall impact to the population. Others say the permit is necessary to deal with problem birds and protect state resources and salmon.
Agencies interested in the permit must show they tried other, nonlethal methods first. The permit will allow the fish-eating birds to be killed at sites in the 48 states where cormorants are shown to pose a danger to endangered or threatened species, where they impact health and human safety or are damaging state or tribal property and assets, among others factors.