Subject: US agency plans new protection for threatened duck(fwd)
Date: Mar 15 13:18:37 2000
From: Deborah Wisti-Peterson - nyneve at u.washington.edu



hello tweets.

i thought you all might be interested to read this.

regards,

Deborah Wisti-Peterson email:nyneve at u.washington.edu
Department of Zoology, University of Washington, Seattle, Wash, USA
Visit me on the web: http://students.washington.edu/~nyneve/
<><><>Graduate School: it's not just a job, it's an indenture!<><><>


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 15 Mar 2000 10:35:05 -0800

>
> From: Mark Graffis <ab758 at virgin.vip.vi>
>
> USA: March 15, 2000
>
> ANCHORAGE - An estimated 17,000 square miles (44,000 sq km) of Alaska
> land and 8,440 square miles (21,900 sq km) offshore would be
> classified as protected habitat for a threatened species of sea duck
> under a plan announced on Monday by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
> Service.
>
> The federal agency proposed designating the acreage as critical
> habitat for the Alaska-breeding population of Steller's eider. The
> Alaska population is one of three populations in the world. The other
> two groups of Steller's eiders breed in Russia.
>
> "This proposal to designate critical habitat in Alaska highlights the
> fact that all species require healthy habitat to survive," David
> Allen, the Fish and Wildlife Service's Alaska regional director, said
> in a news release.
>
> The agency last month proposed a similar critical habitat designation,
> covering 74,539 square miles (193,800 sq km) of coastal terrain, for
> the spectacled eider, another sea duck listed as threatened under the
> Endangered Species Act. The spectacled eider nests only in Alaska and
> Russia.
>
> Both proposals were in response to legal action by environmental
> groups, the Centre for Biological Diversity and Christians Caring for
> Creation, which last year served notice of impending lawsuits over the
> federal government's failure to designate critical habitat zones for
> the ducks.
>
> The critical habitat for both sea ducks would be along Alaska's North
> Slope, the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta in southwestern Alaska and area of
> western Alaska.
>
> The designation would have little practical effect, officials said,
> because the agency already requires oil drillers, commercial fishermen
> and others engaged in resource extraction or economic activities to
> mitigate impacts on the Steller's and spectacled eiders.
>
> "Critical habitat designation only affects federal actions that are
> authorised, regulated or carried out," said Richard Hannan, chief of
> fisheries and ecological services for the Fish and Wildlife Service's
> Alaska office.
>
> The designation would not affect activities on private lands or on
> lands or marine waters owned by the state or municipalities, agency
> officials said.
>
> Little is known about the historical numbers of Steller's eiders, but
> biologists believe numbers have dropped drastically, particularly in
> the Yukon-Kuskokwim area.
>
> More information is available on the spectacled eiders. The duck's
> population in the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta dropped by 96 percent from the
> 1970s to the early 1990s, from 96,000 to fewer than 5,000, the Fish
> and Wildlife Service said.
>
> Biologists estimate that about 8,000 breeding spectacled eiders nest
> today on the Yukon Delta and about 10,000 of them on the North Slope,
> the agency said.
>
> A prime reason for the sea ducks' decline is lead shot, used in the
> past by duck hunters. The metal has been found to poison ducks,
> causing both death and chronic problems, Hannan said. Lead shot is now
> illegal, but there are leftover remnants still causing problems in
> Alaska's spongy tundra, he said.
>
> "In Alaska, because you have permafrost, a lot of times that lead shot
> can't sink very far," Hannan said. "So it's still in that area where
> the birds can ingest it."
>
> REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
>
>