Arizona Wildlife Notebook
A new edition of the “Arizona Wildlife Notebook” is available.
In the year, 2015, lethal heat waves and storms made it clear that humanity was changing the Earth. Anyone who paid attention to the news knew that Earth’s animals and plants were disappearing.
This figure from the review by the World Wildlife Fund (2014) shows that, from 1970 to 2010, Earth’s animals declined by 52%.
I have come to believe that nature conservation is the great challenge of our time. Human beings are imposing a mass extinction that will eliminate almost all animals on Earth. We may not be able to stop this, but I believe that the Notebook will be useful for anyone who hasn’t given up and wishes to work to protect Earth’s creatures.
Arizona Species Conservation Status
For this edition of the Notebook, I added more information on conservation. The table below shows group status for species that AZGFD specialists consider critically imperiled (S1), imperiled (S2), and vulnerable (S3). It also shows group status according to the Endangered Species Act (ESA) for Threatened (LT) and Endangered (LE) species. I didn’t include butterflies, moths, damselflies, and dragonflies in this table because the status of most species in those groups is unknown.
Many species that the AZGFD says are critically imperiled are not given national recognition and protection by the U. S. Endangered Species Act (ESA). It seems that only after species are mostly gone that protection becomes available. Thus, the ESA achieves very little overall protection from biodiversity loss.
|
ARIZONA WILDLIFE CONSERVATION STATUS |
|||
|
Species Group |
Total minus Exotic & Extinct |
AZGFD S1+S2+S3 |
ESA LT+LE |
|
Amphibians |
31 |
18 (58%) |
2 |
|
Birds |
451 |
260 (58%) |
9 |
|
Fish |
40 |
40 (100%) |
13 |
|
Lizards |
67 |
27 (40%) |
0 |
|
Mammals |
189 |
64 (34%) |
15 |
|
Snakes |
76 |
35 (46%) |
1 |
|
Turtles |
10 |
6 (67%) |
2 |
|
TOTAL |
864 |
450 (52%) |
42 |
The third column shows how many species AZGFD considers at risk. For instance, all native Arizona fish species are at risk, and about one-third of native Arizona mammals are at risk. Being “at risk” usually means that numbers are dropping. The principal causes are construction of buildings and roads, and invasive plants and animals.
Click–Arizona Wildlife Notebook–for a free copy of the 168-page book formatted as a PDF “fillable form.” If you like the book, tell others. Write a review for Amazon: http://mybook.to/AZWildlifeNotebook , or Goodreads: http://bit.ly/1Mkgmei. If you would like to review a printed copy of the book, send a note using the form below. Thank you.
Now that you’ve downloaded the book, you have a conversation-starter for tonight’s warm-up party for World Animal Day!
“After pressure from industries and politicians critical of the Endangered Species Act, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service today issued an alternate proposal to protect the 
A bat house built in my back yard in 2004 remained vacant until 2011. The house has room for 600 bats, but only 11 moved in. The number did not increase in 2012—still waiting to see what happens in 2013. The house is near three large stock ponds. Dragonflies, hummingbirds, flycatchers, and swallows find plenty of insects to eat during the day, so it seems reasonable to expect the house will eventually be home to more than 11 bats.
GarryRogers Nature Conservation 