Kitty Corner: Jaguars Win Critical Habitat in U.S.

[xchrom]

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=kitty-corner-jaguars-win-critical-habitat-in-us



Jaguars, the third-largest cats after lions and tigers—and the biggest in the Western Hemisphere—used to live here. During the 18th and 19th centuries they were spotted in Arizona, New Mexico, California and Texas. Sometimes the cats roamed as far east as North Carolina and as far north as Colorado.

As humans encroached on their territory, the endangered cats' range shifted south. Today it stretches from northern Argentina into Mexico's Sonoran Desert. But jaguars cross into the American Southwest frequently enough for some conservationists to argue that they deserve critical habitat protection. Now, after years of legal wrangling, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) has agreed. In a plan published yesterday, the agency proposed designating 838,232 acres—an area larger than Rhode Island—as critical jaguar habitat. That means federal agencies cannot fund or authorize any activities that might "adversely modify" the earmarked land, which covers four stretches of mountain in southeastern Arizona, a section of the Peloncillo Mountains on the Arizona–New Mexico border, and a tiny piece of New Mexico's San Luis Mountains. It includes the site of a proposed copper mine in Arizona's Santa Rita Mountains, which will have to be carefully evaluated for its potential impact on jaguar habitat if the proposal is approved later this year, following a period of peer review, public comment and economic analysis.

[TreasonousBastard]

1. Copper mine? That's gonna be a fight.

[Tansy_Gold]

2. YES!!!!!!!! YES!!!!!!!!! YES!!!!!!!

One of the few times I've ever gotten through to a RWNC (right wing nut case) was when I argued a couple of years ago for protection of jaguar habitat. This was when the captured one died, and one of the local RWNCs just said "it was nature's way."

After a rather fierce "conversation," I just looked at her and said, in my most scathing Tansy Gold growl, "And when humans have made the whole fucking planet totally unfit for any other creatures, how long do you think our species will survive?"

[xchrom]

3. ...

[Tansy_Gold]

10. I have four dogs around me on the floor, but this is on my desk

[xchrom]

11. ...

[Botany]

4. An area larger than Rhode Island that will be protected in perpetuity

That is wonderful news .... I might never go there but I feel better that
such an area will exist. BTW having the macro carnivores helps the whole
balance of nature. I wish the jaguars well.

[xchrom]

5. you are so right: Study Demonstrates That One Extinction Leads to Another

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/08/120814213500.htm

ScienceDaily (Aug. 14, 2012) — When a carnivore becomes extinct, other predatory species could soon follow, according to new research. Scientists have previously put forward this theory, but a University of Exeter team has now carried out the first experiment to prove it.

Published August 15, 2012 in the Royal Society journal Biology Letters, the study shows how the demise of one carnivore species can indirectly cause another to become extinct. The University of Exeter team believes any extinction can create a ripple effect across a food web, with far-reaching consequences for many other animals.

The research adds weight to growing evidence that a 'single species' approach to conservation, for example in fisheries management, is misguided. Instead the focus needs to be holistic, encompassing species across an entire ecosystem.

The researchers bred two species of parasitic wasps, along with the two types of aphids on which each wasp exclusively feeds. They set up tanks with different combinations of the species and observed them for eight weeks. In tanks that did not include the first species of wasp, the second went extinct within a few generations. In tanks in which they co-existed, both wasp species thrived.

[Botany]

6. I went to a talk by a wolf biologist about Yellowstone and wolves and it was great.

The wolves helped to control the elk which were eating up stands of
aspens along creeks and rivers ..... the aspens shaded the streams and
dropped insects into the water which helped the cutthroat trout populations
which in turn help to feed the bears* which stopped a lot of bear problems ....
also the control of the elk population allowed the grasses and flowers in the
meadows to grow better this helped to control flash flooding and allowed
rabbits, mice, voles, and other small critters to thrive and this helped the
hawks, owls, and eagles.

* along with eagles and ospreys.

My one concern is that any jaguars in such a preserve will run into problems
of becoming genetically isolated so I hope such a preserve is open to Mexico
so new jaguar DNA can come in and out.

[xchrom]

7. absolutely. we need 'wildlife hiways'.

there was a plan in the clinton years to link parks vis a vis these hiways.

i don't know what happened to it.

[Botany]

8. It was killed by uneducated idiots.

Grizzly bears were going to come into town and kill all of Ms. Jones 2nd
grade class ......

You see it was based on science and knowledge so it had to be killed.

Just like some people wanted Yellowstone park when they were making
the park's boundaries to include the winter range of the elk and bison
but that idea was stopped so now we have cattle ranchers shooting bison,
bears, and wolves because they are a threat to the ranchers' cows.

[xchrom]

9. oy vey

how stupid indeed.