“Berlin Wall” Across U.S.-Mexico Border will Destroy Endangered Species -

[zonkers]

*** Press Release from the Center for Environmental Divesity ***

Tucson, Ariz. – The Center for Biological Diversity condemned a proposal that is before the U.S. Senate to build a massive series of fences and walls over 700 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border, calling the plan a colossal environmental disaster and declaring that it will not stem the tide of illegal immigration.

“The only living things the walls won’t stop are people,” said Michael Finkelstein, Executive Director with the Center for Biological Diversity. “Jaguars, Mexican Gray Wolves, Peninsular Bighorn Sheep, and other endangered species need to cross their borderland habitat often, and this wall will crush their ability to survive.”

http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/swcbd/press/border-wall-09-21-2006.html

[skids]

1. Unfortunately it won't sway sentiment.

Emotions run too high in those areas whose labor markets have been devestated by imported corporate indentured servitude.

However, any dems campaigning in heavily anti-illegal-immigration areas wanting to use this can do so by pointing out low staffing of border security guards, and either opposing the wall in favor of full patrols, or advocating for heavily monitored breaks in the walls where wildlife can pass.

[scarletwoman]

5. This could all be solved by clamping down HARD on the EMPLOYERS!

But the corporatocracy that runs this country won't stand for that. Better to sacrifice the environment than to actually do what would be most effective -- putting the people who HIRE illegal labor out of business.

sw

[xchrom]

2. walled in america baby!

this wall will be the greatest monument to america's shame.

and the death of any of those species will be the puntuation mark to our ever lasting shame.

[zonkers]

3. In "Custodians of the Planet 101", we get an F.

[xchrom]

4. lol -- our attendance wasn't very good.

[pitohui]

6. jaguars cross the border "often?"

i'd like to know what he's smokin'

[Chipper Chat]

8. Jaguars hanging on by a thread.

Center for Biological Diversity
BECAUSE LIFE IS GOOD
Protecting endangered species and wild places through
science, policy, education, and environmental law.

For Immediate Release – July 12, 2006
Contact:
Michael J. Robinson, 505-313-7017

Conservationists To Sue Over
Bush Administration’s Jaguar Decision
Rare Cat Denied Critical Habitat Protection

The Center for Biological Diversity today sent a 60-day notice of intent to sue the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for its decision to not designate critical habitat for the endangered jaguar. The government’s decision, also issued today, was required by a court approved settlement agreement in a previous Center-led lawsuit.

SNIP

Jaguars are the largest cats native to North America, typically displaying black rosettes (incomplete circles) on their golden fur but occasionally exhibiting a “melanistic,” or black, phase.

Jaguars once roamed the entire southern suite of states from Monterrey Bay in California through the Appalachian Mountains and Florida. Jaguars were hunted out of the southeastern United States by the 19th century. In the western United States they were exterminated by the Fish and Wildlife Service and its predecessor agency to protect livestock. The last female jaguar known in the United States was killed in 1963 in eastern Arizona where Mexican gray wolves have been reintroduced.

Jaguars have continued to migrate from Mexico into Arizona and New Mexico throughout the 20th century. Most of the returning animals have been killed. However, over the past 10 years five different jaguars have been photographed by trip cameras and hunters who allowed the jaguars to live. It appears several male jaguars are consistently using areas in the United States for all or part of their ranges and some of these are still alive today.



The jaguar’s upland habitats are threatened as well. Urban and exurban development significantly encroaches into jaguar habitat throughout much of its range. And increasing border developments – such as fences, stadium-style lights, roads and off-road vehicle destruction of vegetation – threaten the ability of jaguars to cross the U.S.-Mexico border.

snip
“Jaguars are beautiful animals, and they help to keep the balance of nature,” said Robinson. “Critical habitat provides legal protection for the areas required to recover the jaguar. The longer the government stalls, the harder it will be to recover the jaguar. This decision is disappointing, and it will not stand.”

Service has abused narrow exemptions to the requirement to designate critical habitat, and the Bush administration has proved particularly hostile to such designations. Its related decisions are routinely overturned by federal courts.

A peer-reviewed article in the journal Bioscience found that species with designated
The Border Patrol and Department of Homeland Security have utterly failed to participate in, or even use the information developed by the Jaguar Conservation Team, in planning and carrying out their actions. Thus border developments continue to fragment jaguar habitat and likely restrict jaguar movements.

(end)


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[pitohui]

10. let's try it again

the national geographic sending out an article a few years back saying that maybe, possibly, a jaguar was seen crossing into new mexico for the first time in 90 years (don't remember the exact number but it was something equally ridiculous) does not inspire me to believe that there is much jaguar crossing going on

they need to make it a little believable, ya know?

[zonkers]

13. The sighting you mention used to be the rule not the exception. Hundreds

of years ago, Jaguars used to roam as far north as Tennessee before the encroachment of civilization in N.A. on their habitats. Your reasoning is flawed. Furthermore, they have been spotted in Louisiana, Florida and Texas, too.

I don't see why it has to be immigrant fence vs.wildlife. Both purposes could be served with some ingenuity. The development of wildlife corridors connecting preserves and and green belts would be a wonderful achievement. And it is not unrealistic. Just takes a little work.

[Chipper Chat]

14. I'll leave the jaguar debate up to folks out west.

In the meantime, here in Florida we keep an eye out for another species that like to cross streets!

[zonkers]

9. Here's a nice photo of one. Gorgeous animal.

[sweetheart]

7. it will stop all migration without papers

Given that no migrating animals have papers, then hmmm, its bleedin' obvious this,
and rather than build a wall, they should use the army to invade mexico and take
all the land for settlments of migrating animals, driving away all the people to live
in the unpopulated south america. Surely the republicans are gonna short on look
to texas again, and its world view.

[pitohui]

11. it won't stop migration

the monarchs, odontates, and birds that migrate across the border all have wings and have no problem getting over fences

[sweetheart]

12. wings of the soul

yes, those tribes of mexican peoples surely have wings to get over the fences.