News Item: Twenty-three species of animals and plants are now extinct from the planet, among them the fabled ivory billed woodpecker:
“'This is not an easy thing,' said Amy Trahan, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist who reviewed the evidence and wrote the report concluding that the ivory bill 'no longer exists.'
'Nobody wants to be a part of that,' she added, choking up in a Zoom interview. 'Just having to write those words was quite difficult. It took me awhile.'
The Fish and Wildlife Service proposal Wednesday to take 23 animals and plants off the endangered species list — because none can be found in the wild — exposes what scientists say is an accelerating rate of extinction worldwide. A million plants and animals are in danger of disappearing, many within decades. The newly extinct species are the casualties of climate change and habitat destruction, dying out sooner than any new protections can save them." (our emphasis)
It's not at all out of the realm of possibility that more recognizable animals like the African elephant may become extinct in this century, poached for ivory and impacted by dryer climates, never to return. With the ivory billed woodpecker, we've been ensuring his eventual extinction since the 1890s, cutting down the virgin forests in the southeast U.S. where it made its home. Ironically, through the workings of human-caused climate change over future decades, we also may be working on our own ultimate extinction.
