Listen here:
While local and regional focus has been on California Fish and Wildlife’s deliberations on permanently listing the western Joshua tree on the state’s endangered species list, the same debate has been going on at the federal level.
Last week, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service declined to list the iconic tree under the federal Endangered Species Act.
Under consideration since 2015, the federal agency had previously rejected a petition to list the species, but following an appeal by WildEarth Guardians in 2019 a federal district court ordered the agency to reconsider. So last week’s decision was the second time the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service declined to list the species.
In its findings, the service only considered the Joshua trees’ threat of extinction between 2040 and 2069. Studies project species-level decline due to climate change is unlikely before 2100. In California, the species’ future may be more promising due to the proposed Western Joshua Tree Conservation Act and the state’s Fish and Wildlife Services’ possible listing of the tree as threatened.
Those proposals could be resolved as early as this summer.
Previously reported:
