About The Pulse Advertise With Us
Connect with Us facebook twitter instagram
Life Around Town
EPB Business Spotlight
Arts News & Notes
Movie News & Notes
Music News & Notes
Chattanooga Dining Guide
Food News & Notes
Home City Life Outdoor Life Species And Youth Are Endangered
Species And Youth Are Endangered
by Sandy Kurtz
Join the fight to keep the Endangered Species Act effective
The Amazon forest burns. Summers are hotter than ever. Extinction rates increase. Plastics pollute the ocean. Glaciers melt. Pollinator numbers diminish, reducing food supply. Wetland and forest ecosystems disappear due to development. Catastrophic storms continue in unusual places while droughts occur elsewhere. People migrate seeking farmable land.
The present Federal administration walks back both clean air and miles per gallon regulations, resulting in increased fossil fuel emissions. Fracking releases methane gas and encourages earthquakes. Rising sea levels flood coastal cities with increasing regularity. Tropical diseases spread north. The list can go on and on. In short, we are eating our seed corn.
Like canaries in coal mines, our actions are setting off alarm bells. The latest is the weakening of the Endangered Species Act (ESA). This 1973 act has been instrumental in saving the bald eagle, along with thousands of other species. ESA special protection to save certain species has met with 99 percent success. Today, the bald eagle is off both the endangered and the threatened list. The ESA is protecting more than 1,600 plant and animal species.
According to the Center for Biological Diversity, one million species face extinction. Yet President Trump has instructed Secretary of the Interior Bernhardt to gut the Endangered Species Act. These rule changes target species that need to be added to the list. Rather than selections fully based on biological considerations, this ESA backtracking calls for economic considerations to be part of the decision making on a case-by-case basis. That will make it harder to add species to the list. The Center for Biological Diversity and allies are suing.
To briefly summarize the ESA, it says we must provide for the conservation of endangered and threatened species of fish, wildlife, and plants because they have been rendered close to extinction as a consequence of economic growth and development untempered by adequate concern and conservation.
Because they are of value, a list of endangered species and species threatened with extinction shall be published and regulations shall provide for the conservation of the listed species. There is also an international piece within the ESA that prevents loss of species like giraffes that poachers kill and sell for use in consumer products.
Each state list shows endangered and threatened species that may or may not be on the Federal ESA list. There are 67 rare species in Tennessee. You may know about the snail darter, but how about the South Chickamauga crayfish, the pink mucket and rough pigtoe mussels, the highfin carpsucker, the tri-colored bat, the least bittern, gibbous panic-grass, or the white fringeless orchid?
All these and more are on the Tennessee Department of Environment & Conservation's list of endangered and threatened species present in Hamilton County. Too bad insects aren't included in the ESA, as they, too, are critically important to the whole web of life and we are losing them.
And why does it matter that species are rapidly disappearing? How many nails can you remove from a building before it falls? For starters, the disruption of complex and delicately balanced ecosystems not only brings extinctions, but also derails human quality of life. Will future existence require the wearing of masks and very skinny, unhealthy people living in underground abodes?
Then there's the moral component. Like your mother told you, "Clean up your messes." Since humans have caused much of the problem due to over-consumption and destruction of said ecosystems, shouldn't we bear responsibility for repair?
Renowned biologist and author E.O. Wilson says the one process now going on that will take millions of years to correct is loss of genetic and species diversity by the destruction of natural habitats. This is the folly our descendants are least likely to forgive us.
So, we owe it to our descendants to leave them a chance for quality living and happiness on a healthy, supportive planet. Since most species live on private land, save whatever habitat you can.
During the week of September 20-27, young people will be calling for climate action around the world during the Global Climate Strike. That includes our own local strike on September 20 from 4:30-6:30 p.m. in front of the bridge at the Aquarium.
Show up, cheer them on, and speak out. For their sakes contact your legislators and urge them to assure that the Endangered Species Act lives on doing its part to protect all life on Earth.
Sandra Kurtz is an environmental community activist, chair of the South Chickamauga Creek Greenway Alliance, and is presently working through the Urban Century Institute. You can visit her website to learn more at enviroedu.net
Sorry, no events.
Main Street Farmers Market
Jan 20, 2021 4:00 PM - 6:00 PM
Chattanooga Brewing Company
Board Game Night
Barley Chattanooga
Education & Learning Food & Drink
Air Fryer 101
Ooltewah Farmers Market
Ooltewah Nursery & Landscape
Vision + Verse: Erika Roberts And Hope For The Future
Hunter Museum of American Art
Toby Hewitt
Jan 21, 2021 7:00 PM - 10:00 PM
Backstage Bar
Art & Exhibitions Education & Learning
Beginner Embroidery: Positive Affirmations
Lenox Hills
Yoga Basics: 4 Week Workshop
Jan 23, 2021 9:00 AM - 10:00 AM
St. Alban's Farmers Market
Jan 23, 2021 9:30 AM - 12:30 PM
St. Alban's Episcopal Church
Sentimental Upcycling: Bookmaking
Jan 23, 2021 10:30 AM - 12:30 PM
Inspire Chattanooga Cool Runnings
Camp Jordan Park
Scenic City Collection: The Chattanooga Artists of the 2021 4 Bridges Arts Festival
Jan 24, 2021 12:00 PM - 5:00 PM
AVA Gallery
Danimal Pinsion and Friends
Run Club Community Run - Downtown
Jan 25, 2021 10:00 AM - 11:00 AM
Coolidge Park
Education & Learning Health & Wellness
Beginner Tai Chi
Self Care in 2021: Overcoming Fear, Stress and Anxiety
Search Events Submit Yours
Inside The Pulse
About The Pulse
© 2020 The Pulse and Brewer Media. All rights reserved.