As the result of a Center for Biological Diversity settlement with the US Fish and Wildlife Service in June of 2009, a federal rule was finalised to protect the Galapagos Petrel and Heinroth’s Shearwater as endangered under the Endangered Species Act. As part of the settlement, the Service also published listing determinations for 12 birds from Peru, Bolivia, Europe, and the islands of French Polynesia.
The Service originally received petitions to list more than 70 species of the planet’s most imperiled birds – which live throughout the world, including Brazil, Spain, India, Eastern Europe, and the Marquesas Islands – in 1980 and 1991. In violilation of the Endangered Species Act, the agency spent the better part of two decades refusing to finalise listings for many of these species despite the fact that all had been found to warrant protection.
Endangered Species Act listing provides substantial benefits to foreign species. It authorizes the president to provide financial assistance for the development and management of programs in foreign countries and the lets the Fish and Wildlife Service encourage conservation programs and provide personnel and training. Beyond these basic protections, the Act also implements the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) of Wild Flora and Fauna.
Background on the birds
The Galapagos petrel is a bird native to the epic Galapagos Islands. Introduced predators pose the greatest threat to this dark-rumped bird.
The Heinroth’s shearwater is an elusive bired thought to breed in Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands; this bird is similarly threatened by the introduction of predatory species, and is also harmed by the destruction of habitat through deforestation as well as some commercial long-line fishing operations.
The Fish and Wildlife Service has also proposed listing as endangered the ash-breasted tit-tyrant and royal cinclodes (native to Peru and Bolivia); the Junin grebe, Junin rail, Peruvian plantcutter, and white-browed tit-spinetail (native to Peru); and the Cantabrain capercaillie (of Spain), Eiao Polynesian warbler and the Marquesan imperial pigeon (from French Polynesia), the greater adjutant (found in Cambodia and India), Jerdon’s courser (from India), and the slender-billed curlew (from Europe and Africa).