Take Action for Yellow-Legged Frogs

In response to a petition and lawsuit by the Center for Biological Diversity, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has finally proposed protection for four populations of foothill yellow-legged frogs in California, where they’ve disappeared from more than half their historic habitat.

These stream-dwelling amphibians will soon gather for the spring mating season, when males call to females mostly underwater — the best way to be heard in stream environments.

Endangered Species Act protection would help save them from dams, pesticides, grazing and a long list of other threats.

You can help: Tell the Service you support safeguarding this species and the beautiful coastal and Sierra foothill streams it calls home.

Coal-Harmed Crayfishes Get 446 Miles of Habitat

Responding to a Center lawsuit, the Fish and Wildlife Service just protected 446 stream miles of critical habitat for two Appalachian species — the Big Sandy and Guyandotte River crayfishes — in West Virginia, Kentucky and Virginia.

“These unique crawdads would soon be snuffed out by destructive coal mining without these essential protections,” said Perrin de Jong, a Center attorney. “But this isn’t charity, since our fate is bound up with the fate of the crayfish. The clean water they need to survive is the same water people rely on for drinking and recreation.”

Two Victories Over Golden State Sprawl

The Center had two wins this week in the fight to defend California’s extraordinary natural heritage against the pressures of population-related growth.

Near San Diego, a sprawl development on fire-prone hillsides was set back when a court said no to the 3,000-home Fanita Ranch project proposed for the city of Santee. These hills are habitat for coastal California gnatcatchers, western spadefoot toads and other rare species.

And in the San Bernardino Mountains, a judge stopped a controversial “Moon Camp” luxury-home development planned for the north shore of Big Bear Lake. As planned, it would’ve created wildfire evacuation risks for people and threatened a federally protected plant called the ash-grey paintbrush.

Running for Oak Flat — In Prayer and Protest

A group of Native American high-school students in Arizona have finished a three-day, 227-mile run from Flagstaff to Oak Flat, a precious site in the Tonto National Forest. The run served as both prayer and protest: This beautiful place remains in urgent peril.

Oak Flat is sacred to the San Carlos Apache and other tribes in Arizona, but Congress traded it away in 2015 so international corporation Rio Tinto could build a huge copper mine. The mine would destroy this culturally vital site, leaving behind a massive crater in the place of streams, springs and habitat for rare wildlife like ocelots.

Head to Facebook or YouTube to watch our new video of the Brophy Native American Club on its epic run.

Take Action Against Deadly Cyanide Bombs

It’s been five years since an Idaho teen named Canyon Mansfield was badly hurt by an M-44, aka “cyanide bomb,” that killed his dog. The incident spurred a nationwide campaign by the Mansfield family, the Center and our allies to ban these indiscriminate killing devices — so far we’ve helped restrict their use in four states — but they’re still legally used on many public lands. They kill thousands of animals inhumanely every year, including endangered species and pets. 

“It’s outrageous that state and federal governments continue to use cyanide bombs to spew poison and kill wildlife,” said the Center’s Collette Adkins.

Take action to get M-44s banned on public lands. And go one important step further: Help fund the fight with a gift to our Saving Life on Earth Fund.

Biodiversity Briefing: Food Systems and Extinction 

In our latest quarterly “Biodiversity Briefing” presentation, Executive Director Kierán Suckling discusses the Center’s food sustainability campaign and how pesticides are driving the extinction crisis. In the briefing you’ll learn about meat consumption’s role in snuffing out species, our fierce campaigns to stop industrial agriculture from hurting imperiled wildlife — from monarch butterflies to black-footed ferrets — and how the Center is working toward greener food systems and a wild future.   
 

These personal briefings, including Q&A sessions, are open to all members of the Center's Leadership Circle and Owls Club. For information on how to join and be invited to participate live on the calls, email Development Associate Joe Melisi or call him at (520) 867-6658. 
 

Check out the briefing now.

The Revelator: Wolves as Teachers

When Cristina Eisenberg moved to remote northwest Montana, she fell asleep to wolves howling at night and watched them transform her backyard’s ecology. They made her want to learn how the presence or absence of wolves can change a landscape — so she went back to school to become a community ecologist. As a Native American and trained scientist, she understands how Native and western ways of knowing can be used in concert to help solve our toughest environmental problems.

Read The Revelator's interview with her. And don’t miss out on the e-newsletter bringing you each week’s best environmental articles and essays.

Our Beef With Grass-Fed Beef

Cattle grazing is a controversial, often confusing topic tied up with issues like biodiversity loss, the climate emergency, food sovereignty and colonialism. That’s why the Center is hosting a webinar series called “Grazing the Wild: Facts and Fiction About Grass-Fed Beef” with experts who’ll help us cut through misinformation about what cattle grazing does to the planet.

Join us for the first installment, “Habitat-Fed Beef: Separating Facts From Fiction on Grass-Fed and ‘Regenerative’ Beef,” next Wednesday, March 23, at 9 a.m. PT/12 p.m. ET.

That’s Wild: Eavesdropping Elephant Seals

Studying animals in the deep ocean can be extremely difficult, especially when they’re elusive — like groups of beaked whales that rarely surface. Scientists have never really known where the whales go or what they do down there.

But now researchers are recruiting elephant seals for a new project, outfitting them with microphones before letting them loose for their annual trip to search for food.

Learn why elephant seals make perfect spies for science at Vox.

Follow Us

Center for Biological Diversity | Saving Life on Earth

Donate now to support the Center's work.

Photo credits: Foothill yellow-legged frog by Ken-ich Ueda/Flickr; Big Sandy crayfish courtesy USFWS; coastal California gnatcatcher courtesy USFWS; screenshot from Oak Flat video by Russ McSpadden/Center for Biological Diversity; coyote courtesy USDA; black-footed ferrets courtesy USFWS; gray wolf by Lori Iverson/USFWS; beef cow via Canva; elephant seal family by Brocken Inaglory/Wikimedia.

Center for Biological Diversity
P.O. Box 710
Tucson, AZ 85702
United States