US says ivory-billed woodpecker, 22 other species extinct
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — Death has come knocking a last time for the splendid ivory-billed woodpecker and almost two dozen other birds, fish and other species.
The U.S. government is declaring them extinct.
It’s a rare move for wildlife officials to give up hope on a plant or animal.
But scientists say climate change threatens to make extinctions more common as it adds to the pressures facing imperiled species.
The factors behind this latest and largest batch of extinctions vary.
They range from urbanization to water pollution and logging.
In each extinction, humans were the ultimate cause.
Species declared extinct include:
- Bachman’s warbler
- Bridled white-eye
- Flat pigtoe mussel
- Green-blossom pearly mussel
- Ivory-billed woodpecker
- Kauai akialoa
- Kauai nukupuu
- Kauaʻi ʻōʻō
- Large Kauai thrush
- Little Mariana fruit bat
- Maui ākepa
- Maui nukupuʻu
- Molokai creeper
- Phyllostegia glabra var. lanaiensis
- Po`ouli
- San Marcos gambusia
- Scioto madtom
- Southern acornshell mussel
- Stirrupshell mussel
- Tubercled-blossom pearly mussel
- Turgid-blossom pearly mussel
- Upland combshell mussel
- Yellow-blossom pearly mussel
You can read more here.
You can find more local news through the WBBJ 7 Eyewitness News app.
