One of Arizona’s tiniest owls may regain federal protections by the end of the year as climate change, habitat loss and invasive species threaten its future.
One of Arizona’s tiniest owls may regain federal protections by the end of the year as climate change, habitat loss and invasive species threaten its future.
And in eastern Texas, the birds face isolation from larger population groups, such as those in northeastern Mexico, making local extinction more likely. What ensued highlights the precariousness of protecting an endangered species whose protections preclude development and commerce. While listing decisions are supposed to be based on science, politics and the needs of people can undermine protections. In this case, the birds weren’t delisted because they were recovered, but based on a technicality related to how they were originally listed as a distinct population segment in Arizona.
These principles, also known as the 3Rs, essentially mean that there are enough individuals and connected groups distributed across the range that a species is unlikely to go extinct, even in the face of random events such as changes in weather, unbalanced demographics, isolation caused by human development and diseases.
"Aridification is a huge driver of their abundance," Flesch told The Republic."And essentially, rainfall really sets the carrying capacity of the environment. I spent 10 years monitoring nests within over 100 territories just south of the border in northern Sonora from 2001 to 2010 and what we saw is pretty unbelievable, synergistic negative effect of drought and heat on reproductive output.
They also limit the distances they fly because their small size makes them prey for larger aerial predators, Flesch said. Consequently, they fly low and short. Even the construction of major roads has been found to discourage owl movement. The border wall and the associated vegetation disturbance is also believed to be a significant barrier to movement between the U.S. and Mexico, added Flesch, and in turn limits connectivity to larger populations in Mexico.
Of those fifty, twenty-two were hatched at the Phoenix Zoo. Since 2017, they have worked with USFWS, AZGFD, and Wild at Heart in the captive breeding effort, receiving their first owls in 2018. Last year, they and their federal and state partners released their owls in the Altar Valley, south of Tucson.
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