There’s the tiny patch-nosed salamander in northern Georgia and across the border in South Carolina. There is the Cassia crossbill, a finch with a twisty beak found in a single county in Idaho. The analysis found that the habitats of hundreds of imperiled species were entirely outside of the green areas above. It’s part of a larger global push, known as 30x30, to protect more land and water worldwide. The Biden administration has set a goal to conserve and restore 30 percent of U.S. Right now, about 13 percent of the United States is permanently protected and managed primarily for biodiversity, according to the United States Geological Survey. Note: Green areas reflect federal, state and local biodiversity protections. “There are hundreds of species known to be globally critically imperiled or imperiled in this country that have no protection under federal law and often no protection under state law,” said Healy Hamilton, chief scientist at NatureServe, a nonprofit conservation research group that led the analysis behind the map.īy highlighting areas where land is permanently protected for biodiversity, in green below, you can see where the habitats of imperiled species are outside of conservation zones. That work is critical, because scientists say humans are speeding extinction at a disastrous pace. Maps like these offer a valuable tool to officials and conservationists who are scrambling to protect biodiversity. Not included are gray wolves, grizzly bears and other wildlife not at risk of global extinction. Animals like the black-footed ferret and California condor are represented, but so are groups often left out of such analyses: species of bees, butterflies, fish, mussels, crayfish and flowering plants. It’s the most detailed map of its kind so far. Rivers and streams light up with aquatic biodiversity across the South.
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