Hundreds of threatened species not on official US list

Oz Research of Note (in progress)

Many of the animal species at risk of extinction in the United States have not made it onto that country’s official Endangered Species Act (ESA) list, according researchers in Adelaide. Their study compared the ESA list of endangered species with the world’s leading threatened species list, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List.

They found that of the American species included on the IUCN list, 40% of birds, 50% of mammals, and 80-95% of other species such as amphibians, gastropods, crustaceans, and insects, were not recognised by the ESA as threatened.

Bert Harris, Environment Institute and School of Earth & Environmental Sciences, University of Adelaide

Conservation Letters

http://www.adelaide.edu.au/news/news50121.html