In our book, we have seen time and again the damage that so-called progress has inflicted on the natural world. And so long as never-ending economic growth remains the goal of our governments and our major financial institutions, and the corporate bottom line remains immediate profit above the our children’s future, the crimes against the natural world will continue. This means that we who care must use every means at our disposal to fight back. Let’s look at three tools that have been effective in protecting wildlife and wildlife habitat: the Endangered Species Act, Safe Harbor agreements, and conservation easements. The first is enforced by state governments or, for greater protection, by the federal government. The other two are voluntary.

Fortunately in most developed countries, there are laws to protect endangered species. In the United States, there is the 1972 Endangered Species Act, which means, among other things, that if an endangered species is present on federal, state, or private land, no development can proceed that might harm the species or its habitat. Either the site for development must be moved, or an equivalent area of suitable habitat for that species must be purchased and protected elsewhere. Sometimes a developer must also pay for the species in question to be relocated to its new home before the bulldozers move in. Similar legislation protecting endangered species exists in many parts of the world.

It may seem unlikely, but it is true—the presence of a small fly prevented the building of a multimillion-dollar complex, the presence of a worm diverted the planned course of a major oil pipeline, and an insignificant-seeming frog tied up a giant corporation in multiple lawsuits and finally won in the highest court of the land! There is something innately appealing about the story of David and Goliath. These are the kind of tales that I want to share here.

Of course the developers fight back and court cases may go on for years, sustaining countless lawyers and providing big law firms with opportunities to carry out their pro bono work. There can be fierce lobbying, savage courtroom battles, and a great deal of skullduggery. There is often an unholy alliance between corporations and the governments they support, so that both money and power are ranged against Mother Nature and her foot soldiers—the environmentalists and concerned citizens, all those who seek to protect the wonders of the natural world. But even if big business wins, the battle will have been long drawn out and often attracted a lot of media coverage. Many previously unaware people will have learned about the threat to our future and had the opportunity to add their voices to those who are fighting for a more sustainable world. At the very least, the Endangered Species Act slows destructive development; at best it prohibits it.

How an Owl Halted Logging of Old-Growth Forests
The northern spotted owl was the first highly publicized case in which an endangered species listing was used to fight big business. In 1990, as part of an effort to protect the old-growth forests of the Pacific Northwest, a group of environmentalists eventually got the northern spotted owl onto the US Endangered Species List; as a result, all logging in the national forests was stopped by court order the following year.

Immediately there was vehement protest from the logging industry, putting individual loggers and small sawmill owners at loggerheads (pun admitted!) with environmentalists. I remember seeing the pro-logging bumper stickers when I visited Portland at the time. One said kill a spotted owl—save a logger. Another: i like spotted owls—fried! But what was truly significant is that, because of all the bad publicity generated at the time, the timber industry started the Sustainable Forestry Initiative. And although the industry and its political supporters still refer to the spotted owl campaign as being way over the top, and continue to lobby powerful allies in Washington, the long drawn-out confrontation has certainly saved at least some of the last magical old-growth forests of the Pacific Northwest.

Owls are attractive birds, and birding is very popular. It is much more difficult to gain public sympathy for insects, unless, perhaps, they are beautiful butterflies or moths. Flies and beetles are more likely to elicit indifference at best, disgust at worst. And so I want to tell two remarkable stories that, together, give some idea of the commitment and energy needed to protect such lowly creatures and their habitats.

A Community Held Hostage by a Fly
The Delhi sands giant flower-loving fly (Rhaphiomidas abdominalis) has the distinction of becoming, in 1993, the first and so far only fly ever to be listed as an endangered species by the Fish and Wildlife Service.

I met the champion of this fly, Dr. Greg Ballmer, some ten years later. He told me he had been working for that listing for years and was still exhilarated by the successful outcome. I was of course utterly charmed by the name of this fly! And I was delighted to meet someone who had the passion and determination to give battle for an insect—it is no small task to get any species listed as endangered. Greg was up against a proposal to build, among other developments, a new hospital on the fly’s sandy habitat on the outskirts of the city of Colton, California.

Greg showed me a photo of this flower-loving fly. It is orange and brown and, like a tiny hummingbird, it hovers over flowers to drink their nectar. Its only habitat is the Delhi sand dunes (Delhi sand is an officially named soil type) about sixty miles east of Los Angeles. This habitat once extended for forty square miles, but gradually the land was taken over for agriculture and development, and miles of it was covered with concrete. By the end of the 1980s, only a few thousand acres remained.

I asked this enthusiastic and energetic man what had triggered his interest in insects. “When I was three or four,” he said, “I remember crawling in the grass outside my grandparents’ house trying to catch small butterflies with my hands.” Ever since then he has loved studying insects, especially caterpillars. “Then in 1971,” he continued, “I met a fly guy, Joe Wilcox, who had collected some of these flower-loving flies in the 1940s.” They had been identified as a new species. Greg and Joe wondered whether some of the flies might still exist, but felt it most unlikely since the site where Joe had found them had since been converted to highways, vineyards, and a county landfill facility. By the end of the 1970s, this particular flower-loving fly was thought to be extinct.

But then, a decade later, another fly enthusiast, Rick Rogers of Los Colton, rediscovered the Delhi sands giant flower-loving fly on a vacant plot. Greg at once began a systematic survey of some five thousand acres, searching for remnants of potential fly habitat. He found that although the whole area was heavily degraded there were, nevertheless, some of the flies on a few vacant lots. Sadly, however, almost all these places were for sale, and the only large area of about five hundred acres was surrounded by urban development. Without urgent action, Greg realized, the Delhi sands flower-loving fly would really and truly become extinct. And so, in 1989, he filed a petition with USFWS to get the species listed as endangered. By sheer coincidence, just at this time, San Bernardino County was planning to rebuild its county hospital—and one of the possible sites being considered was a seventy-acre area of Delhi sand habitat on the outskirts of Colton.

Three years after receiving Greg’s petition, the USFWS published, in the Federal Register, its intent to list the fly as endangered. Early in 1990, there was a public hearing about the issue—and suddenly everyone was aware of what was going on. The developers, thoroughly alarmed, raced into action: Within just two months of the hearing, and without having conducted the legally required environmental impact study, the plans for the hospital on the Colton site were approved.

“The situation regarding the fly was known by all,” Greg said, “and so from that time on the City of Colton did all it could to encourage development of commercial, industrial, and residential projects on land under its jurisdiction and all around the site selected for the county hospital.” In other words, they hoped to eliminate the remaining habitat of the fly before it could be listed as endangered. They knew that once that happened, they would be unable to do any developments on potential fly habitat without conducting a survey to see if it was there. Moreover, even if no adult flies were seen, this would not mean the species was not present, since the immature stages may remain hidden beneath the soil in a year of low rainfall, not emerging until the following year—they would have to repeat the survey the following summer.

Tempers ran high. “It’s absurd that an economy and a community should be held hostage by a fly,” Daryl Parrish, the city manager, told an AP reporter. And the San Bernardino County administrators threatened to bulldoze the habitat of the Delhi sands giant flower loving fly. But this backfired, for it gave cause célèbre status to the fly. Normally, after a hearing, the FWS actively seeks public comments for about a year before making its final decision, but that threat precipitated an emergency listing of the fly as endangered in September 1993. At once the City of Colton and a coalition of developers sought to de-list it through political lobbying and legal actions. All such efforts failed—one lawsuit went all the way to the US Supreme Court, where it was denied (in 1998).

When I last spoke to Greg, he told me that, after more than a decade of battling in which he has played a major role as advocate for the flies, the city had come up with a compromise. This would allow development on two hundred acres that includes about twenty to thirty acres of prime fly habitat, in exchange for which the city would buy and preserve equal acreage of the flies’ habitat elsewhere. Greg is not happy with the proposed sanctuary for his flies—“it has been fenced off and more or less left,” he noted. “It is ecologically out of whack—it needs rabbits to deal with the undergrowth that is otherwise too thick for the growth of the flowers on which the flies depend, and coyotes to keep the rabbits in check.” And, he said, the invasive plants need to be removed, native vegetation reintroduced, and the soil improved.

“Whether such a trade-off is ultimately beneficial to the flower-loving fly’s survival is open to question,” said Greg. But at the moment this is an academic question, as Colton’s proposal has not been accepted by the USFWS—which has ultimate authority in such decisions. Also, some problems have arisen in the plan to acquire “sanctuary” lands from private interests, and the city is seeking other ways to create it.

“And so,” Greg concluded, “the story goes on. In the meantime, the Delhi sands giant flower-loving fly continues to survive in its fragmented home.”

). Jane with Steve Spomer, Mitch Paine, Tierney Brosius and Dr. Leon Higley during the visit to the University of Nebraska - Lincoln (credit: © Thomas D. Mangelsen).

More Developments Stymied—By a Beetle
When I was lecturing in Nebraska one of our Roots & Shoots youth leaders, Mitch Paine, told me about the struggle to save the Salt Creek tiger beetle (Cicindela nevadica lincolniana) and its environment. The following year I returned and, at the Nebraska University at Lincoln campus, was able to visit the tiger beetle’s two greatest champions, Dr. Leon Higley, head of the lab, and Stephen Spomer, who started it all many years ago.

The beetle is much smaller than I had imagined—I suppose because I had only seen large color photographs. It is, in fact, only half an inch long, brown to dark olive green with a metallic dark green underside. I didn’t get to see an adult, save for dead specimens impaled on pins, but I met one of the larvae that the team are breeding in long, glass, earth-filled tubes. It was white and, having come almost to the surface, it almost seemed to peer through the glass—whereupon it retreated extraordinarily fast to a safer level!

The Salt Creek tiger beetle is found only in the unique salt marsh habitat around Lincoln, Nebraska. Once these salt marshes covered around twenty thousand acres, but only about four thousand acres remain. And this remnant has been fragmented into mostly less-than-twenty-acre patches as a result of commercial, residential, industrial, and agricultural developments—all ringed with car dealerships, restaurants, apartments, and businesses. Somehow this specialist beetle, with the long legs that keep its body up off the baking summer ground, has survived—“but barely,” commented reporter Joe Duggan in one of his articles in the local press. Scientific surveys by Steve, Leon, and students such as Mitch have shown that numbers of tiger beetle populations have fallen from six to three since 1991 and from more than 600 individuals to just over 150, making it one of the most endangered insects in America.

As we talked at the university lab, I realized how demanding it could be, surveying tiger beetle numbers in the unyielding Nebraska landscape. It can be very, very hot there in the summer, and there is no shade for the researchers as they trudge from one site to another over the sweltering salt marsh. Once, Leon told me, he reckons he nearly died out there in temperatures that soared, that day, to way over a hundred degrees. And yet—he goes on doing it, as do they all.

In 2005, as a result of the dedication and determination of this group of “beetle fanatics” and the lobbying efforts of concerned environmentalists, the Salt Creek tiger beetle was finally listed as an endangered species under the US Endangered Species Act. This gives it greater protection than it had enjoyed previously as an endangered species in the state of Nebraska. At about the same time, the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission won a five-hundred-thousand-dollar grant from the federal government to develop a conservation plan to preserve and enhance the critical habitat of the Salt Creek tiger beetle.

When news of the grant was made public, there was outrage among many local Nebraskans. They wrote to the newspapers, angry that the government would “waste” half a million dollars on “a gross beatle [sic] that lives in a disgusting environment”—on a “stupid bug.” But just as many wrote letters praising the decision. Tom Malmstrom is coordinator of a coalition of various interest groups all wanting to protect the saline wetlands that are home to many other species such as migrating waterbirds, and uniquely adapted plants including the state-endangered saltwort.

“Everybody always ties everything into the beetle,” said Malmstrom in an interview, “but really, it’s an interesting ecosystem we’re talking about. I’ve been on that site. It’s really nice.”

Following the federal endangered species listing, Algis Laukaitis, writing in the Lincoln Journal Star in November 2005, summed things up in his headline: “Beetle Influencing Development Plans.” For the listing meant that there could be no development in the area that might harm the beetles or their environment. And as Steve and Leon explained, the beetles can be indirectly harmed by pollutants in runoff, increased sedimentation blocking the entrance to the burrows dug in the ground by the larvae, and light exposure that can distract the adults when, after two years, they emerge for six weeks of hunting—and mating. If developers ignore the requirement, they will face stiff penalties.

The newspaper article noted that “Even though the ink is barely dry, the listing already has affected a high-voltage power line planned north of the city . . . and a private development in a ‘blighted’ area.” In other words, “the endangered species listing could change plans for shopping centers, factories and houses in the area where the tiger beetle hunts, eats and mates during its two-year life cycle.” A local landowner, Doug Nagel, believed that () “the designation of a large area as ‘critical habitat’ could hurt Lincoln’s economy.” This, of course, is the crux of the problem, the never-ending conflict between economic development and preservation of our children’s heritage.

Many people spoke up for the tiger beetle. Joel Sartore is a wildlife photographer for the National Geographic Society. On his own time he shows his photographs, contributes articles, and gives lectures to raise public awareness about the tiger beetle issue. In one essay for the local newspaper, he wrote: “We are killing off the Ark. All plants and animals, even the Salt Creek tiger beetle, are God’s creatures. Who are we to purposefully kill off any of these creations?”

Jessa Huebing-Reitinger, an artist specializing in insects, has painted two large canvases of individual Salt Creek tiger beetles—named Terie I and Terie II. When her husband, James, gives talks about the beetles and their environment, Jessa displays her paintings. Mitch and local Roots & Shoots groups have also helped to raise awareness. It is probable that this and other publicity paved the way for the long-sought—and bitterly opposed—federal listing of the Salt Creek tiger beetle as an endangered species. Many people have given much to help to protect these tiger beetles and their unique habitat. And they cannot give up, for the powerful developers will not give up, either.

Small Animals Frustrate Big Companies: A Series of Vignettes
Many people, when they heard I was writing on this topic, were eager to share their favorite stories with me and I have selected a few of these to share here, along with other examples I hear of as I travel around. I will begin with one of my favorites—the worm that influenced the construction of a gas pipeline.

The endangered Australian giant Gippsland earthworm has an average length of about thirty-one inches, but it can grow to a magnificent three yards in length and is among the largest in the world. I heard about it from one of our JGI-Australian volunteers who is planning to live in the Gippsland area. Numbers have declined in recent years as more land has been taken over by development, and the species is unusually sensitive to disturbances in its environment.

Thus a construction company, working on a multimillion-dollar gas pipeline, was forced to spend  a hundred thousand dollars to protect a colony of the giant earthworms in eastern Victoria. The company had to ensure that a worm expert was present at all times, and all workers had to be trained to identify these worms. If a worm or evidence of a colony was found, all work had to stop immediately. Clearly the Australians take their worms very seriously—there is a Giant Earthworm Museum in Bass, Victoria, which kindly gave us permission to reproduce a photograph here.

I also enjoyed hearing that in Victoria, New South Wales, a four-hundred-million-dollar residential development in Eynesbury was halted when conservationists showed that this would destroy the habitat of the endangered golden sun moth. Another story concerns a subspecies of the red-tailed black cockatoo. The species as a whole is found in many parts of northern and inland Australia (I have seen quite a few myself), but this particular subspecies is listed as endangered. And so when it was found that plans for a new $650 million pulp mill would threaten the cockatoo’s breeding trees, Penola Pulp was forced to purchase a five-hundred-acre property as a substitute habitat suitable for the cockatoo’s nesting.

My sister heard about another little drama. In the UK, our endemic and now endangered red squirrel, beloved by so many, has been driven away from almost all of its original range throughout the country by the introduced gray squirrel. In the few places where it is still found, it is fiercely protected. Residents of Carrbridge in Scotland campaigned against a proposed development of 117 houses—which would have led to an unwelcome 30 percent increase in the town’s population. When the local government rejected the proposal, the developers appealed. And then, during this legal process, the presence of red squirrels in the area was confirmed—despite the fact that the developers, when conducting the legally required survey, had claimed there were none in the area. Since their nests—or dreys, as they are called—are football-size structures of twigs and grass and hard to miss, those making the original survey were suspected of deceit. At any rate, the new confirmation of the presence of red squirrels put an immediate stop to the planned development—possibly forever.

Another story was sent by a German friend. A little clipping from an Associated Press report on August 10, 2007, describes how the construction of a bridge over the Elbe River in Dresden was halted when of a colony of endangered lesser horseshoe bats was discovered near the proposed site. An injunction was issued by the Dresden administrative court blocking plans to start construction the following week. Judges found that these plans failed to “address sufficiently whether the construction would damage the bats’ habitat.” And so, concluded the reporter, “this little-known species has achieved what months of political debate and court cases could not.”

In mid-2007, I read in The Guardian that Mr. Justice Collins blocked plans to build houses on the banks of two former reservoirs near Cardiff in south Wales, UK. He ruled in the High Court that the Countryside Council for Wales was right to designate land on the banks of the reservoirs as a site of special scientific interest to protect the waxcap, an endangered fungus. Complaints from the developer’s attorney were dismissed.

“Extinct” Birds Still Have a Voice
Even birds that are considered by most scientists to be extinct are nevertheless helping conservation efforts. The Australian Coxen’s fig-parrot became increasingly endangered when the rain forest was bulldozed for farmland in the 1980s, and is generally considered to have been extinct since then. Yet from time to time people claim to have made a sighting; as a result, millions of fig trees have been planted to make up for those lost when the forest was cleared.

And there is the ongoing saga of the ivory-billed woodpecker, thought by most ornithologists be extinct.

However, several expeditions to the swamp areas of Arkansas and Florida’s Panhandle, led by scientists from Cornell University and Auburn University, have reported sightings of this woodpecker, and recorded sounds thought to be its distinctive drumming. Most people disbelieved these accounts, since no photograph or recording of its call were obtained. Nevertheless a $424 million project has been halted by US district judge Bill Wilson because the plan—to pump 190 million gallons of water for irrigation—would destroy the swamps where some people still believe the ivory-billed woodpecker exists. Some $197 million had already been spent!

Amphibians to the Rescue
Amphibians are playing a major role in protecting wetlands—one of the most endangered ecosystems. All over the world they are relentlessly drained for developments, and the presence of an endangered species is one of the few tools with which environmentalists can try to save yet another area from being buried under tons of cement.

In the UK, for example, the greater crested newt is hated by developers. If the newts are found when an area selected for development is surveyed, as it must be by law, then the development must be halted or changed. It is the same in Australia, where the tiny, three-quarter-inch-long Wallum froglets and Wallum sedge frogs, which are locally endangered in some coastal areas of Queensland and northern New South Wales, have halted or changed dozens of development plans. For example, the $540 million Tagun bypass, being constructed to fix a traffic bottleneck, will cost thousands of dollars more as developers adjust their plans in order to protect crucial habitat for the amphibians. And organizers of the 2000 Australian Olympics had to rework their plans in order to protect a population of the green and golden bell frog at Homebush Bay in Sydney.

A few years ago, I met a dedicated and energetic young Israeli, Itai Roffman, eager to tell me about his efforts to save the habitat of a critically endangered frog—a frog with an extraordinary name—the Syrian spade-footed cat-eyed frog (Pelobates syriacus syriacus). As a friend of mine said, the poor thing must surely suffer from an identity crisis!

As a child, Itai lived in the city of Herzliya, close to the two-hundred-acre Herzliya bassa—Arabic for “wetland.” As an elementary school boy, Itai spent hours exploring this wonderful place, one of the only four major undeveloped wetland ecosystems along Israel’s seashore. Unfortunately, though, this area was threatened by development. Itai was dismayed and did his best to raise awareness and generate support from the scientific and conservation communities, as well as from the local municipality. And it was because of the spade-footed frog that he would, ultimately, succeed.

These frogs were once found throughout the coastal wetlands, but as the swamps were drained, their numbers were reduced; by the 1990s, the species had already disappeared from most of its original range. Itai, however, was sure they were still present in the Herzliya bassa, and he contacted the famous Israeli zoologist and conservationist Professor Heinrich Mendelson from Tel Aviv University. The professor, who was over ninety years old at the time, was, Itai told me, “very excited to hear that I had found a frog thought to be on the brink of extinction.”

Itai also talked with the Israeli Nature & Parks Authority, and together they wrote letters to the mayor of Herzliya, Mrs. Yael German, enlisting her support for the protection of the bassa. Professor Mendelson added his name to Itai’s letter—one of the last actions he took before his death. Mayor German was very supportive and said she would do everything in her power to help.

A survey was planned, and Itai was able to take part in this with doctoral student Eldad Elron. “The Tel Aviv University scientists gave me, a high school student, a special waterproof suit, boots, a flashlight, and nets for this work,” Itai said, amazement in his voice. He and Elron eventually found “on a very rainy winter’s night an adult female spade-footed frog hopping on a dirt road in the middle of the swamp area.” Finally, they had evidence that the spade-footed frog was alive and well.

This discovery led to a lot of media coverage that went a long way toward raising awareness in the local community. Between 2000 and 2008, many proposals have been made by landowners hoping to convert the bassa into a residential area, but Mayor German did not give in. She and the conservation groups were determined “to save the sole pristine green lung in her city.” Today a municipal park has now been created in the bassa where people can enjoy nature. And a large natural area, planned as a refuge for the spade-footed frogs, was finally saved in perpetuity in May 2008, when the Israeli Supreme Court ruled against a proposal to drain it for urban development.