The law of the wild

There have been dramatic success stories under the Endangered Species Act -- and tales of struggle and outright failure. Each carries its own lesson about the law:

Bald eagle: Its numbers were down to 500 nesting pairs in the 1960s, largely because of DDT; recent counts put the number between 5,000 and 8,000. It was proposed for delisting in 1999, but the process is still dragging.

Lesson: The failure to take robust populations off the list gives the act’s opponents fair ammunition. It’s true that the eagles have not done as well in the Southwest, and some states have not drawn up plans for monitoring the birds. But if federal agencies planned better, getting states ready while species are nearing recovery, the excuses would be few. For now, the bird should at least be delisted in the four of five national regions where it has done well.

Desert tortoise: The tortoise, most of whose habitat is in California’s Mojave and Sonora deserts, is a poster reptile for how the Endangered Species Act can create enmity. The federal government has spent $100 million to restore it, yet the efforts don’t seem to be working. No one knows how many desert tortoises there are or were; it was listed as threatened in 1990 because studies of small areas showed its population decreasing by as much as 90%. Shy and slow, it is threatened by ravens, off-road vehicles and livestock operations that compete with it for food and also attract ravens.

Lesson: It’s easier to gain agreement on saving a species that’s dying from hunting or DDT than one failing from loss of habitat. The federal government missed opportunities to work smart instead of expensively with the desert tortoise. It bought up land for the tortoise but remains slow to remove livestock operations, ban off-roading or move power lines that give ravens a hunting perch. The sensitive tortoise, with possible disease problems as well, might never recover fully.

Whooping crane: Efforts to save the tallest bird in America -- nearly 5 feet -- began decades before the current Endangered Species Act. Fifteen birds were left in 1942. By 1973, their numbers had risen to a still-dismal 48, despite a dedicated, multi-pronged effort. Now there are about 450,329 of them living in the wild.

Lesson: Opponents of the act complain that fewer than 20 species have been delisted. But that ignores come-from-behind successes such as the whooping crane. It will remain on the list for years, but its recovery is looking more assured. It takes longer to restore a species starting from near-extinction. The crane predated the act, but other species wait many years to get listed; it takes years more to get a recovery plan going. Federal agencies could save species faster and less expensively by moving quickly on applications.