Endangered Amphibian Species Leaps to a Minor Legal Victory

SAN FRANCISCO — A species of endangered amphibians, the Sierra Nevada Mountain Yellow-Legged Frog, leapt to a legal victory in a federal appeals court yesterday, but advocates for the frog warned that the advance could be short-lived.The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the Interior Department’s decision to defer formally listing the frog as an endangered species. However, the three-judge panel left the door open for the agency to stall the listing again if it meets certain procedural requirements.“The decision itself was a victory for the frog, but it was decided on a fairly narrow, technical interpretation of the statute,” the lawyer who argued against the government, Michael Sherwood, said.Mr. Sherwood, who works for an Oakland, Calif.-based environmental law group, Earthjustice, said the frog species lives only in high elevations of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. He said listing the frog as endangered could limit grazing or timber rights in the frog’s habitat, but developers are not likely to be interested in the lands where the frog is found.Mr. Sherwood said the main effect of an endangered species designation would be to free up federal funding for studies on why the frog’s numbers are in precipitous decline. “There’s a fungus that’s attacking the frog. Why all of a sudden that’s happening, we don’t know. It could be linked to global warming and climate changes,” he said. The Fish and Wildlife Service took the position that the frog was in danger but that budget and manpower issues made it impractical to list it as endangered right away.“They acknowledged that the species itself is on the brink of extinction,” Mr. Sherwood said. “They claim they’re too busy doing other things and they don’t have enough money.”In the ruling, Judge Pamela Rymer said that under some circumstances the Fish and Wildlife Service can hold off on a warranted listing, but she said the agency failed to publish the appropriate findings when it snubbed the frogs.“It may be that the homework was done, but it has to be turned in to count,” Judge Rymer wrote. Also on the panel were Judges Kim Wardlaw and William Alsup. Mr. Sherwood had asked for an order requiring the frogs be listed as endangered, but the judges returned the issue to the Interior Department. The environmental advocate said they could try to snub the frog again by using “magic words” left out of the earlier ruling.

Endangered Amphibian Species Leaps to a Minor Legal Victory

Endangered Amphibian Species Leaps to a Minor Legal Victory

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