As we are presently working on a new version of penguin-place.com which should arrive later in November we have been blogglng daily at http://penguinplacepost.wordpress.com/ You can find a link to our blog on the home page of penguin place or obviously following the link on this page. There's simply more we can do on the wordpress page than on the present blog here. When we get the new penguin place up and running, we will have a better looking blog with images and other fun stuff. Until then waddle over to our wordpress blog.
There are no wild penguins in the U.S. But many penguin species
worldwide are in danger—some dramatically—and all populations are dropping fast. What to do, what to do?
Last December, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (FWS) proposed protecting seven penguin species
under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). Six of the species would be
declared "threatened," whereas the seventh, the African penguin ( Spheniscus demersus ),
would be listed as "endangered." The action followed a lawsuit, and
resulting court order, to review the penguins' need for protection.
That proposal is still pending (under the law, the FWS has a year to
act on its proposals), but meanwhile the Center for Biological
Diversity (CBD) has announced plans to file another lawsuit to protect three penguin species not covered in the December proposal.
The first of the three species, the emperor penguin ( Aptenodytes forsteri ),
is the world's largest and most ice-dependant penguin species; it has
seen population drops of nearly 50 percent since the 1970s. Like most
of its cousins, the emperor faces declining food supplies throughout
its habitat. FWS turned down a previous request to protect the emperor,
saying it believed populations were stable and that current science did
not support climate models predicting further habitat loss. (It's
important to note that this decision came down under the Bush administration, which one week earlier had made it very clear that the ESA would not be used to regulate climate change.)
The other two species, the northern and southern rockhopper penguin ( Eudyptes moseleyi and E. chrysocome ),
actually had been recognized in the FWS's December proposal, but only
for a few populations of the southern species. "The southern rockhopper
penguin in certain areas of the species range were stable and
increasing, so listing was not warranted," says FWS public affairs
specialist Tamara Ward. The CBD disagrees: "FWS proposed to list [the
rockhopper] in only part of its range, ignoring large declines
elsewhere," says Kassie Siegel, senior counsel at the CBD.
Why protect penguins under the ESA if they don't live in the U.S. or
its territories? "Listing of penguins under the ESA would make import
or export of the species illegal without an ESA permit," Ward says.
"Such permits are issued only if an activity has a conservation benefit
and it is hoped listing may help focus international attention on the
species conservation needs." In addition, according to the CBD, listing
would also require federal agencies to ensure that any action carried
out, authorized or funded by the U.S. government would not jeopardize
the continued existence of the protected species.
Today I took the first concrete steps towards a new version of www.penguin-place.com
by picking of which template I need for the home page, choosing the
shopping and browsing pages, the category expanders, check out pages,
extensions, etc. All this is quite boring and I’m sure there will be
many dull and frustrating sessions to come with my website developer. I
went through this new website thing only two years ago, but the times
they change quickly these days and the 2007 version penguin place is
already quite dated. So, boring as it might be it’s allot of time,
money and work and attention must be paid. Look for Penguin Place 2009
sometime by mid to late October.
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