Feds may slash butterfly habitat in half
Environmentalists call federal proposal ‘recipe for extinction’ for endangered Quino checkerspot butterfly
Federal wildlife officials Thursday proposed slashing by almost half the amount of land they designated earlier as “critical habitat” for the Quino checkerspot butterfly, one of Southern California’s most endangered animals.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposed reducing the amount of land targeted for special treatment under the Endangered Species Act from 172,000 acres to 98,000 acres. Officials said the revision was necessary to focus on saving those areas where significant butterfly populations still exist.
As in the past, the agency’s strategy for saving the insect focuses solely on Southwest Riverside County and the Otay Mountain area of southern San Diego County —- the only known places where the butterfly still lives… [more]
Checkerspots are prairie/grassland butterflies. They thrive in oak savannas maintained by frequent, regular, seasonal anthropogenic fire. The lack of land stewardship leads to brush (chaparral) build-up and the decline of oaks, lupines, and grassy habitat. That is what’s limiting checkerspot populations, not concrete. The recent fires may actually be of some accidental benefit to the butterflies.