By Nneka Nwogwugwu
The US government is declaring extinct ivory-billed woodpecker and 22 other birds, fish and other species.
Government scientists say they have exhausted efforts to find these 23 birds, warning climate change, on top of other pressures, could make such disappearances more common as a warming planet adds to the dangers facing imperiled plants and wildlife.
The ivory-billed woodpecker was perhaps the best-known species that will be pronounced extinct on Wednesday by the US Fish and Wildlife Service.
It went out stubbornly and with fanfare, making unconfirmed appearances in recent decades that ignited a frenzy of ultimately fruitless searches in the swamps of Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Florida.
Others, such as the flat pigtoe, a freshwater mussel from the southeastern US, were identified in the wild only a few times and never seen again, meaning that by the time they got a name, they were fading from existence.
The factors behind the disappearances vary – too much development, water pollution, logging, competition from invasive species, birds killed for feathers and animals captured by private collectors. In each case, humans were the ultimate cause.
Another thing they share: All 23 were thought to have at least a slim chance of survival when added to the endangered species list beginning in the 1960s.
Only 11 species have been removed due to extinction in the nearly half-century since the Endangered Species Act was signed into law, Aljazeera reports.