Federal wildlife officials have removed the red-cockaded woodpecker from the endangered species list.
The agency decided to downgrade the longtime endangered species to threatened, meaning it no longer faces a serious risk of extinction.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service made the announcement last Thursday.
They said that while the bird's habitats still require active management, red-cockaded woodpecker habitats across the Southeastern United States have increased nearly 40% since 2003, when officials last revised their recovery plan.
In 2003, there were an over 5600 active clusters, which typically house 2 to 4 birds, across eleven states.
Today, there are nearly 7800 active clusters of woodpeckers.
The Apalachicola National Forest is one of their primary habitats.
Red-cockaded woodpeckers were first listed as endangered in 1970 after their population declined to fewer than 10,000 birds scattered across the Southeast.
The decline was almost entirely due to habitat loss, primarily due to logging which left only small and scattered forests.
The agency decided to downgrade the longtime endangered species to threatened, meaning it no longer faces a serious risk of extinction.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service made the announcement last Thursday.
They said that while the bird's habitats still require active management, red-cockaded woodpecker habitats across the Southeastern United States have increased nearly 40% since 2003, when officials last revised their recovery plan.
In 2003, there were an over 5600 active clusters, which typically house 2 to 4 birds, across eleven states.
Today, there are nearly 7800 active clusters of woodpeckers.
The Apalachicola National Forest is one of their primary habitats.
Red-cockaded woodpeckers were first listed as endangered in 1970 after their population declined to fewer than 10,000 birds scattered across the Southeast.
The decline was almost entirely due to habitat loss, primarily due to logging which left only small and scattered forests.
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