Urge Fish & Wildlife Service to Protect the Hellbender

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Urge Fish & Wildlife Service to Protect the Hellbender

Director of Fish & Wildlife Service

The Eastern hellbender, our nation's largest salamander, is facing an alarming crisis. Its habitat and population are plummeting across much of its original range—from the mid-Atlantic and Midwestern states to the southeastern corner of the country. Immediate action is crucial to prevent its further decline and possible extinction. Sign the petition to demand the Fish & Wildlife Service protect the Eastern Hellbender!

Even in the remaining pockets where the Eastern hellbender can still be found, like the Susquehanna River basin in north-central Pennsylvania, a staggering 95 percent of its habitat has already vanished. Zero hellbenders have been found in Maryland the past 2 years.

Despite this, the US Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) failed to provide protections under the Endangered Species Act in 2019. In response to our lawsuit challenging that decision, the FWS is now reconsidering the denial. This offers a critical opportunity to push again for the protection the hellbender desperately needs to survive. Now is your chance to make a difference and demand action!

The hellbender needs pristine, clean water to survive. It breathes through its skin, and relies on large, flat rocks on the stream bottoms for its habitat. Because of their high sensitivity to pollution and changes in erosion and sedimentation, they serve as important indicators of water quality and sediment concentration.

To ensure the next generation gets to meet the largest salamander, sign on today to protect the Eastern Hellbender!

P.S. Read more about the Eastern Hellbender through this amazing e-magazine from Middle Susquehanna Riverkeeper here.

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Waterkeepers Chesapeake

To: Director of Fish & Wildlife Service
From: [Your Name]

I urge you to protect hellbenders under the Endangered Species Act.

The Eastern hellbender, our country's largest salamander species, continues to see large-scale declines in habitat and populations in much of its original range, which includes the mid-Atlantic to the Midwestern states as well as the southeastern corner of the country.

Even in areas where it still can be found in pockets, such as the Susquehanna River basin in north central Pennsylvania, experts suggest 95 percent of its habitat is gone.

The hellbender requires clean water. It breathes directly through its skin, wrinkles on its sides increase surface area allowing it to be extremely efficient at absorbing oxygen, but also pollutants. This unfortunately means the species can not survive in impaired waterways yet makes it a vitally important clean water indicator species..

Hellbenders should have been protected years ago, and new science indicates they're even more vulnerable than was previously thought. Hellbenders are sensitive to rising water temperatures and increased flooding and drought driven by climate change. The recent ecological devastation in North Carolina and Tennessee from Hurricane Helene is an example of how the hellbender’s habitat can be destroyed. Hellbenders require large flat rock structures on the bottom of streams to survive and are harmed by sedimentation from mining, logging, and pipeline construction. Water pollution from pesticides and road runoff is increasing, and urban development and the rapid construction of vacation homes in rural places is further degrading water quality.

Water-quality degradation increases the salamanders' stress levels, making them more vulnerable to disease outbreaks. Juvenile survival is also reduced in degraded waterways. Many hellbender populations are now small and isolated and consist of only older individuals living in extinction debt, indicating that their overall status is going to continue to decline.

To recover, hellbenders need habitat protection, a comprehensive recovery plan, and ongoing funding. Endangered Species Act protection would bring all that, as well as coordinated oversight of augmentation programs to ensure that the species' distinct genetic lineages aren't being compromised

Hellbenders are a sentinel of clean water; protecting them would protect thousands of other vulnerable freshwater species. The longer these salamanders wait for protection, the more difficult and expensive it will be to ensure their recovery.

Please give hellbenders protection under the Endangered Species Act to avoid extinction.