Save the Frankenfish! Is the snakehead endangered?

AuthorHowley, Kerry
PositionNorthern snakehead fish

The Northern snakehead fish is a little different from the 388 animal species currently listed as endangered: Federal guidelines say the invasive Asian species is a major threat to native wildlife, and the Virginia state government asks anglers who find one to "kill it humanely with a blow to the head." Nicknamed the Frankenfish, the snakehead is capable of breathing air, slithering over land, and surviving three days outside the water, magnifying its ability to move from one habitat to another. None of this deterred Alan Gardner, a commissioner in Utah's Washington County and vociferous critic of the 1973 Endangered Species Act, from filing an application to get the species listed under the act last December.

Gardner and 12 other officials from across the West say environmental groups are using the Endangered Species Act to lock up land from development rather than save threatened species, and they want some reform from Washington. To make their point, they decided to stick up for an unpopular animal in Washington's backyard. The highly predatory snakehead whipped up a panic when it was first spotted slithering through Maryland waters in 2003.

"We just thought it fit the Endangered Species Act as well as some of the other species that have been listed," Gardner says. "It's...

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