For decades, federal rules said significant habitat destruction could count as “harm” when it actually killed or injured protected wildlife. A rule finalized in July 2026 deletes that definition, narrowing a key protection for animals and the places they need to survive.
This explorer brings together 1,643 distinct species represented in current U.S. Endangered Species Act listings — 1,594 from Fish & Wildlife Service data and 49 marine species managed by NOAA Fisheries.
Every dot is one species. Hover to find its name, arrange the collection by group, status, or agency, or search for one directly.
More than half are plants. The rule examined here concerns the ESA's prohibition on the “take” of fish and wildlife, so its direct effect falls on the animals in this collection.
The ESA makes it illegal to “take” endangered wildlife, and similar protections apply to many threatened animals. Congress defined take to include harm, but never defined harm itself.
Since 1975 — and in its current form since 1981 — Fish & Wildlife Service regulations have said that significant habitat modification can count as harm when it actually kills or injures wildlife by disrupting essential behavior such as breeding, feeding, or sheltering. NOAA adopted a similar definition in 1999.
The new rule removes both definitions and adopts a much narrower reading. The agencies now say habitat modification or degradation does not qualify as “take,” and that take requires an affirmative act directed immediately and intentionally at a particular animal.
Significant habitat modification or degradation can count as “harm” when it actually kills or injures wildlife by significantly impairing essential behavioral patterns.
The regulatory definition is removed. The word “harm” remains in the Act, but the agencies say habitat modification or degradation does not qualify as “take.”
The Endangered Species Act itself is still in force. Species listings, critical-habitat designations, recovery programs, and existing permits are not erased by this rule.
Federal agencies must still ensure that actions they authorize, fund, or carry out do not jeopardize listed species or destroy or adversely modify designated critical habitat.
Each outer square represents a species' historic range — or a particular habitat it depends on. The filled square shows the remaining share reported by the source. Because the figures come from different sources, years, and measures — total range, a particular ecosystem, or reef cover — they are not directly comparable, and the ordering here is not a ranking.
The figures do not all measure the same thing. Some track total geographic range; others track a particular ecosystem or habitat type. Together, they show how little room some species have left.
The new gap may matter most on private land where no federal permit, funding, or other federal action is involved. Critical-habitat protections still apply to federal actions, but generally do not restrict purely private activity without that federal connection.
About the figures. The filled square is scaled by area, so its size matches the reported remaining percentage. The sources report total historic range for the wolves, grizzly bear, Florida panther, and Attwater's prairie-chicken; a particular habitat type for the red-cockaded woodpecker, Florida scrub-jay, ocelot, and northern spotted owl; and reef cover for elkhorn coral. These are snapshots drawn from different sources and years, not a standardized ranking. Grizzly bears and gray wolves have expanded from some historic lows, though both remain absent from much of their former range. Full sources appear below.
None of these recoveries had a single cause. Habitat protection worked alongside captive breeding, reintroduction, pesticide bans, hunting restrictions, disease control, and years of monitoring.
Endangered Species Act protection was part of each recovery, giving species time, space, and coordinated support to rebuild.
The new rule does not erase those recoveries. It removes one way the ESA has restricted habitat destruction that kills or injures protected wildlife.
New definition scheduled to take effect September 14, 2026
Each chart runs from a documented low to the latest available count. Four species shown here — the bald eagle, peregrine falcon, Aleutian cackling goose, and island fox — recovered enough to be removed from the federal list. Counts are wild individuals unless a card notes nesting pairs.
The Interior and Commerce Departments argue that the old definition stretched the word “take” beyond what Congress wrote.
In their view, it turned indirect habitat effects into federal liability, left landowners unsure when a permit was required, and added unnecessary costs to farming, ranching, construction, fishing, energy projects, and other land uses.
The new rule, they say, restores a clearer boundary: acts directed at protected animals remain prohibited, while habitat is addressed through other parts of the ESA.
The economic costs were real in some communities. A 2021 study estimated that the northern spotted owl's 1990 listing and the protections that followed reduced timber employment in the Pacific Northwest and northern California by roughly 16,000 to 32,000 jobs, depending on the comparison method — while still finding losses far below the highest industry forecasts at the time.
Critics argue that this legal distinction does not reflect how habitat loss kills wildlife.
A nesting tree can be felled, a spawning stream drained, or a migration corridor cut off without anyone touching the animal itself. Under the old rule, habitat damage counted as harm only when it actually killed or injured wildlife. It was never a blanket ban on land use.
Other habitat protections remain, but they do not cover the same ground. Critical-habitat review generally requires federal action, funding, or a federal permit.
The ESA's record is also hard to dismiss: fewer than one percent of listed species have gone extinct after receiving its protection.
A coalition of conservation groups filed a federal lawsuit on July 14, challenging the new rule as contrary to the ESA and decades of legal precedent.
The public comment period is closed. The rule is scheduled to take effect on September 14, 2026, and a federal lawsuit is already underway.
Congress can respond. Courts can block or overturn the rule. States can strengthen their own habitat protections.
Habitat is home. What the law protects next is still being decided.