JaguarWIKIMEDIA COMMONS, JOHN VETTERLI
Jaguars once ranged across the US southwest, but a campaign of extermination up until the 1960s eliminated them from the region. In recent decades a few individuals crossed from Mexico into the United States and took up residence in Arizona and New Mexico, but the jaguar’s recolonization in the States is up against a literal barrier—the extensive man-made fences and walls along the US-Mexico border.
Besides the burden posed to US jaguar recolonization, border barriers pose an extraordinary threat to other species and entire ecosystems. Barriers have recently been constructed across a huge scale, and are not subject to any environmental regulation. As such, dozens of environmental protection laws that we rely upon to protect us and our surrounding ecosystems are legally nullified when the ...
