Examples of wildlife displaced by spreading urbanization abound. The California gnatcatcher, once common to southern California's coastal sage scrub, may wind up no more than the object of a taxidermist's pride in a museum display case. Florida's sprawl has put a death grip on the Florida panther, now thought to number only a few dozen individuals in the wild. And Las Vegas, one of the nation's fastest-growing cities, has pushed the desert tortoise to the brink of extinction.
Meanwhile, the species able to adapt to the human landscape--raccoons, deer, crows, and geese--proliferate in newly settled areas. These animals get labeled as nuisance species and are often harassed, trapped and relocated, poisoned, or shot.
The most recent natural-resources inventory report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture states that real-estate development in this country grew to 2.2 million acres a year between 1992 and 1997. That's more than 6,000 acres a day, or 250 acres an hour, 24 hours a day, every day of the year. The simple equation is that more people on more land equals less wildlife habitat--with more species on the verge of extinction and increasing conflicts between humans and wildlife.