According to a state court in California, bees can be legally classified as fish.
The decision, announced Tuesday, allows the state to list bee species as endangered or endangered under the California Endangered Species Act (ESA), using the fish category – as “fish” is defined as including invertebrates.
“The day is great for California earth bees,” said Pamela Flick of Defenders of Wildlife, one of the defendants in the case, in a press release.
“Today’s decision confirms that the protection of the California Endangered Species Act applies to all endangered native species in our state and is critical to conserving our state’s known biodiversity.
According to the California ESA, an ‘endangered species’ could be a bird, mammal, fish, amphibian, reptile or plant. However, this definition may omit other endangered species, such as insects.
On the other hand, the California Fish and Games Code defines “fish” as including wild fish, mollusks, crustaceans, invertebrates and amphibians. This seems to stretch the conversational frontier of “fish” – few people would describe cancer as a fish, for example.
But the expanded definition allows the state to protect, for example, California freshwater shrimp, a species that lives only in California and is endangered.
The court was left to decide whether bees were also considered “invertebrates” according to the state’s definition of “fish” – the only place in the California Fish and Games Code that mentions “invertebrates”.
Habitat seems to be the big difference here, as most people think that fish live in water and bees live on land. As the court says, “Fish, as is commonly understood in everyday language, of course live in aquatic environments.”
But, he added, the state’s definition of “fish” includes at least one terrestrial invertebrate – a snail with Trinity bristles.
Reversing the lower court’s ruling, a U.S. court judge ruled that the definition of “fish” here should not be limited to aquatic wildlife and that terrestrial invertebrates such as bees could be listed by law.
This case arose because the state began listing four species of land bees under the California Endangered Species Act before being prosecuted for various agricultural interests. Previously, the plaintiffs had a lower instance.
Insects like bees face a variety of threats, from pesticides to the climate crisis. According to the nonprofit Xerces Society, an insect protection group and another defendant in the case, 28% of North American earth bees are on the verge of extinction.
Worldwide, warming and habitat loss are destroying insect populations – which could have serious environmental consequences for things like pollination and food sources for other wildlife.
“The court ruling allows California to protect some of its most endangered pollinators, a step that will contribute to the resilience of the state’s local ecosystems and farms,” Sarina Jepsen of the Xerces community said in a press release.
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