Not anymore. For reasons that elude me, the trend today among the "biology" establishment is to push headlong and recklessly into species splitting -- as opposed to species lumping.
Case in point: the marsh wren. The ornithological community seems hellbent on splitting it into two species, even though the two main subspecies FREELY interbreed and produce viable offspring.
Another factoid: Explain to me why the blue-winged teal and the cinammon teal are 100% DNA-matched, yet are two separate "species."
Right now, it's a splitter's world, and I don't understand why.
I liken it to races like in humans. Different genetic features for adaption to different environments. Or just variation in color.
The law allows you to consider HABITAT and RANGE. So, if a bunch of pigeons prefer the playground at School 9, and another bunch prefer the court house downtown, they are, under the law, 2 different species and entitled to whatever protections the laws might allow to keep them from going extinct.
That might include public seizure of private land, prohibition of hunting an "endangered species" with 6 billion members, restrictions on cutting down trees, or planting trees (Fairfax County actually did that ~ guy planted the right trees in the wrong spots, and the wrong trees in the right spots so they sued his britches off and bankrupted him).