[beerandt]

The increased hardship for landowners post 1973 is fact. The endangered species act turns affected land into a liability instead of being an asset.

The original response was that if they were able to enjoy the use of their land before 1973, then there was no harm done.

1) Which doesn't mean the harm/hardship didn't come into play in 1973 once the law was passed. It did. The land would have lost significant value overnight by being declared endangered species habitat.

2) The research showed that the land is now, in fact, a National Wildlife Refuge. The government acquired it. That rarely happens in a fully voluntary way with full compensation, but I don't claim to know the circumstances here.

3) My speculation was merely that harm could have also been done before 1973, which has been turned into somewhat of a straw man.

3b) And I only included that speculation because it's applicable to the state of affairs today, because if the same thing happens to any generic landowner post-1973, it's no longer speculation. Your property value becomes significantly diminished.

[Stupulous]

I think the issue here is just that

>the landowner of that 1944 sighting

can be read in two ways. I assume you meant the person who owned that land when it was taken away, and that's how I read it. But it's not unreasonable to interpret it as the person who owned it at the time of the sighting.