Barely 100 red wolves exist in the wild today. Yet, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service is being pressured by the state in which they live, North Carolina, to walk away from the unfinished job of bringing them back. The USFWS could make a decision in the next month–please take action today and urge that they continue recovery efforts for red wolves!
Members of both the U.S. House and the Senate are are preparing legislation to strip wolves of their federal protections in states including Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. Deciding when to remove Endangered Species Act protections is not the role of politicians in Congress and would set a dangerous precedent — weakening this crucial conservation law.
The U.S. Senate is again considering a twice-failed giveaway to trophy hunters and other special interests that would: a) keep the EPA from doing its job by regulating lead, b) open the door for the importation of sport-hunted polar bears, c) require federal agencies to open up millions of acres of public lands to hunting and trapping, and d) direct land managers to build or expand shooting ranges on public lands, which would increase lead in the landscape. Ask your Senators to oppose the… Continue reading
A little known and decades old Department of Justice policy is protecting the killers of endangered grizzly bears, whooping cranes, California condors, and wolves. The so-called “McKittrick Policy” was enacted after a Montana man gunned down a wolf and later claimed he had thought he was firing on a dog. He was prosecuted, though the Department of Justice (DOJ) later decided to accept his self-exoneration by claimed ignorance and has clung to that policy of inaction for years. Endangered species… Continue reading
The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (USFWS) is set to finalize their plan to kick wolves off of the endangered species list any day. Recently, the Service’s Northern Rockies Wolf Coordinator said, “We think wolves should be delisted, they should be managed by states.” Director Dan Ashe has said repeatedly, that he views wolf recovery as a success and strongly favors turning the job over to the states. Despite the Service’s eagerness to walk away, their job isn’t finished and… Continue reading
A leaked document obtained by ESC member group, the Center for Biological Diversity, shows that U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (FWS) scientists have been ordered to reverse their previous conclusions that wolverines should be protected under the Endangered Species Act. This is political interference in protecting imperiled species at its worst. Wolverines number less than 300 in the lower 48 states and are increasingly threatened by warming habitat. Just last year, FWS scientists concluded that protections were needed–even the Regional… Continue reading
More than one thousand wolves have been killed by trappers in Montana, Wyoming, Idaho, Wisconsin, and Minnesota since 2011. Unlike hunting, trapping is loosely regulated. In states that allow trapping, wolves can be left for days on end. Trapping is thoroughly indiscriminate. Endangered and protected species like bald and golden eagles, wolverines, Canada lynx, and countless others are killed annually by trapping. Even household pets are killed by this outdated, cruel practice. In Montana, lethal traps can be set a… Continue reading
The recent slaughter of Kenya’s biggest elephant, Satao, underscores the urgent need to end the ivory trade. The Obama Administration took initial steps to do so earlier this year, but more action is needed. As the world’s second largest ivory market, the United States has the ability and responsibility to reduce the demand for ivory. Simply removing the widely-abused antiquity exemption would make trading in ivory obtained through poaching much more burdensome. Elephants can’t sustain this level of poaching. President… Continue reading
Following the removal of Endangered Species Act protections from gray wolves in 2011, the state of Idaho has waged an increasingly ugly assault against these animals. Just this year, it passed into law the setting aside of nearly half a million dollars to exterminate 500 wolves. In December 2013, it hired a trapper to go into a federal wilderness area to kill two wolf packs, and it has announced that it intends to kill more. In February, the state gunned… Continue reading
The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Wildlife Services operates largely out of public view and with little oversight, killing more than 5 million animals every year. At an annual cost of $30 million to taxpayers, USDA’s Wildlife Services has become the nation’s most prolific killer of wildlife.
