[MCN] BREAKING: Conservation Groups Initiate Legal Action Against Feds for Failing to Protect Wolves

[Matthew Koehler]

FOR RELEASE: Wednesday, February 7, 2024

Conservation Groups Initiate Legal Action Against Feds for Failing to
Protect Wolves

BOISE, IDAHO*—*Today, 10 conservation groups filed their 60-day notice of
intent to sue
<https://westernwatersheds.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/2024.02.07_Notice_FWSHQES20210106_WWP.pdf>
the
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (“the Service”) for its failure to list
western wolves under the Endangered Species Act. The groups outlined the
reasons why the Service’s “not warranted” finding, formally published in
today’s Federal Register
<https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2024/02/07/2024-02417/notice-of-request-to-renew-an-approved-information-collection-mechanically-tenderized-beef-products>,
ignores obvious threats to the species, runs contrary to the best available
science, and relies on flawed population models for its determination.

“The current killing regimes in Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming put wolves at
obvious risk of extinction in the foreseeable future, and this core
population is key to wolf survival in the West,” said Erik Molvar, a
wildlife biologist and executive director of Western Watersheds Project.
“Even if the states’ population estimates were defensible–and they aren’t,
according to recent scientific analyses–the feds are underestimating the
extinction agendas of anti-wolf state governments and the small and
tentative state of recovering wolf populations elsewhere in the West.”

The finding confirms that a western U.S. distinct population segment, or
“DPS,” is a valid entity for listing consideration, but then argues on the
basis of a modeling exercise that there is no risk of extinction for wolves
in the West either now or in the foreseeable future.

“The Service’s finding seems to give the green light for states hostile to
wolves to follow suit with Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming’s aggressive killing
regimes if they are eventually delisted and transferred to state management
West wide,” said Kelly Nokes, an attorney with the Western Environmental
Law Center representing the groups. “But wolves have yet to recover across
vast portions of the West, and they exist in only small populations in the
West Coast and Colorado habitats they are slowly reinhabiting. We will
continue to fight for the protections this iconic species needs to be
rightfully restored across the West’s wild landscape—protections that some
states have shown only the Endangered Species Act can really provide.”



At present, wolf populations in California and the Cascade Range of western
Oregon and Washington are far below minimum viable population thresholds,
and Utah, Nevada, and northern Arizona, all of which have historic gray
wolf habitat, have no wolves at all.

In 2023, a study by wolf geneticist Dr. Bridgett vonHoldt and others found
that wolf populations in the northern Rockies are losing genetic variability
<https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/mec.17231> and below
genetic minimum viable population levels at today’s populations.

"Idaho, Montana and Wyoming have become the poster children for what
happens when politics trumps science," said Brooks Fahy, executive director
of Predator Defense. "They are cruelly driving wolves in the northern
Rockies to extinction via wanton shooting, trapping, snaring, even driving
over them with a snowmobile. Science shows us the importance of intact pack
structures. Each family member has a vital role to play and they grieve
each loss."

A second 2023 study
<https://www.cabidigitallibrary.org/doi/10.31220/agriRxiv.2023.00215> by
Dr. Robert Crabtree and others found that the Montana state population
model was badly biased, overestimating total wolf populations by as much as
50 percent. These researchers found that this flawed population model
constitutes a “precariously misleading situation for decision-makers that
threatens wolf populations.” In an earlier analysis, Dr. Scott Creel found
that data
<https://westernwatersheds.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Creel-Wolf-Report_FINAL.pdf>
input
into both the Idaho and Montana population models violate the assumptions
of the models, meaning that population estimations generated by the models
are unreliable. Yet the Service relied on these flawed population estimates
in concluding that wolves in the West are not at risk of extinction.

"The public trusts the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to be the backstop
for imperiled species like the gray wolf,” said Lizzy Pennock, carnivore
coexistence attorney at WildEarth Guardians. “The Service has an obligation
to rely on the best available science in decision-making and should have
seen through Montana’s use of flawed population modeling, not heedlessly
accepted it as true. We deserve better from this agency.”

“It's deeply concerning to hear that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has
decided not to list gray wolves, a sacred species to Native Americans in
the western U.S. under the Endangered Species Act, while ignoring
traditional sacred religious beliefs of traditional Native Americans,” said
Roger Dobson with Protect The Wolves. “It's important to protect these
intelligent and family-oriented predators to maintain ecosystem health, and
to protect Native American sacred religious beliefs. Hopefully, the Service
will take steps to address the problems with their determination before
it's too late for these native wildlife species, before violating
Indigenous religious beliefs.”

“The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service committed to ‘immediately pursue’
emergency Endangered Species Act listing of wolves if any state allowed
unlimited and unregulated killing of wolves, which Idaho has done since
July 1, 2021,” said Suzanne Asha Stone, director of the Idaho-based
International Wildlife Coexistence Network. “The Service has failed to
honor its delisting plan just as the state of Idaho has failed to manage
wolves ‘like mountain lions and black bears’ as they publicly swore to do
before wolf delisting. Aerial gunning of animals, killing pups for
bounties, and widespread traps and deadly snares have no place in
responsible wildlife management today.”

“The Service acknowledged the unethical and unfair chase means and measures
that are slaughtering wolves in Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming, but just gave
them a get out of jail free card for it to continue and worsen,” said KC
York, president and founder of Trap Free Montana. “Furthermore, they base
their dreadful decision on flawed population models overestimating wolf
numbers and ignore research warning of the wolves in the region’s genetic
decline.”

“The Biden administration has once again let down wolves and those
Americans who care about them,” stated George Nickas, executive director of
Wilderness Watch. “It has rejected every request to step forward when
states like Idaho, Wyoming, and Montana have implemented egregiously cruel
and inhumane wolf eradication plans. Idaho proposes to kill 90 percent of
its wilderness wolves, and that doesn’t alarm the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service? It seems that like their state counterparts, federal officials
have lost all reverence or respect for these iconic wilderness animals.
It’s really a sad day.”

*CONTACTS:*

Erik Molvar, Western Watersheds Project, 307-399-7910,
emolvar at westernwatersheds.org

Kelly Nokes, Western Environmental Law Center, 575-613-8051,
nokes at westernlaw.org

Suzanne Asha Stone, International Wildlife Coexistence Network,
208-861-5177 suzanne at wildlifecoexistence.org
<Suzanne at wildlifecoexistence.org>

Brooks Fahy, Predator Defense, 541-937-4261, brooks at predatordefense.org

Roger Dobson, Protect the Wolves, 714-750-6878, roger at protectthewolves.com

KC York, Trap Free Montana, 406-218-1170, info at trapfreemt.org

Lizzy Pennock, WildEarth Guardians, 406-830-8924,
lpennock at wildearthguardians.org

George Nickas, Wilderness Watch, 406-542-2048, gnickas at wildernesswatch.org

Mike Garrity, Alliance for the Wild Rockies, 406-459-5936,
wildrockies at gmail.com

Paul Busch, Friends of the Clearwater, 208-882-9755,
foc at friendsoftheclearwater.org

Julian Matthews, Nimiipuu Protecting Our Environment, 509-330-0023,
protectingnimiipuu at gmail.com


# # #
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://bigskynet.org/pipermail/missoula-community-news_bigskynet.org/attachments/20240207/c98f8e93/attachment.html>