<div dir="ltr"><div><span style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial">Unfortunately, this is the grim, barbaric, and unethical reality of the type of state 'management' of gray wolves that Montana Senator Jon Tester unleashed with his undemocratic rider in 2011 that removed gray wolves in the northern Rockies from federal Endangered Species Act protections. Now Senator Steve Daines is trying to do the same thing with threatened grizzly bears, just as we warned we happened nearly 10 years ago. <span style="color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia"><br></span></span></div><div><span style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial"><span style="color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia"><br></span></span></div><div><span style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial"><span style="color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia"><br></span></span></div><div><span style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial"><span style="color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia">For Release: September 10, 2020</span><br><br><div style="color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia;text-align:center"><font size="4"><b>Slaughtered Wolf Pups and Maimed Wolves in Idaho Demonstrate Effects of Federal Delisting </b></font></div><div style="text-align:center"><span style="color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia"><font size="4"><b><br></b></font></span></div><span style="color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia"><div style="text-align:center"><font size="4"><b><i>A single individual may now kill 30 wolves per year in Idaho</i></b></font></div></span></span></div><span style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial;color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia"><div><span style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial"><br></span></div>CONTACTS: <br>Samantha Bruegger, WildEarth Guardians, (970) 363-4191<br>Andrea Zaccardi, Center for Biological Diversity, (303) 854-7748<br>Zoe Hanley, Defenders of Wildlife, (509) 774-7357<br>Brooks Fahy, Predator Defense, (541) 937-4261<br>Talasi Brooks, Western Watersheds Project, (208) 336-9077<br><br><b>BOISE —</b></span><span style="color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia">As the US Fish and Wildlife Service announced last week that the removal of gray wolves from Endangered Species Act protection nationwide is “very imminent,” recent records from Idaho show the ugly face of state wolf management.</span><p style="box-sizing:border-box;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial;line-height:1.7em;max-width:1000px;color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia;margin:0px 0px 1em;padding:0px;height:0px"></p><p style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px auto 1em;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial;line-height:1.7em;max-width:1000px;color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia">Since January 1, 2020, hunters, trappers, and state and federal agencies have killed at least 35 wolf pups in Idaho, some weighing less than 16 pounds and likely only 4 to 6 weeks old.  Wolves shattered teeth trying to bite traps, died of hyperthermia in traps set by the federal agency Wildlife Services, and were gunned down in aerial control actions.  And, from July 1, 2019 to June 30, 2020 570 wolves were killed in Idaho, representing nearly 60 percent of the 2019 year-end population.</p><p style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px auto 1em;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial;line-height:1.7em;max-width:1000px;color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia">“Idaho’s reckless, violent, massacre of wolves and their pups not only showcases the worst of state wildlife ‘management,’ it shines a light on the darkest corners of humanity. To maim, bludgeon, and actively seek to destroy a native animal, that is familial and social by nature, is disgusting,” said Samantha Bruegger, Wildlife Coexistence Campaigner with WildEarth Guardians. “Tragically, the Idaho narrative clearly shows to the rest of the country what can happen to wolves when they are delisted from the Endangered Species Act.”</p><p style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px auto 1em;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial;line-height:1.7em;max-width:1000px;color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia">About 400 wolves have been killed each year in Idaho for the past several years, and the 570 wolves killed in 2019-2020 is record-breaking, perhaps reflecting IDFG’s policies incentivizing wolf hunting and trapping. This level of population disruption leads to population-level effects among wolves, including <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20927363/" style="color:rgb(58,156,193);box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background:transparent;text-decoration-line:none" target="_blank">population decline</a>, a <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28555834/" style="color:rgb(58,156,193);box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background:transparent;text-decoration-line:none" target="_blank">younger, destabilized population</a>, and ultimately <a href="https://www.capitalpress.com/ag_sectors/livestock/record-number-of-wolf-attacks-on-livestock-reported-in-idaho/article_efe15c0e-c51d-11e9-ada0-3768ab589935.html" style="color:rgb(58,156,193);box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background:transparent;text-decoration-line:none" target="_blank">more livestock conflicts</a>.</p><p style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px auto 1em;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial;line-height:1.7em;max-width:1000px;color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia">IDFG recently announced it had awarded approximately $21,000 in challenge grants to the north Idaho-based Foundation 4 Wildlife Management, which “reimburses” wolf trappers up to $1,000 per wolf killed.  A single individual may now kill up to 30 wolves under IDFG hunting and trapping rules—a new increase from the 20 wolves previously allowed.</p><p style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px auto 1em;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial;line-height:1.7em;max-width:1000px;color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia">“There is nothing scientific about the Idaho Department of Fish and Game’s management, which seems to be guided by anti-wolf hysteria among some members of the ranching and hunting communities, rather than any sort of conservation ethic,” said Talasi Brooks of Western Watersheds Project.  “It is cruel, morally and ethically reprehensible, and set through a process which denies conservation interests any voice.”</p><p style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px auto 1em;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial;line-height:1.7em;max-width:1000px;color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia">“It’s sickening to see how wolves have been slaughtered in Idaho once federal Endangered Species Act protections were lifted,” said Andrea Zaccardi, a senior attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity. “If wolves are delisted nationwide, this cruelty could extend to all wolves within our country’s borders. This treatment of our nation’s wildlife is unacceptable.”</p><p style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px auto 1em;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial;line-height:1.7em;max-width:1000px;color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia">“Idaho is not ‘managing’ wolves<span style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background:transparent"> </span>but is attempting to reduce the state wolf population to the brink of federal relisting while jeopardizing region-wide recovery of a native carnivore. This inhumane mass killing of wolves abuses federal recovery objectives and is one of many reasons why Endangered Species Act protection is so important for gray wolves nationwide,” said Zoe Hanley of Defenders of Wildlife.</p><p style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:0px auto 1em;padding:0px;border:0px;outline:0px;vertical-align:baseline;background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-size:initial;background-repeat:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial;line-height:1.7em;max-width:1000px;color:rgb(55,55,55);font-family:Georgia">“It is beyond tragic that Idaho has become the poster child for animal cruelty through their pathological destruction of wolves,” said Brooks Fahy, executive director of Predator Defense. “I find it hard to believe that most Idahoans would approve of this indefensible carnage being carried out on behalf of zealots in the ranching and hunting community. Time and again we see that removing Endangered Species Act protection and allowing states to manage wolves generally leads to mass slaughter.”<br></p><div style="text-align:center"># # #</div></div>