Written by EMMA B. MINCKS on December 29, 2023 

By EMMA B. MINCKS
Source New Mexico
The Mexican gray wolf named Asha roamed for months around New Mexico and parts of Arizona.
She’s now in captivity with two male wolves at the Sevilleta Wolf Management Facility in La Joya, N.M., where U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service officials want her to mate.
Her journey and capture is showing division between federal wildlife managers who want to ensure Asha stays safe from poachers — or people protecting livestock — and conservationists who insist a free roaming Asha is best restoring the Mexican gray wolf population.
A federal judge could ultimately settle the matter.
In 2022, the Center for Biological Diversity and the Defenders of Wildlife co-filed a complaint with the U.S. District Court of Arizona stating that the federal wolf management system does not follow the National Environmental Policy Act or the Endangered Species Act, which prioritizes natural habitat in addition to population growth.
The complaint directs the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to “explore more conservation-oriented alternatives” and use updated scientific research in relation to Mexican gray wolf recovery.
A judge is still considering the matter that could change federal policy and potentially release Asha back into the wild.
Southwest program director and conservation advocate for the Defenders of Wildlife Bryan Bird said, “Northern New Mexico and Valles Caldera where Asha was heading is really a perfect habitat for wolves, and has a low livestock grazing density.”
The Defenders of Wildlife supports roaming for wildlife because of its ecological benefits.
Concerns about Asha’s safety arose when observers realized there were no additional known wolves in the area where she was traversing north of Interstate 40 in western New Mexico.

Federal law clearly states capture
According to revised federal policy for Mexican wolf wildlife management, Asha was always going to be captured if she went across certain boundaries. The law states that “Mexican wolves that move outside of the geographic boundaries of the MWEPA are fully endangered and the allowable forms of take provided for in this rule to address conflict situations are not available.”
On Dec. 9, Asha was captured east of Cuba, N.M. She was then transported by helicopter to the Sevilleta Wolf Management Facility, where biologists said “she is healthy and doing well.”
Asha was seen roaming in New Mexico days before her recent capture. She showed no signs of returning to the wolf recovery area on her own, which led federal officials to decide that recapture was in her best interest.
State wildlife officials said the capture could ensure that Asha is not killed.
“As much as the individual wolves capture the attention and the hearts and the minds of the people, we are really focused on reaching our recovery goals,” said Aislinn Maestas, spokesperson with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “How do we reduce mortalities and reduce conflict with livestock? These are the issues we are focusing on every day.”
Maestas said that federal officials are concerned Asha would mate with other non-wolf animals. She reiterated that if Asha is to mate, it would be better for her and the population health of the Mexican gray wolves as a species.
Because Mexican gray wolves are highly endangered, Asha’s search for a mate has given wildlife management at Sevilleta hopes for breeding and increasing population numbers.
According to Maestas, wildlife management is working around the clock to increase wild wolf population numbers. At least 242 Mexican gray wolves are counted in the wild by federal officials, per 2022 statistics. The 2023 count is expected to be released in January 2024.
She said that the wolves are counted each year through cameras, tracking collars, and helicopter searches.
Officials hope that #F2754, Asha’s official federal designation, will “have a partner, produce pups and contribute to recovery” efforts. Their goal is to increase the wild population to a minimum of 320 wolves.
Brady McGee, the Mexican gray wolf recovery coordinator with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, said that recapturing Asha gives her and potential future pups the best chance of survival and will help increase the Mexican gray wolf population.
Should she be allowed to go her own way?
Asha is being monitored in Sevilleta along with two wolves that she previously didn’t want to mate with, wildlife officials said.
For federal officials to meet their goal of getting at least 320 Mexican gray wolves in the wild, they will need one of the males, both brothers, to attract Asha to mate.
“We are observing her to see which one she prefers,” Maestas said.
But she’s made her choice clear, supporters to release Asha argue, and should be allowed to find the mate she prefers in the wild.
Bird and some wildlife advocates hoped that Asha might find a mate with one of the gray wolves roaming Colorado, which he said could more greatly improve the genetic variation of the New Mexican gray wolf subspecies.
Colorado Parks and Wildlife officials released three male and two wolves from Oregon into the wilderness around Grand Junction on Dec. 18. This follows a directive Colorado voters passed in 2020 to increase the wolf population in the region.
“I think we’re all really disappointed right now,” Bird said regarding Asha’s capture. “There are tools available for peaceful coexistence for predators at the top of the food chain.”
He said that if people are more educated about wolves, it will prevent future problems. It is illegal to kill a wolf in New Mexico; penalties can include a $50,000 fine and jail time.
Maestas defends Asha’s capture, and said the management program in Sevilleta has a successful track record “increasing the health and genetic diversity of the wolf population in New Mexico and northern Arizona.”
Federal officials do plan to relocate Asha again in the spring or summer next year, hopefully with her pups, Maestas said.
Bird, however, argued that current management rules impede wolves’ natural instincts in many cases.

“Down to the fish, birds, and plant life,” he argued, animals need to be given space to follow those instincts to make a beneficial impact to ecosystems. “The issue really is allowing them more habitat range into and not artificially or politically limiting them.”

Photo: Golli. An Icelandic falcon.

• Steindor Gretar Jonsson
• January 2, 2024
• Nature, x News

The falcon population in Iceland has never been smaller, at least not since research into it began in 1981. Bird flu is the likely cause, experts at the Icelandic Institute of Natural History told RÚV.

The gyrfalcon is the largest of the falcon species and its Icelandic population is genetically unique compared to other populations in countries across Arctic coasts and tundra. Its image was featured on the crest of the Icelandic coat of arms until 1919 and Iceland’s highest honour, the medal of The Order of the Falcon, is named after it and bestowed upon citizens and foreigners by the president of Iceland.

Only one case of bird flu discovered

For over 40 years, the Icelandic Institute of Natural History has monitored falcons in an area of over 5,000 square kilometres in the northeast of Iceland. Since research began, the population has never been smaller and has dwindled significantly in the last three years. In only 38 of 88 known nests did experts discover nestlings. Never before have there been as many empty nests in the northeast area. Fluctuations in population size are not unusual, however, and are linked to the population of ptarmigan in Iceland, the gyrfalcon’s main prey.

Experts still say this drop is worrying. The likeliest explanation is that more birds succumbed to bird flu than originally estimated. Only one case of bird flu in falcons was discovered in Iceland in 2022, but many more falcons have been found dead with bird flu as the suspected cause.

Asheville Citizen TimesFollow

Opinion by Brad Gutierrez • 1d

Brad Gutierrez© Brad Gutierrez

As the tumultuous year of 2023 comes to an end and we look forward to a potentially even more raucous 2024, it seems like a good time to remind ourselves what are the foundations of a functioning society. I call them the three C’s: civility, compassion, compromise. I would argue that, in many corners of this country, we have abandoned those three principles in recent years. What is at stake is the very soul of this nation and what it means to be the “United” States of America.

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Civility begins and ends with the simple act of treating other people the way in which you would like to be treated. This applies equally to how we act toward one another and how we speak with one another. The anonymity of the internet and the pervasiveness of social media provides the opportunity for people to say things to one another they would never dream of repeating face to face. Anyone who has engaged in a social media discussion on a social, economic or political topic knows only too well how quickly passions flare and civility disappears. Reliance upon echo chamber rants fomented by media personalities overshadow any effort to focus on evidence-based facts.

The likes of the late Rush Limbaugh and Donald Trump have normalized personal ad hominem attacks on those with whom they disagree rather than debating the intellectual merits of their respective positions. The “United” in our national identity presumes a common agenda to pursue that which benefits the country as a whole. This cannot be achieved if the civility of the day casts those who disagree with us as enemies of the state rather than sincere intellectual sparring partners. 

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Compassion commands us to put ourselves in another’s shoes and recognize that everyone is carrying some burden, be it big or small. At its core, compassion is caring about our fellow human being. In a civilized society, compassion should result, at the very least, in public policy not imposing undue burdens on the lives of its citizenry. To achieve this outcome politicians and the voters who elect them need to look beyond their own particular situation and imagine what they might need if their own lives stumbled.

Recent events in Texas and Florida demonstrate the utter failure of government to fulfill its role. No one can argue that Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton exercised a scintilla of compassion when he went to the Texas Supreme Court to overturn a lower court’s ruling that would have allowed a woman carrying a fatally defected fetus to receive an abortion. The Supreme Court’s decision to side with Paxton forced the woman to leave Texas to receive the medical care she required. Similarly, in Florida a woman was forced to carry a fetus to term even though it was medically known it would not survive outside the womb. The parents were forced to watch their newborn fight for every breath during its 90-minute life.

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Compassion in society is never achieved when policy questions devolve into a dog-eat-dog environment that prioritizes an individual sense of propriety over the collective will. 

To counter our current us versus them national existence, compromise has to experience a rebirth. Compromise is the key to nurturing a civilized society in such a diverse continental nation as the United States. The very essence of compromise is the need for everyone to cede some element of their preferred position in order for the interests of the greater whole to be realized. Unfortunately, we have seen all too frequently the unwillingness of state legislatures and the U.S. Congress to honor the call for compromise in recent years. The result has been virtually no progress on key issues around immigration, health care, social entitlement reform or tax policy. No political party or its supporters should come to the table expecting to win every battle with all preferences intact. 

Civilized society, particularly one that espouses the democratic traditions of the United States, cannot survive intact if its politicians and citizenry cannot or will not engage in the political process in a civil way prioritizing compassion and compromise. “We” has to replace “us” and “them.” If the status quo continues, these “united” states will be little more than 50 geographically contiguous jurisdictions sharing a red, white and blue flag devoid of any meaning worth celebrating. It is up to each of us to determine where this journey ends. 

More: Opinion: Too many Americans apathetic about voting: nearly 40% don’t show up at polls

More: Opinion: We deserve a better Republican choice in 2024 presidential elections

Brad Gutierrez, Ph.D., is a retired U.S. Air Force combat pilot, professor of political science, military diplomat, and senior public policy civil servant. He is currently a woodworker and nonfiction writer based in Marshall.

This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: Opinion: Abandoning 3 key principles threatens the soul of the United States