WASHINGTON, DC, December 17, 2013 (ENS) – The public comment period closed today on a proposal by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to remove federal protections for all gray wolves across the country. Close to one million Americans stated their opposition to the plan – the largest number of comments ever submitted on a federal decision involving endangered species.

Also today, conservation groups challenged as “premature” the Service’s removal of federal Endangered Species Act protections for gray wolves in Wyoming. Arguments were heard at the U.S. District Court in Washington this morning.
wolves
The court’s decision will determine whether Endangered Species Act protections will be restored to gray wolves in Wyoming unless and until state officials develop a stronger wolf conservation plan.

The delisting of wolves in Wyoming turned wolf management over to the state, which the plaintiff groups say is “promoting unlimited wolf killing across more than 80 percent of Wyoming and providing inadequate protections for wolves in the remainder.” Since the delisting last year, 119 wolves have been killed in Wyoming.

Twelve small areas of Wyoming are designated as wolf hunt areas where wolves are classified as trophy game animals, quotas are set, and hunters who kill wolves must present the skulls and skins to state wildlife officials.

In all other areas of the state wolves are designated as predatory animals. There, no license is required to kill a wolf, and there are no closed seasons or bag limits. Anyone who takes a wolf in these areas must report the kill to a state wildlife official within 10 days. Presenting the skull and pelt is not required.

The conservationists claim that Wyoming “has a history of hostile and extreme anti-wolf laws and policies, which in the past caused the Fish and Wildlife Service to deny Wyoming the authority to manage wolves in the state.” But the Service reversed that position in 2012 and delisted wolves in Wyoming after state officials made what conservationists describe as “cosmetic” changes to the Wyoming wolf management laws.

“The extreme hostility toward wolves demonstrated by some who participated in this fall’s Wyoming wolf hunt shows why adequate legal protections are especially important for wolves in Wyoming,” said Earthjustice attorney Tim Preso, who argued the case on behalf of Defenders of Wildlife, Natural Resources Defense Council, the Sierra Club and the Center for Biological Diversity.

“The questions asked by Judge Jackson at today’s hearing got to the heart of the issue,” said Jason Rylander, senior staff attorney with Defenders of Wildlife. “The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service cannot ensure sustainable populations of wolves in Wyoming when the state’s laws allow so much unregulated wolf killing.”

“If allowed to stand, Wyoming’s current wolf management plan will set wolf recovery back decades, and potentially take wolves back to the brink of extinction,” said Bonnie Rice of Sierra Club’s Our Wild America campaign.

“Wolves in Wyoming must have federal protection until the state develops a management plan that treats wolves as valued native wildlife, not vermin that can be killed by any means without a license in over 80 percent of the state,” said Rice.

But the Wyoming delisting is just one state’s experience. The Fish and Wildlife Service is proposing to remove federal Endangered Species Act protections for gray wolves across the country.

“Americans overwhelmingly oppose removing protections for wolves, and for good reason. Wolves have recovered to just a fraction of their range and are severely threatened by state-sanctioned hunts intended to decimate them,” said Kieran Suckling, executive director of the Center for Biological Diversity. “We hope the Obama administration will hear the pleas of hundreds of thousands of citizens and maintain these critically needed protections for wolves.”

The 750,000-plus comments delivered today to the Fish and Wildlife Service by many conservation groups will bring the total number of opposing comments to well over one million.

The wolf conservationists followed delivery of the comments with a candlelight vigil with music and costumes in Triangle Park across from the C Street entrance of the Department of the Interior headquarters.

Fish and Wildlife Service Director Dan Ashe defends the agency’s decision to remove federal protections for wolves.

“From the moment a species requires the protection of the Endangered Species Act, our goal is to work with our partners to address the threats it faces and ensure its recovery,” said Ashe, announcing the proposal in June.

“An exhaustive review of the latest scientific and taxonomic information shows that we have accomplished that goal with the gray wolf, allowing us to focus our work under the Endangered Species Act on recovery of the Mexican wolf subspecies in the Southwest,” Ashe said.

The Service’s proposes to remove existing protections for wolves everywhere except Arizona and New Mexico, where the Mexican wolf is clinging to survival with an estimated population of 75 wolves.

There were once up to two million gray wolves living in North America, but the animals were driven to near-extinction in the lower 48 states by the early 1900s.

After passage of the federal Endangered Species Act in 1973 and protection of the wolf as endangered, federal recovery programs resulted in the rebound of wolf populations in some parts of the country.

Roughly 5,500 wolves now live in the continental United States.

After its most recent population assessment, the Service said, “In the Western Great Lakes and Northern Rocky Mountains, the gray wolf has rebounded from the brink of extinction to exceed population targets by as much as 300 percent. Gray wolf populations in the Northern Rocky Mountain Distinct and Western Great Lakes Population Segments were removed from the Federal List of Endangered and Threatened Wildlife in 2011 and 2012.”

Conservationists argue that the delisting would remove protections for wolves in places where wolf recovery is just beginning, such as Oregon and Washington, and would prevent wolves from recovering in other places where good wolf habitat has been identified, such as northern California, the southern Rocky Mountains and the Northeast.

“Oregon wolves have taken the first tentative steps toward recovery in the last few years,” said Sean Stevens, executive director of Oregon Wild. “If the Obama administration takes away the strong protections of the Endangered Species Act, we pull the rug out from the fragile success story here on the West Coast and leave the fate of wolves in the hands of state agencies in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming who have proven incapable of balanced management.”

But Roy Elicker, director of the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, said when the proposal surfaced in June, “With a solid state conservation and management plan in place for the Northern gray wolf, an experienced wildlife management agency that is committed to wolf recovery, and established populations recovering at an increasing rate, Oregon is ready to take on further responsibility for wolf management in this state.”

“The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife is firmly committed to the long-term persistence of wolves in Washington,” said Miranda Wecker, who chairs the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission. She says the state should be responsible for wolf management and supports the delisting proposal.

But Defenders of Wildlife President Jamie Rappaport Clark, a former director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, said today, “The incredible volume of comments give voice to a sad fact – the delisting proposal is a radical departure from the optimism and courage we need to promote endangered species recovery in this country. The comments show that Americans believe the Fish and Wildlife Service’s proposal falls well short of the conservation ideals this country stood for 40 years ago when the Endangered Species Act was signed.”

Lawsuit: Ban coyote hunting to stop red wolf shootings

Posted on December 17, 2013 by Exposing the Big Game

[On a related note, we need to ban contest hunts on coyotes if we want to keep wolves safe from being targeted by that backwards, barbaric pastime…]

http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2013/12/16/4549879/lawsuit-ban-coyote-hunting-to.html#.UrCQSbCA1y0

Story by Bruce Henderson
bhenderson@charlotteobserver.com

Monday, Dec. 16, 2013

Three conservation groups asked a federal court Monday to stop coyote hunting in five coastal N.C. counties, saying the practice is killing lookalike red wolves.

Five of the endangered wolves have been shot since mid-October, and only the cut-off radio collar of a sixth animal has been found. Rewards totaling $26,000 have been offered for information on the shootings.

The N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission allows an open hunting season on coyotes, which have spread across the state in recent decades. Young red wolves look very much like coyotes.

The motion filed Monday asks that a U.S. District Court judge stop coyote hunting in Dare, Tyrrell, Hyde, Washington and Beaufort counties. Those counties include the 1.7 million acres where about 100 red wolves run wild on the Albemarle Peninsula.

Filed on behalf of the Red Wolf Coalition, Defenders of Wildlife and the Animal Welfare Institute, it says the practice allows the illegal taking of endangered wolves that are protected by federal law.

The Wildlife Resources Commission had no immediate response, spokesman Geoff Cantrell said.

The commission said in a statement last month that its coyote hunting rules are “in the best interest of the public, the environment and the agricultural community.” It denied breaking federal law.

So far this year, 14 red wolves are known to have died. Eight gunshot deaths were confirmed and two more suspected. Killing red wolves is punishable by up to a year in prison and a $100,000 fine.

The Southern Environmental Law Center, which represents the conservation groups, argues that wolves mistakenly shot as coyotes are hurting the breeding success of the recovery program. Eleven breeding pairs of wolves are now down to eight, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has said.

Five shooters in the past two years have said they mistakenly killed wolves they thought were coyotes, the law center said.

Research shows that breaking up established pairs increases the odds that succeeding litters will be wolf-coyote hybrids, pairings that federal biologists go to great lengths to prevent.

In 2012 the Wildlife Resources Commission expanded coyote hunting by allowing shooters to spotlight coyotes, blinding them, and shooting them at night.

With that, said the injunction motion, the problem of telling young wolves and coyotes apart “becomes virtually impossible at night.”

“Endangered” Means There’s Still Time

Posted on December 11, 2013 by Exposing the Big Game

…until December 17th, that is. After that, any state who wants to can join Wyoming in listing wolves as “pests” and implement a policy of extermination.

Interior Dept. Rule Greenlights Eagle Slaughter at Wind Farms

Posted on December 7, 2013 by Exposing the Big Game

Stand Wild For The Eagles!
Let Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell know how outraged and disappointed you are by sending an email to: feedback@ios.doi.gov

Interior Dept. Rule Greenlights Eagle Slaughter at Wind Farms, Says Audubon CEO

New Rule Will Authorize 30-Year Permits for Killing America’s National Bird

http://www.audubon.org/newsroom/press-releases/2013/interior-dept-rule-greenlights-eagle-slaughter-wind-farms-says-audubon–

Jim Grey

Dec 5, 2013

New York, NY –

In a stunningly bad move for eagles, the U.S. Department of the Interior has finalized a new rule that would make it possible to grant wind energy companies 30-year permits to kill Bald and Golden eagles. Audubon’s CEO released the following statement:“Instead of balancing the need for conservation and renewable energy, Interior wrote the wind industry a blank check,” said Audubon President and CEO David Yarnold. “It’s outrageous that the government is sanctioning the killing of America’s symbol, the Bald Eagle. Audubon will continue to look for reasonable, thoughtful partners to wean America off fossil fuels because that should be everyone’s highest priority. We have no choice but to challenge this decision, and all options are on the table.”

Also see: http://seattletimes.com/html/nationworld/2022413566_windeaglesxml.html

The new federal rule is designed to address environmental consequences that stand in the way of the nation’s wind-energy rush: the dozens of bald and golden eagles being killed each year by the giant, spinning blades of wind turbines.

An Associated Press investigation this year documented the illegal killing of eagles near wind farms, the Obama administration’s reluctance to prosecute such cases and its willingness to help keep the scope of the eagle deaths secret. President Obama has championed the pollution-free energy, nearly doubling America’s wind power in his first term as a way to tackle global warming.

Last month, Duke Energy pleaded guilty to killing eagles and other birds at two wind farms in Wyoming, the first time a wind-energy company had been prosecuted under a law protecting migratory birds. The company agreed to pay $1 million in fines.

A study by federal biologists in September found that wind farms since 2008 had killed at least 67 bald and golden eagles, a number that the researchers said was likely underestimated. That did not include deaths at Altamont Pass, an area in Northern California where wind farms kill about 60 eagles a year.

Pure Propaganda: N.M. students take refuge in bus stop ‘kid cages’ as gray wolf population soars

Posted on December 1, 2013 by Exposing the Big Game

Kid cage at school bus stop.

By Valerie Richardson

The Washington Times

Thursday, November 28, 2013

DENVER — Canadian gray wolves are by all accounts thriving in the Northern Rocky Mountains and Great Lakes region, but getting the wolf’s removal from the Endangered Species List won’t be easy.

Even as children in rural New Mexico take refuge from wolves in “kid cages” at school bus stops, wildlife lovers and environmentalists are fighting tooth and nail the proposal by the Fish and Wildlife Service to delist the species.

Bonobo’s hurtling towards extinction

Posted on November 27, 2013 by Exposing the Big Game

Wednesday, November 27, 2013, 16:20

Washington: A study, which is the most detailed range-wide assessment of the
bonobo- formerly known as the pygmy chimpanzee- ever conducted, has revealed
that this endangered great ape is quickly losing space in a world because of
forest fragmentation and poaching.

The research was conducted by University of Georgia, University of Maryland,
the Wildlife Conservation Society, ICCN (Congolese Wildlife Authority),
African Wildlife Foundation, Zoological Society of Milwaukee, World Wildlife
Fund, Max Planck Institute, Lukuru Foundation, University of Stirling, Kyoto
University, and other groups.

Using data from nest counts and remote sensing imagery, the research team
found that the bonobo avoids areas of high human activity and forest
fragmentation.

According to the model developed by the researchers in the study, as little
as 28 percent of the bonobo’s range remains suitable.

“This assessment is a major step towards addressing the substantial
information gap regarding the conservation status of bonobos across their
entire range. The results of the study demonstrate that human activities
reduce the amount of effective bonobo habitat and will help us identify
where to propose future protected areas for this great ape,”
lead author Dr. Jena R. Hickey of Cornell University and the University of
Georgia, said.

The bonobo is smaller in size and more slender in build than the common
chimpanzee. The great ape’s social structure is complex and matriarchal.
Unlike the common chimpanzee, bonobos establish social bonds and diffuse
tension or aggression with sexual behaviors.

Second author of the study, Dr. Janet Nackoney, said Bonobos that live in
closer proximity to human activity and to points of human access are more
vulnerable to poaching, one of their main threats. The results point to the
need for more places where bonobos can be safe from hunters, which is an
enormous challenge in the DRC.

The study is published in journal Biodiversity and Conservation.

http://zeenews.india.com/news/eco-news/bonobo-s-hurtling-towards-extinction_
892729.html

Understanding the Great Divide

Posted on November 24, 2013 by Exposing the Big Game

http://boldvisions.businesscatalyst.com/opinion.html

Stephen Capra

Another week has passed and we have lost more wolves. Not really a surprise, but we also lost a beloved malamute while its owner was hiking. Shots were fired, screams persisted and a beautiful dog lay dead with seven bullets penetrating his body. This is becoming the mantra from Montana on a daily basis. When walking a family canine, a dog must always wear blaze orange and the master must say his prayer of protection when on a trail. The killing of wolves has become a sickness for the depraved and wicked.

This past week in Albuquerque we had a hearing on the Mexican wolf, with ideas the Fish and Wildlife Service has about expanding their range, what the count will be when they are deemed no longer endangered and perhaps easing the means of killing for ranchers. Perhaps 300-400 people showed up for the hearing in a large meeting room at the Comfort Inn. Clearly the pro wolf people held the majority, but there remained plenty of ranchers and county commissioners and other wolf haters who spoke out with rage about the wolf.

Several things struck my mind as they talked. First, why do ranchers not understand it’s rude to leave your hat on at such hearings? It is clearly designed to show their personal arrogance and sense of control. Yet, to me it just shows ignorance. Then there is this obsession with the constitution. Since when did the people that robbed, killed and destroyed our public lands have such a deep feeling about the constitution? The answer is only when it seems politically viable to their own good. Not for any other more altruistic goal.

Then it was time for the fear game rhetoric-Our children……Their safety……We are losing our entire herds…..We are being wiped out…….Poor me……….

It was the usual regurgitation of lies and their dream of an antiquarianism way of life, circa 1870.

What makes this issue so frustrating and demoralizing are the people- the killers, who seem to glee in the chance to steal life. This is the group I characterize as the “angry mob.” They are collectively the people that best define Obama haters, anti-tax loathers, people, who feel that issues like Gay marriage, Climate Change, Health Care are things that liberals like the President have brought to their doorstep and they must fight back, with pride and furry. They do this by collecting an arsenal of weapons, ammo, scopes, night vision equipment. They speak in chat rooms and share their rage against this new America.

They seek in their twisted way a chance to have power and control. The victim of this demented mind-set is wolves. Wolves represent freedom and the power of true spirit. Wildness is at their core, but also love and a sense of family. Yet, for those who feel they have lost control, this animal and its demise makes them feel a sense of power, a place of control, the means to settle their rage. To allow themselves a sense of freedom and spirit, they must kill and steal it from the very symbol of that, which they seek. It also allows them to show their disdain for conservation. Ignorance it seems is truly bliss.

However, there is another aspect to this fight which is often overlooked and it stems from the conservation side. First, as we have said many times, groups like Defenders of Wildlife, tried to find common ground with ranchers from the start. In fact, even when it was clear it was not working, they simply kept doubling down on a flawed strategy. But some of their rational for this stems from the reality of dealing with foundations.

Foundations in America today define how we work in Conservation. They are the funding, which is the lifeblood of any campaign and any organization. Foundations like much of America tend to be more conservative in how they give. By this I mean they do not tend to like direct conflict or issues that cannot fit into a nice collective ending. Therein lies the problem with wolves. This is a fight that is not likely to have a happy, feel good ending; one side will lose. Right now unless we as a community say, we refuse to lose and we will not compromise any longer, all will be lost. But the pressure on many conservation groups is to find a road to compromise. That in turn has led to hunting seasons and other such destructive outcomes.

The opposition has rallied under one voice, which is to say no to all wolf recovery; to push as hard as possible to fight expanded ranges, to create longer hunting seasons, and to say repeatedly that our children and the livestock industry are threatened! The conservation community by contrast seems to have twenty positions and no clear unified strategy. Instead, wolf recovery has turned into an endless fund-raising opportunity, with little success to speak of.

Bold Visions Conservation stands by its 10-point wolf recovery proposal. It is designed to rally support from urban areas to dwarf that which comes from the rural hot spots. It means changing our rhetoric and understanding we are truly in a war, not just to save wolves, but a war of culture which will define the future of the West.

During the hearing a rancher from eastern Washington got up to thank Fish and Wildlife for not creating a sub-species category for wolves in eastern Washington, meaning they can be killed. My first thought was why was he here in Albuquerque? The answer, I believe, is that the ranching community is sharing strategy, working in a unified manner to take what has worked in Montana and bring it to New Mexico, Colorado or any place that could harbor wolves. They are funded to fight and fight they will.

There comes a time in conservation, as David Brower clearly understood, when you fight for what you believe, and when you do so, people respect you. In order to protect and expand wolf recovery we cannot be cute, or speak in only scientific jargon, rather we must get in the trenches and fight, this is a battle we can surely win, it’s for the heart and soul of the America we want to be a part of and the future of our western heritage.

Wolves define the freedom and spirit that is the West of my soul. Join us in the trenches. Victory is ours, when we cross that great divide, united.

“I am he and you are me, and we are all together.”

-John Lennon and Paul McCartney

Idaho Wolf Kill Numbers

Posted on November 14, 2013 by Exposing the Big Game

Associated Press, January 11, 2007: “Idaho’s governor [Butch Otter] said Tuesday he will support public hunts to kill all but 100 of the state’s gray wolves after the federal government strips them of protection under the Endangered Species Act…. ‘I’m prepared to bid for that first ticket to shoot a wolf myself,’ Otter said earlier Thursday during a rally of about 300 hunters…The hunters, many wearing camouflage clothing and blaze-orange caps, applauded wildly during his comments.”

Since 2009, 887 Idaho wolves have been killed by licensed hunters, with many hundreds more killed in official “control” operations. It is estimated that there were fewer than 500 wolves remaining in the state by August, 2013. The 2013-2014 Idaho wolf season began August 30 and will continue in most of 13 state zones until the end of June 2014. The current 2013-2014 wolf season will constitute a mop-up operation by the state’s ferocious anti-wolf mob.

The Idaho political apparatus, controlled absolutely by the hunting and agricultural lobbies, is a vigorous proponent of trap-torture for Idaho wildlife. It has thus encouraged, trained and deployed an army of trappers, both amateur and professional, to prolong the suffering of Idaho wolves since 2011.

Idaho wolf trapping season opened November 15, 2013, and will continue across nine game zones until March 31, 2014. Thus, Idaho wolves continue to be subjected to the terror and cruelty of steel foothold traps and choking snares. Many of these animals, including the youngest of pups, are routinely forced to await their violent death for up to 72 hours while suffering terror, pain, hunger and dehydration.

Zone 1–Idaho Panhandle Zone: (12) Idaho wolves gunned with rifles or hand guns. One animal shot with a handgun was a tiny black pup so young that it had no teeth visible. A bow hunter in this zone also arrowed a gray puppy, a particularly painful way for a canine to die. Two others wolves were killed on private property in August before the season officially began. Licensed wolf kill is legal year round in the Panhandle zone as long as the carnage takes place on private property. These two pre-season wolves were seen together and shot at the same time. Their bodies were retrieved days later, indicating that they were able to run while wounded and therefore suffered for an unknown number of hours or days before dying.

Note: One of our three selected wolf packs for adoption, the Bumblebee Pack, resides in Zone 1. Adoption bracelets are available [link]. Your donations will help sustain our website so that volunteers can monitor and report activities by state, federal and private interests bent on reducing wolves to a genetically unsustainable population. Adoption bracelets are available.

Zone 2–Palouse-Hells Canyon Zone: (1) wolf arrowed. This was a gray animal listed as a pup.

Zone 3–Lolo Zone: (1) Idaho wolf gunned.

Note: One of our three packs selected for adoption is the Kelly Creek Pack, which undoubtedly lives a perilous existence in the Lolo “hot” zone. Lolo wolves have been among the hardest hit in the great Idaho wolf purge. Government agents in helicopters gunned-down some of the wolves killed in this zone during 2011-2012. Adoption bracelets for survivors are available. Adoption bracelets for survivors are available.

Zone 4–Dworshak-Elk City Zone: (3) wolves gunned, one wolf arrowed. One of the wolves, listed as a puppy, was blasted with a hand gun. The arrowed animal was listed as a yearling.

Zone 5–Selway Zone: (3) wolves gunned. Two of the three were listed as pups.

Zone 6–Middle Fork Zone: (3) wolves gunned. Two of the three were listed as pups.

Zone 7–Salmon Zone: (2) gunned. One animal was listed as a pup, the other a yearling.

Zone 8–McCall-Weiser Zone: (3) wolves gunned. One animal was listed as a young of year pup.

Zone 9–Sawtooth Zone: (1) wolf arrowed.

Zone 10–Southern Mountain Zone: (5) wolves gunned. Three of these animals were listed as yearlings. Another was listed as a pup terminated by a hand gun.

Note: One of our three packs up for adoption is the Red Warrior Pack, located in the Sawtooth Mountains within this zone. Adoption bracelets are available. Adoption bracelets are available.

Zone 11–Beaverhead Zone: (0) wolves gunned.

Zone 12—Island Park Zone: (3) wolves gunned.

Zone 13—Southern Idaho Zone: (0) wolves gunned.

Of the 38 wolves obliterated during this time period, 15 (39%) were listed as puppies or yearlings.

– See more at: http://adoptawolfpack.org/summary-of-2013-2014-big-game-mortality-reports/#sthash.xjOOXuKF.dpuf

Wolf protection plan raises hackles in Southwest

Posted on October 28, 2013 by Exposing the Big Game

By Julie Cart
October 26, 2013, 6:30 p.m.

ALBUQUERQUE — In the small, rural community of Reserve, children waiting for the school bus gather inside wooden and mesh cages provided as protection from wolves. Parents consider the “kid cages” a reasonable precaution.

Defenders of the wolves note there have been no documented wolf attacks in New Mexico or Arizona. Fears of wolves attacking humans, they say, are overblown, and the cages nothing more than a stunt.

In 1995, the reintroduction of Canadian gray wolves into the northern Rockies ignited a furor.

Now that acrimony has cascaded into the Southwest, where the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposes to extend Endangered Species Act protections for an estimated 75 Mexican wolves in the wild in New Mexico and Arizona.

Such protections would make it illegal to kill wolves in most instances. The new federal plan would also significantly expand the area where the wolves could roam unmolested.

To many conservatives in the West, such protections are examples of government overreach — idealistic efforts by officials who don’t know what it’s like to live with wolves.

“People have to stand up and defend our rights,” said Wink Crigler, a fifth-generation rancher from Arizona who says guests at her tourist cabins fear they might be attacked by wolves.

Anti-wolf campaigns here — paid for by conservative political organizations antagonistic toward the federal government — often portray the animal as a savage devil preying on children.

The antipathy has encouraged scores of illegal killings of Mexican wolves, whose population dwindled to seven before federal efforts to reintroduce them began in 1998. A young male wolf was fatally shot with an arrow a few weeks ago in the same rural Catron County that uses the kid cages.

Into this atmosphere have come federal officials who by the end of the year are expected to finalize their plan for managing Mexican wolves, a smaller and tawnier subspecies of the Canadian grays.

“With the political debate we see raging, we can’t just listen to the loudest voice in the room,” said Fish and Wildlife Service Director Dan Ashe. “There are many loud voices in the room. No animal engenders more polarizing emotion among Americans than does the wolf.”]]

It is a public policy debate driven not just by biology and science, but by emotional appeals and unalloyed partisanship.

When a previously scheduled Oct. 4 public comment hearing about wolf management was postponed by the government shutdown, advocates came out anyway, staking out nearby meeting rooms at an Albuquerque hotel.

The Save the Lobo rally, paid for by Defenders of Wildlife, featured a man in a wolf costume, children scrawling placards with crayons and people offering videotaped testimony to be forwarded to Washington.

Down the hall, an anti-wolf event was sponsored by Americans for Prosperity, an organization funded by the conservative Koch brothers. The group offered literature by Ayn Rand and screened the documentary “Wolves in Government Clothing,” which equated rampaging wolves with an out-of-control federal government. Said one Arizona rancher at the event: “Is this politically driven? Absolutely.”

An armed guard patrolled — made necessary, Americans for Prosperity said, by death threats from environmental groups.

The issue of public safety loomed large, with much discussion of the kid cages, boxy structures that resemble chicken coops. Photos and video of the cages have been circulated by Americans for Prosperity, although it was unclear how many exist or who requested or paid for them. Local media reports suggest at least some of them were built by students in a high school shop class.

Calls to the superintendent of schools in Reserve were not returned.

To Carolyn Nelson, a teacher in Catron County, the cages don’t go far enough to protect children. She said that seven years ago her son, then 14, was out walking and came across three wolves. Frightened, he backed against a tree. One wolf stared him down while the other two circled.

Only when the boy cocked the gun he was carrying did the wolves run off. “I think it was a miracle he wasn’t killed,” she said.

Continue the story here: http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-wolves-20131027,0,2078501.story?page=2#axzz2j2HBeocx

Wildlife Refuges, Not Hunters’ Playgrounds

Posted on October 20, 2013 by Exposing the Big Game

October 16th, 2013 by Anja Heister

Once again, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) wants to turn even more wildlife refuges into playgrounds for hunters and other “consumptive users” of wild animals.

The U.S. National Wildlife Refuge System includes 550 national wildlife refuges, thousands of waterfowl protection areas and four marine national monuments, totaling more than 150 million acres. Despite being called “refuges”, more than half of all national wildlife refuges are already open to hunters, trappers and anglers.

Consumptive users also have millions of acres of public and private lands outside the refuge system available to them to pursue their frivolous and violent activities of “recreational” trophy hunting and fishing, and trapping for fur. They should not be allowed in refuges, which often are the last remaining places for animal species already struggling for survival.

Furthermore, as the USFWS’s own 2011 survey has shown, wildlife watchers have already well outpaced and outspent wildlife killing interests. Wildlife watchers are a growing economic force, and their overwhelming preference to see living animals needs to be considered and respected.

Wildlife refuges, as the name indicates, should be true sanctuaries for wild animals where they are sheltered from the killing spree that surrounds them.

What You Can Do:

Please copy and paste the comment below to the USFWS and tell them that hunting, trapping and fishing should not be allowed in national wildlife refuges at all.

Please follow these steps to send your comment to the USFWS:

http://www.idausa.org/wildlife-refuges-hunters-playgrounds/

Exposing the Big Game

Forget Hunters' Feeble Rationalizations and Trust Your Gut Feelings: Making Sport of Killing Is Not Healthy Human Behavior

Tag Archives: endangered species

One Million Protest Stripping Wolves of Endangered Listing