Gray Wolves Are Back on the Endangered List... For Now
by Jeremy Elton Jacquot, Los Angeles on 07.20.08
Image from dobak
Thanks to a last minute injunction by a federal judge in Montana, the gray wolf will be returned to its endangered species status, reports the LAT's Tami Abdollah. U.S. District Court Judge Donald Molloy didn't mince his words in criticizing the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's ill-advised decision to take the wolf off the list, calling it baseless and dangerous.
A capricious decision without merit
"Congress does not intend agency decision-making to be fickle. When it is, the line separating rationality from arbitrariness and capriciousness is crossed," he wrote in his 40-page critique.
Wildlife service's decision contradicted its own report
Not only did the wildlife service's evidence not stand up to close scrutiny -- for one thing, it didn't pass the "genetic exchange between subpopulations" criteria established in a 1994 report -- it contradicted a study it itself commissioned last year. Service officials had argued that the population of gray wolves in the West was growing by roughly 24% a year and was well on its way to recovery, allowing for its delisting.
Fall hunt plans would have allowed 500 wolves to be killed
The states of Montana, Wyoming and Idaho; a number of hunter and cattlemen's associations; and the NRA had supported the wildlife service's decision and may yet try to reverse the preliminary injunction, according to the NYT's Felicity Barringer. The three states had planned on allowing 500 wolves to be killed during the fall hunts, which have now been canceled.
While a promising development, we likely haven't seen the last of this legal skirmish.
Via ::Greenspace: Gray wolves get back their endangered species status, for now. (blog)
More about wolves
::Time to Cry, Wolf
::Winter Olympics: Damage to Wolf Habitat?
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This is great news. I hope they stay on the endangered species list forever, and I hope they can introduce them to more areas where they are extinct. The aerial gunning is horrific, its not a one shot one kill but several shots and painful death.
Just like the past when wolves were hunted almost to extiction.....the hunters will never stop trying to eradicate this important link in the chain of life.
I guess mankind won't be happy until every animal except him is extinct. I really lament how beautiful animals like this are hunted because some guy has a 'manhood' problem.
Our population is booming, natural habitat is being destroyed- the use of humans to help control the animal population is very important. Lots of money is payed out to biologists every year to reasearch animal habitat sustainability. Too bad the wildlife service contradicted its own report.
At one time our ancestors (with the help of the government) did their best to eradicate predators.
Back then everyone realized that those killers did nothing to help the growth of our nation.
They only destroyed. Our "experts" of today say that we need them to "balance nature" but, without the help of man, that kind of balance is all in favor of the killers.All other animals (including livestock)
have very little chance of survival co-existing with predators.
The "experts" also tell us that they don't kill big, strong, healthy animals; they only kill the weak and poor ones that will probably die anyway.
That is absolutely not true.
Re Doug Palmer's comments: Once upon a time Nature took very good care of herself until we humans came along and interefered out of our limited and ignorant understanding of how she works. More importantly, being the top predators, we humans have forgotten how we depend on a balanced, healthy, natural environment for our wellbeing and survival...take one species out of the chain of life and the entire eco system changes...to our detriment...check out web of life and eco-biology doug~respect Doug, for all species.