On September 29, twenty-nine sportsmen’s conservation organizations submitted a letter to the U.S. House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations advocating for a number of management directives related to wolf populations in the United States. The letter also expressed support for the decision by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) to delist the Rocky Mountain and Great Lakes wolf populations and for Congressional action directing FWS to reinstate these delisting decisions in Wyoming and the Great Lake States.
The letter urged FWS to “reconsider its policy toward other wolves in the remaining lower 48 states so that future expansion and care for wolf populations of any species or subspecies be the responsibility of the states.” As these groups noted, the “outdated provisions of the Endangered Species Act (ESA) and the more recent FWS policies on defining populations will make such a re-consideration difficult, which is one of many reasons to update and modernize the ESA.” Rather than superseding FWS on other wolf-related issues, the groups suggested that Congress work with FWS and state fish and wildlife managers on a plan to update and modernize the ESA and by reinstating FWS wolf delisting decisions that have been overturned by the courts.
As state fish and wildlife managers have proven their capability of managing delisted wolf populations in the Rockies and the Great Lakes Region using science-based management, they are the group best suited to assume full management of wolves in these regions moving forward. However, as detailed in the letter, misguided, anti-scientific litigation over wolf-delisting decisions poses a great threat to continued science-based management of wolves by state fish and wildlife agencies, and by extension, threatens both the recovery of wolves and the viability of the many game species, such as deer and elk, upon which these wolves prey.
The groups continued the letter by speaking to management of Mexican wolves in the southwestern United States and red wolves in North Carolina. They advocated for the Mexican wolf population to be “delisted and exclusive authority returned to the states for managing this species in the US” upon agreement of a biologically acceptable population of Mexican wolves between FWS and the states of Arizona and New Mexico. They also worked with Mexico’s government to recover the species’ core population. In North Carolina, the groups explained that the proliferation of hybridized red wolves (and the almost certain continued hybridization of the species), whose genetics have been substantially diluted by crossbreeding with coyotes and wild dogs, necessitates the delisting of the red wolf, and a return of management of this species to state authority.
The letter was submitted on September 29 to House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations Chair Representative Louie Gohmert (R-TX) and Ranking Member Representative Debbie Dingell (D-MI).
Studies conducted at both the state and federal level have found that the number of hunters and trappers have been on a generally declining trend over the past several decades. To increase recruitment, retention, and reactivation (R3) of hunters and trappers, which initiative do you think would have the greatest impact?
