Archive for the ‘Animal Welfare Institute’ Tag
From: The Salt Lake Tribune
Jan 11,. 2015 by Brett Prettyman
Courtesy | Arizona Game and Fish Department This wolf was photographed Oct. 27 near the north rim of the Grand Canyon. On Friday, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife confirmed through DNA analysis of its feces that it is a female gray wolf from the Northern Rockies that must have migrated 450 miles through Colorado and/or Utah to reach Arizona
Repercussions » N. Carolina was forced to change its policy after too many endangered red wolves were killed.
Utah wildlife managers and state attorneys insist Utah’s controversial coyote bounty program does not conflict with the Endangered Species Act.
But at least one other state was forced to change its coyote-culling hunt after too many endangered wolves were killed.
Potential crossover between Utah’s free-wheeling coyote hunt and the federal program for protecting animals threatened with extinction became clear last month after a hunter said he confused an endangered gray wolf for a coyote before he illegally shot and killed it.
The U.S Fish and Wildlife Service and Utah Division of Wildlife Resources continue to investigate the circumstancesthat left a collared, 3-year-old female wolf dead outside Beaver on Dec. 28.
Utah Assistant Attorney General Martin Bushman said the Endangered Species Act does “provide for instances where the [killing] of animals that look like other species” can happen. But that hasn’t happened in the case of gray wolves.
“Coyotes are not listed as threatened or endangered and the state maintains the authority to regulate the take however it wants to go about it,” Bushman said.
But there is a precedent for groups challenging the open hunting of coyotes in areas where wolves are protected.
Three conservation groups settled a lawsuit last fall after accusing the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission with violating endangered species protections by proposing nighttime hunting with lights and an unlimited take for coyotes.
Just 100 red wolves, a cousin of the gray wolf, live in North Carolina. Smaller than the gray wolf, the red wolf is closer to the size of coyotes.
According to the Animal Welfare Institute, one of the plaintiffs in the suit, 20 red wolves have died from gunshots and hunting is suspected in 18 other wolf deaths since 2008.
Since 2012, the institute reports, five people have admitted they shot wolves thinking the canines were coyotes.
According to the News and Observer in Raleigh, North Carolina, the lawsuit was settled when the wildlife commission agreed to keep coyote hunting illegal at night in five counties. Daytime hunting of coyotes would require a special permit. Furthermore, coyote hunting in the five counties will be suspended if two or more red wolves are shot in the same year on state game lands by people hunting coyotes.
The red wolf population is obviously more threatened by extinction than the gray wolf. U.S. Fish and Wildlife estimated 1,674 gray wolves were living in Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington and Wyoming at the end of 2012.
Mike Jimenez, Fish and Wildlife’s northern Rocky Mountain wolf recovery coordinator, said gray wolves showing up near Beaver or on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon is a sign that the effort to restore their population in the West is working.
“Dispersing wolves take on a lot of charisma. People who like wolves get really upset when they are shot, and understandably so,” he said. But, “biologically, it is not a threat to the population.”
The name of the man who shot the wolf has not been released and it is not clear if the hunter was participating in Utah’s $50 coyote bounty program.
Utah lawmakers created the bounty as part of the Mule Deer Preservation Act in 2012.
Hunters who want to collect a bounty must register and follow procedures to collect their money, but there is no license required to shoot coyotes in Utah, where they are an unprotected species.
More than 14,000 coyotes were turned in for the bounty in the first two years of the program.
Nothing in Utah’s online bounty registration process helps hunters tell the difference between a coyote and a wolf. Nor is there information alerting hunters that they need to be aware of the possibility of seeing the endangered species in Utah.
Wildlife managers acknowledge that might change as the number of wolves visiting Utah grows.
brettp@sltrib.com
Twitter: @BrettPrettyman
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From: Hamptonroads.com
Dec, 30, 2014 by Jonathan Drew
RALEIGH, N.C.
Hank, one of the two resident red wolves is seen at the Red Wolf Education and Health Care Facility in Columbia, N.C., on June 4, 2014. (Stephen M. Katz | The Virginian-Pilot)
In the 27 years since federal officials reintroduced the red wolf in the wild, a restoration program has mustered about 100 of the carnivores in a handful of North Carolina counties. A decision looms in early 2015 on whether to continue efforts to maintain the only wild population of the species.
How the species’ existence will play out, in the wild or in a cage, has been debated in courtrooms, at high levels of the federal government and in 48,000 public comments to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The importance of the decision is reflected in the deliberate pace the agency is taking.
Tom MacKenzie, a spokesman for the wildlife service, said that the decision on the program’s fate is expected in the first three months of the year but that he couldn’t be more specific.
“They’re trying to get it done early as possible, but in a deliberative process that allows for everyone’s opinions to be brought in,” he said.
Once common in the Southeast, the red wolf had been considered extinct in the wild as of 1980 because of factors including hunting and loss of habitat. In 1987, wildlife officials released red wolves bred in captivity back into the wild in North Carolina. About 100 of them now roam five eastern North Carolina counties, and about 200 are in captive breeding programs.
As part of their evaluation, federal officials commissioned an independent review in late 2014 that found flaws in how the program is run, ranging from inadequate understanding of population trends to poor coordination with local managers. The report also suggested that red wolves be reintroduced in additional areas.
The federal agency has said all options are on the table. When a program to restore the wolves to the Smoky Mountains in the western part of the state ended in 1998, the agency tried to capture all of the animals and bring them back to captivity, Leopoldo Miranda, an assistant regional director for the Fish and Wildlife Service, has said.
MacKenzie said Miranda and other decision-makers were unavailable for an interview.
In November, conservation groups won a court battle to impose stricter hunting rules for coyotes in five eastern North Carolina counties — including a ban on nighttime hunting — that are meant to protect the wolves, which look similar. The groups cited gunshots as a leading cause of death for the wolves, even though it’s illegal to kill them in most circumstances.
The settlement agreement does allow for daytime hunting on private land by permit. A lawyer for the Animal Welfare Institute, Tara Zuardo, said she hopes that allowing daytime hunting will placate landowners and reduce political pressure that wildlife officials may be feeling. All coyote hunting had been banned for several months before the settlement was struck.
Zuardo said she’s hopeful that federal wildlife officials will decide to continue or modify the red wolf program — and perhaps release them in additional sites — rather than pull the plug.
“In my opinion, if they were to terminate the program it would be a political and financial decision,” said Zuardo, whose group was one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit challenging the coyote hunting rules. “And certainly if Fish and Wildlife chose to do that, they will be challenged. It’s not a good idea.”
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Red Wolf, captive specimen at “Parks at Chehaw”, Albany GA, USA (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
From: The State – South Carolina’s Homepage
BY BRUCE SICELOFF
The News & Observer (Raleigh, N.C.)November 13, 2014
Three conservation groups and the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission have agreed on new rules aimed at reducing the shooting deaths of endangered red wolves in five Eastern North Carolina counties by limiting the hunting of the wolves’ non-endangered lookalikes: coyotes.
In the five-county Red Wolf Recovery Area, nighttime hunting of coyotes will be banned, and special permits will be required for daytime hunting. The area is home to the world’s only wild red wolves, which have dwindled in recent years to an estimated count of 100.
The new rules are part of an agreement that settled a lawsuit by conservation groups accusing the Wildlife Resources Commission of violating the federal Endangered Species Act. The groups argued that by allowing coyote hunting, the state agency was responsible for the deaths of red wolves.
Hunting the wolves is illegal. But the animals are frequently mistaken for coyotes, and gunshot is the leading killer of red wolves.
“This settlement will advance the long-term protection of red wolves by reducing the likelihood that they will be killed by hunters who mistake them for coyotes, thereby facilitating species recovery,” said D.J. Schubert, wildlife biologist for the Washington-based Animal Welfare Institute, one of three plaintiffs in the lawsuit. “With only an estimated 100 red wolves remaining in the wild, each death by gunshot jeopardizes the survival of the species.”
Saving the wolves
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has sought to reintroduce the red wolf with a program that started in 1987 at the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge in Dare and Hyde counties. The red wolves’ gunshot death toll, 15 between 1987 and 2000, increased to 73 between 2000 and 2013.
The Wildlife Resources Commission has promoted trapping and hunting in recent years to reduce coyote attacks on livestock and pets. Across the state, hunters killed 27,000 coyotes last year.
A commission spokesman declined Thursday to comment on the new hunting rules or to say when they would take effect in the affected area: Dare, Hyde, Tyrrell, Beaufort and Washington counties.
The agreement was approved Wednesday in Elizabeth City by U.S. District Judge Terrence W. Boyle. The new hunting rules are a permanent replacement for a preliminary injunction Boyle issued in May, which temporarily halted all coyote hunting in the red wolf counties.
Under the new rules for the five counties:
—Coyote hunting remains illegal at night.
—Daytime hunting is legal only for licensed hunters, who also must have special coyote permits. Hunters must report coyote kills within 24 hours to the Wildlife Resources Commission.
—All coyote hunting permits in the five-county area will be suspended if two or more red wolves are shot during the same year on state game lands by hunters who have coyote permits.
After Boyle temporarily halted coyote hunting in the five-county area earlier this year, the Wildlife Resources Commission asked the Fish and Wildlife Service to reconsider its 27-year effort to restore red wolves. When the federal agency agreed to do so, it received more than 47,000 comments from citizens and organizations — including conservationists who support the program and Eastern North Carolina farmers who oppose it.
The Fish and Wildlife Service hired a nonprofit consulting group to evaluate the red wolf recovery program and to provide its recommendations by Friday. A decision is expected early next year.
Siceloff: 919-829-4527 or newsobserver.com/roadworrierblog Twitter: @Road_Worrier
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Wolf Is My Soul 