Gray wolf to leave endangered list
By Jim Robbins
The New York Times
December 22, 2002
YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK, Wyo. — On Jan. 15, 1995, 14 gray wolves from
Canada were released in the midst of the world’s largest elk and buffalo
herds to be the seed, it was hoped, of a new breeding population in the
Northern Rockies.
Fifty-two more wolves were released here and in Idaho in 1995 and 1996.
Now, buttressed by the return of wolves that migrated from Canada to
northern Montana on their own, the wolf is back in the West after a
half-century’s absence in remarkably short order. More than 700 wolves now
roam the Northern Rockies. And the federal government says it is time to
end the protections.
Sometime this month or next, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service plans to
change the status of the gray wolves in and around Glacier National Park
to “threatened” from “endangered.” By spring, the service will move to
withdraw such protections from all wolves in Wyoming, Idaho and Montana,
meaning that they can be hunted or trapped. The new status means that a
rancher can kill an attacking wolf without calling a federal officer.
“Biologically, wolves are recovered,” said Ed Bangs, coordinator of the
wolf recovery program for the Fish and Wildlife Service in Helena, Mont.
“Our job is done.”
Barring successful legal challenges, the change means that the gray wolf
will join rarefied company. Just six other species have moved off the list
of endangered plants and animals: 243 animal species remain on the list.
But far from ending the controversy over the wolf’s return, the plan
appears to shift the argument to a new phase. Since their return, wolves
have made their presence felt in many ways, reducing the Yellowstone elk
herds, angering ranchers and delighting naturalists.
Wildlife agencies in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming are preparing to take over
the responsibility and $1.1 million annual expense of managing the wolf
from the federal government. Legal questions crop up, too. Montana and
Idaho have laws that assure that the wolf will not be driven toward
extinction again. Wyoming has a law from the frontier days that classifies
wolves as predators and lets them be shot on sight.
Wildlife conservationists have said they think the proposed delisting is
premature.
“The Fish and Wildlife Service has done a good job, but it is not
complete,” said Nina Fascione of Defenders of Wildlife.