Wyoming makes argument for managing gray wolves
By Matt Joyce
Associated Press Writer
Salt Lake Tribune
CHEYENNE, Wyo. — The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s rejection of Wyoming’s management plan for gray wolves was an “arbitrary and capricious” decision, the state claims, and a federal court should order the agency to transfer wolf management to Wyoming.
Wyoming made the argument Monday in a brief filed in U.S. District Court in Cheyenne. The state filed suit in June after the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reversed course and decided to leave gray wolves in Wyoming on the endangered species list while delisting them in Idaho and Montana.
The state’s case is part of long-running legal battles over gray wolves in the region. Politicians, biologists, ranchers, hunters and environmentalists have been fighting over wolves since before they were reintroduced in Yellowstone National Park and central Idaho in the mid-1990s.
The agency’s main reason for rejecting Wyoming’s wolf management was the state’s plan to classify wolves as a trophy game species for licensed hunters in the state’s northwest corner — the bulk of the animals’ range — while classifying them as a predator species in the rest of the state, meaning anybody could shoot them at any time.
The agency said Wyoming needs to manage wolves as trophy game statewide to assure that wolves survive.
In its Monday filing, the state argued that the service’s position is not biologically defensible. The best scientific information available proves that the predator classification wouldn’t prevent the state from maintaining its share of a recovered population, the state said.
“If the court sees things our way, the service is going to have to amend the current delisting rule to include us,” said Jay Jerde, Wyoming deputy attorney general.
A spokesman for the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division declined to comment on the state’s arguments. The federal government’s response is due Dec. 14. Arguments in front of U.S. District Judge Alan Johnson are set for Jan. 29.
The Wyoming Wolf Coalition, a group that supports state management of wolves, also filed a brief on Monday. The group said it’s unlawful for the Fish and Wildlife Service to change its mind about delisting wolves in Wyoming “based upon political influences rather than scientific evidence.”
There are an estimated 1,645 wolves in Montana, Idaho and Wyoming, including between 300 and 350 in Wyoming, federal biologists say. Wyoming’s lawsuit is separate from a lawsuit filed by environmental groups in federal court in Montana seeking to restore the endangered status of gray wolves throughout the region.
“If the Montana court were to issue a ruling that vacated the delisting rule, I think the Wyoming court could still take on the issue of whether the service was correct about the Wyoming regulatory scheme, and there would be still some benefit if the Wyoming court were to rule on those issue,” Jerde said.
In its rejection of Wyoming’s plan, the Fish and Wildlife Service also said Wyoming needs to maintain at least seven breeding pairs and 70 wolves outside Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks.
Wyoming said the service’s quota was arbitrary. The state argued that the requirement could force the state to take on more than its share of 15 breeding pairs and 150 wolves if there were more than eight breeding pairs in the parks.
Wyoming also said the service violated the Endangered Species Act when it deemed the state’s management rule inadequate for technical reasons.
Park County, which borders Yellowstone, also sued the Fish and Wildlife Service over its delisting decision. Monday’s brief was a joint filing of the state and county.