Tell the US Fish and Wildlife Service to Return the Wolf to its Rightful Place in Utah’s Wildlands
The US Fish and Wildlife Service proposes to remove the imperiled wolf from federal protection as an endangered species in Utah and other western states. The agency proposal allows states to assume responsibility for the wolf’s fate. The last time that happened wolves across the West were effectively exterminated.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is required by law to accept public comments before they can make their final decision on this misguided proposal. Make sure the decision makers in Washington hear what Utahns thinks about the premature delisting of gray wolves. Submit your comments today and tell the FWS that you strongly oppose their misguided proposal to delist nearly all wolves.
For more information or assistance in commenting, contact Kim Crumbo, Utah Chapter ExComm, 928-606-5850. Review the regulations and leave your comments here.
Here are some important points you could include in your comments:
- Gray wolf recovery is not complete. This decision could derail wolf recovery efforts in states that possess some of the nation's best unoccupied wolf habitat, such as UTAH and Colorado; or in areas around the country where it has barely begun — the Pacific Northwest and northern California.
- Delisting would prematurely turn wolf management over to the states. We've already seen what can happen when irrational anti-wolf politics are allowed to trump science and core wildlife management principles.
- Utah’s wildlife state agencies are not ready for wolf management. Utah’s legislature recently passed legislature requiring the states Division of Wildlife Resources to manage wolves to prevent the establishment of a viable pack in all areas…where the wolf is not listed as threatened or endangered. The state’s wildlife agency has committed to “vigorously oppose” recovery of wolves to Utah.
- Montana, Wyoming and Idaho — where wolves have already been delisted — are not managing wolves like other wildlife such as elk, deer, and bears. Instead they're intending to drive the wolves' population numbers back down to the bottom.
- Other species, such as the bald eagle, American alligator and peregrine falcon, were declared recovered and delisted when they occupied a much larger portion of their former range. Wolves deserve the same chance at real recovery.