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MOTION
FILED TO OVERTURN BUSH
DECISION ALLOWING EXTINCTION
OF PUGET SOUND ORCAS
The
Center for Biological
Diversity and other groups
have filed a Motion for
Summary Judgment in their
suit challenging the
Bush administration's refusal
to protect
Puget Sound’s killer
whales under the Endangered
Species Act. The administration
admits that the whale
population is unique and
headed for extinction, but
argues that its demise is
"not significant."
The Bush administration is the
first in the history
of the Endangered Species
Act to argue that extinction
is insignificant. The Puget
Sound killer whale was
the first, but not the last,
it also deemed the looming
extinction of the Kootenai
river burbot in Idaho to
be insignificant.
If our motion is granted, the
administration will
be compelled to afford the
fullest protections possible
to save the orcas of Puget
Sound, and to stop declaring
that extinction is acceptable.
For
more information.
SUIT
FILED TO PROTECT MONTANA FLUVIAL
ARCTIC GRAYLING
The
Center for Biological Diversity,
Western Watersheds
Project
and George Wuerthner sued
the U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service 5-21-03
for failing to list the Montana
fluvial arctic grayling as
an endangered species. In
response to a petition from
the Center for Biological
Diversity and Wuerthner,
the Fish and Wildlife determined
in 1994 that the fluvial
(i.e. found in rivers) grayling
warranted protection as an
endangered species under
the Endangered Species Act.
However, the agency maintained
that finalizing this status
was "precluded" by
higher priority actions.
Once
found throughout the upper
Missouri River drainage
above
Great Falls, the fluvial
arctic grayling has
been reduced to a single
self-sustaining population
in a short stretch of the
Big Hole River above Divide
Dam, comprising about 4%
of its historic range. A primary
factor in this range decline
was, and continues to
be, the dewatering of the
grayling's stream habitat,
and degradation of riparian
areas. Extensive water
withdrawls from the Big Hole
river and four consecutive
years of drought continue
to threaten the Big Hole
population with 2002 recording
the lowest populations
since monitoring began in
1978.
The suit seeks to force Fish
and Wildlife to use their
power to emergency list the
species and prosecute landowners
who have refused to cooperate
with a voluntary plan
to leave water in the Big
Hole River during drought
years. The groups are represented
by Judi Brawer of
Advocates for the West.
SUIT FILED
TO PROTECT RARE DESERT
PLANT
On 4-30-03,
the Center for Biological
Diversity and the California
Native Plant Society filed
suit against
the Bush Administration for
refusing to consider the
desert cymopterus (Cymopterus
deserticola)
for protection under the
Endangered Species Act. Also
known as the
desert spring parsley, the
desert cymopterus lives
only in the West Mojave desert.
It has been extirpated
from the Antelope and Victor
Valleys due to urban sprawl,
off-road vehicles and livestock
grazing. The BLM's
soon to be released West
Mojave Plan fails to consider
conservation for the cymopterus,
assuring that it will
continue spiraling toward
extinction...unless it is
protected under the Endangered
Species Act.
Like thousands of imperiled
species, many of which
have gone extinct, the desert
cymopterus has bounced
around federal waiting lists
for almost 30 years. The
Smithsonian Institution first
petitioned the U.S. Fish
and Wildlife Service to list
it as an endangered species
in 1975. The Fish and Wildlife
Service proposed to
list it in 1976, but never
completed the process. Meanwhile
its habitat has continued
to disappear and the species
has continued to decline.
SFEDS KILL
MEXICAN GRAY WOLF TO APPEASE
LIVESTOCK INDUSTRY
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
destroyed the Sycamore
Pack of Mexican gray wolves,
capturing the male on
5-21-03 and shooting the
female on 5-27-03. She was
the first Mexican gray wolf
shot by the government
since the Endangered Species
Act was created in 1973.
The pack was targeted from
capture because they had
chased cattle.
The female was originally released
in February 2000
in the Apache National Forest
of Arizona as part of
the Campbell Blue Pack. She
and her mate left the recovery
area and thus were recaptured
in July 2000. While in
captivity, she broke her
leg while trying to scale
a chain-link fence. After
receiving veterinary care,
she and her mate were re-released
in December 2000
in the Gila National Forest
of New Mexico, but the
previously cohesive pair
split apart shortly after
release. After re-uniting,
on March 9 and May 25, 2001
they were found scavenging
on livestock carcasses of
animals they did not kill
and shortly afterwards began
killing cattle together --
for the first time. They
were captured again on June
10, 2001. She was paired
with a new mate and re-released
again this Spring as
the Sycamore Pack, but her
attraction to cattle evidently
remained.
Her killing and the low number
of Mexican wolves in
the wild today reflect systematic
mismanagement of
the Mexican gray wolf reintroduction
program stemming
from policies demanded by
the livestock industry and
supported by Secretary of
the Interior Gale Norton.
These policies are at odds
with recommendations by
scientists and with past
statements by Fish and Wildlife
Service Mexican wolf recovery
coordinator Brian Kelly
that management will change
according to a review of
the program that was conducted
two years ago.
In June, 2001, a committee of
four independent scientists
led by the renowned carnivore
biologist Paul C. Paquet,
Ph.D. of the University of
Calgary recommended that
wolves not be captured whenever
they leave the two
national forests that constitute
their recovery area,
but be allowed to roam freely
just like other wildlife.
Repeated recaptures of wolves,
the report warned, might
be undermining their social
structure, an assessment
consistent with the original
Campbell Blue Pack's splitting
apart after their re-release
in 2000.
The Paquet Report also advised
that carcasses of cattle
and horses that die of other
causes on the forests
be removed or destroyed before
wolves scavenge on them
and become habituated to
stock. Wolf 592 had shown
no interest in cattle until
she scavenged on carcasses.
Almost all the Mexican wolves
that have attacked livestock
are known to have first scavenged
on the carcasses
of stock.
The Fish and Wildlife Service
has not acted on either
of these Paquet Report recommendations,
despite the
scientists' warning that
failure to change course put
the Mexican wolf population
at a 39% chance of declines
in numbers, rather than the
increase in numbers intended
in the reintroduction program.
At the time their report
was released two years ago
there were 27 radio collared
wolves in the wild, and today
there are just 19, including
two pairs in New Mexico.
An unknown but small number
of additional uncollared
wolves also roam Arizona and
New Mexico, and several females
are also believed to
be nursing pups born this
year.
On December
5, 2002, a coalition of
fifteen environmental, animal
protection and religious
groups wrote to Interior
Secretary Gale Norton to
request she halt the planned
killing of two wild-born,
uncollared Mexican wolves
in Arizona. The wolves were
never found or killed,
and the predation on cattle
of which they were suspected
ceased nonetheless. But an
Interior official wrote
back on January 13, 2003
with a refusal to rescind
the kill order, citing "data
collected during
the subsequent two breeding
seasons" after the
Paquet Report's release as
reason to disregard the
scientists' recommendations.
More Information: Center's
Mexican Wolf Web
Click
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for wildlife and habitat.
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