I’m a bit confused about what this means, however.
Story in the Casper Star Tribune. By Whitney Royster.
Ralph Maughan
Dr. Ralph Maughan is professor emeritus of political science at Idaho State University. He was a Western Watersheds Project Board Member off and on for many years, and was also its President for several years. For a long time he produced Ralph Maughan's Wolf Report. He was a founder of the Greater Yellowstone Coalition. He and Jackie Johnson Maughan wrote three editions of "Hiking Idaho." He also wrote "Beyond the Tetons" and "Backpacking Wyoming's Teton and Washakie Wilderness." He created and is the administrator of The Wildlife News.
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More crazy wolf news in Wyoming from the associated press.
Wyo. — While federal wildlife officials are retaining management of wolves in northwestern Wyoming, wolves that roam into southern Wyoming mountain ranges would not be protected.
Ed Bangs is a wolf recovery coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. He says the original wolf-recovery plan included all of Wyoming as part of the gray wolf’s range.
But federal officials now consider only the state’s northern corner to be essential to wolf recovery.
If wolves make it to the Laramie, Sierra Madre or Snowy ranges in southern Wyoming, they would be considered predators.
Bangs said those ranges aren’t suitable for wolves, both for geographic reasons and because they’re used extensively for livestock grazing
Worse, if they make it to SW Wyoming, which they do all the time, they will be killed on sight if anyone wants to as well.
Legally, the FWS would have to undertake a NEPA process, including an EIS, to change the original rule that established the entire State of Wyoming as part of the recovery area. FWS just can’t change the rule with a flimsy argument that the ESA doesn’t require historical range to be part of a recovered species’ “significant” range.
The proposal is arbitrary and capricious on its face.
Robert’s assessment of proposal is right on. A solid environmental attorney would see it in the same light.
A word about “historical” range: There’s still suitable habitat for wolves in Northern New England and, arguably, in the Adirondacks. In fact, some regional conservation groups sense societal support for wolf reintroduction there to be far greater than that for cougars.