It's agreed, we all want to make sure the Gray Wolf is front and center!
MATTHEW BROWN, Associated Press Writer
BILLINGS, Mont. – Tens of thousands of gray wolves would be returned to the woods of New England, the mountains of California, the wide open Great Plains and the desert West under a scientific petition filed Tuesday with the federal government.
The predators were poisoned and trapped to near-extermination in the United States last century, but have since clawed their way back to some of the most remote wilderness in the lower 48 states.
That recovery was boosted in the 1990s by the reintroduction of 66 wolves in Idaho and Yellowstone National Park. Yet as those first packs have flourished, increased livestock killings and declining big game herds have drawn sharp backlash from ranchers, hunters and officials in the Northern Rockies.
But biologists with the Arizona-based Center for Biological Diversity want to expand that recovery across the country. A few isolated pockets of wolves, they say, are not enough.
"If the gray wolf is listed as endangered, it should be recovered in all significant portions of its range, not just fragments," said Michael Robinson, who authored the petition. Robinson said the animals occupy less than 5 percent of their historic range in the lower 48 states.
This movement portends one of the most memorable moments in American history, the nationwide repatriation of the American Graywolf, symbol of courage, survival and magnificent natural beauty. Hounded by ranchers, bounty hunters, and the U.S. government, the Graywolf persevered despite being ruthlessly driven to the edge of extinction. It hung on, like Chief Sitting Bull and the Lakota Sioux, by retreating to Canada. Only a few years ago, it was decided to repatriate this noble American symbol, to Montana, Utah and Wyoming, where it has flourished in co-existence with humans and their livestock.
ReplyDeleteAt long last perhaps it is ready to reclaim its rightful place among American wildlife.
From one who knows.