AP, LATimes, NYTimes, etc: Judge orders feds to put Yellowstone Grizzlies back under Endangered Species Act protection
What a ruckus ensued about two years ago when, with states’ rights-oriented appointees from the Bush Administration in charge, the US Fish and Wildlife Service declared the grizzly bears in and around Yellowstone Nat’l Park to be doing just great and no longer needing protection as an endangered or threatened population. Now a judge has sorted through the enormously long briefs from both feds and a throng of environmentalists who filed two suits, and now orders that the Obama team put the big bruisers back under ESA protection – where other grizzlies in the lower 48, namely those near Glacier Nat’l Park in N.W. Montana, have been right along.
Main reasons, according to the judge’s decision, are that the Fish and Wildlife Service’s quiltwork of local and planned protections, ostensibly able to assure the continued recovery of the bears, had no teeth and hence did not meet the ESA’s requirements for delisting. The judge also ruled favorably on arguments that climate change and loss of traditional food – mainly the nuts of high alttitude whitebark pines that are being killed by revved-up beetle attacks and a “blister rust” fungus – are a reason to keep the bears listed as a threatened species. The judge did agree with a few of the government’s positions, including the definition of the bear’s natural available range and that, while they are isolated, their genetic diversity can be maintained.
Funny how that part of the country has two glamorous and fierce predators, wolves and brown bears (aka grizzlies), in legal crosshairs. The animals remain precarious and yet are also reclaiming parts of old range – and running into landowners, hunters, tourism interests, and state officials who want few or none of them anywhere outside the park proper.
Stories:
- NYTimes/Green Inc. – James Freed: Federal Court Rules That Yellowstone Grizzlines Should Be Listed as “Threatened” ;
- LA Times – Kim Murphy: Court restores safeguards for grizzly bears ; Good info from the plaintiffs, including material amassed too late for the lawsuits such as the large fatality rate among Yellowstone grizzlies last year.
- AP – Matthew Brown: Fed judge says grizzlies still threatened ;
- Idaho Statesman – Rocky Barker: Judge orders Obama administration to relist Yellowstone grizzly bears ;
Grist for the Mill:
Montana District Court Judge Donald W. Malloy ruling ;
Ironically Related News:
Great Falls Tribune (Montana) – Karl Puckett: River bottom grizzlies spark warnings to hunters ; Well north of Yellowstone’s grizz, their conspecific distant cousins are wandering out into the plains along riparian corridors (aka creek beds). Hunters or others breaking bush through the vegetation need to be careful. Protected these creatures may be. They remain powerful beasts sharp in tooth and claw. If a bear comes charging out from 30 feet away, good luck getting your rifle or big-bore pistol out and aimed with the safety off, etc. Bear spray, it says here, is best.
Charlie Petit
