Wolves are much ado about money

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, in April, will move to have the Western Great Lakes wolf population removed from the endangered species list. When this happens, the management of the wolf will be in the hands of the states of Wisconsin, Minnesota and Michigan. The Western Great Lakes wolf population has far exceeded recovery goals and is no longer endangered. The Western Great Lakes wolf population has been delisted before, only to have environmental-animal rights groups file lawsuits based on technical issues, not biology issues, resulting in the delisting being reversed. Likewise, the wolf population in the Rocky Mountain states of Idaho, Wyoming, and Montana has also far exceeded the recovery goals. It has been delisted several times and then relisted due to technical issues and lawsuits filed by environmental-animal rights groups. With the non-native, never endangered and much larger (up to 175 pounds) wolf subspecies Canis lupus occidentalis replacing the extinct native Rocky Mountain wolf (Canis lupus irremotus) that averaged 90 pounds, elk herds in the Yellowstone ecosystem are being decimated by a subspecies of wolf that evolved to kill much larger moose. If the goals of wolf recovery in these areas have been exceeded for years and with wolf populations growing at double-digit rates, why do the environmental-animal rights groups continue to file lawsuits? Two reasons. First, our federal government pays them to sue under the Equal Access to Justice Act. Also, the emotional propaganda of wolves in danger, even when not true, is a phenomenal fundraising scheme, and now they are threatening to sue for a wolf recovery plan for the lower 48 states...more