____________________________________________________
\ SOUTHWEST BIODIVERSITY ALERT
#162
/
\
11-25-98
/
\
/
\ SOUTHWEST CENTER FOR
BIOLOGICAL DIVERSITY
/
\ http://www.sw-center.org
/
\________________________________________/
MEXICAN GRAY WOLF UPDATE
- 5th wolf confirmed shot, no free roaming
wolves left.
- Inmate claims cattlemen offered wolf bounty.
Cattlemen
deny wolves were shot, claim Bible is
anti-wolf.
- SW Center releases Wolf Safe Haven Plan. Coalition
blasts
livestock industry, asks them to drop suit.
-
Babbitt warns ranchers. Tucson Citizen calls for
cancellation of grazing permits.
- Reward stands at
$35,000
*****
***** *****
5TH WOLF CONFIRMED SHOT. The U.S.
Fish & Wildlife Service has
confirmed that the wolf found dead Monday on
the border of
the Apache National Forest and the Fort Apache
Indian
reservation was killed by gunshot wound. Of the 11
reintroduced
wolves, 5 were shot, 3 were removed after leaving the
recovery
area, 1 is missing. The two remaining males were captured
and
placed in release pens with two new females. No Mexican gray
wolves
are in the wild at this time. The four penned wolves
will be released
soon.
BOUNTY FOR WOLVES. New West Research has released an audio
tape
of Jody Cooper who, while in prison on wildlife violations,
claims to
have been offered $35,000 by a member of the New
Mexico Cattle Growers
Association to kill all the introduced
wolves. In an interview with the
Tucson Citizen, however, Cooper
denied being offered the bounty.
In a
bizarre twist, Eric Ness of the New Mexico Farm &
Livestock Bureau
simultaneously suggested that no wolves were
shot, AND that they were shot by
"extreme leftist
environmentalists." A New Mexico rancher attending a
lecture
by the killer of the first gray wolf, told the crowd
that the
Bible refers to cattle positively 80 times, and
only five times to wolves,
all of them negatively. "God is on
our side," he said.
WOLF SAFE HAVEN
PLAN RELEASED. In response to the slaughter,
the Southwest Center released
its Gray Wolf Safe Haven Plan
on 11-24-98. The plan calls for:
- designation of the Blue Range Primitive Area as a
federal
wilderness,
- establishment of a
1.9 million acre wolf release zone in the
Gila/Aldo
Leopold wilderness complex along with a travel
corridor along the San Francisco River between the
Blue
Range and Gila/Aldo Leopold recovery
zones,
- reintroduction of wolves next year into the more
remote
Gila/Aldo Leopold wilderness
complex,
- closure of unnecessary roads throughout the Apache and
Gila
National Forest,
- phasing out of
livestock permits within the 3.6 million acre
Blue
Range and Aldo/Leopold primary recovery zones,
- re-opening of the
investigation in the killing of the first
wolf
See the full plan at http://www.sw-center.org/swcbd/news.html
COALITION
BLASTS LIVESTOCK SUIT. The Southwest Center, Wildlife
Damage Review,
Defenders of Wildlife, New West Research, White
Mountain Conservation League,
Animal Protection of New Mexico,
the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, Sky
Island Watch, Maricopa
Audubon Society, Grand Canyon Chapter of the Sierra
Club, and the
Southwest Forest Alliance sent a letter on 11-24-98 asking
the
livestock industry to drop its lawsuit to shut down the
wolf
reintroduction program:
"The livestock industry, now
working with New Mexico's farm
bureaus, has been the principle force
behind the near
extinction of the Mexican gray wolf. Whether through
bounties,
direct hunting, trapping and poisoning, or through
subsidized
federal and state predator eradication programs, the
livestock
industry has waged war on the wolf for the last hundred
years...
Your current lawsuit to end the gray wolf recovery
program,
like the Farm Bureau suit in Yellowstone, continues a
shameful
chapter of history that should have ended long ago.
Americans
broadly support wolf reintroduction. A November 17, 1998
poll
by CNN showed that 89% of Americans favor wolf
reintroduction...
These people own the public lands where the Mexican
gray wolf
has been introduced. Their tax dollars subsidize the
livestock
industry on these lands...Your misguided lawsuit not
only
contradicts the wishes of Americans nationally and locally,
it
has helped to foster an atmosphere of fear and hatred
within
which cowardly and ignorant actions fester..."
see the
full letter at http://www.sw-center.org/swcbd/news.html
BABBITT
WARNS RANCHERS. While helping to release two female wolves
on 11-2-98,
Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt warned the livestock
industry that wolves
are here to stay:
"I'm standing on public land owned by the people
of the United
states of America, and 90 percent of those people want
wolves
here...The question is not the wolves- they have learned
how
to live here - it's their human neighbors. The livestock
industry...has come to think of range rights as exclusive rights
akin
to ownership, for running cattle for their exclusive use.
That is not
the way it is...Our job is to make sure the interest
of all the public
is protected - not one use to be exalted
above all others."
On
11-17-98, the Tucson Citizen prefigured the Southwest
Center's Safe Haven
Plan by calling on the U.S. Fish & Wildlife
Service to find a more remote
wolf release site, and upon the
U.S. Forest Service to begin revoking grazing
permits if the wolf
killings continue:
"The federal
government's biggest enemy in the effort to
reintroduce wolves to
Arizona is the federal government. It
leases land to ranchers at
bargain basement prices. It is fully
aware that the sentiment that led
to the wolves' extinction in
the area 50 years ago - through bullets,
poison and traps - is
still strong today.
Yet the
government seems to think it can put wolves and people
together in
close proximity and expect them to live harmoniously.
Perhaps it
should stop renewing some of its grazing leases to
give the wolves a
chance. Perhaps it should take the bold step
of announcing it will do
just that if another wolf dies.
Unless the federal government puts
the wolves beyond easy
reach of people who want to gun them down, and
protects them
from hostile interests, there's no reason to hope the
slaughter
will end any time soon."
$35,000 REWARD. Thus far the
U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service has
offered $10,000 for information leading
to the arrest and
conviction of the killer(s). Defenders of Wildlife has
matched
this with another $10,000. The staff of the Southwest Center
have
put up $5,000. Author Michael Blake has put up $5,000. And
a
coalition including the Southwest Center, the Southwest
Environmental
Center, Forest Guardians, New West Research and others has
put
up $5,000. The agency reports that credible information has
been
forthcoming since the rewards were
offered.
_____________________________________________________________________________
Kierán
Suckling
ksuckling@sw-center.org
Executive
Director
520.623.5252 phone
Southwest Center for Biological
Diversity 520.623.9797 fax
http://www.sw-center.org
pob 710, tucson, az 85702-710