Action timeline

January 4, 1974 – The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service listed gray wolves as endangered under the Endangered Species Act.

April 1, 2003 – The Service issued a final rule to reclassify and reduce federal protections for northern Rockies gray wolves.

January 31, 2005 – Ending a suit brought by the Center and allies, a federal judge overturned the Service’s 2003 downlisting of the wolves.

June 25, 2007 – The Center and Western Watersheds Project filed suit against the U.S. Department of Agriculture for failing to assess the ecological impact of a federal sheep-grazing station in Montana and Idaho west of Yellowstone National Park. The USDA Sheep Experiment Station grazes more than 6,000 sheep on more than 100,000 acres of public land, threatening the habitat of northern Rockies gray wolves and other imperiled native species.

January 28, 2008 – Seven conservation organizations, including the Center, sued the Service for adopting a rule allowing the states of Idaho, Wyoming, and Montana to kill up to half of the Rocky Mountain wolf population.

February 19, 2008 – The Center’s case against the Department of Agriculture was settled when the Department agreed to assess the ecological impact of its Sheep Experiment Station.

February 27, 2008 – The Service announced the removal of northern Rockies wolves from the endangered species list, to be effective March 28. The Center and 10 allies filed a notice of intent to sue the Service for the decision.

April 28, 2008 – The Center and 11 allies filed suit against the Service for delisting the wolves.

July 18, 2008 – A federal judge issued a temporary injunction restoring northern Rockies gray wolves to the endangered species list pending the conclusion of the lawsuit challenging their delisting.

September 16, 2008 – The Fish and Wildlife Service announced it was giving up its attack on the wolves and withdrawing its rule removing them from the endangered species list.

October 25, 2008 – The Service re-opened for public comment its 2007 proposal to delist the wolves.

January 4, 2009 – The Service announced a final rule to remove Endangered Species Act protections from all northern Rockies gray wolves except for those in Wyoming. The rule also stripped protections from gray wolves in the Great Lakes region.

January 20, 2009 – President Barack Obama began his administration by issuing a freeze on publication of federal regulations planned under the Bush administration but not yet published. The move effectively halted the premature removal of gray wolves from the endangered species list.

March 5, 2009 – The Fish and Wildlife Service moved forward with the Bush administration’s plan to remove gray wolves in the northern Rockies and the upper Midwest from the federal Endangered Species list.

March 25, 2009 – In passing the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009, Congress approved a demonstration project involving federal compensation for livestock losses to wolves, as well as federal funding for nonlethal activities to reduce the risk of livestock losses to wolves.

April 2, 2009 – The Fish and Wildlife Service’s rule to delist northern Rockies and Great Lakes–region wolves was published in the Federal Register; the Center and allies, represented by Earthjustice, filed a 60-day notice of intent to sue.

May 4, 2009 – The rule removing protections for gray wolves in the northern Rockies, and Great Lakes region officially took effect. The rule also removed federal protections from any wolves residing in a third of eastern Oregon and Washington, as well as a portion of northern Utah.

June 2, 2009 – The Center and allies filed suit to restore Endangered Species Act protections to gray wolves in Idaho and Montana.

August 20, 2009 – The Center and allies requested that a federal district court block wolf hunts in Idaho and Montana. Idaho had authorized the killing of 225 wolves in a hunt to begin Sept. 1; Montana had authorized the killing of 75 wolves in a hunt scheduled for Sept. 15.

September 8, 2009 – A federal district court found that the delisting of northern Rockies wolves was probably illegal, finding merit in our case against the administration for removing the wolves’ protections. However, the judge declined to stop the wolf hunts in Idaho and Montana.