CYANIDE BOMBS

Stopping M-44s From Killing American Wildlife

For the past century a federal program called Wildlife Services, part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, has been slaughtering wildlife deemed “undesirable” by agribusiness. They’re usually animals like wolves, coyotes, beavers, and bears, but the program also kills creatures it doesn’t mean to — like family dogs and endangered wildlife.

M-44s are one of the most horrifying methods the program uses for its indiscriminate killing.

What Are M-44s, or Cyanide Bombs?

M-44s — more descriptively called “cyanide bombs” — are inhumane, spring-loaded traps that spray sodium cyanide into the faces of unsuspecting wildlife lured by their sweet, scented bait. Any creature — or person — who pulls on the baited trigger can suffer tortuous poisoning followed by a slow, agonizing death or severe injury.

Background

In 2023, before M-44 use was banned on Bureau of Land Management lands, Wildlife Services used cyanide bombs to poison 6,543 animals. Of the resulting deaths, 156 were unintentional. The program continued to use the devices even after a well-known tragedy in 2017 in Pocatello, Idaho. A 14-year-old boy inadvertently triggered an M-44 device placed on BLM land behind his home; the M-44 killed his dog and injured him. He’s believed to have been spared from death because of the wind’s direction.

Our Campaign

In late 2023 we scored a massive win across 245 million acres when, in response to a petition that June and years of work by the Center and allies, the BLM banned M-44s across the lands it manages.

But in 2026, supported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the BLM quietly walked back that ban, deciding to allow the devices’ use again on a “case-by-case basis.”

And the Environmental Protection Agency won’t stop approving these cruel, unnecessary cyanide traps. The agency denied our 2017 petition for a nationwide ban on M-44s, reauthorizing them in 2019 despite their outrageous death toll. The EPA also allows M-44 use by state agencies in South Dakota, Montana, Wyoming, New Mexico, and Texas. Responding to pressure from the Center and other wildlife advocates, the agency did pass some restrictions — but the deaths continue.

The Center has been directly targeting M-44s since 2016, when we and allies first warned the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service we’d sue over its failure to protect imperiled mammals and birds from the devices — and we did sue the next year, securing an agreement forcing the Service to analyze how M-44s impact endangered wildlife. We’ve also had state victories: As part of another agreement won through a lawsuit by the Center and allies, in 2019 a federal court approved a ban on Wildlife Services’ M-44 use across more than 10 million acres of public land in Wyoming. And in 2020 we finalized an agreement banning the dangerous traps in Idaho, along with measures to help protect wolves from snares and federal killing on public land.

In 2024, with ally groups, we petitioned the U.S. Forest Service to ban the use of M-44s in national forests. We won’t stop fighting until M-44s are outlawed everywhere. And we have the public behind us.

Check out our press releases to learn about all our actions against cyanide bombs.