ALERT: The Trump admin. plans to end protection for gray wolves
It’s now or never for gray wolves in the Lower 48 states: The Interior Department just moved to end wolves’ Endangered Species Act (ESA) protections.1
Gray wolves need our help right now.
This could be a disaster. Delisting wolves in this way would leave them vulnerable across the entire Lower 48 states.
Hunting, trapping and poisoning nearly drove wolves to extinction in the 1900s.2 Without the proven protection of the ESA, we could see a repeat of last century’s tragedy.
Wolves need the protection of the Endangered Species Act.
When wolves lose the protection of the ESA, hundreds or thousands of them die. When the wolf population around the Great Lakes were taken off the list, 1,500 were killed before protection resumed.3
With as few as 5,600 wolves living in the Lower 48, they just can’t afford killing on that scale.4 If the Interior delists wolves, we will be in real danger of losing them forever.
An America without gray wolves would be a tragedy for us and for the environment. Wolves play a vital role on the landscape, bringing balance to the ecosystems they call home. Their haunting howls have captivated generations. We want to make sure that wolves’ howling song is heard for generations more to come
You can help wolves by taking action today.
We’ve protected wolves before, and we know we can do it again if we take action together. Last year over 25,000 of you asked Congress to maintain protections for wolves — and we won.
Today, wolves need our voices again — more urgently than ever. Will you speak up for our nation’s irreplaceable gray wolves?
1. Matthew Brown and John Flesher, “AP NewsBreak: US plans to lift protections for gray wolves,” San Francisco Chronicle, March 6, 2019.
2. “Wolf Restoration,” U.S. National Park Service, December 15, 2017.
3. Matt McKinney, “Court: Great Lakes wolf hunt must stop,” StarTribune, December 19, 2014.
4. “Gray Wolf (Canis lupus) Current Population in the United States,” U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, accessed March 6, 2019.