Trump administration tells Colorado wolves must come from U.S. Rockies states, not Canada
FORT COLLINS, Colo. (AP) — The Trump administration is telling Colorado to stop importing gray wolves from Canada as part of the state’s efforts to restore the predator; It’s a change that could hamper plans for further reintroductions this winter.
State releases wolves west of Continental Divide since 2023 After Colorado voters narrowly approved Reintroduction of wolves in 2020. About 30 wolves currently roam the state’s mountainous regions, and the management plan calls for potentially 200 or more wolves in the long term.
The program was not very popular in rural areas where some wolves live. attacked livestock. Now, after two winters of evictions during President Joe Biden’s administration, wolf opponents appear to have found support from federal officials under President Donald Trump.
Colorado wolves should come from the Northern Rockies states, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Director Brian Nesvik said in a recent letter to Colorado Parks and Wildlife Director Jeff Davis.
Nesvik wrote that Colorado “must immediately cease and desist any efforts to capture, transport, and/or release gray wolves not obtained from the northern Rocky Mountain states.”
Many of those states — including Yellowstone-area states Idaho, Montana and Wyoming, where wolves were reintroduced from Canada in the 1990s — have said they want no part of Colorado’s reintroduction.
This could leave Colorado in a difficult situation this winter. The province plans to relocate 10 to 15 wolves as part of an agreement with British Columbia’s Ministry of Water, Land and Resource Management and Colorado Parks and Wildlife spokesman Luke Perkins, it said.
According to Perkins, the agreement was signed before the state received the Oct. 10 letter from Nesvik. He said the state “continues to evaluate all options to support this year’s gray wolf releases” after receiving “final guidance” from the Fish and Wildlife Service.
Although some of the wolves reintroduced to Colorado came from Oregon, the most recently released wolves came from British Columbia.
The issue now is whether the federal agency, when it identified Colorado’s “experimental” population of reintroduced wolves, required that the wolves come only from the northern U.S. Rocky Mountain states.
a federal notice announcement of appointment In 2023, he only mentioned the northern Rockies as a “preferred” region, not a required source of wolves.
Defenders of Wildlife attorney Lisa Saltzburg said in a statement that the Fish and Wildlife Service “twisted its language” by saying wolves could not come from Canada or Alaska.
Saltzburg said people in Colorado “should be proud of their state’s leadership in conservation and coexistence, and the wolf reintroduction program demonstrates those values.”
The Colorado Governor’s Office and the Colorado Parks and Wildlife Service have been in contact with the Department of the Interior regarding the letter and are considering “all options” to allow the release of wolves this year, Shelby Wieman, a spokeswoman for Gov. Jared Polis, said via email.
Fish and Wildlife Service spokesman Garrett Peterson, who said in his voicemail that he would not be available until the government shutdown is over, did not immediately return a message seeking comment.
