Guiding Federal Permission To Kill Wolves Imperiled By Bad Science

Oregon Dep't, of Fish & Wildlife photo

Maybe the mass killng of wolves in Wisconsin and elsewhere is going to grind to a halt:

BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — A proposal to lift federal protections for gray wolves across most of the U.S. suffered a significant setback Friday as an independent review panel said the government is relying on unsettled science to make its case. 

Federal wildlife officials want to remove the animals from the endangered species list across the Lower 48 states, except for a small population in the Southwest. 

The five-member U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service peer-review panel was tasked with reviewing the government's claim that the Northeast and Midwest were home to a separate species, the eastern wolf. 

If the government were right, that would make gray wolf recovery unnecessary in those areas. 

But the peer reviewers concluded unanimously that the scientific research cited by the government was insufficient. 

That could make it difficult for federal officials to stick with their proposal as it now stands, further protracting the emotionally charged debate over what parts of the U.S. are suitable for the predators.

Wisconsin's wolf hunt began its route to legality in Wisconsin when the federal government withdrew the protection status, the DNR says:

After five years of delisting attempts and subsequent court challenges, a new federal delisting process began on May 5, 2011 and wolves were officially delisted on January 27, 2012. The count in winter 2011 was about 782-824 wolves with 202-203 packs, 19-plus loners, and 31 wolves on Indian reservations in the state.

Currently, the wolf hunt in Wisconsin is disallowed on tribal lands, but in 2012, 117 wolves were killed in the rest of the state legally, and another 257 in 2012 - - mostly through trapping followed up with a gunshot to the head - - DNR data show.