“9th Circuit won’t halt wolf hunting in Idaho, Montana”….

I’m too sad to comment.

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From the Seattle Times

In a decision filed Thursday, the court denied the request by the Alliance for the Wild Rockies to cancel the hunts while the court considers a challenge to congressional action that stripped wolves of federal protections in Montana and Idaho, and in parts of Washington, Oregon and Utah.

By The Associated Press

HELENA, Mont. — A federal appeals court on Thursday denied a request by environmentalists for an emergency injunction to halt wolf hunts scheduled to start next week in Idaho and Montana.

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals denied the request by the Alliance for the Wild Rockies seeking to cancel the hunts while the court considers a challenge to congressional action that stripped wolves of protections in Montana and Idaho, and in parts of Washington, Oregon and Utah.

Earlier this month, U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy in Missoula reluctantly upheld a budget rider inserted by Rep. Mike Simpson, R-Idaho, and Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., to remove federal protection of wolves.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2016016592_wolfhunts26.html

And We Wait…

This blog will be two years old next month. In two years,  wolves have been delisted, hunted, relisted, delisted and face brutal hunts once again. They’ve been loved, hated, worshiped and vilified.  I’ve written of their incredible beauty, their value to our ecosystem, their loving nature, their devotion to family, their restless spirits, their renowned endurance. I’ve written memorials to their name, lingering long into the night and early morning.  And yet here we stand perched on the precipice once again.  I allow my mind to wander and it takes me to a place I don’t want to go. To the brutal slaughter that awaits the gray wolf.  Only the US Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals can stop this now.

I look back and remember the elation we all felt when Judge Molloy relisted wolves in the Northern Rockies. It was a blissful day. A long-awaited day.  But evil wouldn’t rest. It picked itself up and went to work.  It went to work for the ranchers who want a predator free landscape.

“Today, ranchers have 26,000 permits to graze millions of livestock on pasture managed by the Bureau of Land Management and the Forest Service. They pay $1.35 per head of cattle per month — a price set by cattle prices, livestock production costs and, ostensibly, private grazing lease rates. But since 1980 that amount has decreased 40 percent to its statutory minimum, and it is typically one-10th of grazing fees on private property and state lands.

Taxpayers Foot Bill

The U.S. spends about $135 million per year managing public-lands grazing, according to the Government Accountability Office, but collects only $21 million in fees. Taxpayers also foot the bill for the Agriculture Department’s predator control program, whose hunters killed 81,684 coyotes and 478 wolves in 2009.“

It went to work for the hunting lobbies and their buddies in Congress, who helped push though a death sentence for wolves in the Northern Rockies via budget rider.

And now we wait. Wait for the Ninth Circuit. Wait for a reprieve for wolves. Will their howls be silenced once again in the Northern Rockies, sacrificed on the altar of hate and ignorance?  History repeating itself.

Video: Courtesy WildEarth Guardians YouTube

Posted in: Wolf Wars, Biodiversity

Tags: WildEarth Guardians, gray wolf, wolf persecution, ignorance, wolf hate groups, delisting, wolf hunts, animal cruelty