Our Accomplishments
We made great strides recently
As the year rolls on, we are proud of recent positive gains for wild carnivore conservation in 2006-07. A few highlights include:
- Pushed the Wildlife Commission to approve the development of a mandatory mountain lion hunter education program by the Colorado Division of Wildlife (DOW) so all licensed lion hunters and outfitters will learn to identify female catspotentially mothers with kittens. Although we don't support hunting lions, we believe this program will reduce the impacts on the mountain lion population by protecting females with dependent young.
- Challenged the Wildlife Commission and Colorado Division of Wildlife on a proposal to allow trappers to "box trap" and kill nine species. The Commission voted to open trapping on two of the speciespine marten and minkand Sinapu filed a lawsuit given the state's constitutional ban on trapping (September court date).
- Petitioned the Environmental Protection Agency to ban two predator poisonssodium cyanide and Compound 1080used by USDA Wildlife Services to kill native carnivores. Federally protected species including bald eagles, wolves, California condors, and grizzly bears have been unintentionally poisoned by sodium cyanide, as have family pets (still pending).
- Advocated for an ecological alternative to Rocky Mountain National Park's plan to kill hundreds of elk each year (a plan aimed at reducing overgrazing by elk). Underscoring the need to restore wolves to the Park and the rest of the Southern Rocky Mountains as the most ecologically-sound and long-term solution to the problem of lazy elk (still pending).
- Provided a detailed legal and ecological critique of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service's plan to remove legal protections from wolves in the Northern Rockies, emphasizing the fact that wolves are presently represented across less than five percent of their native range nationwide.
- Mobilized several renowned scientists to review and ultimately oppose the Department of the Interior's effort to gut the Endangered Species Act (ESA) by re-defining the "range" of imperiled species to mean "current range" rather than "historic range." Such a twisted change in the definition of "range" would eliminate significant protections for imperiled species, and would prevent listing new species as threatened or endangered under the ESA.
- Launched a "Bear Aware Business" Campaign in Boulder this spring. The goal is for businesses to sign a pledge that they will operate responsibly with regard to bears (bear-proof trash cans, etc.). Once a business owner pledges to operate as a bear aware business, they will receive a "Bear Aware Business" window sticker that they can publicly display.
