Can the Red Wolf survive the U.S. Dept of Interior?

A decade behind on the science of wildlife management

B. Bartel/U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service

The Red Wolf is still endanger of extinction.

This week a non-profit environmental organization, the Center for Biological Diversity, petitioned the federal district court in the Eastern District of North Carolina for an injunction against the U.S. Department of Interior, to follow the law and comply with the Endangered Species Act to protect, not allow shooting of, the red wolf.

All that is to say, the U.S. Department of the Interior is allowing legal shooting of this experimental struggling tiny Red Wolf population even when there is no threat from the wolf.

The Red Wolf population estimate reported by the U.S. Department of Interior as of August 2023 is:

• Known/collared (wild): 13

• Total estimate (wild): 23-25

• Red Wolf SAFE (captive breeding programs): 269

That would seem to be an obvious duty for the federal department charged with administering the Endangered Species Act, yet they represent the biggest threat to stopping the extinction of the red wolf — human-caused mortality.

The U.S. Department of Interior was sued in 2014 for an actual event where a politically motivated federal employee allowed a Red Wolf mother who was responsible for multiple litters of wolf pups to be shot by a home owner because he saw it in his yard. No threat, just that he saw it and wanted to shoot it.

This U.S. Dept of Interior employee, Leopoldo Miranda-Castro,¹ was in charge of the U.S. Dept  of Interior’s ten state region of the southeast when he approved a “take” permit for the most endangered wolf in America on the coast of North Carolina where only 30 or so exist in the wild. It was so egregious, a federal judge ordered US DOI to stop violating section 7 of the Endangered Species Act with these actions in the case Red Wolf Coalition v. U.S. Fish & Wildlife (2021).² Fortunately, he “retired” shortly thereafter and was hired by the ironically named, Conservation without Conflict organization in February 2023.³

Using Scientific Studies for the Basis of Regulation

In the complaint that was filed this week, the petitioners point out that the psychology behind the 10(j) take permit for endangered species was intended to prevent illegal taking and make the public more comfortable with the protection of these species. Instead, these policies have just the opposite effect. The petition cites a 2022 study where the research finds that more wolves are killed as a result of these take permits.⁴ The design of the research is as follows:

We evaluated how changes in federal and state policies protecting red wolves influenced the hazard and incidence of mortality and disappearance. We observed substantial increases in the hazard and incidence of red wolf reported poaching, and smaller increases in disappearances, during periods of reduced federal and state protections.

The study showed that the liberalization of killing through such policies as the 10(j) permit used to senselessly kill Red Wolves, has instead resulted in increases in killing Red Wolves. They write:

The traditional, and still pervasive, assumption in wildlife management is that some policy interventions liberalizing killing (through reduced protections, such as permits for killing) may increase human tolerance for a species or approval of management policies, leading to a reduction in overall poaching. Indeed, despite contrary evidence from multiple sources since 2013, the US Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) has argued in favour of this ‘killing for tolerance’ (table 1, column B, summarized in [22]) hypothesis in federal court and as recently as December 2020 in intergovernmental communication [23].⁵

So the U.S. Department of Justice which litigates with or on behalf of the U.S. Department of Interior, claims their take permits are for conservation when in fact, scientific studies and data show they have just the opposite effect! Judges rely on lawyers to present truthful facts but they also depend on opposing counsel to object to false statements. Where scientific evidence is needed you will need a scientific expert to testify to the data in the study (you cannot just submit the study to the court without an expert witness facilitating this.) That appears to be what is called for here to stop this false claim by the government since 2013.

The Duplicity of the U.S. Dept of Interior

In 2019, the same public interest, non-profit organization, filed a petition to force action on the part of the federal government for failing to act in a legal obligation to develop a conservation plan for the Red Wolf.

In 2016, the same environmental group filed for an injunction to compel U.S. Dept of Interior to revise its 10(j) rule that permits Red Wolf killings by home owners. This is counter-intuitive and contrary to the law, where the goal is all about preventing extinction! They accomplish this bizarre result by calling this small population of 26 individual Red Wolves was a “non-essential” population! The Federal DOI Handbook defines “non-essential” in its use in 10(j) as":

A "nonessential experimental population" is a reintroduced population whose loss would not be likely to appreciably reduce the likelihood of survival of the species in the wild. ⁶

Yet, the U.S. Dept. of Interior through the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, find the sole population of red wolves in the wild numbering about 23-26, “whose loss would not be likely to appreciably reduce its likelihood of survival of the species in the wild.” Willful ignorance or intentional mismanagement is clearly at play, here.

The petition in 2019 recited its action in 2016 as follows:

Additionally, in May of 2016, the Center and its allies submitted an emergency petition to the Service to strengthen existing regulations for the red wolf. Specifically, the petition sought a revised 10(j) rule that would reduce shooting deaths, establish additional wild populations of red wolves, and reclassify all reintroduced populations of red wolves as “essential” experimental populations.

The Red Wolf Coalition filed a motion for an injunction to stop these permits allowing homeowners to kill this struggling population . The court stopped the federal government from this practice and held:

“This Court preliminarily enjoined USFWS from authorizing lethal takes of non-problem red wolves, id., and subsequently entered permanent declaratory and injunctive relief against USFWS. Red Wolf Coal. (Red Wolf Coal. II) v. United States Fish & Wildlife Serv., 346 F. Supp. 3d 802, 815 (E.D.N.C. 2018). Specifically, the Court permanently enjoined USFWS from authorizing lethal takes of non-problem red wolves either directly or by landowner authorization. ‘

So why are we back in court over the “kill” permits?

In 2018, the court rightly permanently enjoined the U.S. Department of Interior from distributing its kill permits. So why is the Red Wolf Coalition back in court over the 10(j) rule?

The petition explains that the Red Wolf Coalition, a non-profit group, asked the U.S. Department of Interior/U.S. Fish & Wildlife to revise or withdraw the 10(j) regulation but they refused:

In denying the Center’s request that the Service revise the red wolf 10(j) rule to remove the language authorizing killing of non-offending red wolves by private landowners, the Service stated that this provision “has effectively already been removed” by the 2018 court decision. ⁷

Yet, the court has permanently enjoined them and they are required to comply with the law as interpreted by the federal court. The U.S. Department of Interior has continued to keep the rule and to continue to show it on their website in open defiance of the order of the federal court.⁸

The Red Wolf Coalition has also asked that the population of Red Wolves be designated as “essential” rather than continuing to keep them as “non-essential” opening the door for a kill permit, again in defiance of the court order.

U.S. Department of Interior has been delegated responsibility for protecting wildlife, land, minerals and national parks (the U.S. Forest Service is in the U.S. Department of Agriculture), and they are also responsible for the administration of programs for federal recognized tribes and Alaska Native villages (corporations). Needless to say, they have failed in a number of these areas. We rely on non-profit organizations to hold them accountable, and the occasional Congressional oversight hearing to threaten their budget when the public makes enough calls to their Members of Congress and Senators.

But is this system making US DOI accountable, fast enough to prevent extinction of that which we have entrusted them to protect? While it is challenging in a Department with so many competing priorities and overt acts of duplicity, extinction has got to rise to the top of the list. Let’s hope that it does.

Where can you see Red Wolves?

You can see them in captivity as well as in the wild.

The SAFE program is a national coalition of zoos and conservation centers that are dedicated to nurturing endangered species so that they can be used to repopulate the wild populations. The Red Wolf stands as the first successful program to take a carnivore that had become extinct in the wild and restore it to a wild population. It is a success story for the Endangered Species Act and the SAFE program. There are currently 269 red wolves in that program, and not all of them are selected as candidates for living in the wild.

To see them in the wild, you can occasionally catch a glimpse of one in the North Carolina Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge where the only population in the wild exists.⁹ If you are in Texas, you can see them in captivity at Fossil Rim Wildlife Center in Glenrose, Texas¹⁰ which is part of the SAFE coalition and has several breeding pairs.¹¹

__________________________

In June 2023, I wrote about the red wolf as a species and how being a distinct species was necessary to be a protected species under the Endangered Species Act.

1. https://www.fws.gov/staff-profile/leopoldo-leo-miranda-castro . We both share the same degree from the same institution – a B.S. degree in Zoology from North Carolina State University, so it is sad this was his “takeaway” from a great program.

2. https://casetext.com/case/red-wolf-coal-v-us-fish-wildlife-serv

3. https://wildlifemanagement.institute/outdoor-news-bulletin/february-2023/leo-miranda-hired-executive-director-conservation-without

4. https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsos.210400

5. https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsos.210400 at p. 2

6. https://www.fws.gov/sites/default/files/documents/endangered-species-consultation-handbook.pdf at p. 2-5 or p. 45 in the document.

7. https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/species/mammals/red_wolf/pdfs/Red-Wolf-58-Complaint-10-4-23.pdf

8. The Petitioner’s write:

58. Even after that court decision, the red wolf 10(j) rule remains unchanged in he Code of Federal Regulations, as well as on the Service’s website.

59. That the text of the red wolf 10(j) rule does not accurately dictate the circumstances when the public can lawfully kill red wolves may lead to misinformation and fuel anti-wolf sentiment.

9. https://www.fws.gov/refuge/alligator-river

10. https://fossilrim.org/animals/american-red-wolf/

11. https://fossilrim.org/animals/american-red-wolf/