Wildlife Advocates Sue Forest Service Over Rising Wolf Body Count in Washington

Twenty-six wolves killed—including the Profanity Peak Pack—due to agency’s continued preferential treatment for livestock grazing over coexistence with wildlife

Spokane, WA – WildEarth Guardians, Western Watersheds Project, and Kettle Range Conservation Group filed a lawsuit today to ensure that the U.S. Forest Service protects endangered gray wolves on the Colville National Forest in northeast Washington where livestock ranching activities have incited conflict. This woeful negligence by the federal agency has resulted in the deaths of 26 wolves since 2012, including the total destruction of both the Profanity Peak Pack and the Old Profanity Territory Pack.

Specifically, the lawsuit challenges the Forest Service’s revised Colville National Forest Plan for failing to evaluate how the agency’s federally permitted livestock grazing program adversely affects wolves—a species eradicated from most of the contiguous United States by the 1920s. The groups are also challenging the Forest Service’s approval of cattle grazing for Diamond M Ranch, which is responsible for the majority of wolf deaths on the Colville National Forest since 2012, without requiring any measures to prevent these wolf-livestock conflicts from recurring.

“The blood of these wolves is on the Forest Service’s hands. Just because the agency didn’t pull the trigger, doesn’t mean the agency didn’t supply the gun and ammunition,” stated WildEarth Guardians’ Wildlife Coexistence Campaigner, Samantha Bruegger. “The Diamond M Ranch livestock grazing allotments, on 78,000 acres of the Colville National Forest, have been notorious as the place where wolves go to die. We want to change that and we think the agency can and should demand ranchers who receive grazing permits must coexist with wolves on national forest land.”

Located in the Kettle River Range and the Selkirk Mountains, the Colville National Forest is mostly comprised of densely forested, rugged terrain—ideal habitat for native carnivores like wolves, grizzly bear, and lynx. Yet nearly 70 percent of the national forest (about 745,000 acres or 1,164 square miles) is allocated to livestock grazing, making the region the epicenter of wolf-livestock conflicts in Washington State.

In its newly revised Forest Plan, adopted in October 2019, the Colville National Forest failed to even acknowledge the gray wolf’s return to the region, yet the plan sets management directives for livestock grazing, wildlife and other uses across all the forest’s 1.1 million-acres for the next 15 to 30 years.

“The gray wolf only began reclaiming its historic habitat in Washington State around a decade ago, yet the Forest Service entirely ignored the management implications of this native carnivore’s return to the Colville,” explained Jennifer Schwartz, staff attorney at WildEarth Guardians. “The Forest Service is legally obligated to explore measures for reducing these recurring conflicts so wolves can hold their rightful place on this forest and carry out their critical ecological role. This deliberate agency inaction is contrary to federal law.”

“It is the responsibility of National Forest leadership to protect, restore, and maintain wildlife habitat, but it has abdicated its authority,” said Timothy Coleman, director for Kettle Range Conservation Group. “Whether you love wildlife, like to hunt and fish, or enjoy beautiful trails free of manure, putting one cattle corporation’s profits ahead of all other interests is a blatantly outrageous waste of our Public Land.”

“Washington’s wolves deserve better than to be cast aside for private business profits,” stated Jocelyn Leroux of the Western Watersheds Project. “The Forest Service has ignored its charge to protect wildlife and instead relinquished power to a wolf-hating private livestock operation. By failing to consider the impacts of cattle grazing in the Colville National Forest on Washington’s native wildlife, the Forest Service has all but guaranteed the wolf slaughter will continue.”

The Forest Service’s inaction is symptomatic of a larger problem within the institutions charged with “managing” wildlife on these federal public lands. Much like the federally-funded wildlife killing program, Wildlife Services, the Forest Service has also chosen to blatantly ignore the changing values of the public and scientifically-backed coexistence practices that can proactively avoid and reduce conflicts between native carnivores and livestock. In fact, for the last 5-10 years, environmental groups have engaged in a relentless and tenacious effort to reform the reckless ways of Wildlife Services and those efforts have resulted in significant steps forward, like in WildEarth Guardians’ most recent settlement in Montana.

“Unfortunately, it takes litigation to force these federal agencies to fulfill their legal duties when it comes to dealing with conflicts between livestock and gray wolves, and this case is just another example,” stated Laurie Rule, senior attorney with Advocates for the West who is co-counseling the case.

Historically, the Forest Service has largely escaped intense scrutiny for its practices. Yet, it is this agency’s actions, through the permitting of livestock grazing, that are driving the killing of wolves, grizzly bears, and other carnivores on public lands across the West. With cattle just turned out for the 2020 grazing season on the Colville National Forest, wildlife advocates don’t want the fate of a new wolf pack in this territory—the Kettle Pack—to similarly hinge on whether one of them attacks a cow, wandering unattended, in this vast, heavily wooded expanse.

4 thoughts on “Wildlife Advocates Sue Forest Service Over Rising Wolf Body Count in Washington”

  1. “The Forest Service is legally obligated to explore measures for reducing these recurring conflicts so wolves can hold their rightful place on this forest and carry out their critical ecological role.”

    Given that they haven’t been around for 100 years, and conceivably other carnivores are still around (as in mountain lions and coyotes) I wonder how “critical” their “ecological role” really is. Ticks are probably happier; elk less so.

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  2. A word search of the revised forest plan FEIS shows no mention of effects on wolves, nor does this seem to have been addressed in the objection process (though plaintiffs must have raised the issue). Wolves are a sensitive species on the Colville, but there does not appear to be a biological evaluation as required by agency policy, and so there is no evidence of compliance with the requirement to provide conditions for a viable population of this sensitive species. The one thing sure to invalidate an agency decision is when the record is silent on a relevant factor; that makes the decision arbitrary. And the similar silence of antiquated NEPA analysis for project grazing decisions is also problematic (though there it is a challenge based on “new information” for an ongoing decision, which is sometimes a harder case to make).

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  3. It’s been very difficult to keep up with the rising wolf body count in Washington State, but I believe that now we can say:

    Woeful negligence by various agencies, including the U.S. Forest Service has resulted in the slaughter of 34 state-wolves in Washington since 2012, including the total destruction of the Profanity Peak Pack, Old Profanity Territory Pack and now the Wedge Pack. The Washington Department of Fish and Game also has an outstanding kill-order for two more wolves from the nearby Leadpoint Pack.

    The vast majority of these dead wolves have been killed on the Colville National Forest at the request of the Diamond M Ranch, which has livestock grazing allotments on 78,000 acres of the Colville National Forest. Nearly 70 percent of Colville National Forest (about 745,000 acres or 1,164 square miles) is allocated to livestock grazing.

    In its newly revised Forest Plan, adopted in October 2019, the Colville National Forest failed to even acknowledge the gray wolf’s return to the region, yet the Forest Plan sets management directives for livestock grazing, wildlife and other uses across all the forest’s 1.1 million-acres for the next 15 to 30 years.

    Great system, eh?

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  4. UPDATE: The U.S. Forest Service allows Diamond M Ranch, a private livestock corporation, to graze their cows across 121 square miles of the Colville National Forest in northeastern Washington for just $1.35 a month per a cow and her calf.

    In recent years, at least 27 wolves have been slaughtered on public lands at the insistence of this one ranching corporation. That’s why in June, a lawsuit was filed challenging the Forest Service’s revised Colville National Forest Plan for failing to evaluate how the agency’s federally-permitted livestock grazing program adversely affects wolves and also specifically challenging the Forest Service’s approval of cattle grazing for Diamond M Ranch.

    On September 18, in an official court declaration, the four managing partners of Diamond M Ranch (Len A. McIrvin, Bill R. McIrvin, Justin R. Hedrick, and Mathan S. Knapp) wrote this about native gray wolves on the Colville National Forest:

    “Diamond M Ranch’s interests are not adequately represented by the Defendants [U.S. Forest Service] as DMR has access to information Defendants do not as well as DMR promotes a position that gray wolves as a reintroduced and overpopulated species should not have protection in the Colville National Forest as they are a menace predator. (Partnership Declaration). DMR advocates for the reasonable control of the overpopulation of wolves that have resulted in the elimination of most of the natural wildlife such as deer, moose, elk, caribou, etc. Man, disease and starvation are the only natural enemies of wolves. The WDFW must kill thirty (30) wolves per year just to maintain the status quo.”

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