As federal wildlife officials consider new rules for the management of grizzly bears, the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation and other conservation groups are urging increased state authority and policies that incentivize rather than penalize recovery goals.
In a March letter to Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and acting U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) Director Paul Souza, RMEF, the Boone and Crockett Club, Property and Environment Research Center and Wyoming Wildlife Federation laid out clear steps the Trump administration can take to empower states in the short term while working toward the long-term goal of grizzly bear delisting.
“We recognize that the Service is also likely to revisit its decision not to delist recovered populations of grizzly bears, as it should,” the letter states. “However, that lengthy — and likely litigious — process will prolong what is necessary for the continued conservation of the grizzly bear and the states and landowners with whom they share the landscape.”
Montana and Wyoming had petitioned the Biden administration to delist grizzlies in the Northern Continental Divide and Greater Yellowstone ecosystems. Populations in both regions have far exceeded recovery goals with more than 1,000 bears each. The petitions sought delisting under long-held “distinct population segment” (DPS) rules, which allow the FWS to delist wildlife in recovered areas while maintaining federal protections in areas that remain below recovery goals.
In a January draft proposal, outgoing officials in the Biden administration decided against delisting Lower 48 grizzlies. And not only would federal management continue, but they proposed upending DPS designations for the Northern Continental Divide, Greater Yellowstone, Selkirk, Bitterroot, Cabinet-Yaak and North Cascade ecosystems in favor of a single, large DPS covering all grizzly habitat in the Lower 48. Officials argued the larger DPS would allow greater flexibility for agencies and private landowners to deal with livestock conflicts.
The Biden-administration proposals saw heavy criticism from elected officials in Montana, Wyoming and Idaho. RMEF Chief Conservation Officer Blake Henning described the proposal as “moving the goalposts” while rejecting established science that should be celebrating recovered grizzly populations.
Shortly after President Donald Trump was sworn in, incoming FWS officials put the brakes on the proposals. The recent letter from RMEF and its conservation partners urges a new path forward that would provide clarity and make states a stronger partner in grizzly management. The letter points out major flaws in FWS’s rules that could set delisting back for generations. FWS found that because bears in the Northern Continental Divide and Greater Yellowstone ecosystems have significantly expanded their ranges in recent years, they are ineligible for delisting as individual DPSs because their ranges now nearly touch. The letter encourages officials to revise rules to not only eliminate penalties for a species successfully expanding its range, but also to better analyze the ecological relationship between grizzlies across the northern border in Canada.
“In the case of grizzlies below the 49th parallel, the flaws in the DPS policy artificially magnify concerns about bears below the line, disregard the distinctiveness of the recovery areas as originally defined and ignore Congressional direction to apply DPS policy only when needed to encourage genetic diversity,” the letter states.
But revisions to FWS’s DPS rules would take years and face likely litigation. In the immediate term, the letter proposes a new framework for states to take a much larger role in grizzly management based on recovery progress.
Areas Meeting Recovery Goals — Where populations are meeting recovery goals, rules should allow states to manage grizzlies by exempting them from the prohibition on “take.” That would empower states in the Northern Continental Divide and Greater Yellowstone ecosystems to regulate take under their own laws and regulations rather than seeking federal approval.
“This would, in effect, give states much of the management authority they have sought through their delisting petitions,” the letter states. “Considering that the Service denied those petitions on a technicality, exempting these populations from federal take regulation, would be a proper reward for the recovery of these populations.”
State regulations may include hunting, which has become one of the standard talking points of opponents of delisting that claim it could drive populations down and threaten recovery. There is no reason to expect such a decline, the letter points out, as no recovered species has ever been relisted, and FWS could easily put in population safeguards or temporarily prohibit hunting to ensure species conservation.
Other Recovery Zones — In areas where grizzly populations have increased but remain below recovery goals, the letter urges rules providing for states to take over management gradually as populations progress. Metrics such as the number of females or mortality limits could then trigger greater state authority. The letter points out that using recovery goals as triggers for gradually ceding management has already been litigated and upheld in a case over the Mexican gray wolf.
“Using recovery goals as a trigger for gradually ceding management authority to states would create a clear incentive for states and other stakeholders to continue working on recovery for these populations,” the letter states. “This approach would also avoid the risk that, when these populations reach their recovery goal, the Service will be blocked from recognizing that recovery and transferring management to states due to political and legal conflict.”
Connectivity Areas — In areas identified as connectivity zones and where the FWS has not established recovery goals, the letter urges that states be given more authority to manage bears. Those authorities could include the ability to relocate or remove bears involved in conflicts without first seeking federal approval.
“Overly onerous federal regulation of these areas would merely penalize states and other stakeholders for grizzly bears’ expanded range,” the letter states.
