The Imnaha wolf pack’s alpha male after being refitted with a working GPS collar on May 19, 2011.
credit:
Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife
Update: The AP reported late Wednesday the Oregon Court of Appeals on Wednesday granted a request by conservation groups to temporarily halt Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife plans to shoot two of the state’s 14 wolves for killing livestock.
SALEM, Ore. - Three conservation groups filed a lawsuit in Oregon Wednesday aimed at stopping the state from killing a pair of wolves. The plaintiffs allege the kill order would virtually wipe out one of the few wolf-packs to re-establish in Oregon.
The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife confirmed ranchers’ suspicions that the two wolves are responsible for the death of more than a dozen livestock. The agency decided to kill the two predators nearly two weeks ago. But a spokeswoman says they haven’t been found yet.
The agency’s Michelle Dennehy wouldn’t comment on the lawsuit, saying ODFW officials are still reviewing it.
Josh Laughlin of Cascadia Wildlands says the group hopes a judge will issue an injunction putting the kill order on hold until the case is fully reviewed.
“We’re fighting the clock and the guns and the traps out in northeast Oregon right now,” Laughlin says. “What’s at stake is monumental. It’s Oregon’s first wolf-pack back in the state in over 60 years.”
The ODFW killed two other problem wolves from the same pack earlier this year. If it finds its current targets, that would leave just a female and a pup in the pioneering Imnaha pack.
(This was first reported for the Northwest News Network.)
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