Conservationists fault federal lethal capture plan for grizzly bears in Montana

(CN) — The federal government didn’t do enough research on the impact of its predator management program on the grizzly bear population in Montana, three conservation groups told a federal judge Friday.

The group want the judge to set aside part of the Wildlife Services’ practice of lethal capture of grizzly bears, which have been listed as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act since 1975. Under that designation, the bears are protected except under special circumstances, such as the need to remove those that pose a threat to human safety.

WildEarth Guardians, joined by Trap Free Montana and Western Watersheds Project, sued the federal agency over its predator killing program in Montana in January 2023, claiming the program violated both the Endangered Species Act and the National Environmental Policy Act.

At the crux of the dispute is an environmental assessment that Wildlife Services, a program within the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, released on its predator removal activities in 2021, which the conservation groups accused of failing to analyze the state’s grizzly bear population properly.

Appearing before Barack Obama appointee U.S. District Judge Dana Christensen on Friday, the conservation groups argued the predator removal program threatens the ongoing recovery plans to foster the state’s grizzly population and the take of one bear can severely impact those efforts.

Wildlife Services typically handles conflicts between bears and livestock producers and is authorized to take grizzly bears under a 2022 agreement with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Between Wildlife Services and the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks, the other agency authorized to take grizzlies, an average of about 30 bears are killed in the state each year, according to filings from the plaintiffs.

The conservation groups’ lawyer Matthew Kellogg Bishop, with the Western Environmental Law Center in Helena, Montana, told Christensen the agency’s assessment didn’t look into how the take of grizzly bears may adversely affect the animals’ connectivity between designated grizzly bear recovery zones in the state. Particularly, the groups noted the assessment failed to include information about the number of bears killed outside of recovery zones in the state.

“There’s sort of this space where no one is really analyzing the effects of grizzly bear mortality once they leave these areas,” Bishop said.  

The conservationists say Wildlife Services violated the National Environmental Policy Act by omitting further analysis on the impact to grizzly bears and not preparing an environmental impact statement, which the law requires if the agency’s action may cause significant effects. The agency takes around nine bears a year, either by removing them from the area or killing them, according to the plaintiff's brief in support of summary judgment.

Wildlife Services argues grizzly bears are well into recovery and the findings posed no significant effects warranting an impact statement.

“The conservation measures have worked here,” Krystal-Rose Perez with the Department of Justice said on behalf of the defense, pointing to U.S. Fish and Wildlife’s efforts to review whether grizzly bears still belong on the threatened species list.

Perez said Wildlife Services turns to lethal removals only after nonlethal methods have failed in conflicts between grizzlies and livestock producers and accused the plaintiffs of focusing too narrowly on that aspect.

Christensen peppered Perez with questions about the environmental assessment’s lack of information about grizzly bear takes outside of recovery zones in the state and why the agency doesn’t disclose removals outside of those areas.

“There is no population information for outside of the recovery zones,” Perez answered. “There would be no way to analyze that.”

The Fish and Wildlife Service does not track population status outside of those areas, the attorney said.

“You’re maintaining that there is absolutely no information available to the Wildlife Service, population estimates, any population data, outside of the recovery zones?” Christensen asked. Wildlife Services confirmed that information was not tracked.

The conservation groups seek partial annulment of Wildlife Services' environmental assessment as it pertains to the lethal removal or transfer of grizzly bears and the program stopped until new assessments can be done. The groups noted the agency may change its approach to the issue if forced to reanalyze the data.

"I don’t think they should be killing bears or handing off bears to others until they really take a hard look at how this is affecting the species and conservation," Bishop said. "No one is really tracking what’s going on."

Wildlife Services argues that would disrupt the process for aiding livestock producers and diminish livestock producers’ tolerance for dealing with grizzly bears, which could increase unintentional and unreported takes. The agency also pointed to the Fish and Wildlife Services, the agency that authorizes Wildlife Services to lethally remove a grizzly, as the focus.

“It’s really Fish and Wildlife, it’s their decisions that are at issue in this case," Perez said.

The conservation groups initially challenged a biological opinion by Fish and Wildlife Services as part of the lawsuit but opted not to pursue it further after the agency revised and updated the opinion in response to the filing.

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