New lawsuit against Mexican grey wolf program

The Center for Biological Diversity filed a lawsuit Wednesday in a bid to push federal wildlife officials into making rule changes, first recommended 11 years ago, to increase the population of the endangered Mexican gray wolf. 

The lawsuit, filed Wednesday in federal court in Arizona, marks the latest chapter in a year’s long effort to get the Fish and Wildlife Service to amend project rules that environmentalists and biologists say have hindered the wolf recovery effort. 

At the start of 2012, there were 58 wolves in national forests in southeast Arizona and southwest New Mexico, far below the 100 that biologists estimated would be roaming wild by the end of 2006.

 In June 2001, three years after the first release of wolves in Arizona, a review team of wolf experts recommended three key changes be made “immediately” to the program. 

New lawsuit against Mexican grey wolf program