via mlive.com by Garret Ellison
WASHINGTON, DC -- Federal appellate judges have upheld a lower court decision that maintains federal Endangered Species Act protections for gray wolves in Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin.
On Tuesday, Aug. 1, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a 2014 ruling that put wolves back on the endangered list after the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service delisted the predator in 2011, a move that led to Michigan's only wolf hunting season in 2013.
A unanimous three-judge panel on the nation's second highest court ruled the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (FWS) "failed to reasonably analyze or consider" the impact of partial delisting and the species historic range loss when it de-listed wolves in 2011.
The FWS argues that wolf populations in the Great Lakes region have recovered enough to warrant delisting and states should be put in charge of management, but in 2014, U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell ruled the FWS can't declare a "distinct population segment" of a species recovered and then drop protection within that zone on a map.
The complete story here > Federal appeals court keeps Great Lakes wolves on endangered list