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ACTION: Abandoned and left to die?

Jamie Rappoport Clark, Defenders of Wildlife

No animal should have to endure this fate.

Red wolves are on the brink of extinction with fewer than 100 animals surviving in a small part of eastern North Carolina. Despite this, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), the agency in charge of ensuring this wolf’s survival, appears to be quietly walking away from their red wolf recovery program, dooming these wolves to extinction in the wild.

Urgent: Tell FWS not to give up on red wolf recovery!

After being hunted to the brink of extinction, FWS was entrusted to help save these shy wolves. Yet last year, 10 percent of the red wolf population was killed, and another five percent lay dead so far this year.

What’s worse, key staff vacancies are going unfilled at the FWS Red Wolf Recovery Program, critical field work is being skipped, and most telling of all – there has not been a single red wolf released into the wild in years.

Under pressure from North Carolina special interests, FWS appears to be walking away from this recovery program and all red wolf recovery efforts. You may recall Defenders went to court last year to successfully stop night hunting of coyotes in red wolf habitat. The two animals are strikingly similar in appearance which has led to dozens of “accidental” red wolf shootings.

Defenders will take whatever action is necessary to stop this tragedy.

We’ve simply come too far to give up on these magnificent creatures - there is no excuse for walking away now.