http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-grizzly-bears-20170623-story.html
The grizzly bear in Yellowstone National Park has been protected by the federal government for more than four decades.
That will begin to change next week.
Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke this week said the agency intends to remove grizzlies living in the Yellowstone area from Endangered Species Act protection. The change will be entered into the federal registry next week and can take effect 30 days from that point.
The move was decried by several conservation groups and Native American tribes who feared the delisting of the grizzly would lead states to open up hunting season on the bears in the protected Yellowstone zone, which reaches into Idaho, Wyoming and Montana.
Jonathan Proctor, Rockies and Plains program director for Defenders of Wildlife, said Friday that populations of grizzlies remain in isolated ecosystems and need continued federal protections to grow and connect with other pockets of bear populations to increase genetic diversity and help sustain the species.
“The ongoing recovery of the Yellowstone population shows how we can bring a species back from the brink,” he said. “But we are concerned about the actions of states after a delisting. We can’t let the work of saving these bears go down the drain.”
Stan Grier, chief of the Piikani Nation of the Blackfoot Confederacy, described the decision in cultural terms.
“This announcement is no doubt being celebrated by trophy hunters like Don Jr. and Eric Trump, and the president’s extractive industry cronies, but for us it is an act of cultural genocide,” Grier said. Calling the grizzly a “sacred being that protects our sacred lands,” he added, “this is a struggle for the very spirit of the land — a struggle for the soul of all we have ever been, or will ever become."
