Protect America's Wolves!

Petition Background

Wolves are native, ecologically vital and beautiful members of the North American landscape. Wherever they live, wolves are remarkable, natural predators that keep their prey species healthy and strong. Wolves have been persecuted and massacred for centuries, due to human ignorance, intolerance and cruelty. It is the very opposite of the respect, admiration and protection they deserve. Wolves are highly social and very intelligent beings and like all canines, they are loyal and loving to their families, their wolf pack.

Brutally persecuting and killing such ecologically vital, sensitive, intelligent and family-oriented beings should be labelled what it is: unacceptable, criminal animal abuse and unacceptable, criminal killing. In days of old, when much of humanity was ruled by fear and ignorance, the terrible slaughter of natural predators was too often a sad part of the human condition. To perpetrate such brutality and unjustified killing of wolves and other natural predators, in this modern era with our deeper knowledge and understanding of earth science and ecology, is pathologically and ecologically criminal.

Too many cattle ranchers perpetuate deadly, hysterical myths and ridiculous exaggerations about depredation of cattle by wolves, which is statistically insignificant in every state. Wolves much prefer their wild prey. For instance, in the huge state of Montana there are 2,500,000 non-native cattle. Tens of thousands of cattle in Montana die every year due to weather, disease, birth complications and from eating poison plants, for which ranchers receive zero compensation. In 2011, the US Fish & Wildlife Service confirmed only 74 cattle taken by wolves in the entire state. 74 out of 2,500,000... that is statistically zero! And Montana ranchers are foolishly compensated for such tiny losses and just like other ranchers throughout the West, whine endlessly about wolves to anyone who will listen. The depridation statistics are similarly tiny in nearby Idaho and Wyoming. Yet, many of these cattlemen constantly scheme and pressure federal and state politicians to kill wolves.

These ranchers should be ignored and they need serious therapy to deal with their collective neurosis regarding wolves. They feel entitled to continue a horrific tradition of unacceptable brutality, the same criminal brutality that earlier destroyed Native American people and culture and massacred native wildlife throughout the continent. Decent Americans can no longer allow them to have their way. It is disgraceful and unacceptable that any supposedly honest and decent American politician would listen to such destructive liars and then serve their cruel, unjust, and immoral demand that innocent wolves be condemned to death.

To add massive insult to massive injury, the rancher's non-native cattle graze on federal tax payer subsidized public lands that belong to all Americans, land that should be a haven for America's vital wolves and other native wildlife, including native bison, grizzly bears, mountain lions, prairie dogs, wolverines, coyotes and so many other amazing members of the continent's rich natural heritage. The massive numbers of non-native cattle grazing unsupervised throughout the arid West cause tremendous damage trampling across fragile ecosystems where they do not belong. The cattlemen's reign of terror against the wildlife and wild lands of the United States must permanently come to an end. Let their well deserved demise begin by stopping these federal tax payer-subsidized welfare ranchers, once and for all, from their vile, unjustified and unrelenting campaign of demonization and slaughter of America's wolves.

Ecologically ignorant hunters and sadistic trappers relentlessly persecute and slaughter natural predators that belong in every ecosystem. Wolves, like all natural predators, are miracles of evolution and keep every ecosystem they inhabit vibrant and healthy. Where wolves are present on the landscape, there are often more elk and deer, and these prey animals are healthier.

When wolves returned to Yellowstone, after a seventy year absence, it didn't take long for a cascade of positive change to occur across the land. Stream-side vegetation which had been stripped bare by an unnatural over-abundance of elk, started to grow again and as trees rose up, stream and river waters were cooled by the shade, fish and beavers and song birds returned. Coyote populations were reduced by wolves which allowed more smaller mammals to survive and thrive. Birds of prey had more to eat, as did many other animals that depend on the presence of wolves. No one would know such scientific facts, by listening to the anti-wolf propaganda nonsense from hunter lobby groups such as the dishonest Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation. Most hunting organizations are focused on killing with little or no regard for ecological balance and ecosystem health or the ethical concerns of the non-hunting majority.

There should be no hunting or trapping of wolves and other natural predators. They are simply too important as living beings that create balance and ensure biodiversity within every ecosystem, just as nature intended. Nature controls their numbers very well without any help from wildlife managers and sport killers.

Wolves are not just being killed in the US, many, including pups are being tortured. Why does the modern United States still allow barbaric wildlife trapping, with steel torture traps and strangling cables? This horrific torture of wild beings is outlawed in 89 countries as out-dated and cruel. It is certainly time to outlaw barbaric wildlife trapping in the US. Wolves, as sentient, intelligent and family-oriented beings, feel intense pain and fear and suffer horribly just as humans would, when caught in a torturous steel trap or snared by a strangling cable. In the 21st century, no animal of the wild should be subject to such cruelty and torture.

Are you a dog lover? We have wolves to thank for the precious gift of our loving dogs. From the tiniest chihuahua to the largest great dane, every single dog comes from their living ancestors, wolves. That is why wolf and dog DNA match up nearly 100%. The affection, devotion, playfulness and intelligence that so many of us cherish in our dogs, are the very same qualities of wolves, even more so. How can we allow ecologically vital, sensitive, intelligent and family-oriented wolves to be demonized, abused, tortured and massacred any longer? Dog lovers should be among the most passionate and active of wolf defenders!

Imagine your family dog (your family wolf), alone in the night, caught in a painful steel trap by a delicate paw or snared by its neck to slowly strangle or shot in its gut while a gleeful sport killer watches it suffer an agonizing death. And all this animal wants is to be free and get back to you, to its family pack. America's wolves are being persecuted, tortured and killed in this and other horrible ways, as you are reading this, in the "land of the free and home of the brave." Free to be what? A cruel and violent animal abuser and killer?

In Wisconsin, home of ecology hero Aldo Leopold, state wildlife "officials" and a small "citizens board" (packed with hunters and trappers) recently voted to allow the tiny minority of bear hunters there - who are allowed to hunt, chase, harass and kill innocent, harmless black bears using attack dogs - to use these same dogs to chase, persecute and kill innocent, wild wolves. These wildlife abusers and killers have even been given the OK to use their attack dogs on wolves during denning season when female wolves give birth to their pups. This is wildlife policy for and by morons, not for the decent and respectable people of a modern state or country.

Federal and state wildlife agencies that are now facilitating this shameful persecution and massacre of America's wolves are full partners in the deaths of thousands of innocent wolves. The rising death toll from these corrupt state government sanctioned wolf massacres is in addition to the annual slaughter of hundreds of wolves by the US Department of Agriculture's hideous Wildlife Services division. Wildlife Services is a federal tax payer-subsidized, paramilitary-like agency devoted to the mass killing of America's native predators and other wildlife that belong across the landscape, even though they are deemed unworthy of life by earth destroying cattlemen, industrial agribusiness and the sport killer lobby. This brutal federal agency established over a hundred years ago should never have been created and must be permanently shut down. Most Americans are unaware of this bizarre agency of wildlife killers, as powerful cattle and agribusiness interests have succeeded in foiling any Congressional oversight of Wildlife Services for decades.

When wolf defenders finally succeed in stopping this latest American wolf massacre, serious reform of these corrupt agencies must be implemented without delay. Wildlife Services must be defunded and dismantled. The mission of all state wildlife agencies must permanently shift away from serving cattlemen, agribusiness and the sport killer lobby. It's time that these corrupt state agencies evolve and change to reflect the kinder ethical values of the majority of American citizens who have themselves evolved and learned to treasure the country's natural heritage. Their primary mission must be the restoration, conservation and protection of America's wildlife and their habitat. That is an honorable mission to be proud of. We are supposed to be a democracy and an ethical country, after all.

A humane and wildlife-loving majority of Americans and wolf friends from around the world, demand an immediate end to the unjust demonization, persecution and slaughter of America's wolves. Wolves must be placed back on the Endangered Species List and permanently protected from further hateful propaganda and malicious fairy tales directed against them. More and more Americans believe wolves should be our national symbol, alongside the bald eagle, which would outlaw the killing of any wolf in the United States.

Wolves are vital, beautiful and amazing beings. To love wolves is to love life. Please help defend and protect them.
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Important Note to ALL wolf defenders:
After signing this petition and leaving a comment, visit:
*** Howling for Justice (http://howlingforjustice.wordpress.com) - the best wolf defender blog on the web.
*** Predator Defense (www.predatordefense.org) - an excellent, non-profit organization that has been fighting to stop the mindless persecution and cruel massacre of all natural predators in the United States, since 1990.
When you visit Predator Defense, be sure to view their recently produced video: "The Imperiled American Wolf" and share it widely. And please support their wolf defender billboard campaign near Yellowstone and in nearby Rocky Mountain states.

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And another way you can help wolves survive and thrive, wild and free, is to stop eating cows which will end your personal support of the earth destroying cattle industry and cattlemen. Try it. It is not as hard as many people think it is. For wilderness, for the Earth: Wolves! Not Cows.