Judge rejects Idaho’s rare request to reverse earlier decision
By Benjamin Alva Polley EBS COLUMNIST
The future of wolf and grizzly protection in Idaho continues to shake out in the courts.
Federal Magistrate Judge Candy W. Dale firmly upheld her decisive ruling on Feb. 4, categorically prohibiting Idaho from authorizing recreational wolf trapping and snaring in critical grizzly bear habitat during the non-denning season.
Idaho’s request for the judge to reconsider her March 2024 ruling, which established that recreational wolf trapping and snaring jeopardize grizzly bears, has been categorically denied. After reviewing her previous decision, Judge Dale reaffirmed her stance, underscoring the imperative of protecting grizzlies from these dangers.
“Judge Dale’s initial decision was always the correct one to protect grizzly bears from state-authorized wolf trapping and snaring and we also appreciate the time she took to get it right a second time,” stated Ben Scrimshaw, senior associate attorney for Earthjustice’s Northern Rockies Office in a press release. “Grizzly bears forever belong in the West, and securing this decision is part of a bigger movement for true grizzly recovery.”
Idaho’s political leaders are pushing to expand wolf trapping and snaring into the eastern regions, where grizzly bears migrate from western Montana, including the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem and the Missoula area. However, Idaho’s attempts will be thwarted.
Unmarked wolf traps and snares put numerous species at risk, including children and domestic dogs.
“Grizzly bears face serious survival challenges—global warming, habitat destruction, loss of critical food sources, heightened recreational pressure and busy highways bisecting grizzly corridors,” stated Connie Poten, Footloose Montana board chair, in a press release. “Idaho’s year-round baited wolf snaring and trapping added unjustified, cruel mortality Grizzlies are an umbrella species that more than one hundred other species depend on. We are extremely grateful for Judge Dale’s decision to uphold the purpose of the ESA and give grizzlies a fighting chance. It’s a win for the planet.”
Represented by Earthjustice, multiple advocacy organizations—including the Gallatin Wildlife Association, Center for Biological Diversity, Footloose Montana, Friends of the Clearwater, Global Indigenous Council, the Humane Society of the United States, International Wildlife Coexistence Network, Nimiipuu Protecting the Environment, Sierra Club, Trap Free Montana, Western Watersheds Project, Wilderness Watch and Wolves of the Rockies—stand united in this cause.
In July 2021, Idaho escalated the hazards of wolf trapping by instituting a permanent recreational wolf-trapping season on private property statewide. The state removed limits on the number of wolves that can be killed by an individual and increased financial incentives for recreational trappers for each wolf taken. Furthermore, Idaho’s decision to permit wolf baiting has alarmingly drawn grizzly bears to these traps.
Judge Dale’s ruling has definitively upheld the ban on state-authorized recreational wolf trapping and snaring during the non-denning season for grizzlies. This ban distinctly applies to Idaho’s Panhandle, Clearwater, Salmon and Upper Snake regions from March 1 to Nov. 30.
“This decision is a victory for life to exist in our natural world and acknowledges that predators—in this case, grizzly bears—are part of that natural process,” stated Clinton Nagel, president of the Gallatin Wildlife Association. “It also acknowledges that we as a society must be careful when our actions have unintended consequences. We have a responsibility for the greater good.”
Benjamin Alva Polley is a place-based storyteller. His stories have been published in Audubon, Esquire, Field & Stream, The Guardian, Outside, Popular Science, Sierra, and other publications on his website. He holds a master’s in Environmental Science and Natural Resource Journalism from the University of Montana. Follow him on Instagram.
