The Race for Survival

In the wake of the episode, Kempthorne ordered a review of the decisions taken under MacDonald's watch, and found eight cases that warranted another look, the white-tailed prairie dog among them. Seven of those decisions, most a question of where to draw critical-habitat boundaries, were reversed or sent back for additional review, including the negative recommendation on the white-tailed prairie dog. Also getting a reprieve is the Preble's meadow jumping mouse, which under MacDonald had been proposed for removal from the list; the listing will be amended instead. Kempthorne, acknowledging that the 73,000 people in his department may have "different ways to interpret things," says that MacDonald was an anomaly. "Our responsibility is to look at the science," says Hall, "and once we figure out what we think the truth is, our only agenda is to follow the truth."

Environmentalists are also trying to reopen the case of the greater sage grouse, a chicken-size bird of the grasslands of the Intermountain West. A petition to list the grouse was rejected in 2005, after MacDonald extensively edited the scientists' report—at one point disputing, according to a copy obtained by NEWSWEEK, the biologists' description of the bird's diet. A federal judge has ordered a review of that decision, on the ground that it was based on faulty science supplied by oil and gas interests. Grouse have the misfortune to be uncomfortable around drilling rigs and gas wells, a problem since about 90 percent of their habitat in Colorado has been leased for energy development. "Vertical structures put them on edge because historically that's where raptors perch. So when a gas well appears, they get out of there," says Gary Graham, director of Audubon Colorado, an affiliate of the National Audubon Society. "Studies show that when you build a well, the grouse will show up for a couple years, but eventually they disappear." The state of Colorado is planning to restrict oil and gas drilling during the birds' mating and nesting times, a total of about 90 days a year—regulations that the oil companies view as an effort to "scale back the oil and gas industry," according to Americans for American Energy, an industry trade group.

Another Western species that conservationists are eyeing is the wolverine, a reclusive, but ferocious, predator like an oversize raccoon that lives in the northern Rockies, patrolling home territories that can cover hundreds of square miles and feeding off deer and elk carcasses. Wolverines, which den and give birth in snow caves, are also threatened by global warming, as the mountain snowpacks melt earlier in the spring. A petition to list them drew opposition from the recreational-snowmobile industry, which doesn't want to risk being ordered out of the animal's critical habitat. That's not unrealistic. "Where there are snowmobiles, there are few wolverines," says Dave Gaillard of Defenders of Wildlife. In Montana, researchers witnessed a wolverine mother abandoning her den and carrying her kits away when snowmobiles ventured nearby. The petition was turned down earlier this year, on the ground that there are healthy populations of wolverines in Canada and Alaska, so why worry about the ones in Montana? But by the same rationale, the bald eagle—one of the great success stories of the Endangered Species Act—might never have been listed, either; there were always plenty of those in Canada and Alaska, too.

The gray wolf—a species unrelated to the wolverine—is another success story. After being listed in the Lower 48 states in 1974 and reintroduced to the northern Rockies in 1995, it came off the list this March, as its population reached an estimated 1,500 in Montana, Wyoming and Idaho combined. That may not sound like very many, but it was enough to inspire the region's hunters, and its sheep and cattle ranchers, to get their rifles out. A new Wyoming law allows wolves to be shot on sight in a "predator zone" that covers 90 percent of the state, and residents wasted no time. Three wolves fell on the first day, including an aging male with a limp who was known to tourists as Hoppy. In April, two wolves in Ashton, Idaho, were shot by a rancher who spotted them hanging out near his horse corral. He had to chase one a mile on his snowmobile before downing it. In the past, wolves could be shot only for approaching sheep or cattle with hostile intent. But under a new Idaho law, they can be killed for "worrying" livestock. Since sheep get understandably nervous if a predator just walks past them, this pretty much puts the burden of avoiding getting killed on the wolf. The county prosecutor's office investigated the shootings but determined they were justified. Now both sides are up in (metaphorical, so far) arms: environmentalists suing to overturn the delisting, and ranchers who think extinction is exactly what the wolves deserve, at least in their part of the world. (Hunters would like to keep just enough of them around to shoot.)

To wind up in federal court is the fate of much of American wildlife now. One might well ask whether the term "wildlife" has any meaning when the creature in question is tracked by satellite across its designated swath of critical habitat that's been drawn up by negotiation among bureaucrats who wouldn't recognize a flattened musk turtle if it landed in their soup. Even the majestic polar bear, roaming the far reaches of the Arctic, is exhibit A in lawsuits planned by conservation groups aimed at getting the government to act more aggressively to save it, and also in a suit announced by Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin to reverse the listing, on the ground it might hurt the state's oil- and gas-dependent economy. (And another one by a big-game hunting group, protesting the ban on importing trophies.) The fate of the entire planet is a lot of responsibility to lay on just 20,000 bears, but those are the rules set by the only species whose opinion counts at the moment. Let's hope it chooses wisely.

With Daniel Stone in Washington, Anna Kuchment in New York and Paul Tolme in Arcata, Calif.

© 2008