AZ Daily Sun (original) Posted: Wednesday, August 11, 2010 4:00 am
To the editor: The Daily Sun article, "Feds to review status of Mexican gray wolf (Aug. 4) offers another glimmer of hope for the endangered lobo here in the Southwest. This past week the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service agreed to review the status of the Mexican gray wolf, acknowledging that it may need greater protection than its northern cousins if it is to survive. If the lobo receives classification as a separate subspecies, the government would be required to create a specific recovery plan for the Mexican wolf and it would receive greater legal protection than it has under its current "nonessential experimental population" status.
The lobo, native to Arizona and New Mexico, was shot, trapped and poisoned to near extinction by the 1940s. A reintroduction effort stated in 1998 has suffered tremendous losses of these endangered wolves by anti-wolf fanatics who have illegally shot more than 30 wolves since the program began. Classifying the lobo as a separate subspecies will give it a better shot at survival, and add teeth to the legal penalties for those criminals who believe they can decide the fate of the Mexican gray wolf for all of us.
STEVE ROBINSON
Flagstaff
