1st reported by the Salt lake tribune: Utah wildlife managers and state attorneys insist Utah’s controversial coyote bounty program does not conflict with the Endangered Species Act. But at least one other state was forced to change its coyote-culling hunt after too many endangered wolves were killed.
Potential crossover between Utah’s free-wheeling coyote hunt and the federal program for protecting animals threatened with extinction became clear last month after a hunter said he confused an endangered gray wolf for a coyote before he illegally shot and killed it.
The U.S Fish and Wildlife Service and Utah Division of Wildlife Resources continue to investigate the circumstances that left a collared, 3-year-old female wolf dead outside Beaver on Dec. 28.
Utah Assistant Attorney General Martin Bushman said the Endangered Species Act does “provide for instances where the [killing] of animals that look like other species” can happen. But that hasn’t happened in the case of gray wolves.
“Coyotes are not listed as threatened or endangered and the state maintains the authority to regulate the take however it wants to go about it,” Bushman said.
But there is a precedent for groups challenging the open hunting of coyotes in areas where wolves are protected.
Three conservation groups settled a lawsuit last fall after accusing the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission with violating endangered species protections by proposing nighttime hunting with lights and an unlimited take for coyotes.
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