UNITED STATES — The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) announced on Wednesday, Nov. 29, that North American wolverines have received long-awaited official protection under the Endangered Species Act (ESA).
According to the Center for Biological Diversity, the decision will provide this species with new legal protections and programs for recovery throughout the United States. A campaign by conservationists over a course of decades, including six rounds of successful litigation to secure federal protections, was instrumental in placing the wolverine among the rankings of other listed endangered species. This new listing provides the species and its remaining habitat with additional protections to ensure its best chance for survival.
“I’m thrilled that the Fish and Wildlife Service finally followed the science and granted wolverines the federal protections they need to survive and recover,” Center for Biological Diversity’s Carnivore Conservation Legal Director Andrea Zaccardi said via press release. “Like so many other species, wolverines waited far too long for federal protections, but I’m overjoyed that they’re finally on the path to recovery.”
In September 2023, the FWS updated its 2018 species status assessment for the North American wolverine with an addendum, which includes updated information on climate change, habitat connectivity, trapping, snow, population density and impacts on genetic diversity, as well as considered changes in regulatory mechanisms and conservation measures.
The wolverine, the largest terrestrial member of the weasel family, faces habitat loss due to climate change. Wolverines depend on areas with deep snow through late spring. Pregnant females dig their dens into this snowpack to birth and raise their young. Scientists estimate that no more than 300 wolverines remain in the lower 48 states, per Center for Biological Diversity press release.
“The science is clear: snowpack-dependent species like the wolverine are facing an increasingly uncertain future under a warming climate,” Defenders of Wildlife Rockies and Plains Program Director Michael Saul said via press release. “The protections that come with Endangered Species Act listing increase the chance that our children will continue to share the mountains with these elusive and fascinating carnivores.”
According to the FWS, wolverines are snow-adapted, cold-climate, territorial animals with large home ranges and once roamed as far south as New Mexico in the Rockies and Southern California in the Sierra Nevada range. After more than a century of trapping and habitat loss, wolverines in the lower 48 today exist only as small, fragmented populations in Idaho, Montana, Washington, Wyoming and northeast Oregon.
Today’s wolverine populations are also at risk from traps, human disturbance, habitat fragmentation and extremely low population numbers resulting in low genetic diversity, Center for Biological Diversity said via press release. Conservation groups have warned that without new conservation efforts the dangers faced by wolverines threaten remaining populations with localized extinctions and inbreeding.
The U.S. FWS seeks public comment on an interim 4(d) rule promoting measures tailored to the wolverine’s conservation needs. A “4(d) Rule” refers to section 4(d) of the ESA, which directs the Secretary of Interior and the U.S. FWS to issue regulations deemed “necessary and advisable to provide for the conservation of ” a threatened species.
A 60-day comment period begins on Thursday, Nov. 30 and comments must be received by Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2024. Read the proposal and submit comments concerning future conservation efforts for the wolverine population here.
