The conservation group Defenders of Wildlife says a new plan by federal officials fails to ensure the recovery of endangered Mexican gray wolves in the Southwest.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service late last month announced changes to its management plan after a federal court ordered the agency to rewrite it.
The new proposal would do away with the population cap on Mexican wolves and temporarily ban some allowable killing.
But Defenders of Wildlife says Fish and Wildlife’s new proposals ignore the judge’s order, aren’t based on current science and restrict wolves to too small a range in the Southwest for their long-term survival.
Wolf advocates have long called for an increase in the animal’s territory.