Press Release: Cascadia Wildlands Statement on Oregon’s 2022 Minimum Gray Wolf Population Count
April 18, 2023 — Today, the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (ODFW) released its annual report of the minimum 2022 gray wolf population and pack count for the state, which shows a continuing pattern of very low growth. The 178 wolves documented in 2022 is only an increase of three wolves over year-end 2021 numbers, while the number of wolf packs increased from 21 to 24. The state’s minimum wolf population only grew by two wolves in 2021, from 173 to 175 wolves. The stagnant population numbers are a cause for great concern in a state with significant suitable – yet unoccupied – wolf habitat. Removal of state Endangered Species Act protections was predicated on an assumed steady population increase, an assumption that has proven false since 2020.
Press Release: 2021 Worst Year for Oregon’s Wolf Population Growth Since Return
April 20, 2022 — Conservationists are concerned about the plateau of Oregon’s wolf population in 2021, largely resulting from poaching and agency killings. The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife’s (ODFW) annual wolf population report, released late yesterday, shows Oregon’s wolf population grew by the lowest percentage (just over one percent) since wolves naturally returned to the state. The 2021 minimum population of 175 wolves increased by just two animals from the 2020 minimum count of 173.
Press Release: ODFW Uses Tax Dollars to Kill 3.5 Month Old Wolf Pups
August 2, 2021 — The Oregon Wildlife Coalition, an alliance of nine wildlife conservation organizations, has learned that the Oregon Department of Fish & Wildlife (ODFW) needlessly slaughtered two 3 ½ month-old wolf pups from the Lookout Mountain pack by helicopter over the weekend. As allowed by ODFW’s weakened wolf conservation and management plan, the pups were killed to appease the livestock industry, making it clear that Oregon aligns its wolf management with states like Idaho, Wyoming, Montana and Alaska. The killing of defenseless pups underscores how the removal of federal wolf protections allows state agencies hostile to wolf recovery to undermine the decades long species’ recovery efforts. Pups this age are entirely dependent on the older wolves in their packs to bring back food: they do not participate in hunts.
Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission Petitioned to End Beaver Trapping and Hunting on Federal Land
September 10, 2020 — Conservation groups filed a petition today asking the Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission to permanently close commercial and recreational beaver trapping and hunting on the state’s federally managed public lands and the waters that flow through them. Beavers are Oregon’s official state animal, but they can be legally hunted and trapped with few limits.
INTERN-al VIEW: No Longer the “Beaver State”- The Quest to Protect Oregon’s Beavers
by Chelsea Stewart-Fusek Cascadia Wildlands Legal Intern, Summer 2020 The North American beaver (Castor canadensis) is a primarily nocturnal, semi-aquatic rodent that is known as an ecosystem engineer because its dam-building behavior drastically changes the habitat in which it lives. Beavers are also considered a keystone species because their removal has far-reaching impacts on other … Continue reading INTERN-al VIEW: No Longer the “Beaver State”- The Quest to Protect Oregon’s Beavers
Legal Victory for Marbled Murrelets in Oregon!
August 7, 2019 — An Oregon judge has issued a decision concluding the Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission violated Oregon law in denying a petition filed by five conservation groups demanding the commission uplist the murrelet from threatened to endangered under the Oregon Endangered Species Act.
Conservation Groups Exit Oregon Wolf Meeting Citing Potential Increased Killing
January 7, 2019 — Four conservation groups have notified Oregon Gov. Kate Brown and the state wildlife commission that they are withdrawing from stakeholder meetings about the management of the state’s wolf population.
LEGAL VICTORY: Oregon to Regulate Humboldt Marten Trapping!
January 3, 2019 — In response to a lawsuit from the Center for Biological Diversity and Cascadia Wildlands, the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife has agreed to issue new regulations addressing the trapping of critically imperiled Humboldt martens in Oregon’s coastal forests. The regulations must be finalized by September, according to a legal agreement. Fewer than 200 Humboldt martens survive in Oregon due to historical over-trapping and clear-cutting of coastal forests.
Oregon Sued for Humboldt Marten Trapping
December 19, 2018 — The Center for Biological Diversity and Cascadia Wildlands sued the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife today for failing to ban the trapping of imperiled Humboldt martens in Oregon’s coastal forests.