Wildlife Services: The Inappropriately Named Government Agency

By: Gabe Gonzalez

I. Introduction

To one unfamiliar with the work of Wildlife Service, the name may lead one to believe the division aims to serve and benefit the interests of wildlife; that notion could not be further from the truth. Wildlife Services is a division of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) responsible for the death of 1.85 million animals in 2022. As a branch of the USDA, Wildlife Services has acknowledged that they are an institution with “a continuity of purpose in promoting the private interest of livestock growers, especially in the western rangeland states.” As we have moved on from a time where many Americans rely on agriculture for sustenance and survival, we must reevaluate Wildlife Services' role in managing wildlife.

II. Brief History and Statutory Authority of Wildlife Services

Prompted by pressure from ranchers, Congress passed the Animal Damage Control Act of 1931 (ADC) to meet the needs of the agriculture and livestock industry, granting Wildlife Services the authority to identify the most effective techniques to eradicate, suppress, and control wildlife species. Under the Rural Development, Agriculture, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act of 1988, Wildlife Services is authorized to enter into an agreement with states, municipalities, individuals, and other entities injurious or nuisance mammal and bird species. Although the ADC and the Rural Development, Agriculture, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act grant Wildlife Services their authority, much of their actions intersect with other federal laws, mainly the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), Endangered Species Act (ESA), and Migratory Bird Treaty Act (MBTA).

 Under NEPA, Wildlife Services may have to prepare various levels of environmental documentation depending on the scale and impact of their proposed activities. This could range from a Categorical Exclusion (CE), used for actions typically having no significant impact, to an Environmental Assessment (EA), which assesses if the impacts will be significant. A more detailed Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) is prepared if significant impacts are identified. Section 7 of the ESA requires Wildlife Services, just like any other federal agency, to ensure that any action an agency authorizes, funds, or carries out does not jeopardize the continued existence of an endangered or threatened species or result in the destruction of designated critical habitat. Similar to the ESA’s prohibition on the take, which prohibits the harassing, harming, pursuing, hunting, shooting, wounding, killing, trapping, capturing, collecting, or attempting to engage in any such conduct of threatened and endangered species, the Migratory Bird Treaty Act similarly prohibits the take of migratory bird species without prior authorization by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

III. Legal Challenges

Wildlife Services has seen its share of controversies and legal challenges, often challenging whether its actions have violated the above-stated laws. In Humane Society of the United States v. Glickman, the Humane Society challenged Wildlife Services on the grounds that their implementation of the Canada Geese Management Plan violated section 703 of the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. The D.C. Circuit agreed with the plaintiff’s argument, holding that federal agencies must abide by the Migratory Bird Treaty Act in applying for and receiving a permit when agency action results in the take of a migratory bird species.

In recent years, Wildlife Services has faced numerous challenges from nonprofit organizations claiming Wildlife Services programs fail to comply with NEPA. In 2019, WildEarth Guardians successfully challenged Wildlife Services predator-killing program in Montana because Wildlife Service's reliance on decades-old environmental analyses violated NEPA, resulting in a settlement and a new environmental analysis. In a pending case, WildEarth Guardians and others have challenged Wildlife Services’ decision to continue its Montana predator-killing program, which involves the use of traps, snares, aerial shooting, chemicals, and poisons to kill native predators, as well as Wildlife Services' environmental assessment containing a “Finding of No Significant Impact” for the predator removal program.

IV. Controversies

Wildlife Services has been widely criticized for a lack of accountability and transparency and even purposely falsifying findings. In 2020, Wildlife Services eradicated an entire pack of endangered Mexican gray wolves in the Gila National Forest in New Mexico. Wildlife Services justified decimating 5% of the wild population of this endangered species for one reason: they claimed the pack was prolific cattle killers, a finding that watchdogs and wolf biologists alike heavily questioned. The critics' suspicions were confirmed when Robert Gosnell, the former New Mexico director of the agency, highlighted the systemic corruption he observed revolving around the Mexican wolves. Gosnell explained that the inspectors responsible for conducting the investigations were pressured to “rubber-stamp” any claims brought to them by ranchers. Additionally, Gosnell explained how many investigators worked second jobs for the ranchers as hunting guides, violating the agency's ethics.

Wildlife Services has seen its fair of controversies in recent years resulting from not only its lack of accountability and unethical behavior but its use of methods that have harmed pets and people as well. In 2017, 14-year-old Canyon Mansfield and his dog, Casey, unknowingly activated an M-44 device Wildlife Services had placed only 3oo feet from Mansfield’s home, resulting in Canyon witnessing his 3-year-old Labrador seizing and dying from cyanide poisoning; the gas temporarily blinding him as well. Canyon luckily survived, but the image of his dog horrifically dying in front of him due to the negligence of Wildlife Services will likely haunt him for years to come.

V. Wildlife Services Activities in Colorado

Colorado itself has had its fair share of controversy with Wildlife Services. While Wildlife Services play a significant role in preventing avian-aircraft collisions at Denver International and numerous smaller airports in the state, they participate in countless other lethal control activities that do not promote public safety nor are based on sound scientific reasoning, often without conducting a full Environmental Impact Assessment.

In 2022, Wildlife Services is responsible for the deaths of over fifty-seven thousand animals within the state of Colorado. Among those deaths were nine coyotes who were killed by the same M-44 devices that killed Casey and blinded Canyon Mansfield. In recent years, Wildlife Services has come under fire in Denver for its involvement in the Resident Canada Goose Damage Management Program, which, with Denver Parks and Recreation, rounded up and killed over 2,000 resident geese over two years. This resulted in the Animal Legal Defense Fund filing suit against the USDA for redacting information regarding the number of geese the city planned to slaughter and the amount paid to the slaughterhouse.

VI. Conclusion

Given not only the alarming and troubling methods Wildlife Services uses to control and kill wildlife but also its history of viewing itself as above the law, it is essential to question whether this renegade agency can continue to coexist with a conservation mindset. Unless Wildlife Services wishes to continue to hear calls for its elimination, it must begin to not only act in the interests of ranchers but instead allocate its resources to reduce conflict in a way that is scientifically and ethically sound and not the result of mere political pressure. Taxpayers should no longer be funding the slaughter of wildlife.