Judge Orders Gray Wolves Returned to Endangered Species List

The Rocky Mountain gray wolf is again an endangered species.

The population numbers haven't changed since the Bush Administration removed the species a few months ago. Instead, a federal judge in Montana issued an injunction Friday requiring the Interior Department to restore Canis lupus to protected status.

According to a New York Times article to be published in Saturday's editions, the court's decision was heavily swayed by the administration's decision to reverse course from an early refusal to allow Wyoming to put in place a management plan allowing extensive hunting.

According to a press release issued by Natural Resources Defense Council, one wolf per day has been killed, with mortality exceeding 100 animals, since the Bush Interior Department removed Endangered Species Act protections on March 28, 2008.

The gray wolf was originally listed as an endangered species in 1973, shortly after the Endangered Species Act became law. The species was eliminated from about 95 percent of its habitat in the United States by the 1930s after a lengthy, government-sponsored extermination campaign.