Montana judge ends wolverine trapping

A judge entered an order Monday that effectively ended any possibility of wolverine trapping occurring in Montana this year.

Broadwater and Lewis & Clark County district judge Jeffrey Sherlock extended a temporary restraining order entered last month after the parties asked that a Jan. 10 hearing to decide whether to grant a preliminary injunction be rescheduled.

He set the expiration of the temporary restraining order after the end of the proposed trapping season on Feb. 15.

"Basically, the injunction is in effect and we're going to report back to the judge on March 1 whether we still need it," Matt Bishop, an attorney at the Western Environmental Law Center, said.

By then, the fate of next year's trapping season may be known. The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service is scheduled to decide by Jan. 18 whether to add the wolverine to the list of endangered and threatened species.

"We're going to have to wait to see what the feds do," Bishop explained. "If they decide to list the wolverine, trapping won't be allowed in Montana."

According to a Dec. 19, 2012 report in Greenwire, the Obama administration is expected to propose Endangered Species Act protection for Gulo gulo luscus before the mid-January deadline.

The animal was designated a candidate for inclusion on the list of threatened and endangered species in  2010.

Montana is the only one of the lower 48 states to allow trapping of wolverines. The state had proposed to allow five of the rare and elusive animals to be killed that way during a season that it planned to start last Dec. 1.

The environmental group plaintiffs in the Montana anti-trapping case include Alliance for the Wild Rockies, Friends of the Wild Swan, Montana Ecosystem Defense Council, Native Ecosystems Council, Swan View Coalition, WildEarth Guardians, and Footloose Montana.

Photo of wolverine (Gulo gulo luscus) courtesy U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, photo by Steve Kroschel.