revised grizzly for member comment.11.8.10

THE WILDLIFE SOCIETY 5410 Grosvenor Lane • Bethesda, MD 20814-2197 Tel: (301) 897-9770 • Fax: (301) 530-2471 E-mail: tws@wildlife.org Final Position Statement Delisting of Grizzly Bears in the Greater Yellowstone Area The population of grizzly bears in the Greater Yellowstone Area (GYA) was rapidly declining by 1975 when the species was appropriately listed as “threatened” under the newly enacted Endangered Species Act (ESA). In the ensuing 35 years, state and federal resource managers and researchers worked cooperatively to develop a framework for recovery and have implemented that framework in the GYA more successfully and completely than in the other five recovery areas identified in the national Grizzly Bear Recovery Plan. As mandated by the ESA, the recovery plan for GYA grizzly bears identified population and habitat management goals that would define recovery and permit delisting when achieved. Cooperative efforts by state and federal resource management agencies also resulted in development of a Conservation Strategy that identified important habitat protections, regulatory mechanisms, monitoring, and research designed to ensure continued security of a delisted grizzly bear population in the GYA. The Conservation Strategy includes habitat protections on U.S. Forest Service lands that were adopted in a package of forest plan revisions for the six national forests surrounding Yellowstone National Park. The Conservation Strategy ...