By Laura Zuckerman
SALMON, Idaho, Oct 11 (Reuters) - Conservationists onThursday asked a state judge to end trapping of wolverines inMontana at a time when fewer than 300 of the elusive animalsroam the Northern Rockies and Northern Cascades.
Montana is the only one of the lower 48 U.S. states thatpermits the harvesting of wolverines, carnivores that resemblesmall bears with bushy tails. They are sought for their fur.
Allowing licensed sportsmen to kill woverines is a directviolation of Montana's state policy of maintaining or restoringpopulations of rare animals, the conservationists argued in alawsuit filed on Thursday in state court in Montana.
Federal biologists estimate that between 250 and 300wolverines remain in the high country of Idaho, Montana,Washington and Wyoming.
The civil court fight comes two years after the U.S. Fishand Wildlife Service moved to protect wolverines because warmingclimates threaten the mountain snows they use for dens and foodstorage. A final decision on whether wolverines are grantedthreatened or endangered status was expected by 2014.
In Montana, trappers each year are allowed to catch fivewolverines - reduced from 10 in 2008.
The lawsuit was filed on Thursday by Alliance for the WildRockies and seven other conservation groups is an effort to stoptrapping altogether in Montana.
Ron Aasheim, spokesman for Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks,said state wildlife managers believe the trapping each year offive wolverines is sustainable. He said the state halved thetrapping quota in recognition that "we needed to do some thingsto ensure long-term viability."
Michael Garrity, head of Alliance for the Wild Rockies, saidscaling back the harvest was not sufficient.
"The state doesn't want to admit wolverines are almostextinct," he said.
Wolverines are known for their voracious appetites andcantankerous dispositions. Their solitary nature and theirpreference for extreme alpine environments have made itdifficult for scientists to estimate population numbers.
Climate change was predicted to reduce suitable wolverinehabitat in the lower 48 states by 23 percent as of 2045 and by63 percent as of 2099, according to the University of Washingtonand the U.S. Forest Service Rocky Mountain Research Station.
(Editing by Barbara Goldberg and Eric Walsh)
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Keywords: USA WOLVERINE/