Tell Congress to stop funding Wildlife Services' killing crusade

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Wildlife Services program has been able to operate for over a century because they kill animals in the shadows.

Over the last five years, litigation by WildEarth Guardians and our partners against Wildlife Services has resulted in a number of settlement agreements and legal victories, all curbing the program’s slaughter of native wildlife and making the program accountable for its activities.

However, we must do more. Please write your members of Congress and urge them to stop funding Wildlife Services’ killing crusade.

Photo Credit: rpbirdman

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Dear Decision Makers,

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For over a century, the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Wildlife Services program, formerly called Animal Damage Control, has conducted wildlife killing campaigns across the country, mainly in a misguided attempt to resolve wildlife conflicts for the livestock industry.

In just the past three years, Wildlife Services killed 188,670 coyotes, 74,630 beavers, 8,183 foxes, 2,108 bobcats, 1,267 black bears, 1,007 gray wolves, 784 cougars, and 12 endangered grizzly bears.

The methods used to kill native animals by Wildlife Services are as inhumane as they are indiscriminate: traps, snares, poison, and aerial assault. These weapons used by Wildlife Services also pose a true public safety risk and have already killed hundreds of pets and even poisoned a child.

We are living in the midst of a climate crisis, biodiversity crisis, and a mass extinction event. Every action that the government takes, or does not take, can have far reaching consequences for the environment and the people who inhabit it. Mass killing of over a million animals annually for the livestock corporations and industrial agriculture is no longer just irresponsible, it is reckless.

Moreover, modern science has demonstrated that nonlethal coexistence solutions are not only more effective at reducing livestock depredations in the long-term, they are also more fiscally responsible than using taxpayer dollars, at the rate upwards of $875 an hour, to kill coyotes.

It is time for a culture shift at the USDA's Wildlife Services, which must come from congressional leadership.

I urge you, as my representative and senators, to ensure that my taxpayer dollars exclusively fund only non-lethal wildlife management practices by Wildlife Services.

We will all benefit from taxpayer funds being directed toward nonlethal wildlife management practices that ensure public safety, ecosystem integrity, and effective long-term coexistence solutions.

Sincerely,
[Your Name]
[Your Address]
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[Your Email]