"The critical habitat proposal decreases areas around Yellowstone, but adds swaths of Colorado and New Mexico"
"The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service last week finalized a recovery plan for Canada lynx, a species listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act, and proposed new critical habitat designations to increase federal protections for the winter-adept felines in some areas.
More than 19,000 square miles across six western states are part of the proposed critical habitat revision, but a large swath of land around the Greater Yellowstone area — nearly 90% of the area’s existing critical habitat — has been removed, including land within Yellowstone Park as well as in Gallatin, Carbon, Park, Stillwater and Sweetgrass counties in Montana.
The long-term recovery plan and revised habitat designations came from settlement agreements stemming from a long series of legal battles between the federal government and environmental groups that alleged not enough was being done to protect populations of the wildcats found in the U.S.
Since its release, scientists defended the recovery plan and new habitat proposal, and conservation groups praised them as a step in the right direction. But the plans, open for comment for the next couple of months, might be dead on arrival under the incoming Trump administration based on actions taken during his previous term to remove federal protections for lynx."
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