Wildlife Services: Our Nation's Predator Killers

Where did this federal agency come from?

The latest report on the destruction by Wildlife Services is appalling. This federal agency killed more than 1.75 million animals across our nation in 2021. This included at least 64,131 coyotes, 3,014 foxes, 605 bobcats, 433 black bears, 324 gray wolves, 200 mountain lions, and even six ESA-protected grizzly bears. Disturbed by these numbers, I found myself wondering how Wildlife Services came to be such a vicious force behind our national war against predators.

The story starts in 1885 when Congress appropriated $5,000 that created a three-person unit called the Section of Economic Ornithology. The unit would be part of an effort to educate farmers about birds and mammals so that destruction of useful species could be prevented, according to Donald Hawthorne in “The History of Federal and Cooperative Animal Damage Control.” Hawthorne, by the way, is a former administrator for Wildlife Services.

The word “useful” is key in that mission statement and livestock interests would soon make sure that predators were not considered useful. Ranchers throughout the West paid grazing fees to graze livestock on public lands. Of course, those public lands were rightfully home to predators which took some livestock. Livestock interests lobbied against paying grazing fees on public lands populated with predators. To keep ranchers paying fees, predators could not be considered useful and must be eliminated. 

In 1905, war was declared on predators. That’s the year the Section of Economic Ornithology became the Bureau of Biological Survey. Between 1905 and 1907, the Biological Survey, writes Hawthorne, investigated predator-livestock conflicts and distributed publications describing ways of destroying predators by shooting, trapping, and poisoning them—even in their dens.

This predator-killing organization’s name would be changed so many times over the next 40 years that for ease of reading, I’ll leave out most of the changes and simply refer to it as the Bureau of Biological Survey (BBS).

In 1915 Congress expanded the war by allocating a significant chunk of federal funds for controlling predators and making the BBS responsible for the federal predator control program. A year later an increase in rabies in wild animals led to even more federal money and more killing, especially of coyotes, writes Hawthorne. 

The BBS wanted even more chemical weapons to use in its war against predators so researchers studied poisons at the aptly named “Eradications Methods Laboratory.” (Of course, that name would be changed later.) For many years, carcasses found on the range had been “salted” with raw strychnine, but coyotes and wolves had learned to avoid salted carcasses. Persistent BBS researchers found other ways to eradicate wolves and coyotes with strychnine.

By 1945, yet another chemical weapon, compound 1080 (sodium monoflouroacetate) was discovered by Wildlife Services researchers. Unlike strychnine, compound 1080 is tasteless, easier to use, and only requires a small amount to kill. Predator killing became more “efficient.”

By the late 1940s, the BBS added another weapon in the war against predators: airplanes dropping tiny bombs—bait salted with strychnine. While on bombing runs, agents realized that they could also shoot predators from planes. Aerial gunning from fixed wing aircraft became another weapon in the war and was used in 2021 to kill 11 wolves, 18,133 coyotes, 32 foxes, and one black bear.

The BBS kept busy developing and using its variety of weapons to kill predators while it was shuffled from one federal department to the next. The BBS eventually became known as Animal Damage Control (ADC).

Regardless of the new name, by 1963 ADC’s killing outraged environmental organizations. Secretary of the Interior Stewart Udall appointed a group chaired by Starker Leopold, a college professor and son of famed ecologist Aldo Leopold, to review the killing of predators. The Leopold Report had six recommendations including reassessing program goals, revising predator control guidelines, increasing research, controlling the legal use of certain pesticides, and changing the name of the organization yet again.

Changes were made but not enough to quell the outrage. During 1971, the Defenders of Wildlife, the Sierra Club, and the Humane Society of the United States sued the Department of the Interior demanding an end to using poison against predators. This led to more study and eventually President Nixon signed an executive order banning the use of poisons for the control of predators by a federal program or on federal lands. Next the Environmental Protection Agency outlawed strychnine, compound 1080, and sodium cyanide.

Unfortunately, those restrictions on the use of poisons eased over the years. In 2021, Wildlife Services used compound 1080 in Texas to kill six coyotes. Sodium cyanide was used in M-44 cyanide capsules to kill 6,653 coyotes, 546 gray foxes, and 52 red foxes. The M-44 capsule is placed on the ground like a land mine and ejects a cloud of cyanide when tugged at by animals. There’s a lot of collateral damage with these land mines. For example, Wildlife Services reports that in 2021 in addition to the 546 gray foxes killed intentionally, M-44 capsules killed 266 gray foxes unintentionally.

Regardless of collateral damage, the search for new weapons continued. How about killing these useless predators from helicopters? A study in Bridger National Forest in Wyoming found that using a helicopter was better than using an airplane to shoot predators in the mountains and in areas with dense cover. Helicopters were used in 2021 to kill 46 wolves, 8,166 coyotes, 36 foxes, and 53 bobcats.

In 1985, Congress transferred the Animal Damage Control program from the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service to the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service of USDA. On August 1, 1997, the killing organization’s name was changed one more time to Wildlife Services—the misleading name still used today.

In addition to the weapons mentioned so far, in 2021 Wildlife Services captured and killed predators using neck snares, foothold traps, culvert and cage traps, and, of course, rifles—sometimes with the aid of night vision and even infrared sensors.

From a three-person agency with $5,000 of funding in 1885, Wildlife Services had grown to more than 2,000 employees in 2010 (latest data found). The agency’s funding was more than $116 million in 2013 (latest data found). The agency operates in all 50 states and about half its funding comes from the federal government and half from those agencies, businesses, and individuals that hire Wildlife Services. 

Wildlife Services has been widely and rightly criticized by conservation organizations such as Predator Defense, Defenders of Wildlife, Center for Biological Diversity, and the Natural Resources Defense Council. These groups and others state that Wildlife Services cannot justify killing millions of animals each year because there is no evidence that these animals pose a threat to the public.

The groups also say that this killing is conducted on behalf of the livestock industry rather than public safety and has led to sharp declines in the populations of numerous species.

Last, but certainly not least, Wildlife Services is criticized for its use of the M-44 cyanide capsules for killing predators—along with the collateral damage of killing non-targeted predators and some family pets and injuring humans.

To Learn More:

See Predator Defense’s comprehensive report on Wildlife Services

See the 2021 Wildlife Services Report

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I write and photograph to protect wildlife and preserve wild lands.

My bestselling In the Temple of Wolves; its sequel, Deep into Yellowstone; and its prequel, The Wilds of Aging are available signed. My books are also available on Amazon unsigned or as eBook or audiobook.

Photo credit:

Yellowstone wolf and coyote by Rick Lamplugh