Dear Jan Brewer,
We who sign this petition are asking that you keep our Mexican Gray Wolves protected from Wildlife Services and any government agency who seek to kill them and limit their habitat. They are essential, they keep the ecosystem healthy and are a part of our National and Arizona Heritage. They are as natural to Arizona as the mountains, cactus and mesquites. Our Governor and citizens of this state and country should be protecting these animals with the fierceness of a mother. They belong to us all, not just the government who is making bad and devastating decisions when it comes to the Mexican Gray Wolf. The majority of citizens of this state and the country want the wolves protected and free from persecution by ranchers, hunters, poachers and especially the wildlife killing machine "Wildlife Services."
Some facts about the Mexican Gray Wolf:
The Mexican wolf, also known as “El Lobo,” is the smallest subspecies of the gray wolf and the most endangered wolf in the world. Found only in North America, its historical range was the Southwest, including Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and northern Mexico.
The smallest gray wolf subspecies in North America, the Mexican gray wolf is also one of the rarest and most endangered mammals on the continent. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (and its predecessor agency) poisoned and trapped almost all Mexican wolves from the wild from 1915 until 1973; the last five survivors, captured between 1977 and 1980, were bred in captivity and their progeny reintroduced in 1998. At the beginning of 2013, 75 Mexican gray wolves and only three Mexican wolf breeding pairs remained in the wild.
The Mexican wolf weighs between 50 and 85 pounds, which is a little more than half the size of its northern cousin, the North American gray wolf and about the size of a German shepherd or Labrador retriever. It lives to the ripe, old age of 10.
