We Demand Answers for Killing Mother Grizzly & Sending Her Infant Orphaned Cubs to a Zoo for Life
- by: Richard Spratley
- recipient: Daniel Wenk, Superintendent, Yellowstone National Park; Jonathan Jarvis, Director, National Park Service; Sally Jewell United States Secretary of the Interior
Yellowstone Superintendent Dan Wenk ordered the death of Blaze the mother grizzly and then sent her two infant cubs to a zoo for the rest of their lives without thought or an attempt to put them in rehabilitation or a sanctuary.
This sow was only doing what any mother would do.....protect her babies. It is her maternal and inherent natural instinct to defend her cubs from any threat. She acted as you would expect any grizzly sow would do. It is a travesty this hiker had to die. It is equally tragic this mother was killed and her babies are now imprisoned for life because of the hiker's negligence.
We reached out to Mr Wenk and his staff on numerous occasions in an attempt to not only stop the killing of Blaze, but to also give her cubs a chance at a decent life without her. He/they refused to communicate, negotiate or convene with us in any way.....despite 150,000 signatures on our petition in just 3 days.
We want to know why?
Why kill a 20+ year old grizzly mother with two COY's without trying to relocate them hundreds of miles away?
Why not allow bears to be bears in their own natural bear habitat?
Why can't a bear kill a human while humans are planning their extinction by delisting them from the Endangered Species List to be hunted?
Why not make a mandatory rule you have to carry bear spray, even bear bells?
Why not give these cubs a chance to be rehabilitated back into the wild? Why not try and put them in a sanctuary instead of a zoo? Why would you not even attempt to seek public opinion?
You folks have hundreds of thousands of people that are extremely agitated and angry by the way you handled this most recent situation with the Yellowstone Grizzly sow and her infant cubs. As if killing 760 wasn't horrible enough, you killed another very popular Grizzly. We demand answers to why it was handled the way it was and how you will handle it differently in the future. You have shown the world how merciless you are towards these beautiful animals, or at least that is the perception. You have the ability to make yourselves look better in the eyes of the public by giving us the answers we seek.
Update #18 years ago
I greatly appreciate you signing, sharing and supporting this cause. However, I feel it necessary to close the petition down. Our fight is evolving. Our fight is to help these cubs and the future of grizzlies. I'll be creating additional petitions in the coming weeks. Please continue to sign, share and support our fight.
http://www.thepetitionsite.com/597/307/109/send-orphaned-grizzly-cubs-to-a-rehabilitation-center-or-sanctuary.....not-a-zoo/
