(Raleigh News Observer) The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is offering $2,500 for information about a red wolf found dead in Beaufort County on Oct. 12, apparently of a gunshot wound – the second rare wolf killed in North Carolina in two months.
Friday’s announcement came less than a week before Wake County Superior Court is scheduled to hear a complaint against a rule that allows hunters to shoot coyotes at night. North Carolina is home to the world’s only wild population of red wolves, with only about 100 living in an area that spans five northeastern counties, and red wolf activists worry hunters will mistake those wolves for coyotes.
“This is not just an endangered species,” said Derb Carter, the Southern Environmental Law Center attorney who is representing wildlife and environmental groups in the case. “It’s a critically endangered species, and this is the only wild population in the world.”
The groups specifically hope to block the night hunting rule, which was enacted in August, in the five counties where red wolves live, Carter said. The state legislature approved night hunting as a way to control coyotes, which are non-native predators that prey on poultry, small livestock and pet dogs and cats.
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