Usda

The grizzly bear is one of this country’s most majestic creatures. Originally numerous throughout the American west, including California and Texas, grizzly bear populations were decimated in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries through a combination of commercial trapping, unregulated hunting and rapid habitat deterioration. Between 1800 and 1975, grizzly bear populations fell from estimates of over 50,000 to less than 1,00o. Today, they are present only in Washington, Idaho, Montana and Wyoming.

One sub-population of grizzly bear, central to the present case, is the Yellowstone grizzly bear, which is protected under the Endangered Species Act and monitored as part of the Yellowstone Grizzly Bear Recovery Zone. The Yellowstone grizzly bear shares its habitat with a variety of other species, including the Yellowstone bison, which migrates seasonally inside and outside of Yellowstone National Park. Because the Yellowstone bison carries brucellosis, a disease deadly to cattle, their migration patterns are controlled through carefully selected “ ‘hazing, or herding,’ ” methods. Although these hazing methods effectively limit -encounters between Yellowstone bison and…