Colorado producers may no longer utilize rubber bullets as a hazing measure against wolves in the state.
The Colorado Parks and Wildlife Commission updated its hazing regulations in early May to better align with the state’s plans to introduce wolves under Proposition 114 and the federal decision to relist gray wolves as an endangered species.
Earlier in the year, the commission adopted emergency provisions allowing nonlethal hazing of wolves after there were reported wolf attacks on livestock.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service told the commission in a letter that most of its hazing measures were consistent with the Endangered Species Act and still viable, but it did not specifically identify rubber buckshot or slugs as a measure, leading the state commission to remove the action from its approved list of hazing measures.
