Two grizzly bears fighting; Credit: Dani Pozo/AFP/Getty Images
Despite being on the state flag, but grizzly bears are all but extinct in California. Some 10,000 grizzlies lived in the state when European immigrants first landed, but within 75 years, they had been hunted and killed. Fresno County in 1922 was the place and time a grizzly was last killed in the state, according to the Valley Center History Museum in San Diego County. There were a couple sightings in Sequoia National Park in 1924, but after that, nothing.
Now, an environmental group wants the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to bring the grizzly back to California. The Center for Biological Diversity is asking federal officials to carve out some 11,00 square miles in California, Arizona, New Mexico, Utah and Colorado for 300 to 400 bears, according to the LA Times.
Even if the US Fish and Wildlife grants the petition, it’d be years before any action could happen. But given the grizzly’s fearsome reputation, should they be place so near to humans?
Guest:
Noah Greenwald, Endangered Species Director, Center for Biological Diversity, the environmental group behind the petition