New York group joins petitioners to 'recolonize' wolves

I guess the following is one of those "What-could-they-be-thinking?" ideas that otherwise intelligent, educated people sometimes come up with. In this case, under the similarity of appearance clause in the Endangered Species Act, a group of citizens from the states of New York, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine has petitioned the Secretaries of Interior and Commerce to regulate the commerce or taking in these four states of coyotes, wolf/coyote hybrids, eastern wolves and wolf hybrids, in order to protect what they claim are wolves attempting to "recolonize" the northeastern U.S. from Canada.

Now I'd guess that these folks unfortunately typify the misguided notions that we can just plunk down any plan that will reintroduce extirpated wildlife and it will succeed, or that total protectionism will result in increasing numbers of the species involved, and they will then make a big comeback. What they fail to grasp is that habitat and land use changes are most often the real culprits in why some species decline or disappear and others flourish.