Wes Silver’s Newsletter The Fish and Wildlife Service’s over-holiday review, and what it means for 850 million acres of public land and water – “Of all our public acres, it’s wildlife refuges that rely most on conservation rather than preservation. The system was conceived by the Boone and Crocket Club, an early advocate for what’s now known as the North American Model for Wildlife Conservation. Club member, and President, Teddy Roosevelt established the first refuge—Pelican Island—in 1903, and went on to create 50 more during his two terms. Now, there’s more than 570 national wildlife refuges spread across all 50 states, covering 96 million acres of land and 760 million marine acres. That’s a full ten times the total acreage protected by the National Park Service, but the Wildlife Refuge System operates on an annual budget of only about $1 billion, less than one-third of that required by NPS. Part of the reason for that is hunters provide a significant portion of the funding for wildlife refuges. Money raised through sales of the federal duck stamp—an annual permit for hunting migratory waterfowl—makes up fully 5 percent of the budget in wildlife refuges, and pays for the acquisition and restoration of wetlands in refuges. 96 percent of all bird species in North America rely on wetland habitat for their survival.

Like other land management agencies, USFWS and the refuges it manages are both under assault by the Trump administration, and used as a tool to spread disinformation. 90 percent of the land acres in wildlife refuges are open to hunters, but it’s still common to see press releases from Trump’s DOI make sweeping claims about opening up more..”