Grizzlies Should Stay on Endangered Species List, Scientists Say

Yellowstone National Park grizzly bears could be removed from the Endangered Species list after a new federal report revealed that the bears are not threatened by the loss of one of their main foods, whitebark pine nuts.

But outside scientists are criticizing the report, calling it incomplete, politically motivated and flawed.

"It does not take into account the situation, the realities of the conditions on the ground in whitebark pine forests," said Jesse Logan, the retired head of the U.S. Forest Service's bark beetle research unit. Whitebark pines are increasingly falling victim to mountain pine beetles, which kill trees in the process of laying their eggs under the bark. Climate change has made the high-elevation whitebark pines more accessible to the destructive beetles.

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