Injurious Wildlife

What is Injurious Wildlife?

In 1900, the country’s earliest national invasive species law took effect, and it has served us well in one form or another for 125 years!  However, it has many gaps and needs modernizing to meet the demands of today’s live animal import industry and globalization. I served as Injurious Wildlife Listing Coordinator from 2010 to 2024, the longest serving coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. It’s my mission to provide easily understandable and accurate information on this subject, gained from my experience and occasional other sources. It’s also my mission to impress upon decision-makers that we can’t wait any longer to stop the invasions by harmful wildlife species and that I can help with recommendations for a new federal law to preempt invasions of harmful wildlife species.

Perhaps you’ve heard of the Lacey Act? The law that started injurious wildlife was under the Lacey Act of 1900, but that is not law that injurious wildlife is under now. The current law is 18 U.S.C. 42–not a very catchy or memorable name! So many people just keep calling it the Lacey Act. To add the confusion, another law that started with the 1900 Lacey Act is now called 16 U.S.C. 3371-3378, also not a catchy name, so people just keep calling that one the Lacey Act!

• Here is a paper that should help clear up the difference for you and what the injurious law is now.
  • Jewell, S.D. 2024. The Legacy of Lacey. The Wildlife Professional 18(1):53-57.
• If you want to know more about what Injurious Wildlife is, here is a good summary: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Injurious_wildlife

• Two more papers on injurious wildlife are:
  • Jewell, S.D. 2020. A century of injurious wildlife listing under the Lacey Act: a history.  Management of Biological Invasions 11(3): 356–371, https://doi.org/10.3391/mbi.2020.11.3.01
  • Jewell, S.D. and P Fuller. 2021. The unsung success of injurious wildlife listing under the Lacey Act. Management of Biological Invasions 12(3): 527–545, https://doi.org/10.3391/mbi.2021.12.3.03