Comment from Lopez, Victoria

Please deny permits to the following applicants: Craig Keller, Tunkhannock, PA; Permit No. PER25338256 Brandon Isenhour, Hickory, NC; Permit No. PER26245660 Stephen Isenhour, Hickory, NC; Permit No. PER26245661 Vicki Lynn Lee, Ft. Collins, CO; Permit No. PER26618348 George Sammut, Morgan Hill, CA; Permit No. PER26821388 Collin Griffiths, Missoula, MT; Permit No. PER26935891 Charlie Dally, Rathdrum, ID; Permit No. PER27974123 Please stop allowing people to kill animals in foreign lands and then allowing those people to bring the dead bodies of the poor animals into this country as "trophies" for bragging purposes. Killing animals in canned hunts does not help any animal population to thrive and survive. Also, there is the real issue that reckless breeding done at these ranches has led to the hybridization of the bonteboks, because the bonteboks are bred with the blesboks in order to create more of these animals for paying customers to kill. It's clear that this business is not about saving the bontebok population. The bonteboks are just being used to make money, because some people are paying to kill them. And killing these animals from a captive herd guarantees an easy kill, because where can the poor animals hide for their protection? The Humane Society of the United States has repeatedly appealed to your agency to not issue these import permits and below in the first link is a PDF file giving their reasons as to why these permits are not helpful for the bonteboks. Also, poaching does not lessen with these canned hunts, but it grows, because these vulnerable animals are seen as more valuable dead than alive. It creates even more of a market for people to profit off of this killing business of the bonteboks. The hybridization of the bonteboks also means that there are less pure bonteboks than it would seem at first glance. And hybridization tends to have negative health consequences for these animals. Please, Fish and Wildlife Service, I beg you to spare the lives of these poor animals. Please stop allowing them to be killed and stop allowing these import permits to take place to bring in dead animals that were killed. Trophy hunting is not necessary and is not helpful for the animals. Please protect the bonteboks from now on. Please deny these permit applications for the bonteboks that were killed. Please deny permits to the following applicants: Minnesota Zoo, Apple Valley, MN; Permit No. PER26188753 St. Augustine Alligator Farm, St. Augustine, FL; Permit No. PER21244411 St. Augustine Alligator Farm, St. Augustine, FL; Permit No. PER21244412 Please have these animals be sent to accredited sanctuaries if they need to be sent away from where they are instead of going to a zoo. I worry the transportation would hurt the animals either in the way of accidents or disease. And Assiniboine Park Zoo has a troubling history of incidents where animals died in their care like in 2014 when an Amu Tiger got into another enclosure and killed another tiger and when in the same year, a blind seal died after getting trapped in a drain. And then in 2019 in this same zoo, a five-year-old polar bear, Blizzard, died due to fluid in its chest. It seems like animals are not really protected at Assiniboine Park Zoo. I wouldn't want any animal kept at the Assiniboine Park Zoo with that history. Instead, the animals at that zoo should be moved to an accredited sanctuary that will really protect them. Henry Vilas Zoo also has had a bad history with animals' incidents like when the polar bear, Chief, in 1988 was shot after a crazy man climbed into his enclosure and the bear would not back off. And my question is why do animals get punished for peoples' irrational decisions? And there was another incident in 2014 when a woman climbed into a Giraffe's enclosure and she was kicked in the face, but I don't know if anything happened to the Giraffe. Hopefully not, because it was the woman's fault to begin with. And there was an investigation some years ago about this zoo and they found inadequate welfare for animals. Please protect all these amazing animals. Links: https://www.humaneworld.org/sites/default/files/uploads/assets/pdfs/hsus-hsi-bontebok-import-commets.pdf https://www.humaneworld.org/en/news/trophy-hunting-animals-under-fire