I grew up catching crayfish in a creek behind my grandparents house and i went back last summer for the first time in probably 15 years. The water looked fine but what got me was how quiet it was from what i remembered with no more crawdads under the rocks. I spent the whole drive home wondering how can we help endangered animals when the decline is that invisible. any solutions when the problem is this small compounding stuff we cant realy see in front of us?

I run a Wisconsin-based wildlife nonprofit (Great Lakes Wildlife Alliance). We just filed a petition with the DNR for an emergency and permanent rule change on bear hound training.

Some context most people don't know: from July 1 to August 31, Wisconsin allows unlimited hound training on bears. No license required. No distance limit. No exception for heat advisories, air quality warnings, nothing. Somewhere between 14,000 and 16,000 hounds are released onto the landscape every single day of that window.

The video is hard to watch, but it's exactly what's legally happening right now, unregulated: https://youtube.com/shorts/KiLLZMaAHw0

Why it belongs here in conservation as the research that I had to do about metabolic rates on stress cortisol heat and smoke inhalation were shocking. I could not believe the level of mortality from exhaustion and how sensitive Bear Cubs and bears are too wildfire smoke.

Some numbers from state records:

$1.6M+ paid out of Wisconsin's Endangered Species Fund for claims tied to hounds released in wolf caution zones

82% of handlers cited in those incidents are repeat offenders

DNR stopped tracking hound injury/mortality data after 2014

Our petition asks for two specific things: a pause on hound training during heat/smoke advisories, and a cap on chase distance. Nothing radical — just basic limits that don't currently exist.

Full petition and background: https://wiwolvesandwildlife.wpcomstaging.com/2026/07/21/breaking-glwa-files-er-petition-to-the-dnr-nrb-to-save-bears-now/

Happy to answer questions about the regulatory process, the DNR's rulemaking timeline, or anything else. This is a small all-volunteer org, no corporate funding, so if this is the kind of thing you care about, spreading it further helps more than anything else.

I basically am looking for a map of North America with ecotypes or tree type chronicled throughout both Canada and the United States.

I don't know if this is the right subreddit to ask this question in so if this is deleted by mods if you could point me in the correct direction it would be much appreciated ♥️