WASHINGTON - Conservation groups have sued the U.S. Forest Service to get a ban on lead ammunition in Northern Arizona's Kaibab National Forest, where they say spent ammo is the leading cause of death for endangered condors.
The suit, filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Prescott by the Tucson-based Center for Biological Diversity, the Sierra Club and the Grand Canyon Wildlands Council, said spent lead ammo is poisoning condors as well as some other birds.
"Lead is harmful in very small amounts, so it doesn't take very much to cause lead poisoning," said Sandy Bahr, director of the Sierra Club's Grand Canyon Chapter.
The birds get the lead from the remains of animals killed with lead ammunition, either from an animal that escaped before it died or from the entrails left by hunters.
Condors are scavengers and will typically eat the carcass of a dead game animal or its "gut pile," the suit said, making themselves sick in the process.
By requiring use of non-lead ammo, Bahr said, the conservation groups hope to cut back on the number of deaths to condors, which were reintroduced to Arizona in 1996.
A Forest Service spokeswoman said the agency could not comment on the issue because the case is under litigation.
But Kathy Sullivan, a condor program coordinator for the Arizona Game and Fish Department, said the department already offers a volunteer program whereby hunters are educated on the harmful effects of lead ammo and are provided non-lead ammunition for free.
