On June 26, in the midst of the whirlwind on Capitol Hill over the massive tax and spending bill that attacks civil liberties, there was a glimmer of hope—Congress reintroduced Canyon’s Law, which could make the world a kinder, safer place for wildlife.

Canyon’s Law would ban the use of M-44 devices, commonly referred to as “cyanide bombs,” which are used by Wildlife Services, the animal-killing program of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, in the rogue agency’s attempt to control native predators like coyotes suspected of preying on doomed cattle and sheep being raised by the greedy meet industry. The bill was reintroduced by Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.), Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) and Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.),

We are asking our supporters to help get Canyon’s Law passed by contacting their members of Congress and telling them to support it. Find your congressmembers here.

A similar bill was introduced in March of 2017 following a trend of tragic incidents involving humans and domestic dogs caused by M-44’s. The most notable involved 14-year-old Canyon Mansfield, who was taking his dog, Kasey, for a walk close to his family’s home, near Pocatello, Idaho. Canyon recognized what he thought was a sprinkler head sticking out of the ground. Before he knew it, the unknown object triggered in front of him, sending a plume of cyanide powder five feet into the air—Canyon had accidentally stumbled along an M-44.

Canyon was injured but survived. If not for the wind direction, he could have been killed. Kasey died in front of Canyon.

Kasey’s tragic death was, unfortunately, no anomaly: M-44’s killed close to 2,000 domestic dogs from 1997-2016, and countless since then.

Kasey’s death was also, by all accounts, negligent. The federal government admitted as much when they agreed to pay the Mansfields $38,500 in 2020, although no dollar amount can heal the immeasurable scar left by that M-44.

Coyotes are the main target for M-44’s are coyotes. In 2023, Wildlife Services slaughtered 68,562 coyotes, and 6,148 of them were killed by M-44’s. In 2023, M-44s also killed 325 gray foxes, 48 red foxes, 11 raccoons, 4 striped skunks, 2 dogs, 2 kit foxes, 2 opossums, and 1 pig. 

Despite the horrific scale of target and non-target deaths these M-44’s cause, they’re still widely used. Just last year, federal agents used cyanide bombs in 10 states: Colorado, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Texas, West Virginia and Wyoming. State agents also used the “bombs” in South Dakota.

On a positive note, in 2020 Oregon became the first state to outlaw M-44s. And in 2023 the Bureau of Land Management issued a ban prohibiting the use of M-44s by Wildlife Services on all 245 million acres of BLM lands. M-44s are currently not used on lands administered by the National Park Service, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, or the Bureau of Reclamation.

The time is ripe for a nationwide ban.