When Colorado Parks and Wildlife commissioners in January 2021 allowed hunters in some areas to lure mountain lions with electronic calling devices, animal rights groups reacted with a new plan: asking lawmakers to ban hunting of Colorado’s wild cats.

“That was it for us,” said Aubyn Royall, the Colorado director of the Humane Society of the U.S. that has spent the previous several years asking state wildlife officials to ban mountain lion hunting. “We have been working through the appropriate channels and not having any success so we decided we needed to work through legislation.”

Senate Bill 31, introduced last week by four Front Range lawmakers, all Democrats, would ban hunting of mountain lions, Canada lynx and bobcats.

Sen. Joann Ginal, of Fort Collins, pulled her name from the measure on Thursday, saying not enough stakeholder work had been done. That leaves Sen. Sonya Jaquez Lewis, of Boulder County, Rep. Judy Amabile of Boulder and Rep. Monica Duran, of Wheat Ridge, carrying the bill. It has no Republican sponsors.

The legislation has rallied hunters and anglers across the state. An online post by Backcountry Hunters and Anglers urging members to oppose the hunting ban spurred more than 20,000 emails to Colorado lawmakers.

Read more at The Colorado Sun.