Albuquerque, NM (KKOB) – The Center for Biological Diversity filed a petition in December 2022, arguing the forest in southwest New Mexico would be ideal for the recovery of the jaguar. The big cats were listed as endangered in the 1970s, and the petition called on the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to revise the listing’s critical habitat designation to include the forest in New Mexico and the Chihuahua Mountains in southern Arizona where North America’s only known jaguar lives. The federal government denied the petition this month, arguing that doing so would not sufficiently aid in the species’ recovery.