New West Colorado, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Utah, Wyoming
With the recent attachment and passage of a rider to the Congressional budget bill by Senator John Tester (D-Montana) and Congressman Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) delisting wolves from the Endangered Species Act, hunting is once again proposed for Idaho and Montana wolf populations. Wyoming wolves would remain under federal control for the time being due to the failure of Wyoming to come up with an acceptable wolf management plan.
There are a number of misconceptions, and a lack of perspective that drives the wolf hysteria in these states. Below are a number of commonly heard popular comments about wolves and a response. Like any popular quip there is typically some kernel of truth that often is greatly exaggerated or is repeated without verification. These assertions are repeated so often they are adopted as “truths” without critical examination of the fundamental assumptions.
POPULAR COMMENT: There are “too” many wolves and the Northern Rockies states can’t support the current population of 1650 wolves, much less more wolves as some people advocate.
RESPONSE: What is too many is, of course, a matter of perspective. It’s important to distinguish between biological carrying capacity and social carrying capacity. The idea that there are “too many” wolves in the Northern Rockies is not based upon biological realities. There is sufficient prey to support 1650 and quite a few more wolves.
Rather the desire to reduce wolf numbers in the region is more a reflection of intolerance by some members of the region—primarily hunters and ranchers. Politics is driving wolf delisting, not biology and that important distinction should be emphasized over and over again.
For comparison we can look at Minnesota. Minnesota is smaller and more densely populated (10+ million people) than Idaho, yet has 3000-3500 wolves as compared to an estimated 1650 wolves for the entire Northern Rockies including the states of Wyoming, Idaho and Montana. Although there are some obvious differences in geography and prey between Minnesota and the Rockies, the main point is that livestock industry and hunting are sustained in Minnesota, despite having double the number of wolves found in the Rockies.
The two primary factors identified as responsible for wolf carrying capacity are prey base and human population density, a crude proxy for development. In that regard, from a biological perspective, the Northern Rockies with its low human population and development as well as strong prey base, should be able to support far more wolves than at present.
In the three state region of Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan, there is a combined human population of over 20 million people, and somewhere between 4200-4500 wolves. The combined human population of the Northern Rockies states of Idaho, Wyoming and Montana is approximately 2.5 million and these three states geographically cover a much larger area than the Upper Midwest states, so theoretically should be able to biologically support more than 1650 wolves.
The combined prey base biomass of elk and deer in the Northern Rockies is equal or slightly greater than the biomass of whitetail deer, the primary prey of Midwest wolf populations. Between the three Upper Midwest states there are an estimated 3 million deer. Despite assertions that wolves will destroy hunting opportunities, Upper Midwest hunters kill hundreds of thousands of deer annually and overall the presence of wolves hasn’t caused any significant decline in hunting opportunity.
The tri-state Northern Rockies area is home to several million mule and whitetail deer, plus 370,000 elk (each elk worth about two-three deer minimum in terms of biomass) suggesting that the Northern Rockies prey base could easily support at least twice as many wolves as exist today.
Even accounting for differences in geography (Upper Midwest is flat, while the Rocky Mountain states are, well, mountainous which tends to concentrate wolves and prey to lower elevations in winter), there is clearly sufficient prey and habitat to support more than 1650 wolves in the region. There are not “too many” wolves for the prey base and/or habitat.
POPULAR COMMENT: The minimum populations called for in recovery plan was 100 wolves in each state so 1650 and is now way over the biological targets.
RESPONSE: The original minimum population goals of 100 wolves in each state were not based upon biology but politics. This is important because the ESA clearly says that biology should drive listing and recovery decisions. It is telling that at the same time that 100 wolves minimum goal was adopted for in the three Rocky Mountain States, the MINIMUM population set for wolves in Minnesota when listed was 1600 wolves! In other words, what is now considered far too many wolves for the Rockies (1650) was low enough that wolves in Minnesota were listed under the ESA. Are the biological needs of wolves in Minnesota so much greater than in the Rockies? Probably not. Rather those huge differences in numbers are a good indication of the political way that wolf recovery plan for the Northern Rockies was developed.
In addition, since the original recovery plan was written more than 20 plus years ago, we have learned considerably more about minimum populations needed to maintain wildlife species. There is some question whether 100 wolves, particularly if they were geographically isolated, might not be sufficient to ensure the long term viability of these populations. It is now recognized that recovery across its historic range is both desirable and possible.
Though all the states are likely to maintain wolves at populations higher than the minimum—for instance, Montana is planning on maintaining between 300-400 wolves—unexpected population declines from disease, and/or other factors could jeopardize recovery. Plus there is a growing awareness of problems created by genetic bottlenecks and inbreeding of small populations that may not be apparent for generations. Why risk this by allowing wolf populations to be reduced to minimum numbers.
We have also learned considerably more about the ecological influence of wolves—information that was not available when the original plan was written. The projected numbers of wolves that Idaho and Montana plan to maintain is still not sufficient to ensure that the ecological influence of wolves is sustained across the region.
Wolves, by their mere presence reduce elk and deer numbers in some places for a period of time. This gives plant species like aspen and willows time to recover from heavy browsing pressure. This in turn increases the ecological function of riparian areas along streams, and increases wildlife habitat for everything from songbirds to trout. Wolves can also influence other wildlife. For instance, since wolves tend to kill coyotes, and since coyotes are among the major predators on pronghorn fawns, the presence of wolves increases fawn survival. Another study suggests that wolves ,by reducing coyote predation on mice and voles, increases the opportunity for hawks and owls to hunt for these prey species.
Managing wolves based on 25 year old information would be analogous to fighting cancer using the knowledge base of the 1980s. What we know today is that 100 animals is inadequate to ensure the long term viability of wolf numbers and is too small to ensure the ecological function of a top predator.
Wolves, even if they do not ultimately reduce elk and deer numbers, change the way these animals use the landscape. Where there are wolves, elk spend more time in dense timber and in steeper terrain. This makes it more “challenging” for hunters—a challenge that apparently most hunters are unprepared to accept.
POPULAR COMMENT: Wolves are ruining the livestock industry and threatening public safety.
RESPONSE: The number of domestic livestock killed annually by wolves is incredibly small compared to other sources of mortality. Weather, calving problems, digestive & respiratory problems are the leading cause of cow/calf deaths totaling 95% in most years Predation, mostly from coyotes, accounts for the remaining less than 5% of all loses in these states. Of those losses in the northern Rockies, in 2010 only 199 cows and 249 sheep were killed by wolves. Such losses are hardly going to “ruin” the livestock industry as some suggest.
What’s more, most of the livestock conflicts are self-created by poor animal husbandry practices. In other countries where indiscriminate killing of predators is not permitted, livestock producers must implement practices that discourage predation. This includes use of guard dogs, night time corralling of livestock, rapid removal of dead carcasses, and other measures. In fact, in Minnesota, when a wolf is involved in a livestock depredation, the livestock producer is required to sign and implement changes in animal husbandry that will reduce or preclude the likelihood of a repeat depredation before any financial compensation is provided. A similar requirement in the Northern Rockies would further reduce livestock conflicts without having to kill wolves.
In a number of studies these practices alone or in conjunction were shown to reduce livestock losses by up to 90% or more. If one reduced these livestock losses by 90% considerably less than a hundred animals would likely be killed a year by wolves—a total would make the argument for wolf control laughable.
POPULAR COMMENT: Wolf hunting will reduce livestock conflicts and increase public safety.
RESPONSE: Contrary to popular perception wolf hunting likely exacerbates human conflicts by disrupting the social ecology of wolf packs. Hunting wolves tends to skew populations towards younger animals that are less skillful at hunting, and have less “cultural knowledge” about where to hunt such as where elk migration routes are located and that sort of information. Hunted packs are also likely to be smaller with more pups per adult to feed, making it more difficult for the parents to provide for pups.
To illustrate you can have 20 wolves in a given area. That 20 wolves may be a single pack with a hypothetical 15 adults and 5 pups, or you could have 20 wolves divided up in four packs with 2 adults and 3 pups each. The smaller packs with only two adults would have a more difficult time providing for their pups than the single large pack with 15 adults.
Younger animals whether we are discussing bears, cougar or wolves tend to be bolder but less able to provide for their own needs. These animals are more likely to attack people and/or associate closely with human habitation. Thus indiscriminate sport hunting and predator control indirectly increases potential conflicts with humans.
What’s more hunting is indiscriminate taking out many wolves that are not involved in any livestock depredation. Most hunting takes place on the larger blocks of public lands. Hunters do not hunt on the fringes of urban areas nor is there a lot of hunting on private ranchlands due to limited access. Thus the wolves that are killed are not the ones most likely to be involved in any livestock depredation or a potential threat to public safety (even though that threat is greatly exaggerated).
POPULAR COMMENT: Hunters, through their purchase of license tags, pay for wildlife management.
RESPONSE: Most wildlife management is directed towards maintaining and increasing hunter opportunity. The only reason there is a need to manage deer, elk and other wildlife is to keep hunters from killing too many. It would be desirable for state agencies to start spending more money managing for all wildlife. (We can debate about how to pay for this—but public funding of state wildlife agencies is desirable). This is not to devalue the contribution that hunters make towards the acquisition of wildlife habitat through their purchase of license and tags. There is no denying that purchase of say elk and deer winter range indirectly protects habitat for many other species, particularly predators which may depend on these ungulates, but this ecological value is primarily coincidental conservation and secondary to the main goal of sustaining and increasing hunter opportunities.
However, much of the management of predators including wolves appears to be more persecution rather than directed towards maximizing their biological potential. State agencies have a Public Trust obligation to preserve and protect all wildlife for all citizens. Deer and elk do not “belong” to hunters. Rather all wildlife is held by the state as a Public Trust. By demonizing wolves, and practicing population reductions merely to satisfy the desires of some hunters, state agencies are abandoning their Public Trust mandate.
Geo
Before the hyenas show up, I’d like to thank you for a fine column. Just a few points.
1) It needs to be clarified that the “100 wolves/10 breeding pairs per state” numbers were established in the 1994 Final Rule for Reintroduction merely as one of the triggers for beginning the process of delisting. Nowhere will you find in the Rule a statement that these numbers were meant as a maximum number. Even then, as primitive as population viability science was (Ed Bangs’ discussion of it in appendix 9 of the Final Gray Wolf Environmental Impact Statement was sophomoric), no one believed that such low numbers constituted a biologically viable population. That’s why the Rule also established a requirement for a metapopulation, that is, genetic interchange between and among populations. The key issue is connectivity, not numbers in one place or another.
2) It also needs to be clarified that there were a number of requirements set in the Rule for delisting (see appendix 11 of the Gray Wolf FEIS), of which the stated numbers was only one. The other major requirement was that each state had to put into place “an adequate regulatory mechanism” for the sustainable management of wolves to prevent the need for their relisting. That is, the states had to have management and conservation plans in place to prevent the need for relisting. However, Wyoming of course has refused to do that; its dual status law for wolves, trophy game in the northwestern part of the state, predatory animal to be shot on sight in the rest of the state, is in fact a re-extinction law. Dual status is designed to prevent the development of a metapopulation of wolves in the northern Rockies, the fundmental biological requirement for delisting.
3) I would also add that focusing on numbers really doesn’t get us to where we need to be. The issue is distribution of the species. The ESA clearly requires the federal government to restore wolves to their historical range. That historical range is, as we all know, most of the United States. If wolves were restored to their historical range, to the degree that is humanly possible, then their own population dynamics, biological and social, would determine actual numbers. Quite frankly, the numbers discussion is a red herring.
Once again, thanks for a fine column.
RH
The fees from hunting licenses,and from taxes collected under Pittman-Robertson act DO go to manageing all wildlife,not just species that are hunted.
Hunter generated fees are what paid for the system of national wildlife refuges.
The anti-hunting bias shows clearly in this column.
Mountain Hunter
The vast majority of all license fees goes towards managing “game species.” The benefits that accrue to other wildlife are mostly coincidental–though of course that does not make them less valuable.
However, the vast majority of wildlife species get no special attention or management–and the fact that we have so many species listed as endangered or threatened is indication that these species are often neglected.
As for paying for wildlife habitat, yes hunters have made great contributions to protecting important habitat including big game winter range, wetlands, and other critical lands. I do not want to denigrate the contribution of hunters and angler fees to the purchase of these lands, but it must be pointed out that the vast majority of all public wildlife habitat in the United States has been paid for by public tax dollars.
Specifically the ownership and management of all of our national forest, national parks, BLM lands, even the bulk of our national wildlife refuge system and so forth are all tax supported wildlife habitat. These lands comprise the bulk of all wildlife habitat.
JLH
Not sure exactly what point you are trying to make about RMNP. I do know there is some concern that the elk populations are not well distributed in the park, and as a consequence may be having some impacts on vegetation. Clearly the restoration of wolves to Colorado, and in particular, RMNP would likely change that situation.
As for wolves eliminating all elk and deer from any state, that is probably hyperbole, though if predators do their job, we can expect elk and deer habitat usage to shift and perhaps some elk and deer herds to be reduced, though typically not permanently.
TLM
I think you would find that Upper Peninsula of Michigan–as low as the human population is in that area–is still considerably more developed and population than the bulk of the wolf habitat in Montana, Idaho and Wyoming. There is nothing in the UP to compare to say the Selway-Bittterroot/River of No Return Wilderness, and other large roadless lands found in the Rockies.
But I could have used a more extreme example. Italy has 60 million people and more wolves than in Montana.
What wolves and other predators are doing to elk and deer populations is not unusual. But we also have to keep in mind that there are many places with wolves and other predators where hunting has continued and in fact is considered quite good. Most of the game units in Idaho, Wyoming and Montana are all at or over objectives. Wolf predation, so far, has not diminished the hunting opportunities.
I used the Upper Midwest because there is a large hunting culture there, and a huge number of hunters–far more than in the Rockies. And despite the presence of far more wolves, hunting still persists.
As for Oregon and the recent killing of two wolves, there is no denying that wolves will occasionally prey on livestock. But compared to the things that kill livestock, predators are a minor factor–about 5% of all losses. Wolves, in particular, are responsible for an even smaller amount of losses. There’s a lot of hysteria about wolf predation. This is not to suggest that a loss to any individual rancher isn’t a real financial cost, but the future of the livestock industry as a whole is not in any way threatened by wolves.
George,
As always, a well written article, and as always likely to spur debate as a thought provoking piece should. Hopefully the discourse will maintain civil levels.
In terms of wolf activity in MN, Wis, Mich, there exist robust wolf populations, due to equally robust deer populations.
Ah, lies, damned lies, and statistics raise their ugly heads again. As it so happens, I’ve researched the question of the ratio between confirmed and unconfirmed wolf kills of livestock. The 1:7/9 ratio has no scientific basis. None.
I called up Wyoming Game & Fish about it two years ago when it was asking for public comment on its new regulation for how much to pay ranchers for wolf kills of livestock, and here is what I learned from Scott Talbot, now the Director of the Department. (The Department adopted the 1:7 ratio for payments to livestock owners).
Talbot told me that the G&F;Department used the information compiled in the “Mexican Wolf Blue Range Reintroduction Project 5- Year Review: Socioeconomic Component” relating to confirmed livestock losses” to develop the 1:7 compensation formula.
However, a review of the Mexican Wolf document (which is available online, folks can look it up if they’re not too lazy) shows no scientific support for a 1:7 formula–or for any formula at all.
The Mexican Wolf document indicates that ratios of confirmed:unconfirmed kills are largely based upon unverified rancher estimates, not independent scientific assessment.
Rancher opinions are not science.
Most of the published literature on predator depredation on livestock indicates that wolf-caused mortality is far less than other forms of mortality, and when it does occur, it frequently depends upon environmental, geographical, and operational variables that can be addressed through careful management–a point George has made many times.
In short, a large majority of livestock deaths are due to rancher negligence or just plain accident. Not wolves.
While the Mexican Wolf report asserts that more livestock are killed by wolves than can be confirmed–which is indeed likely, because the terrain makes it too difficult to find carcasses or carcasses are often skin and bone when found, making it difficult or impossible to determine cause of death–those very factors beg the question of whether those animals were killed by wolves or died from some other cause. The Mexican wolf document Wyoming G&F;used to establish its payment ratio simply failed to distinguish between wolf kills and other accidents. It’s simply a made up number. A very expensive made up number.
As any Wyoming game warden will tell you, all dead livestock have been killed by predators–according to ranchers. That’s why game wardens spend so much of their time investigating depredation claims. You can’t trust ranchers’ word and if you’re not careful, they’ll rob you blind.
It is so, ranchers say, so it is so. Don’t confuse the issue with science.
I might remind folks that the money used to pay this extravagant and illegitimate compensation to ranchers for dead livestock comes out of the G&F;Fund, that is, hunting and angling license fees. All damage compensation payments come out of the G&F;Fund. These payments are a kind of forced tribute hunters have to pay the livestock industry simply because the ranchers had the political pull to get it through the legislature. Just another subsidy to the livestock oligarchy. Something to think about.
RH
P.S. Thanks, George. Great compilation. I would use the analogy of an inside-the-Park home run. Another analogy might be it’s bulletproof.
The most recent issue of the Yellowstone Science has a fascinating article by Paul Schullery and NPS historian Lee Whittlesey titled ” How many Wolves were in the Yellowstone area in the 1870′s “. It has a fascinating compilation of accounts of early estimates of wolves in the northern Rockies from Lewis & Clark forward, including the expeditions of the mid to late 1800′s just as the wholesale market hunting of nearly all wildlife species was ramping up.
One especially incisive citation is the study of “archived” Yellowstone grey wolf specimens—the skulls and hides left behind from the extermination era—using the new mitochrondial DNA analysis tools. The researchers, Leonard et al 2005 , determined that for the wolves of the interior American West to show the genetic diversity they found, the population would have been at least 380,000 at its apex. It’s interesting to note the genetics of the Yellowstone area Grey Wolf also had traces of DNA from Mexican wolves and eastern wolves from as far away as Labrador in Canada. The researchers noted that the current management goals of northern Rockies wolf recovery which target a threshhold population of about 400 wolves total in Wyoming, Montana, and Idaho to qualify for delisting is probably short by a few orders of magnitude.
The really sobering account in this article is the extent of the market hunting; particularly the extermination of Bison and Elk and other ungulates in addition to the vendetta against wolves. The grandfathers of the same hunters who are claiming here and now that its hunters who are paying for and driving big game conservation today conveniently forget it was hunters who destroyed 10-12 million elk that used to range from the Berkshire Mountains of western Massachusetts all the way to the eastern Cascades. Of course we all know the sordid saga of the extermination of 60 million Bison , but the elimination of the Woodland Caribou from western Wyoming to the West Coast doesn’t get the attention I feel it deserves. For starters.
I’ve concluded the concept and now practice of ” hunting” wolves is really not an effective wildlife management tool. It’s just a surrogate, a feel-good pseudo tool for the hunting community to do the only thing they know how to do, which is kill animals. It’s the only tool they know and use in the end. Everything else such as their conservation / habitat work leads to those autumn elk camps and the killing fields.
Commentors here— such as big sky —never bring up the positive ecologic value of wolves or nonlethal wolf management techniques or a more roundabout matrix of predator management alongside better big game hunting regulation by humans. While their holy gospel of the North American Big Game Conservation Model may have served us all well in rebuilding and restoring the severely depleted herds( read: exterminated by hunters) for the past 75 years, it has now become corrupted and actually is distorting the populations and ecology of the ungulates they cherish so much they want to hang one on their wall.
The hyper-emphasis on trophy big game hunting —the excessive hammering of prime adult males with really big antlers — and their insistence that commercially motivated hunting operations ( read: outfitting) are to be given the highest and first considerations in setting seasons, are very damning points of evidence that the North American wildlife model needs to be updated to version 2.0. to more include overall herd health and diversity and not necessarily huntable numbers . By insisting that state game agencies provide large numbers of what amounts to a farmed crop of elk every year, year after year, for high harvests that put a variety of stresses on the game populations inconsistent with ecology and genuine conservation.
In fact, the elk hunting seasons in my part of Wyoming have so deviated from genuine conservation of elk population balance and health—starting long before wolves were brought back— that wolves may be the best option on the table for recovering elk. Population numbers tell you one thing, herd health tells you another, and the obsession with wolves as being a negative force instead of a positive force of nature is a third thing altogether, seldom brought to the table. The history is being ignored in the interests of contemporary expedience and misguided politics overruling what really needs to be done in the wild. I would interject at this point with some anecdotal evidence already documented that wolves are probably the best tool available for controlling Chronic Wasting Disease, case in point.
One thing I can say for sure. The Good Old Days of trophy Elk hunting are behind us, for now. They were opn their way out the door before the wolves were reintroduced. It all changed in the 1980′s , especially if you consider the Yellowstone fires of ’88 as a smoking gun.
Now, not only do wolves have to be brought to the table as an effective ungulate population management tool in lieu of failed human hunting programs, a representatative of Global Climate Change needs to be at the state game agency table during season setting time.
I’d like to think that Teddy Roosevelt would see the wisdom of this.
The updated North American Wildlife Conservation Model version 2.0 definitely includes a healthy Grey Wolf component. At least in my corner of Wyoming…
Dewey
Yes,wolves are wildlife,and should be managed as wildlife-by the states.
No,no objection to Pittman-Robertson funds being used to conserve wolves-wolves are wildlife-wolves are not going to be exterminated again,my issue with the whole wolf fiasco is that all the enviro/animal rights whackos have made millions,clogged the courts with an endless stream of lawsuits,and dragged out returning wolf management to the states.
I don’t have any problem woth wolves,the problem is the states not being able to manage their own wildlife.
Hunting is a valuable wildlife management tool.
I have a problem when people deny the fact that wolf predation has severely depleted elk in areas with high wolf populations.
I have a problem with people who write articles and make up their own facts,skew numbers to suit their own views,and blame hunters for trying to exterminate wolves again-all hunters I know only want states to manage wolves,and remove some wolves in areas with high wolf numbers/low elk/deer numbers.
It needs to be clearly understood that the ONLY reason wolves are not delisted in the Northern Rockies has nothing to do with environmentalists’ lawsuits and has everything to do with the intransigence of the State of Wyoming with its bullheaded, Stockgrower-driven, ILLEGAL dual status law.
The very first state plan written by the Wyoming Game & Fish Department a decade ago envisioned wolves as trophy game throughout the entire state, as required by the federal rules for delisting. Had Wyoming gone the statewide trophy game route, wolves would have been delisted and the lawsuits would have failed five years ago. But no, the Stockgrowers realized that if wolves were delisted and brought under state management ranchers would lose a valuable propaganda tool for maintaining rancher control over state-federal politics. So the Stockgrowers forced dual status through the legislature, and here we are a decade later still fighting over wolves.
With the lawsuits, we’re fighting for the rule of law and the rule of science over politics.
Hunters need to figure out who their enemies really are. The enemy isn’t environmentalists. It’s the livestock oligarchy, which is by the way pushing to privatize hunting as quickly as it can.
RH
George
The National Wildlife Refuge system is for all species,over 300 refuges allow hunting,and the funds from hunters are what pays/paid for establishing the majority of the refuges,the federal Duck Stamp that all hunters who hunt waterfowl purchase is a major source of funding for the refuges.
The bulk of funds for the refuge system comes from hunters,and fishermen.
The BLM lands you mention were established for cattle grazing,not wildlife management,and they,like national forest lands are for multiple use recreation-that includes hunting.
The National forests/national parks are not primarily wildlife management areas-thats what the refuge system is for-
wildlife is manged in national forests-national parks do not manage wildlife until whatever the problem is has reached a critical stage-
just look at Yellowstone as an example.
How many acres has Ducks Unlimited preserved? How much have sportsmens groups like D.U.,pheasants forever,the national wild turkey federation,RMEF,whitetails unlimited,etc. done to preserve lands,and crucial wildlife habitat?
Far,far more than all the enviro whacko/animal rights whackos.
The wolf issue is filled with lies,half-truths,and obfuscation. Most of it by the pro-wolf side claiming-falsely-that hunters want to wipe out wolves.
Tony
George didn’t skew numbers,but he did make unfair comparisons,and cherry-pick his facts.
You are the one who clearly doesn’t know many hunters-I have hunted N.W. Montana/Idaho since I was in my early teens,and hunted all over the U.S. and some in Canada.
Where I hunt,there are fewer elk in some areas,a lot fewer in some areas,”getting an elk” is not all that hard,it’s harder,but that’s why it’s called hunting. It’s not supposed to be easy-and it never was-which shows you know zero about hunting and hunters.
Comparing wolves in Michigan and Minn. to the northern rockies is not a reasonable comparison-those wolves have a prey base of millions of whitetail deer,which have twins every spring-the deer do not stop giving birth like elk have.
The terrain is different,the climate is different,the prey base is different.
Dewey
The only area I hunt that has had a major drop in elk population is around Lolo pass.
I do hunt the backcountry-then I am far away from those who like to ride in to their hunting area on an ATV.
If no enviro’s are opposed to regulated wolf hunts-why did they go to court to stop Montana’s last wolf hunting season?
I’ll take a cow elk-better for the herd,and cows taste better to me.
By the way-I personally would not hunt a wolf-can’t eat them,and I believe in eating whatever animal I take.
I was done trophy hunting 25 years ago- it makes no sense from a management standpoint.I hunt to be in the backcountry,and for the meat.
One quick afterthought: In Wyoming, the revenue from elk licenses sold by Wyo Game and Fish doesn’t come anywhere close to paying the program costs of elk hunting. In fact, of all the Big Game species hunted in Wyoming, only Pronghorn pays its own way with tags.
Fully 30 percent of Wyo Game & Fish budgets in recent years were balanced using federal funding. That money is derived from ALL taxpayers everywhere, even downtown Manhattan Island NY , not just sportsmen. A susbstatial amount of Wyo G&F;operating budget comes from similar state general fund appropriations, again, paid by all taxpayers, not just sportsmen excise fees and Duck Stamps etc. In Wyoming, that means Arch Coal and Peabody severance taxes are paying for elk hunt program costs, not the rod and gun club. Wildlife trust fund money in Wyoming , used for habitat projects and often on a matching funds basis with NGO’s, comes from mineral taxes.
What I’m saying here is numbers and dolalrs are cherrypicked and skewed by all sides of a particular wildlife issue. It’s very disingenuous to blame the enviros and pro-wolfers for statistical/financial chicanery without also following your own money and the Big Picture money , comprehensively so, and applying the same stern admonitions..
Tony
You just provided an example of skewing the facts-by using elk numbers for all 3 states-use the elk numbers in areas with high wolf populations and you get a different result.
You just clearly are anti-hunting,and think there should be an unlimited number of wolves,which is not good for the wolves,or the prey base.
As I stated to Dewey-I could care less about trophy hunting,and most areas I hunt do have healthy elk numbers,with the exception of the Lolo pass area.
The areas which had major elk population declines all have high wolf populations.
You don’t wipe out one species to save another.
Dewey
Fair enough,as I said BOTH sides use lies,half truths,obfuscation,and cherry pick facts,and skew numbers.
It’s annoying,and I’m sick of being told all I care about is “getting my elk” which is far from the truth.
I’m out of here,I’m sure comments will be closed sooon anyhow.
Well, here in the Upper Wind River Valley of Wyoming, home of the Wiggins Fork Elk Herd (hunt areas 67, 68, and 69), we have four wolf packs. The elk herd is also over objective and starting to hammer its winter ranges. Wyoming Game and Fish has increased the late season cow-calf licenses for all three hunt areas by 600 over last year.
Clearly, wolves (and bears) aren’t doing their job of keeping the elk in check. This fact more or less undercuts the false claim that wolves are wiping out elk.
RH
Dewey
One last thing,I agree with you concerning the RMEF
Robert Hoskins
Again,in areas with high wolf numbers,you get low elk numbers-not a myth,a fact.
Not the case here, nor is it the case anywhere in Wyoming. Not only do I closely follow the herd I hunt, I carefully review the yearly G&F;herd unit reports. The one problem we do have is excessive take of mature bulls by outfitters. The problem isn’t too many wolves; it’s too many outfitters taking too many bulls year after year after year. It seems you’re the one who has problem with facts, and that’s because you have a problem with science.
RH
I have to echo Robert Hoskins statement that the livestock industry is the major detriment to hunting in many, many ways. For instance, just the forage consumed by livestock reduces what is available for native herbivores from elk to pronghorn. Particularly in deplete ranges, this forage competition can significantly reduce the carrying capacity for native ungulates.
But that is only one way that livestock affects native ungulates. Most native species avoid areas with domestic animals unless they have no other choice. Thus when cattle and sheep are released on to public rangelands the native animals leave and are confined to less suitable habitat.
Or consider all the rivers that are dewatered for irrigation and how that affects aquatic species and fishing opportunities.
The prairie potholes that have been filled to make more grain production to feed livestock.
The diseases transmitted to native species from domestic animals-for instance domestic sheep to bighorn sheep.
That is only a partial list of impacts. That is why it is surprising that so few hunters and anglers seem to get it–their friends are not the ranchers.
Thank you George for a very well written article which states the facts!
Love the history angle. It makes you wonder sometimes how much of the history was written in the last 10 years….
Todd, I have a picture of wolf pelts stacked at Wolf Point, Montana. That is why Wolf Point got its name in the first place. I could very well see that there were many, many wolves in the buffalo days. What I don’t see is a large number in the mountains. One of the only reliable sources on wildlife is of course the Lewis and Clark Journals. If anyone has read those, recall those fellas had a tough time when they got to the mountains…..no food available. Little game was found until they went over the divide and found the people who lived on the other side of the divide. Those folks mostly lived on salmon, and if I remember right they stated they got pretty sick of salmon on the rest of the journey down to the coast.
When the buffalo were eleminated, so were the wolves. Not necessarily because of hunting, but because there was not an ungulate population to support them anymore.
By the way Robert, I have no problem with a few wolves. I do have a problem with people like yourself and George setting policy for people like me or others who are directly affected by wolf introduction. Let em grow and reproduce and all the things needed to keep things wild. In the same breath when they show up in the backyard, calf pen, or horse coral shoot em. Not everybody has a trust fund, retirement or a tax free nonprofit to support them.
We made room for some wolves. Now its time to manage some and back off and see what happens.
Christianity should not be talked about when discussing wildlife issues Greg. God is not real. He’s a figment of the imagination and the bible is just a book written by your fellow man. It has no merit what so ever. God gave nothing to man because he’s not real. You don’t have to be “anti-human” to admit that man is indeed a disturber of earth. Just look at what we are doing to the environment and how many species are endangered of becoming extinct because of human actions.
reality22
No, it is the livestock business that is reprehensible. You can’t live with the wolves, you can’t live with the grizzlies, and you happily murder the bison. Let’s not forget to mention the wild horses in Nevada that they are trying to fence away from water on public lands, just so the welfare ranchers can have a bit more grass.
You are destroying millions of acres of public lands with overgrazing and sloppy management. What your cattle don’t eat they crap on, what streams they tear up are now mud bogs.
You feel that you should be able to turn your livestock out on allotments and have no worries about losses. Here’s a hint, the livestock business is a BUSINESS. If someone owned a 7-11, opened the doors, and then went to lunch, you can be damn sure that they are going to suffer some kind of loss. So why is turning out livestock on open range and leaving them to tend themselves any different? Don’t want losses? Then take care of your livestock.
You aren’t the kings, you aren’t the barons, and you aren’t the rulers of the world. The wildlife was there far before you were and deserves the right to be there now. And for those of you who are looking to defend the rancher, be advised that the Elk are next on their list to destroy, in the name of the “brucellosis”.
“Wild Horses”? There is no such thing in the US. They are an invasive species that should be dealt with. I do not necessarily like to have our public lands used as breeding grounds for cattle, but we do WANT (not need), as a nation beef…Until WE as a society, decide that beef “is not what’s for dinner”, we are doomed to public grazing allotments.
prowolf, Did the herds of bison “as far as the eye can see” not to the same (or worse) to the environment as cattle! The leases have limits & you know that! I’ve been involved with moving cattle into these leases. There are restrictions on the number of cattle that can graze a lease.
You have spent too much time on Ralph Maughan anti-hunting hate site! Cherry pick what will eliminate hunter opportunity ignore the rest. Who cares if it plows ranchers under that get in the way! It’s certainly not about endangered species when it comes to wolves.
reality22
Nope, the Bison, Elk, Wolves, and all other animals co-existed just fine prior to the invasion of the white man. One of the first things that early explorers to the west noticed were the tall grasses that were able to sustain the wildlife and remain strong.
Perhaps a little Aldo Leopold is in order: (written in 1949)
“The land ethic simply enlarges the boundaries of the community to include soils, waters, plants, and animals, or collectively: the land.”
“This sounds simple: do we not already sing our love for and obligation to the land of the free and the home of the brave?
Yes, but just what and whom do we love?
Certainly not the soil, which we are sending helter-skelter down river.
Certainly not the waters, which we assume have no function except to turn turbines, float barges, and carry off sewage.
Certainly not the plants, of which we exterminate whole communities without batting an eye.
Certainly not the animals, of which we have already extirpated many of the largest and most beautiful species.
A land ethic of course cannot prevent the alteration, management, and use of these ‘resources,’ but it does affirm their right to continued existence, and, at least in spots, their continued existence in a natural state.
In short, a land ethic changes the role of Homo sapiens from conqueror of the land-community to plain member and citizen of it.
It implies respect for his fellow-members, and also respect for the community as such.”
As far as “restrictions” go, I know that those who “manage” these allotments do not go out and count each head of cattle. And in reality it doesn’t matter if they do or not, the damage is still being done, and all for a whopping $1.35 per AUM. COWS do not belong in the National Forests, WILDLIFE does. Kind of funny, you complain about lack of hunter opportunity, perhaps if the livestock wasn’t destroying the habitat that belongs to the wildlife, the wildlife wouldn’t have near as big of a problem surviving.
Yes, I am a regular visitor to Ralph’s wonderful site. But I also know how to READ and form my own opinions, based on factual data. I also grew up on a cattle ranch and fully understand proper livestock management, for both prime livestock husbandry and environmental protection.
Everybody has their history;
Quentin Skinner, professor in the Department of Rangeland Ecology and Watershed Management at the University of Wyoming’s College of Agriculture put together a historical perspective on riparian zones in the late 1980s.
The paper was presented in 1986 at the Wyoming Water 1986 and Streamside Zone Conference in Casper, and more recently in November 1995 at a conference at Tufts University which focused on Environmental Enhancement Through Agriculture.
Joe Hiller who is currently the Associate Director of Cooperative Extension Service at the University of Wyoming co-presented the paper with Dr. Skinner at Tufts. They offer some insight as to what riparian areas looked like in the 1800′s, and how agriculture heightened the quality and the extent of riparian wetlands in the semi-arid western United States. Skinner and Hiller divide the management history of western riparian areas into six periods; exploration, migration, settlement, after creation of dams and reservoir storage, multiple use management, and riparian zone management.
Using the written accounts of the Lewis and Clark expeditions, Skinner and Hiller conclude that riparian vegetation was limited to specific situations. Water would spread over wide channels during high flows, then return to narrow channels during low flow. The observations of Lewis and Clark imply that river banks were seldom over flooded. Vegetation was noted to be at the very edges of straight reaches in a water channel, at meander point bars where groundwater interflow would supply water, at stream junctions where ground water and surface water moved from one stream to the next, and on islands where water in the channel was available even at low flows.
Expedition accounts also report that buffalo, as well as the Native Americans, were confined to riparian areas because of their need for water and shelter. Huge herds of buffalo were reported as were the impacts that these herds had on vegetation and riparian areas. One account by Captain Fremont on the North Platte, near Casper, in July of 1842 says:
“We found no grass today at noon; and in the course of our search on the Platte, came to a grove of cottonwoods where an Indian village had recently encamped. Boughs of the cottonwoods, yet green, covered the ground, which the Indians had cut down to feed their horses upon. It is only in the winter that recourse is had to this means of sustaining them; and their resort to it at this time was a striking evidence of the state of the country.”
water is absolutely necessary to life, so settlement naturally took place close to rivers and streams. Agriculture replaced buffalo with livestock, and .began to develop off-stream water supplies.
These activities reduced the impact on riparian areas, and reduced erosion by diverting high flows to other uses such as flood irrigation which in turn provided groundwater, that according to Skinner “was, and often still is, stored under the developed land mass that borders our present perennial streams.”
Reductions in streamflow during spring runoff caused sediment to be deposited along stream banks and fill in the less-developed braided channels. Streamflow became consolidated into one or a few channels, with the ‘wide channels that Lewis and Clark. saw becoming riparian zone flood plains. These flood plains are still supported today by the over-bank flooding that occurs during spring runoff. The change in configuration of stream channels that occurred during settlement actually augmented riparian zones.
Further augmentation of riparian areas would come with the creation of reservoir storage. “Riparian zone wetlands along regulated river systems now support corridor forest from the Missouri River to the Rocky Mountains in areas where they did not exist before settlement,” states Skinner. “Small reservoir storage designed by agriculture for livestock water, distribution of animals and erosion control has created riparian zones where none existed before,” writes Skinner. Skinner and Hiller onclude that agriculture, livestock grazing and water development must be given their fair share of credit for building and maintaining riparian zone resources.
They state, “… in the western U.S., well-managed private lands and riparian zones represent a large fraction of the critical winter habitat needed to maintain the increased wildlife populations the public desires. Equally important is that the off-stream water developed by agriculture is the reason that the distribution of all grazing. livestock can be managed today.
Agriculture in Wyoming appears to have accomplished much since the 1930′s when it was common knowledge that livestock .grazing was too heavy to maintain desired rangeland conditions. Today’s grazing management has allowed vegetation cover to keep erosion to a level that is natural for the landscape position that Wyoming occupies in the U.S.”
“Agriculture and livestock grazing have taken their share of criticism for reducing riparian zones. We hope that this historical perspective of water development in the semi-arid west puts some of the myths concerning the destructiveness of agriculture to rest,” they write. From Wyoming Agriculture, July! August 1997