Hasn't the wolf population drop consistently year after year since state management was permitted? Given Idaho has offered up everything but the kitchen sink this year for "wolf management" it's pretty clear they are motivated to try and get to the bottom.
It seems though, that the use of hunters and trappers is working, and should continue to work....besides with all the elk dead they gotta be out of food at some point
IIRC the main goal of the ID legislature is to divert as much IDF&G money as possible to predator management lest it be used to destroy cattle habitat for the benefit of elk and deer. So mission accomplished once again.
Robert,
What are you doing on the Doughfenders e-mail list?
Spy?!
Between the helicopter gun ships, gov't trappers, snaring and incredibly liberal limits, it's safe to say Idaho has gone too far too fast. We know that wolves are resilient and that they can handle some pretty aggresive management strategies due to reproductive rates, etc, but we're not paying much attention to pack dynamics, and how wolves actually live (as opposed to elk, deer, etc). Idaho simply went too far too fast.
The MT model is showing that you can incrementally change the way you manage wolves, so long as you stay within the accepted plan. We are reducing the MT population through a tightly managed regime of trapping and fair chase hunting. Maybe MT hunters and trappers are just better than ID?
If it were up to me, I'd slow it down. Considerably. I'd also not willingly give the Obama administration a pass on funding wildlife services.
I agree with you brymoore.
Annual DOW budget meeting didn't go as planned.We all might be tired of the wolf debacle, but that doesn't mean the fight is over. It will take constant maintenance to keep this thing from going to far one direction or the other.
Hopefully the waters will calm down someday.
Dear Robert,Idaho has gone too far with their endless assaults on wolves.
Less than five years after losing federal protection, it is clearer than ever that the state refuses to manage its wolf population responsibly.
That’s why today, Defenders of Wildlife officially requested that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) immediately initiate a status review of wolves in the Northern Rockies and examine the relentless threats that this species has encountered since being stripped of Endangered Species Act protection back in 2011.
The call for this status review is the first step toward restoring Endangered Species Act protection to wolves in Idaho and other Northern Rockies states.
Instead of managing their wolves like other wildlife, the state of Idaho has declared war on them.
In the less than three years since Congress stripped Idaho’s wolves of protection, the state has:
- Used aerial gunning to wipe out entire packs, including those on national forest lands, to artificially boost elk populations;
- Allowed hunting of wolves every day of the year;
- Doubled the number of wolves that could be trapped or snared from five to ten;
- Sent a professional trapper to eliminate two packs of wolves in a federal wilderness area;
- Has proposed killing 60 percent of the remaining wolves in the Frank Church Wilderness; and
- Recently passed HB470 into law setting aside an annual amount of $400,000 for the sole purpose of killing as many wolves as possible.
The Governor of Idaho has made no secret of his intention to reduce the state's wolf population to 150 animals or less – which would require initially killing more than 450 wolves and their young as more are born.
We warned this would happen – when federal protections are removed, wolves die.
Sincerely,Jamie Rappaport Clark
President
Defenders of Wildlife
