Embedded Files
We are placing this Court Case in Montana. So, you are questioning the legality and consitutionality of the Montana Idaho Wolf Depredation Law. (Same law as Idaho described below).
Here is the part of the Montana State Consitution applicable to the Wolf Depredation Law:
The Montana State Constitution reads:
"(1) The state and each person shall maintain and improve a clean and healthful environment in Montana for present and future generations.
(2) The legislature shall provide for the administration and enforcement of this duty.
(3) The legislature shall provide adequate remedies for the protection of the environmental life support system from degradation and provide adequate remedies to prevent unreasonable depletion and degradation of natural resources."
Mont. Const. art. IX., § 1.
QUESTION TO THE SVCS SUPREME COURT: Is the Montana Wolf Depredation Law (same as Idaho's) that aims to reduce the current wolf population by 90% in violation of the Montana State Consitution's amendment "The state and each person shall maintain and improve a clean and healthful environment in Montana for present and future generations"?
On July 1, 2021, the Wolf Management Act went into effect. It allows anyone with a wolf hunting tag to kill an unlimited number of wolves and gets rid of restrictions on how the wolves can be killed:
Hunting methods:
Trapping: Year-round trapping is allowed on private property with landowner permission
Shooting: Any legal method for taking other wild canines in Idaho can be used, including shooting from vehicles
Baiting: Hunting wolves over bait is allowed on private land with landowner permission
Dogs: Dogs may be used to pursue wolves, and no hound hunter permit is required
Night vision equipment: Allowed, including spotlight or night vision equipment
Other provisions:
Allows the state to hire private contractors to kill wolves
Allows hunters and trappers to kill an unlimited number of wolves
Allows running down wolves with ATVs and snowmobiles
PRO WOLF SOURCES: articles and videos
SOURCE #1: PRO WOLF
The Endangered Species Act (ESA for short) was enacted by Congress in 1973. Under the ESA, the federal government has the responsibility to protect:
Endangered Species - species that are likely to become extinct throughout all or a large portion of their range.
Threatened Species - species that are likely to become endangered in the near future.
Critical habitat - vital to the survival of endangered or threatened species.
The Endangered Species Act has lists of protected plant and animal species both nationally and worldwide. When a species is given ESA protection, it is said to be a "listed" species.
As of October 2009, 1,361 plants and animals in the United States were listed as threatened or endangered. There are many additional species that are currently being evaluated for possible protection under the ESA, and they are called “candidate” species.
Bull trout (Salvelinus confluentus) Threatened
Chinook Salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) Threatened
Kootenai River white sturgeon (Acipenser transmontanus) Endangered
Steelhead trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) Threatened
Sockeye Salmon (Oncorhynchus nerka) Endangered
Threatened, Endangered, and Candidate Species
Threatened, Endangered, and Candidate Species
Endangered- Any species in danger of extinction throughout all or a significant portion of its range.
Threatened- Any species likely to be classified as endangered within the foreseeable future throughout all or a significant portion of its range.
Candidate- Any species that is undergoing a review process for possible listing as endangered or threatened.
Proposed Threatened- A species undergoing a review process to determine if it will be listed for protection under the ESA.
Designated Critical Habitat- A geographic area(s) that contains essential features for the conservation of a species.
LISTED SPECIES IN IDAHO
LISTED SPECIES IN IDAHO
Mammals
Canada Lynx (Lynx Canadensis) T
Grizzly Bear (Ursus arctos horribilis) T
Northern Idaho Ground Squirrel (Urocitellus brunneus) T
Southern Selkirk Mountains woodland caribou (Rangifer tarandus caribou) T
Fish
SOURCE #2: DELISTING DISASTER
SOURCE #2: DELISTING DISASTER
YouTube Video
Click here for VIDEO ON NEW WOLF KILLING LAW
On February 7, 2014 an independent scientific peer review panel told the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service that their proposal to strip federal protections for gray wolves across nearly all of the lower 48 states was not based on the best available science.
“The peer reviewers have now said what we have been saying all along: The Fish and Wildlife Service’s proposal to strip
protections for gray wolves in the U.S. is not based on the best available science. This should now make it clear to the Service that delisting the gray wolf is premature and shortsighted.”
– Jamie Rappaport Clark, president of Defenders of Wildlife
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is proposing to remove Endangered Species Act protection for most gray wolves across the United States. This decision could forever change the future of gray wolf conservation in our country.
Gray wolf recovery in the U.S. is not complete. These wolves face rabid anti-wolf politics, aggressive lethal control, unsustainable hunting, intolerance and other threats across the entire country, and haven’t yet returned to suitable habitat in many parts of their historic range. By delisting them now, USFWS would be turning their backs on one of the best wildlife conservation stories in U.S. history before it’s finished. Beyond all the hyped up hysteria about wolves, the truth is that an average of 33 people are killed by lightning in the U.S. every year.1 An average of 413 people die per year in the U.S from ATVs2 and there are another 26 fatalities3 on average caused by elevators in the U.S. each year. The average number of people killed by wolves per year in the Lower-48?? Zero. In the 21st century, only two known deaths have been attributed to wild wolves in all of North America.4
So ignore extremists trying to scare you about the threats posed by wolves. It’s nonsense. Their claims are based on fairytales, not reality.
(www.defendersofwildlife.org 5-15-15)
SOURCE #2 SAWTOOTH NATIONAL FOREST KEEPS WOLVES FROM LIVESTOCK WITH NON-LETHAL METHODS: PRO WOLF
COEXISTING WITH WOLVES IN IDAHO’S WOOD RIVER VALLEY
Nestled in the scenic Sawtooth Mountains of south-central Idaho, Wood River Valley seems like the perfect place for wolves. However, this majestic area is also grazing grounds for more than 25,000 sheep every summer. In 2007, a new wolf pack settled in the valley’s Blaine County. Just as the pups were getting big enough to travel beyond their den, the sheep grazing season began. The pack preyed on several lambs and was promptly slated for extermination—until Defenders of Wildlife stepped up to help.
Defenders worked with local stakeholders to try nonlethal methods for keeping wolves from preying on livestock, giving the pack a second chance. The following grazing season, in cooperation with Blaine County commissioners and local livestock producers, Defenders’ field crew worked with sheep herders to keep livestock and wolves safely apart.
Today, the Wood River Wolf Project is going strong, drawing on experience and a suite of proactive methods and tools:
-livestock guard dogs to alert sheep and flock attendants,
-trail cameras to monitor packs,
-noisemakers,
-spotlights to scare wolves away and
-temporary electrified fladry corrals as needed to protect sheep at night.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Idaho Department of Fish and Game provide information on wolf activity from their aerial monitoring flights, and the U.S. Forest Service keeps us abreast of sheep movements on its land. With support from the Natural Resources Conservation Service, LightHawk, the Audubon Society and The Nature Conservancy, the project has expanded from 120 square miles to more than 1,000 square miles of national forests and private lands with one of the highest concentrations of livestock and wolves in the western United States.
A model of success
A model of success
Since its inception in 2007, the Wood River Wolf Project has:
---Kept sheep losses to wolves at less than 1 percent—90 percent lower than losses reported in the rest of the state—and wolves killed by wildlife control agentsto zero.
---Provided agencies and livestock cooperators with training in radio telemetry monitoring, turbofladry, sound and light deterrents, radio-activated alarm systems, carcass removal and other nonlethal deterrent techniques.
---Co-sponsored wolf-livestock coexistence workshops with the Blaine County Commission to educate area ranchers, state and federal agencies and international researchers about the project and measures that have led to near-zero losses of livestock in the project area.
---Served as a testing ground for nonlethal coexistence methods.
---Created a site-analysis system to collect data and recommend best practices for individual ranchers and land owners.
The project is also becoming one of the largest and most comprehensive wolf coexistence efforts in the country: At the request of Blaine County officials, Defenders is now working to expand the Wood River Valley project countywide to include cattle ranchers as well as sheep producers.
An inspiration for others
An inspiration for others
The Wood River Wolf Project has provided many benefits (see box, opposite) with great potential for duplication in other areas where wolves and livestock are present. Inspired by the success of the Wood River model, wildlife biologists in other states and researchers from Europe and Australia are developing similarstakeholder-driven projects to address wildlife and livestock conflicts.
The Wood River Wolf Project demonstrates that even stakeholders with divergent interests can build collaborative relationships that wouldn’t exist otherwise by working together to find solutions to conflicts with wolves. This, in turn, reduces conflict among people about sharing the landscape with these predators
—a win-win for all.
The Benefits of Cooperative Coexistence
The Benefits of Cooperative Coexistence
The Wood River Wolf Project demonstrates that that proactive prevention pays in many ways:
Reduces livestock predation by wolves and other predators.
Lessens the impact of livestock grazing on wolves and other predators.
Contributes to the economic sustainability of the ranching community and reduces the cost of wolf-livestock management.
Improves community support of ranching and conservation coexistence practices.
Builds good working relationships and facilitates collaborative conflict resolution among stakeholders.
Increases tolerance for wolves and other native wildlife.
Enhances scientific knowledge through data collection, human dimensions case studies and field application of nonlethal methods.
(www.defendersofwildlife.org 5-15-15)
SOURCE #3 NATE BLAKESLEE INTERVIEW AND IN THE VALLEY OF THE WOLVES: addressed Druid Wolf Pack of American Wolf
by Nate Blakeslee
SOURCE #3: 2021 IDAHO LAW ALLOWS FOR YEAR ROUND HUNTING OF WOLVES AND FROM STV'S, SNOWMACHINES, AND HELICOPTERS
New Idaho Law Allows Killing of 90 Percent of State’s Wolves
New Idaho Law Allows Killing of 90 Percent of State’s Wolves
Supporters of the law argue wolves are a threat to livestock. However, only 102By Theresa Machemer
SMITHSONIANMAG.COM
MAY 10, 2021
170
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Last week, Idaho governor Brad Little signed a bill into law that allows hunters to kill about 90 percent of the state’s wolves.
The new law, SB1211, was supported by ranchers who say that wolves threaten their livestock and hunters who say that the wolves have reduced elk populations. Both of those claims are disputed by opponents of the new rules, who include scientists, conservation groups and other hunting groups, Douglas Main reports for National Geographic. The new law allows anyone with a wolf hunting tag to kill an unlimited number of wolves and lifts restrictions about how those animals can be killed. It also increases the state’s budget for hiring private contractors to kill wolves.
“Today marks a low point for gray wolf recovery in the U.S.,” says Zoe Hanley, a carnivore ecologist and representative of the Defenders of Wildlife, per the Associated Press’ Keith Ridler. “For years Idaho wolves have been intensely persecuted through the nation’s most permissive hunting and trapping seasons, and this bill all but pushes the species back to the brink of federal relisting.”
Gray wolves lost federal Endangered Species Act protections in January, though they had been delisted in the Northern Rockies since 2011. A recent count estimated that Idaho’s wolf population is 1,556 animals, and about 500 animals were killed in 2019 and 2020 through hunting, trapping and other population control efforts in the state, reports KTVB.
The new law creates a goal of 15 wolf packs in the state, or about 150 wolves total, per Outside magazine’s Wes Siler.
The law also changes the restrictions for wolf hunting methods. When the law goes into effect, hunters will be able to use the same as those for other canines like coyotes, Rico Moore reports for the Guardian. That will open up the use of night-vision equipment, baiting, snowmobiles and ATVs, and hunting from helicopters. Trapping and snaring of wolves, including newborn pups, on private property will be allowed year-round, reports the Associated Press.
Cameron Mulrony, executive vice-president of the Idaho Cattle Association, argues that wolves have had a negative impact on livestock and big game hunting industries.
“A cow taken by a wolf is similar to a thief stealing an item from a production line in a factory,” says Mulrony to the Guardian.
But opponents of the law argue that wolves have a relatively low impact on livestock losses. In the last fiscal year, the state’s livestock industry lost only 102 sheep and cattle to wolves, reports National Geographic. Idaho loses about 40,000 cattle to non-predator factors each year, per Outside.
The group Idaho for Wildlife wants wolf numbers reduced to 15 packs to boost the elk population for big game hunting. Steve Alder, a representative for the group, tells the Associated Press that “I think (the new law) will be very effective…I really do think that they’ll finally get wolves down to the 150.”
However, research in Yellowstone National Park has shown that a healthy wolf population can stabilize the ecosystem and improve the health of elk herds, per National Geographic. There are currently about 120,000 elk in Idaho; only a few thousand elk less than the state’s all-time-high elk population of 125,000, and 8,000 more elk than when wolves were first reintroduced to the state in 1995, reports Outside.
“Backed by an array of misinformation and fearmongering, the state legislature stepped over experts at the Idaho Fish and Game Department and rushed to pass this horrific wolf-killing bill,” says Center for Biological Diversity senior attorney Andrea Zaccardi in an emailed statement. “And Republican lawmakers have promised that this is just the beginning, even though the new measure would doom 90% of Idaho’s wolves. We’re disappointed that Gov. Little signed such a cruel and ill-conceived bill into law.”
If the wolf population drops even further than SB1211 outlines, it is possible that the federal government could again take over management of wolves in the state. There are three ways that could happen in Idaho, per Lindsey Botts at Sierra magazine: if the state’s wolf population drops below 10 packs or 100 animals, if the population is below 150 individuals for three years in a row, or if human pressures significantly threaten the wolf population.
Source #3: Outside Magazine
Idaho Governor Brad Little signed SB 1211 into law on May 5.
This week, Idaho governor Brad Little is expected to sign into law a bill that calls for the extermination of 90 percent of the state’s 1,500-strong wolf population. Proponents say wolves are ruining the livelihoods of ranchers and hunters. Opponents say the wolves are necessary to a healthy ecosystem.
“They’re destroying ranchers,” said Republican senator Mark Harris, one of the bill’s sponsors, during a debate in the Idaho statehouse. “They’re destroying wildlife. This is a needed bill.”
“The politicians behind this bill lack science, ethics, and fact,” Amaroq Weiss, senior West Coast wolf advocate for the Center for Biological Diversity, told Outside.
After being eradicated earlier in the 20th century, wolves were reintroduced to Idaho in 1995. Initially protected by the federal government under the Endangered Species Act, the state legislature worked to establish political control over management of the species. The Idaho Wolf Conservation and Management Plan was passed in 2002, creating a blueprint for the state’s Fish and Game department to take over management of the species upon delisting from the ESA, which took place across the northern Rocky Mountains in 2011.
That original plan, written by the legislature, not Fish and Game, called for a minimum population level of 15 packs. Given that wolf packs in this part of the world average about ten members, that roughs out to a population of about 150 wolves. That number was determined by the legislature to be the population size that would allow the species to remain sustainable in the state—without creating conflict with ranchers and hunters. Wildlife biologists, in contrast, argue that wolves must return to the entire portion of their historic range that’s currently able to support the species before their population can be considered sustainable.
This new bill, SB 1211, calls for Idaho’s wolf population to be reduced from its current estimated size of 1,556 back to that politically determined level of 150 wolves. To achieve that, it devotes $590,000 to hire contractors to exterminate the animals and removes any limits on the number of wolves hunters may harvest, while freeing them to use any method currently legal in the state, including trapping, the use of night vision equipment, shooting from vehicles, and baiting.
The Idaho Fish and Game Commission opposes the legislation, arguing the bill would remove decisions about how to manage wildlife from the department’s professionals and place that decision making in the hands of politicians. Idaho’s approach is also in conflict with that of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
Here are the reasons the bill’s proponents argue such extraordinary action is necessary—and how they compare to science.
The Claim: Wolves Kill Livestock
The Claim: Wolves Kill Livestock
“A cow taken by a wolf is similar to a thief stealing an item from a production line in a factory,” Cameron Mulrony, executive vice president of the Idaho Cattle Association, told The Guardian.
And in the debate at the statehouse, Idaho’s Senator Harris called wolf livestock depredation a “disaster.”
The Reality: The Number of Kills by Wolves Is Exceptionally Small
The Reality: The Number of Kills by Wolves Is Exceptionally Small
In 2018 there were 113 confirmed wolf kills of cows and sheep. In 2019 that number was 156, and in 2020 it was 84. That gives us a three-year average of 113 wolf kills per year in the state. There are currently 2.73 million head of cows and sheep in Idaho. That means confirmed wolf-caused losses amount to 0.00428 percent of the state’s livestock.
According to a study published in 2003 and widely cited by the agriculture industry, variables like terrain can sometimes make it hard to find dead livestock, so the true number of wolf-related losses may be up to eight times greater than the official tally. Assuming that worst-case scenario applies universally, wolf kills may account for as much as 0.02 percent of the state’s livestock.
Idaho loses about 40,000 cattle each year to non-predator causes like disease, birthing complications, and inclement weather.
U.S. Fish and Wildlife provides the state of Idaho with funding to compensate ranchers for confirmed cases of livestock lost to wolf depredation. Currently that amount covers 50 percent of the rancher’s total cost.
The Claim: Killing Wolves Reduces Depredation
The Claim: Killing Wolves Reduces Depredation
“We need proper management to keep Idaho ranchers in business,” wrote Cameron Mulroney, vice president of the Idaho Cattle Association, in an opinion piece published by the Idaho Statesman. He goes on to call for taxpayer-funded wolf culling and increased wolf hunting opportunities for members of the public.
The Reality: Healthy Packs Prefer Natural Prey
The Reality: Healthy Packs Prefer Natural Prey
“Multiple state-sponsored studies have concluded that large-scale wolf removal through public hunting or significant lethal control does not substantially reduce livestock losses to wolves in areas of recurring conflict,” Zoë Hanley, a representative of Defenders of Wildlife, wrote in a letter to Idaho lawmakers.
Many biologists believe that, because wolves function in packs, destabilizing and weakening those packs by killing members of them forces the wolfs to seek easier prey. “The odds of livestock depredations increased four percent for sheep and five to six percent for cattle with increased wolf control,” said a study that tracked livestock depredations across Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming between 1987 and 2012.
The study does confirm that culling wolves to the point of removing them from an ecosystem can be demonstrated to reduce depredation.
The Claim: Wolves Decrease Hunting Opportunities
The Claim: Wolves Decrease Hunting Opportunities
Wolves are “destroying wildlife,” said Senator Harris in the debate. Hunters complain that they must compete with wolves for their natural prey, elk and deer, and that wolves push those animals out of traditional hunting areas, while reducing their outright numbers.
“The old place where you took your Dad or your dad takes your son, you can’t go there anymore because the elk are gone,” wrote Benn Brocksome, executive director of the Idaho Sportsman’s Alliance, in an opinion piece. “There’s one or two deer where there used to be hundreds, they’ve really pushed the elk and deer populations around, and really diminished the populations in different areas.”
The Reality: Wolves Create Healthy Ecosystems
The Reality: Wolves Create Healthy Ecosystems
Despite all those pesky wolves, elk populations in Idaho are actually at or above management objectives. The outright number of elk in the state currently stands at 120,000, just 5,000 fewer than the all-time high of 125,000. That’s also 8,000 more elk than were counted in 1995, the year wolves were reintroduced to Idaho.
As of 2019, the population of bulls (male elk) was above management objectives in 41 of Idaho’s 78 elk-hunting zones. According to Idaho Fish and Game, 2019 saw the 14th-highest elk harvest of all time in the state. In fact, the biggest problem elk populations in Idaho face is a lack of hunters prepared to hunt tough terrain. “One of the challenges we face in managing elk populations is getting enough hunters to hunt hard for and harvest antlerless elk in areas where we are working to bring elk herds back to the population objectives in the statewide elk plan,” Rick Ward, the department’s deer and elk program coordinator, said in a statement.
Mule deer aren’t fairing quite as well. “The three-year stretch of winters spanning from 2016 to 2019 was tough on many of Idaho’s mule deer herds, largely due to poor-to-average fawn survival,” according to Idaho Fish and Game. Still, 24,809 mule deer were harvested during the 2020 hunting season, with 28 percent of hunters finding success. Below average, but far from the lowest.
It doesn’t appear that wolves decreased populations of ungulates, and the predators may even play an important role in protecting them: chronic wasting disease (CWD) is a contagious neurological disease that degrades brain tissue in deer and elk over time, leading to emaciation and eventually death. CWD has not yet reached Idaho, but it has been found just over the border in southwest Montana and in Wyoming. There is currently no known cure and no effective tool for preventing its spread.
At least that’s what researchers thought until they began a research project into CWD’s spread in Yellowstone National Park. There, preliminary results suggested that wolves may be effective at slowing its spread by killing infected animals. Wolves cannot be infected by the disease.
“Wolves wouldn’t be a magic cure everywhere,” Ellen Brandell, the Penn State University researcher leading the project, told The New York Times. “But in places where it was just starting and you have an active predator guild, they could keep it at bay and it might never get a foothold.”
Gary J. Wolfe, a wildlife biologist and the former president and CEO of hunting advocacy group the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, agrees. “While I don’t think any of us large carnivore proponents are saying that wolf predation will prevent CWD, or totally eliminate it from infected herds, it is ecologically irresponsible to not consider the very real possibility that wolves can slow the spread of CWD and reduce its prevalence in infected herds,” he said in a statement released by the Sierra Club. “We should consider wolves to be ‘CWD border guards,’ adjust wolf hunting seasons accordingly, and let wolves do their job of helping to cull infirm animals from the herds.”
SB 1211 isn’t going to save livestock and won’t help hunters, but ultimately it may pose one major problem for anti-wolf Idahoans: if it causes the state’s wolf population to fall below ten packs, the bill could eventually lead to the state losing the ability to manage wolves within its borders. The 2002 Wolf Conservation and Management Plan, written by Idaho’s own legislature, calls for wolf management to revert to U.S. Fish and Wildlife control if the state’s population falls below ten packs.
“In the unlikely event the population falls below ten packs … wolf management will revert to the same provisions that were in effect to recover the wolf population prior to delisting,” according to Idaho’s management plan. That’s the Endangered Species Act.
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SOURCE #4 Center for Biological Diversity against Wolf Depredation Law
Idaho Lawmakers Pass Bill to Kill Hundreds of Wolves
$400,000 to Be Spent Wiping Out 500 Wolves, Setting Up Wolf-killing Board
BOISE, Idaho— The Idaho Legislature today passed House Bill 470, a bill to create a new lethal “Wolf Depredation Control Board” to administer a fund for widespread killing of wolves in the state. The bill, expected to be signed into law by Idaho Gov. C.L. “Butch” Otter, sets aside $400,000 in state funds to kill roughly 500 wolves, leaving just 150 in the entire state.
The new board will consist of members appointed and overseen by Otter, who said in 2007 that he wanted to be the first to kill an Idaho wolf after federal protections were taken away. The board will be made up of representatives of the agricultural, livestock and hunting communities. The bill does not require any members of the board to represent the wolf conservation community.
“Political leaders in Idaho would love nothing more than to eradicate Idaho’s wolves and return to a century-old mindset where big predators are viewed as evil and expendable,” said Amaroq Weiss, West Coast wolf organizer at the Center for Biological Diversity. “The new state wolf board, sadly, reflects that attitude. The legislature couldn’t even bring itself to put a single conservationist on the board, so the outcome is predictable: Many more wolves will die.”
Congress in 2011 stripped Endangered Species Act protection from wolves in Idaho and Montana. Since then, 1,592 wolves have been killed in those states.
The bill is the latest in a series of anti-wolf actions in Idaho that could ultimately backfire and force the return Endangered Species Act protections for gray wolves in the northern Rocky Mountains. Other commitments made by Idaho, including promises to maintain refuges for wolves in remote areas and wilderness, have been rolled back. The Idaho Department of Fish and Game sent a hunter-trappeD into the Frank Church-River of No Return
Wilderness this winter to eliminate two wolf packs. It recently announced a new predator-management plandesigned to kill 60 percent of the wolf population in the Middle Fork area over the next several years, and contracted with USDA’s Wildlife Services to gun down 23 wolves in the
Lolo management zone in February.
“Yet again, Idaho has put a black eye on decades of tireless work to return wolves to the American landscape,” said Weiss. “This bill sets aside $400,000 in state funds to wipe out as many wolves as legally possible in Idaho. Reducing these wolf populations to below even the absolute bare minimum sets a dangerous precedent and ensures that true wolf recovery will be little more than a pipedream in Idaho.”
In combination with mortality from annual hunting and trapping seasons, the wolf population in Idaho is under serious threat of dropping near — or even below — minimal recovery levels that Idaho promised to maintain when wolves in the northern Rockies lost federal protections in 2011.
The sponsor of H.B. 470, Rep. Marc Gibbs (R-Dist. 32), says the intent of the bill is to reduce Idaho’s wolf population to as few as 10 packs. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is required by its own delisting criteria to review the population if changes in Idaho law or management objectives significantly increase the threat to the population. It must then decide whether to reinstate federal Endangered Species Act protections or extend the post-delisting period for federal oversight.
(www.biologicaldiveristy.org 5-17-15)
SOURCE #5 PHANTOM WOLVES OF SUN VALLEY
SOURCE # 6
Idaho Suspends Wilderness Wolf-Killing Plan In Face of Court Challenge
Idaho Suspends Wilderness Wolf-Killing Plan In Face of Court Challenge
by KEN COLE on JULY 29, 2014 · 74 COMMENTS · in ADVOCACY, IDAHO DEPARTMENT OF FISH AND GAME, IDAHO WOLVES, LAW, LAWSUIT, PUBLIC LANDS, WESTERN WATERSHEDS PROJECT, WILDLIFE NEWS, WOLVES
POCATELLO, Idaho – Faced with a legal challenge by conservationists and an imminent hearing before a federal appeals court, the Idaho Department of Fish and Game (“IDFG”) has abandoned its plan to resume a professional wolf-killing program in the Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness during the coming winter.
In a sworn statement submitted to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit on July 24, 2014, IDFG Wildlife Bureau Chief Jeff Gould stated that IDFG “will not conduct any agency control actions for wolves within the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness before November 1, 2015.” IDFG had previously advised the court that the program could resume as early as December 1, 2014.
A professional hunter-trapper hired by IDFG killed nine wolves in the Frank Church Wilderness last winter and state officials in February announced plans to kill 60 percent of the wolves in the Middle Fork section of the wilderness over a period of several years in an effort to inflate wilderness elk populations for the benefit of commercial outfitters and recreational hunters.
“As we mark the 50th anniversary of the Wilderness Act this September, we are relieved that the Frank Church Wilderness will be managed as a wild place, rather than an elk farm, for at least the coming year,” said Earthjustice attorney Timothy Preso, who is representing conservationists challenging the wilderness wolf-killing program. “Now we must make sure that wilderness values prevail for the long term.”
Earthjustice is representing long-time Idaho conservationist and wilderness advocateRalph Maughan along with four conservation groups—Defenders of Wildlife,Western Watersheds Project, Wilderness Watch, and the Center for Biological Diversity—in the lawsuit challenging the wolf-killing program. The conservationists argue that the U.S. Forest Service, which is charged by Congress with managing and protecting the Frank Church Wilderness, violated the Wilderness Act and other laws by allowing and assisting the state wolf-killing program in the largest forest wilderness in the lower-48 states.
In a separate sworn statement filed with the Ninth Circuit on July 24, the Forest Service committed to providing the conservationists with notice by August 5, 2015 of any plans by IDFG to resume professional wolf-killing in the Frank Church Wilderness during the 2015-16 winter, as well as “a final determination by the Forest Service as to whether it concurs with or objects to such plans.”
“IDFG’s announcement now gives the Forest Service the chance to play out its mission—its obligation to protect our irreplaceable Frank Church Wilderness for the American people and for all its wildlife against an effort to turn it into a mere elk farming operation on infertile soil,” said Maughan, a retired Idaho State University professor who was a member of the citizens’ group that drew up the boundaries of the Frank Church Wilderness 35 years ago.
“We are pleased to see this truce in Idaho’s wolf reduction efforts in the Frank Church for a full year,” said Suzanne Stone, Defenders’ regional representative who has worked nearly three decades to restore wolves in Idaho. “The Frank Church is both the largest forested wilderness area and a core habitat for gray wolves in the western United States. Wolves belong here as they have made the ‘Frank’ truly wild again. Ensuring healthy wolf populations here is critical for the recovery of wolves throughout the entire northwestern region.”
“It is hard to imagine a decision more inconsistent with wilderness protection than to allow the hired killing of wolves,” added Travis Bruner, executive director of Western Watersheds Project. “Today, some relief for wild places flows from the news that IDFG will not continue that odious operation this year. Next we will see whether the Forest Service will take action to protect the Frank Church Wilderness from such atrocities in the future.”
“It’s time for the Forest Service to stand with the vast majority of the American people by taking the necessary steps to protect wolves in the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness for the long-term, not just the next 15 months,” stated George Nickas, executive director of Wilderness Watch.
“Wolves are the epitome of wildness. Their protection is key to preserving the area’s wilderness character.”
“We’re glad Idaho’s wolves are rightly getting a reprieve from the state’s ill-conceived predator-killing plan, at least for a year,” said Amy Atwood, senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity. “We’re also happy to see the Forest Service agree to be more transparent about any future decision to allow Idaho to kill wolves in the Frank Church.”
SOURCE #7: Idaho Wolf Depredation Compensation Plan
The goal of the State Wolf Depredation Compensation Plan is threefold. The first goal is to ensure the long-term survival of wolves in Idaho. Second, provide a process for compensation for wolf-livestock conflicts that inevitably result when wolves and livestock are in the same vicinity. And finally provide a means of compensation to those livestock producers who go out of their way to avoid or reduce wolf-livestock conflicts. Wolf-caused mortalities are difficult to detect in range livestock areas.
Heavy cover, large pastures, great topographical variation and complete carcass consumption by wolves lend increasing degrees of difficulty to timely detection of wolf kills. The proportion of wolf-related depredations that go undetected or unconfirmed is unknown and will vary by area. For example, two studies (Oakleaf, et. al., 2003 and Bjorge and Gunson, 1985) on cattle have shown that for every 5.8 or 6.7 cattle lost only 1 confirmed kill was noted. Given this, the number of unconfirmed depredation losses attributed to wolves will always be a contentious issue. Some scientific data also suggests that further effects of wolf predation include stress-related loss of body condition in harassed herds and subsequent decreases in pregnancy rates and weaning weights (Stricklin and Mench, 1989). Cattle seeking to escape wolves may leave areas where they are supposed to be and disrupt grazing management plans. Economic losses and/or penalties from land management agencies could be the result.
For some ranchers, the cumulative effects of wolf predation may cause losses sufficiently severe that livestock production becomes untenable. Although the impact of wolf predation to the entire livestock industry of the state is expected to be small, the impact to the individual can be devastating. This plan provides a means for compensating, at least in part, wolf-livestock conflicts that inevitably result when wolves and livestock are in the same vicinity. In addition, it tries to compensate those producers who go out of their way to avoid or reduce wolf-livestock conflicts. The following are offered as guidelines and are in no way to be considered “final.” (See page 3, last paragraph.) Although some research would indicate otherwise, it is suggested that this program recognize three types of losses plus proactive approaches for possible compensation: 1) Confirmed kills based upon field examination. 2) Probable kills based upon field examination. 3) No confirmed or probable kills but livestock missing and wolves in the area. 4) Proactive programs that reduce the opportunity for wolf-livestock interactions. Confirmed losses are currently paid at 100 % and probable losses at 50 % of market value for livestock lost to wolves through the Defenders of Wildlife Wolf Compensation Program.
Currently, USDA/APHIS Wildlife Services makes these determinations for confirmed or probable losses. The Idaho Wolf Depredation Compensation Fund would compensate a producer for the losses above and beyond normal where wolves exist yet losses have not been determined as “confirmed” or “probable” based on the standard compensation criteria established by Defenders of Wildlife. The Idaho Wolf Depredation Compensation Fund is designed to compensate for documented losses that are not covered by Defenders or any other sources. Compensation dollars will be prorated among the requests dependent upon the number of claims filed versus the number of dollars to be used for paying such claims.
Methodology:
1) Prices paid will be a blended price per hundredweight for steers and heifers for calves lost, price per hundredweight received for market cows and bulls, or dollars per hundredweight for lambs or ewes lost.
2) Compensation will be paid based upon site specific information regarding actual losses submitted by the applicant. Compensation for verified losses will be given priority. The emphasis will then shift to compensating for missing livestock. Finally, compensation for proactive efforts will be awarded IF funds are available.
3) In those cases where there’s insufficient, reliable evidence to determine losses above those expected from causes other than wolf predation a multiplier will be applied. The actual multiplier used is to be determined by the compensation board on a caseby-case basis.
4) Compensation will not be automatic and the determination of the compensation board will be final.
Compensation for Proactive Efforts:
1) Up to 50 % of the actual costs incurred for current year, proactive, out of pocket expenses.
2) Proactive approaches include, but are not limited to, renting pastures away from known rendezvous sites when conflicts are known to be inevitable, hiring of extra riders or herders, use of guard dogs, etc.
3) Compensation will not be automatic and the determination of the compensation board will be final.
4) It is recommended that direct losses be given the highest priority for payment.
For purposes of this program the following documentation will be needed to file a claim:
1) Grazing livestock has some inherent risk. Because of this, there is a “normal” death loss associated with grazing cattle on range. Claimants will need to supply documentation of this normal loss. This can be accomplished by providing “on/off” counts as submitted to agency personnel with a minimum of three consecutive years data required, historic losses from neighboring ranches running on the same allotment if three years data are not available.
2) Losses will require documented depredations or confirmed wolf presence in the area in question. For a confirmed sighting to be valid it must be recorded by either IDFG, USDA/APHIS WS or employees of the Nez Perce Tribe wolf monitoring group
SOURCE #8 IDAHO'S ARIEL KILLING OF WOLVES ON FEDERAL LANDS (FEBRUARY 8, 2016)
Breaking news from Idaho.
The state government with the highest body count of wolves in the West has unleashed a new round of aerial killing. Once again, the purpose is to artificially inflate elk numbers for sport hunters and boost the sale of elk hunting licenses. And once again, the killing is happening on public land.
We’re still trying to learn how many wolves have already been shot from the air in Idaho’s Lolo National Forest. But even one wolf killed in this way is unconscionable.
The deeply disturbing actions by the Department of Agriculture’s Wildlife Services agency working on behalf of the state of Idaho must stop. And the U.S. Forest Service is letting it happen on its land! It’s now up to the federal government to put the brakes on Idaho’s vendetta against wolves.
What we continue to see over and over again is that Idaho does whatever it wants, whenever it wants, with zero consequences when it comes to wolves.
This latest outrage comes less than a month after Idaho state officials “accidentally” put radio collars on wolves in the nearby Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness area managed by the Forest Service. The state has not ruled out using those unauthorized collars at some point to follow the wolves back to their packs and kill them. While those are not the wolves currently being gunned down in the Lolo, it’s just one more indication that Idaho’s war on wolves will continue and is completely out of control.
Since Congress prematurely forced Idaho’s wolves off the endangered species list in 2011, more than 1,900 wolves have been killed in that state.
Both the U.S. Forest Service and Wildlife Services are agencies in the Department of Agriculture.
SOURCE #9
Wolves in Idaho’s ‘Lolo Zone’ Being Gunned Down by Government
Wolves in Idaho’s ‘Lolo Zone’ Being Gunned Down by Government
by PRESS RELEASES on FEBRUARY 8, 2016 · 140 COMMENTS · in IDAHO, PREDATOR KILLING, PRESS RELEASE, WESTERN WATERSHEDS PROJECT, WOLVES
Moscow, ID– Aerial gunning of wild wolves is underway in remote and rugged areas of the Clearwater National Forest, conducted by the federal “Wildlife Services” agency at the behest of the Idaho Fish & Game Department. The government is using helicopters to kill wolves in the so-called ‘Lolo Zone,’ which covers portions of the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness and stretches north across the North Fork Clearwater drainage. Approximately 50 wolves have been killed from the air in the Lolo Zone since 2011, despite the low wolf population in the area and throughout the state.
Aerial gunning operations are occurring in remote areas of the Clearwater National Forest. The North Fork Clearwater contains close to 1-million acres of roadless public wildlands that qualify for wilderness designation. These wildlands offer some of the best habitat for large carnivores in the entire Lower 48. Despite this, the IDFG seems to be trying to sanitize the wild landscape for game animals.
“The Idaho Fish & Game Department is wrongfully blaming the decline of elk populations in the Lolo Zone on native carnivores, including gray wolves,” said Gary MacFarlane, Ecosystem Defense Director of the Friends of the Clearwater. “Everyone, including the Idaho Fish and Game Department, knows the decline is due to long-term habitat changes in that area. Targeting predators like recovering gray wolves is unscientific, won’t work to boost elk numbers and violates the wildness of these public lands.”
“Excellent habitat for native predators like gray wolves, lynx, wolverines, and fisher exists throughout the Clearwater National Forest, including in the Lolo Zone,” said Ken Cole, Idaho Director of Western Watersheds Project. “But the Idaho Fish & Game Department wants to turn this wild country into an elk farm and that’s ridiculous and inappropriate.”
Conservation groups are especially concerned by the precedent of the wolf killing in the Lolo Zone that uses radio collars to track the packs, because earlier this year, the Idaho Fish & Game Department landed helicopters in the iconic Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness to collar elk and “accidentally” collared a number of wolves, too.
“The collaring of wolves appears to be one strategy that Idaho Fish & Game uses to track down and kill wolves in the Lolo Zone,” said Gary Macfarlane. “It is likely that the department collared the wolves in the Frank Church area so that they would eventually know the location of those individuals and their entire packs. We suspect that the wolf collaring that took place in the Frank Church may end up being used to kill wolves there too.”
Money from the Idaho Wolf Depredation Board funds the aerial gunning operations in the Lolo Zone. The fund is a combination of fees collected from hunting licenses and state taxpayer dollars.
“It’s important for the citizens of Idaho to realize that their hard-earned tax-payer dollars on being spent on helicopter wolf gunning operations,” said Ken Cole. “Governor Otter should be spending that money to fund public schools, highways and other important services, not on the killing of Idaho’s native wildlife.”
SOURCE #10: ALDO LEOPOLD'S THINKING LIKE A MOUNTAIN
Wolves and Deforestation
Wolves and Deforestation
Thinking Like a Mountain
By Aldo Leopold
A deep chesty bawl echoes from rimrock to rimrock, rolls down the mountain, and fades into the far blackness of the night. It is an outburst of wild defiant sorrow, and of contempt for all the adversities of the world. Every living thing (and perhaps many a dead one as well) pays heed to that call. To the deer it is a reminder of the way of all flesh, to the pine a forecast of midnight scuffles and of blood upon the snow, to the coyote a promise of gleanings to come, to the cowman a threat of red ink at the bank, to the hunter a challenge of fang against bullet. Yet behind these obvious and
immediate hopes and fears there lies a deeper meaning, known only to the mountain itself. Only the mountain has lived long enough to listen objectively to the howl of a wolf.
Those unable to decipher the hidden meaning know nevertheless that it is there, for it is felt in all wolf country, and distinguishes that country from all other land. It tingles in the spine of all who hear wolves by night, or who scan their tracks by day. Even without sight or sound of wolf, it is implicit in a hundred small events: the midnight whinny of a pack horse, the rattle of rolling rocks, the bound of a fleeing deer, the way shadows lie under the spruces. Only the ineducable tyro can fail to sense the presence or absence of wolves, or the fact that mountains have a secret opinion about them.
My own conviction on this score dates from the day I saw a wolf die. We were eating lunch on a high rimrock, at the foot of which a turbulent river elbowed its way. We saw what we thought was a doe fording the torrent, her breast awash in white water. When she climbed the bank toward us and shook out her tail, we realized our error: it was a wolf. A half-dozen others, evidently grown pups, sprang from the willows and all joined in a welcoming melee of wagging tails and playful maulings. What was literally a pile of wolves writhed and tumbled in the center of an open flat at the foot of our rimrock.
In those days we had never heard of passing up a chance to kill a wolf. In a second we were pumping lead into the pack, but with more excitement than accuracy: how to aim a steep downhill shot is always confusing. When our rifles were empty, the old wolf was down, and a pup was dragging a leg into impassable slide-rocks.
We reached the old wolf in time to watch a fierce green fire dying in her eyes. I realized then, and have known ever since, that there was something new to me in those eyes - something known only to her and to the mountain. I was young then, and full of trigger-itch; I thought that because fewer wolves meant more deer, that no wolves would mean hunters' paradise. But after seeing the green fire die, I sensed that neither the wolf nor the mountain agreed with such a view.
Since then I have lived to see state after state extirpate its wolves. I have watched the face of many a newly wolfless mountain, and seen the south-facing slopes wrinkle with a maze of new deer trails. I have seen every edible bush and seedling browsed, first to anaemic desuetude, and then to death. I have seen every edible tree defoliated to the height of a saddlehorn. Such a mountain looks as if someone had given God a new pruning shears, and forbidden
Him all other exercise. In the end the starved bones of the hoped-for deer herd, dead of its own too-much, bleach with the bones of the dead sage, or molder under the high-lined junipers.
I now suspect that just as a deer herd lives in mortal fear of its wolves, so does a mountain live in mortal fear of its deer. And perhaps with better cause, for while a buck pulled down by wolves can be replaced in two or three years, a range pulled down by too many deer may fail of replacement in as many decades. So also with cows. The cowman who cleans his range of wolves does not realize that he is taking over the wolf's job of trimming the herd to fit the range. He has not learned to think like a mountain. Hence we have dustbowls, and rivers washing the future into the sea.
We all strive for safety, prosperity, comfort, long life, and dullness. The deer strives with his supple legs, the cowman with trap and poison, the statesman
with pen, the most of us with machines, votes, and dollars, but it all comes to the same thing: peace in our time. A measure of success in this is all well enough, and perhaps is a requisite to objective thinking, but too much safety seems to yield only danger in the long run. Perhaps this is behind Thoreau's dictum: In wildness is the salvation of the world. Perhaps this is the hidden meaning in the howl of the wolf, long known among mountains, but seldom perceived among men.
ANTI-WOLF SOURCES or PRO-LIMITING THE WOLF POPULATION
SOURCE #1 Idaho Governor Otter Signs Wolf Control Board Bill into Law: ANTI WOLF
SOURCE #1 Idaho Governor Otter Signs Wolf Control Board Bill into Law: ANTI WOLF
Today Idaho’s Governor Otter signed H0470, the Wolf Control Board bill, and H0649, the bill that appropriates $400,000 in general funds to the Board, into law. The Board will receive additional funds up to $220,000 with $110,000 coming from Idaho Department of Fish and Game and $110,000 coming from the livestock industry for a total of up to $620,000 annually.
According to statements made by several of the bill’s proponents, the intent of the Board
will be to reduce Idaho’s wolf population to 150 wolves and 15 breeding pairs which
is the minimum number of wolves needed to keep the wolves from being relisted
under the Endangered Species Act.
The board will be overseen by the Governor’s office and will be comprised entirely of members directly or indirectly appointed by the Governor.
THE AMENDED BILL PLACES THE NEW BOARD WITHIN THE GOVERNOR’S OFFICE TO FUND WOLF MANAGEMENT WITH $400,000 FROM GENERAL TAX DOLLARS, AND ADDITIONAL FUNDS FROM HUNTING AND FISHING LICENSES AND TAXES ON LIVESTOCK. SUPPORTERS SAY THE BOARD SIMPLY WILL REPLACE FUNDING LOST BY CUTS TO THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE’S WILDLIFE SERVICES AGENCY.
BUT CRITICS SAY IT’S A PART OF A TARGETED ATTACK ON WOLVES THAT BREAKS THE STATE’S COMMITMENT TO MANAGE THE PREDATORS LIKE IT DOES OTHER GAME ANIMALS. JAMIE RAPPAPORT CLARK, A FORMER U.S. FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE DIRECTOR AND NOW PRESIDENT OF DEFENDERS OF WILDLIFE, TOLD THE IDAHO STATESMAN THURSDAY THE STATE’S WOLF MANAGEMENT PROGRAM WAS “IRRESPONSIBLE.”“THIS IS NOT ABOUT HUNTING,” CLARK SAID. “THIS IS AN ISSUE OF EXTERMINATION AS FAST AS THEY CAN.”
Idaho’s wolf population has steadily decreased since 2009 when they were first removed from the protection of the Endangered Species Act. Lawsuits by wildlife groups, including Defenders, convinced a federal judge to order the animal back on the list in 2010.
Congress took the unprecedented action of removing them from the list again in 2011. Today, a minimum of 480 wolves remain after a high of more than 850.
Under the Endangered Species Act, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is required to monitor the wolf population for five years. The Center for Biological Diversity said this month the dramatic population drop and the state’s unwillingness to protect wolves in the Frank Church-River of No Return wilderness violates commitments Idaho made. CBD said it was preparing a lawsuit to require the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service step in and either relist the wolf or extend the monitoring period another five years.
I asked to interview U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Director Dan Ashe but was told he would be unavailable. His spokesman, Gavin Shire in Washington, referred me to the state, which controls wolves as long as they are above the recovery level of 150 wolves.
“Should wolf numbers drop below that threshold, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service can re-list either or both populations of the gray wolf under the Endangered Species Act and re-assume responsibility for wolf management,” he said.
Interior officials are troubled by Idaho’s actions, Clark said, but they have not carried out the leadership through their monitoring responsibilities she expects. “Instead they seemed to have turned a blind eye to what has happened in the Northern Rockies,” Clark said.
Steve Alder represents Idaho for Wildlife, a Lewiston-based hunters group that has lobbied for more wolf killing. He said he hopes the control board’s funds are used to quickly radio-collar 150 wolves to ensure Idaho can prove it's meeting the recovery goal.
“We have to make sure we have a cushion and a threshold with that 150,” he said. “We don’t want to trigger the feds coming back in."
Clark said she supports the Center for Biological Diversity’s goal to get her old agency to intervene with Idaho.
“I don’t think they are at a point where they will be able to involve the (Endangered Species Act),” Clark said. “But this is not what success looked like when we put these wolves in Idaho.”
SOURCE #2 SAVE ELK ON NEED FOR STATE WOLF MANAGEMENT: ANTI WOLF
SOURCE #3 Big Game Forever on Idaho Wolves (0:00-10:00)
SOURCE #4: Big Game Forever on Enough wolves to sustain
population
Jan. 23, 2014–BOISE — Although Idaho’s wolf population is dropping, data show there are enough wolves to maintain state management of the population, state Fish and Game officials said Thursday.
The state’s count of wolves likely is lower than the actual number because packs in remote areas can be hard to document, said Jim Hayden, staff biologist for the state Department of Fish and Game.
The count of 550 to 750 wolves in 2014 is substantially higher than the 150 that Idaho is required to have to avoid the canines’ relisting under the federal Endangered Species Act.
But the number is dropping, evidence shows. Fish and Game documented a peak of 856 wolves in 2009. The number has been falling ever since; the agency counted 659 wolves in 2013.
The agency recorded 20 wolf breeding pairs in 2013 that meet the federal criteria of two wolves with two pups. So far, 22 have been documented for 2014, Hayden said, based on a study of 30 of the state’s 107 wolf packs, though this number might go up when all the data are analyzed.
The delisting rule requires the state to maintain at least 15 breeding pairs in mid-winter. Federal monitoring will continue until May 4, 2016, under the current rule.
Reported wolf attacks on livestock and wolves killed by hunters and trappers have decreased significantly, Hayden said, which also points to a declining population.
In 2014, 75 livestock attacks were reported, the fewest since 2008. And hunters and trappers have taken 170 wolves so far in the 2014-15 season, down from 234 at this point in 2014.
The federal reintroduction of wolves into Idaho in the mid-1990s was controversial, with many concerned about attacks on livestock and the effect on the elk and deer populations.
Wolf hunting started again in 2009 and, in 2014, the state created a Wolf Depredation Control Board and gave it $400,000 to kill wolves. Gov. C.L. “Butch” Otter is asking lawmakers for the same amount for 2015-16.
The state’s management policies have received pushback from environmental groups, who have dubbed it a “War on Wolves” and say the state wants to kill as many as possible.
“This report should be a wake-up call to the (U.S.) Fish and Wildlife Service,” said Andrea Santarsiere, a staff attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity.
“Idaho’s adopted plan of state-promoted execution isn’t working, and the (Fish and Wildlife) Service must step in to save the wolf population before it’s too late.”
Santarsiere said the group still is discussing what its next step should be. The green group hopes for an increase in federal monitoring, with the population dropping at the very least. One possibility would be to ask the federal government to protect wolves again.
“They’ve said in the past that if any of the states’ management plans are not complying with these numbers, that federal protections may be warranted again,” she said.
Hayden said Fish and Game stepped up its data collection in 2014 by collaring more wolves. State studies have shown more breeding pairs than the federal criteria ndicate, he said. For example, he said, DNA testing of wolf pups in 2012 showed at least 75 successful litters, and field workers confirmed that at least 66 packs had produced pups.
Over the past few months, some federal judges have indicated a willingness to return wolves to federal protection after concluding states aren’t managing them adequately. In response to lawsuits from environmental groups, federal judges restored Endangered Species Act protections for wolves in Wyoming in September, and in several Great Lakes states in December.
But some lawmakers in Congress are writing legislation now to return the authority to the states. U.S. Rep. Mike Simpson “strongly supports continued wolf management by the state,” says his press office.
Steve Alder, head of the hunting rights group Idaho for Wildlife and its controversial predator derby in Salmon the past two years, years, said Fish and Game should do more to document the wolf population.
“My opinion is, we’ve got some real wolf advocates working with Fish and Game that would like to see state management gone,” he said.
Alder wrote on Facebook later Thursday, though, that Hayden is good with data, and he hopes Hayden’s numbers can be substantiated. He seemed pleased with the increased monitoring since last spring.
“If the feds take over, it’s going to be worse for the wolves and the environmental community,” Alder said. “It’s going to just cause more hatred for wolves and wolf advocates. We don’t want that.”
SOURCE #5 HUNTING WOLVES NEWS FILM CLIP
SOURCE 6: WOLVES ARE GOVERNMENT SPONSORED
PREDATOR TERRORISTS
SOURCE #7 : MUST REDUCE WOLF POPULATION
Latest Fish and Game wolf population estimate is 1,543 and stable since 2019
Latest Fish and Game wolf population estimate is 1,543 and stable since 2019
idfg-rphillips
Thursday, January 27, 2022 - 12:26 PM MST
Idaho has had a summer population of about 1,500 wolves for the last three years
Idaho’s wolf population has remained stable and consistent over the last three years based on camera surveys done last summer and since 2019. The 2021 population estimate for Aug. 1 was 1,543 wolves. The 2020 and 2019 estimates were 1,556 and 1,566.
Fish and Game staff deploy cameras during summer when Idaho’s wolf population is near its annual peak. Biologists then monitor hunting, trapping, and other sources of mortality throughout the year to understand how the population varies from late spring when pups are born and throughout fall and winter when most hunting and trapping occurs.
"The population estimate is a valuable tool to measure the effectiveness of Fish and Game Commission’s wolf management and provide the public with a clear understanding of that management," Idaho Fish and Game Director Ed Schriever said.
Documented mortality from July 1 through Dec. 31, 2021, was 300 wolves, which is 37 more than July through December of 2020, and 36 fewer than the same period in 2019, which was a record year for wolf harvest.
Most wolves are taken by hunters and trappers each year. Other mortality includes wolves killed during, or after, preying on livestock, and wolf management done by Fish and Game to reduce pressure on elk herds, as well as natural mortality.
Documented wolf mortality in Idaho over the last 5 years (2016 through 2020) has averaged 436 wolves annually. Wolf mortality is tracked from July through June rather than a calendar year.
Expanded hunting and trapping opportunities in 2021
In an effort to reduce wolf conflicts with livestock and elk herds, the Idaho Fish and Game Commission in 2021 expanded wolf seasons and hunting and trapping methods. The Idaho Legislature also passed SB1211, which further expanded methods of take and extended trapping seasons, mostly on private lands, in an effort to decrease depredation on livestock. Many of those enhanced methods did not take effect until July 1, 2021.
Documented human-caused mortality, along with estimates of natural mortality and reproduction rates, allow Fish and Game biologists to understand the annual wolf population cycle and estimate the minimum population at approximately 900 wolves in early spring before pups are born.
"It is important to understand both the annual population cycle and longer-term population trend from year to year," Schriever said.
Idaho has enough wolves to meet federal criteria for entire Rocky Mountains
Idaho has committed to maintaining at least 150 wolves, Schriever said, and the Idaho Fish and Game Commission intends to manage for a smaller wolf population than the current number in order to reduce conflicts with livestock and manage a balance between wolves and their prey, which is primarily elk.
The Commission’s intent is similar to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s delisting criteria, which suggests a management range of about 500 wolves in Idaho. That number would likely reduce wolf and livestock conflicts while still maintaining a sustainable wolf population and also help elk herds in areas that are not meeting management goals.
The Fish and Wildlife Service’s 2009 delisting rule stated that more than 1,500 wolves across the entire Northern Rocky Mountain recovery area would “slowly reduce wild prey abundance in suitable wolf habitat” and “high rates of livestock depredation in these and surrounding areas would follow.”
The Fish and Wildlife Service’s delisting rule called for about 1,100 wolves within the Northern Rocky Mountains, which means Idaho’s population alone would meet the service’s objectives for Idaho, Montana, Wyoming and other states.
Camera-based population estimates are a relatively new tool
Idaho is the first state to use remote cameras to produce a statewide estimate of the wolf population, which is a method pioneered by a collaboration between the University of Montana and Idaho Fish and Game researchers.
To get the latest population estimate, Fish and Game crews deployed 533 cameras in July and August of 2021 that collected about 9 million photos. Then they used specialized computer software to identify photos that contained pictures of animals, and Fish and Game staff categorized those pictures by species.
Wolf monitoring is integrated into a larger statewide project that uses game cameras to estimate populations for a variety of species and complements other methods of surveying wildlife.
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