WASHINGTON (AP) -- The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service eased federal protection for gray wolves on Tuesday, a move made possible by its work to reintroduce the predator to the mountain West.

The switch from "endangered" to "threatened" applies to wolves in most areas of the country, the service announced. While threatened species are still protected by the government, the lower status, among other things, could allow ranchers to kill wolves caught attacking their livestock.

"Wolves are coming back, and their new status highlights our progress toward recovering them across their range," Fish and Wildlife Service Director Steve Williams said Tuesday.

Williams said the status change gives the service more flexibility to manage gray wolves as the government works to remove the animal from the endangered species list, where it has been for 30 years.

In the Rockies, the service estimated there are 664 wolves in 44 packs in northwestern Montana, Idaho and in and around Yellowstone National Park, where the reintroduction effort began in 1995.

There are an estimated 2,445 gray wolves in Minnesota, 323 in Wisconsin and 278 in Michigan. Those states have passed that region's population targets, the service said.

Wolves are coming back, and their new status highlights our progress toward recovering them across their range.

The change does not apply to wolves in Arizona, New Mexico and parts of Colorado, Utah, Texas and Oklahoma, where the animals are still considered endangered.

That status change also does not affect wolves listed as "experimental populations." They already can be killed under certain circumstances.

Fish and Wildlife officials have been considering the change since 2000. The downlisting launches the next phase of the service's plan: delisting, or removing all federal protection, and letting states manage gray wolves like other wild animals.

Montana, Idaho and Wyoming, the three states where most of the Western wolves live, must have acceptable management plans in place before delisting will occur.

Gray wolves once roamed across North America, but had virtually disappeared by the 1930s after being hunted for fur and targeted by government efforts to control predators.

The government reintroduced the animals to the northern Rockies in 1995, when 14 Canadian wolves were released in Yellowstone National Park, which had been without wolves for decades.

The population has since grown dramatically with wolves spreading beyond the park boundaries. Lone wolves, considered advance scouts of their species, also have wandered into Utah, Oregon and Washington.

Where do I apply for a tag? Dutch.

A good start now we have to work on a hunting season if we had one of those. You would seen less resitance to them.

Radio and news talk today was that maybe by the end of the year there might be a season. You mentioned wolves in Utah, Washington, and Oregon. You didn't mention the one that was shot in north east Nebraska. 700 wolves now and by the end of the year estiments are over 1000. Enough is enough. Time for a season and some control and management.

SSS....... Shoot Shovel and shut up..

The Canadian Grey wolves, predators of the first order, 365 days a year, dumped into Idaho in 1995, are hammering our game herds here. I'll be first in line at the Id. F&G, if they start issuing tags!!

L.W.

I like the idea of wolves as a game animal, elevate him above varmint.

Personally, I've never felt a wolf or a cougar "hammered the game herds" near as badly as the greed of the game farmers/ranchers who helped spread CWD throughout the country.

A wolf or cougar is just another game animal to me. If we have enough of them, make them legal. I personally don't consider either a very desirable trophy. I go nuts for anything with a cloven hoof.

Kensco, naturally occuring predators don't have to big of an impact on game. But introduced and unchecked in virgin country!! They are hammering our elk in Wyoming. The elk had never seen a wolf but did learn fast. 700 in Wyoming, estimated, some counts go over 800. How many elk do you think they can eat?????? Not to mention moose and deer.

As for game farms, I think Nebraska has quite a few. Not one confirmed case of CWD around, near, or in the vicinity of one in Ne. CWD started in Colorado and came from deer in a USF&W deer research faciltiy! True story! (Maybe a population control experiment gone bad)

G and F will sit on their nuts,until the wolf population has tripled. G and F loves the wolf,it provides them with deniability. They can blame their own piss poor management techniques on the wolf. Grizzly hunts in the U.S are a prime example of how hard it will be to have a wolf hunt.

They just found a wolf in the big horn mountains last week. But according to the G and F,its just a two year old looking for other wolves. It won't stick around. Its just a miracle that it was found in the kerns elk pasture,it surely wasn't killing any elk. Ya right.

[ 03-19-2003, 20:47: Message edited by: RMK ]

"CWD started in Colorado and came from deer in a USF&W deer research faciltiy! True story! (Maybe a population control experiment gone bad)"

Sounds like a good urban legend spread by the game farmers.

Some of the early cases were in Colorado, inside the game farm fences. Virtually none of the surrounding wild game was infected. Once wild game began to show signs, the game farmers petitioned the government to eradicate the wild game around their ranches. Talk about balls.

The reason CWD spread to all parts of the country so fast was that game farms were selling and transporting infected game.

You didn't think an infected elk from Colorado just walked up to American Airlines and asked for a one-way ticket to Wisconsin did you?

A conservative estimate had a pack eating 20 to
30 deer/elk a month. Not to mention animals that they
kill and dont eat. Wolves like a lot of predator
will kill just for the thrill.

Elkslayer,

I can't say whether you are totally wrong or not. I'd question your source. The easiest answer to every problem in the U.S. is to blame the government somehow.

The State of Montana outlawed game farms to protect their wild herds, at least that's what's been reported here.

The incidence of CWD inside the high fences have always been much higher than the wild population surrounding these farms. I wonder why that might be?

I think, with CWD, we were too late getting out of the chute, just like with AIDS. We thought it was someoneelse's problem so we ignored it until it was damn near too late.

There aren't any heros in this story. I respect what Montana has done. I like hunting wild game. I want wild game protected. I have absolutely no use for game farms. I don't want the U.S. to end up like South Africa where everything is take-and-pay. I've hunted for forty years on open land. I'd like to think the next generation might enjoy it too.

Elkslayer is right, it was CSU facility in conjunction with USF&W. The feds had their fingers in it.

Of the elk ranches in my area, I know of none who have ever offered any shoots.
I believe CWD was a naturally occuring disease, that was only discovered because of yearly testing on the game farms, where genetic differences were being researched. Then some bright guy from the gubbmint decided he could get a grant from it, and make a life time career of the research. And then of course, when game animals were tested outside of the farms, gee whiz, they have CWD too! Go figure! I kind if imagine if the people researching it, sampled a large enough amount of deer in any area, they would find it. It seems to be a self limiting disease, whereas those who are immune will survive, making a stronger, healthier herd in the end. Going out and shooting off a herd sure as hell doesn't make sense. The arguement of thinning the herd so there isn't so much contact between the individual animals is ridiculous. Deer and elk are gregarious animals, and no matter how much you may think you are thinning them out in an area, the rest will find each other in short order.

It's a fact Kensco . CWD was first discovered on a govt. research facility in Colorado .

There are a lot of good CWD sources on the web. Colorado and Nebraska are two. Search CWD.

The following is from the Nebraska site.

As more extensive steps have been taken to learn more about the disease, its spread, and its prevalence in both wild and captive deer and elk herds, the body of evidence continues to grow. It was once thought that the disease occurs naturally in less than 5 percent of the wild deer population and in about 1 percent of the wild elk population, largely based on studies conducted in the infected areas of Colorado and Wyoming. More recently, however, concern has increased that perhaps those numbers may be greater, particularly in the more socially oriented white-tailed deer populations.
In the past year, the Commission has undertaken two culling operations to assess the presence of the disease in Nebraska. In 2001, Commission staff, upon learning that a mule deer taken in Kimball County in the 2000 hunting season tested positive for the disease, began a culling operation in Kimball County. Of 104 deer taken in that operation, one tested positive, bringing to two the number of wild deer in Nebraska testing positive � all in the extreme southwestern Panhandle. Two additional deer taken in Kimball and Cheyenne Counties during the 2001 hunting season tested positive for CWD.
Upon learning that a number of captive whitetail taken inside the Sioux County game ranch tested CWD positive, and concerned about the Kimball County results, Commission staff in January 2002 began a culling operation within a 15-mile radius of the Sioux County game ranch. Of 113 wild animals taken in that culling operation, nine tested positive for the disease, for an overall infection rate of nearly eight percent. Of those testing positive, five were culled within two miles of the game ranch boundaries, two were culled within two to five miles, and two were culled within five to seven miles.
At the same time, Commission staff culled 172 mule and white-tailed deer from within the captive game ranch in Sioux County. Of 154 test results received, 79 animals tested positive. An additional culling, in cooperation with the South Dakota Department of Game, Fish and Parks, along our common border resulted in a sample size of 193 deer with all being negative. In April of 2002, a sick-looking whitetail deer collected near Gering in Scotts Bluff County also tested positive.

At least three states believe the disease is naturally occurring, but the sale and transportation of privating owned game is a primary transmission vehicle.

Since three of you know the "urban legend" is a fact, one of you post the source of the story and if it sounds like a fact, smells like a fact and quacks like a fact, maybe I'll buy in.

Right now it sounds like a federal conspiracy theory. By the way, I think Oswald, acting alone, killed Kennedy.

What is the history of CWD?
A. The following is a brief chronology of CWD:

CWD was first described clinically as a wasting syndrome in captive deer belonging to Colorado research facilities in 1967. A few years later it was described in a Wyoming research facility.
CWD was first determined to be a TSE in 1978 by Dr. Elizabeth Williams of the University of Wyoming.
The first cases of CWD in wild deer and elk were diagnosed in 1981 in Colorado and 1985 in Wyoming.
Beginning in the 1980s, the distribution of CWD in wild deer and elk in Colorado and Wyoming was determined through surveillance by wildlife agencies in those States. Through their efforts, an endemic area for the disease in wildlife in their States was described. This area includes much of northeastern Colorado and southeastern Wyoming.
In 2001, discovery of a positive wild mule deer in neighboring Kimball County, NE, extended the endemic area into southwestern Nebraska.
From 1996 to June 2002, CWD was diagnosed in farmed elk herds in Colorado, Kansas, Montana, Nebraska, Okalahoma, South Dakota, and the Canadian Provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan.
From 2000 to June 2002, CWD has also been found in wild deer in northwestern Nebraska, southern New Mexico, southwestern South Dakota, south?central Wisconsin, northwestern Colorado, and the Canadian Province of Saskatchewan.
Q. What are the symptoms of CWD?
A. CWD
It was a program with the USF&W involved.

Also there were two shooters! One in the book depository and one in the storm drain. Neither were Oswald!

[ 03-22-2003, 08:25: Message edited by: kudu56 ]

http://www.aphis.usda.gov/lpa/pubs/fsheet_faq_notice/faq_ahcwd.html

Read it and weep! The US government is the Walt Disney of wildlife! Remember the lynx incident in the north west. USF&W was involved, or one of the Clinton clones! Same diff!

[ 03-21-2003, 06:32: Message edited by: kudu56 ]

"Q. What is the history of CWD?
A. The following is a brief chronology of CWD:

CWD was first described clinically as a wasting syndrome in captive deer belonging to Colorado research facilities in 1967. A few years later it was described in a Wyoming research facility."

For the non-beleivers of this "urban legend" , that quote is right off of the USDA link that kudu56 has posted .

No one said it was a government conspriracy . I just think the unatural concentration of game animals in a spot like a research facility , or later , in game farms , created the right enviroment for this pestilence to sprout . And the people at the research facilities had the expertise to realize they were dealing with some new type of bug .........

[ 03-22-2003, 07:55: Message edited by: sdgunslinger ]

Kudu56; Good Site

I buy the fact that it was first described clinically in a captive herd in a research facility. That doesn't lead me to believe some U.S. government Frankenstein experiment gone bad was the origin of the disease.

I agree with sdgunslinger. I think when you start hemming up wild game in an unnatural environment, you are asking for trouble. I'm not sure about the last comment though. If they ran up against something never seen or studied before, I'm not sure anybody would have known how severe or contageous the disease might be, or even what to do with the information.

I sure don't know the answer. I just hate when I read about a 100+ herd of big game being "de-populated" with no sick animals found, or one sick animal found.

I think Montana took the correct step. Stop the game farms and trans-shipment of wild game. If you can't find the cure, at least limit the spread.

You can stop all the game farms you want. But you're still left with places like yellowstone and other winter refuges that are 5 or 6 times over their actual carrying capacities. Yet the game and fish never point a finger at these areas. These areas are prime for spreading disease. You have thousands of animals that have migrated from all over the country and have been exposed to who knows what and they're all cramed together in hay fields,being artificially sustained by game departments. The weak and sick don't die off as fast,because they're being supported.