Coyotes are very intelligent critters. They have strong family ties, and are very efficient hunters. They have a lot of very admirable qualities.

You can say all the same things about wolves, except that wolves are larger, and are more successful at bringing down larger animals, like elk and cattle.

Everywhere, coyotes are regarded as pests, and people try to eradicate them.

Am I the only one who thinks that in 50 years, the people who turned wolves loose on the western US will be about as highly thought-of as the guy who deliberately turned starlings loose in the US? Why are wolves a good idea, and coyotes not?

denton,

Are you the only guy who thinks the guy that turned the wolves loose in the US is a dumb ass? NO!

Who said wolves are good idea??

Daryl

What is about wolves that get people so fired up? Is it that they are viewed as an competitor for deer and elk?

Bakes

Hi, Bakes:

How are the foxes doing on Tasmania? Got the wombats wiped out yet?

kk

KK
Havn't heard much about them of late. There was a article in one of our gun mags last month, but other than that it have fallen from favour as a news item. The article said that there have been confirmed sighting all over the north of the state, which would suggest to me that there is a breeding population in Tassie and they have been there for some time, so its not a recent thing. I don't know about them wiping out wombats, wombats are a big tough animal,if I was a fox I would be worried about the Tassie devil. They would make short work of a litter of fox kits!

Bakes

Interisting side note just heard on the news this morning that a pack of wolves has taken up living on the fort Mccoy military post in middle of Wis. They should have good living. I go there for training a few times a year there are more deer then you can count. Due the very restrictive hunting regs. They can not control the population by hunting.
I love shooting yotes and if we ever get a season on wolves in Wis I sure I well like shooting them more. The wolves population in Wis. is growing by leeps and bounds. That is why they are spreading out of the north into the very deer rich areas of the south. The people who say wolves need willderness to survive are nuts. As long as man does not hunt them they will live along side of humans as much as any animal that is not shot on site.
Iam sure all the antis well like them down there when they start eating things that they are not surpose to like cows, horses, cats and dogs.

Hasn't everyone figured it out yet? Our game management policies are decided by the cliff dwellers in NYC. One bourough of NYC can out-vote just about any state. Especially states west of the big river.
And where do the cliff dwellers get their "knowledge"? From the fat broads on day time TV.

I was working in Salmon idaho when they released 5 wolves in the local mountains which were caught from (believe it or not) about 5 miles from my house in Central B.C. in Canada.

There was a big hulaballo about it. Some of the comments were "are the kids safe to play outside" and "there is a sale on silver tipped bullets"
Give me a friggin break! I truely hope that we stop sending our beautiful animals to places they aren't wanted.

Kids listen closely "They won't bother you if you don't bother them". "They won't kill all your deer or cattle". "And finally, "They are don't make people in to werewolves" haha

Make no mistake, wolves do kill hunting hounds in short order. However, there are those that would say this is ok since we should ban hunting with dogs.
Famous animal rights leader- "our goal is to end all hunting
Same leader talking to hunters- "our goal is to help hunters clean up their image by excluding the activities of hunting with dogs, bait, etc"

Same AR person talking to their membership- "the most sucessful way to fight the enemy is to divide the enemy"

I agree they won't eat all the cattle. The ones inside in a stable are pretty safe.

It amazes me to no end that anyone with outdoor experience would believe that a wolf would not go for the easy kill....

I propose we tax every environmentalist with the same percentage of net income that ranchers lose to predation. Boy, would that change some minds in a hurry amongst the soccer moms!

We had another'n shot about 30 miles south of my farm, on the Idaho/Utah border, or thereabouts. Ya think they were eating water lilies, or the last two decent deer? Sigh, Dutch.

KK
I havn't heard about them killing devil kits. But as I've said it doesn't make the news anymore.In most parts of southern Australia the wombat population has boomed, this is with the population of foxes and feral dogs, a mate of mine lost his dog to a wombat, it crushed it in its hole. I wouldn't think that they would have much trouble with the foxes in Tassie. People are in a panic about a few foxes, when the place is crawling with feral cats and dogs anyway, I don't get it.
And don't get me wrong by the way,I'm a dog lover and train them for a living, but I shoot feral dogs and dingo's and would like to shoot a coyote and wolf, its just funny how people get so worked up about it, after all its just another animal to hunt.
Bakes

Read the other posts in the Big Game HUnting column! THere are a lot of truths. The wolves released into Wyoming are out of control and a tremendous amount of irrevesable damage has already been done to the elk population of NW Wyoming. No control and no management. One was shot in N.E. Nebraska in Dec. one was shot last weekeknd in southeast Idaho, one was trapped in Utah, One pack is in the Big Horns, and two packs have moved into the high desert area south of Meeteetse Wy. 280 is the count as best as anyone can come up with just in Wy. How many elk can 280 wolves eat???? LOTS!

Am I to assume that the dingo never made it to Tasmania and that there are no T. devils on the Aussie mainland? If so, that tells me that the dingo won the battle with the T. devil. I'm of the notion that even carnivorus marsupials are too slow to generally win fights with carnivorus mammals. The roos are very fast of course.

Do they still have to feed the Wyoming elk herds hay in the winter to keep them from starving to death? I know this was once common practice since the elk herds were far greater in population than the land could support.

Lucs

Leo
No the dingo never made it to Tassie. The mainland had devils and Thylacine's and a marsupial lion, they died out with the other meagfauna, I think about 30,000 years ago, or they just couldn't compete with the dingo. The Tassie Tiger (Thylacine) was an active hunter of wallabies, so you'd have to be fast for that at least over a short distance. The last one died in the 30's. Or depending on who you talk to they are still roaming the Tassie bush . The two largest carnivorus marsupials in Australia today are the Tassie Devil and the Tiger Quoll (sort of like a cat)

Bakes

Gentlemen, thank you for the update on the feeding of elk in the winter. I found the hunting in Colorado to be at it's best near the feed stations. People hunting in areas without feed stations saw few if any elk, while we saw many trophy animals. Again that was several years ago and I was worried that the wolves may have reduced the populations to such a degree that winter feeding was no longer required.

Lucs

500A2---It's illegal to feed wildlife in Colorado. I don't know what you are talking about hunting near a feed site. You talking about a game ranch?

The reason elk are fed on feed grounds is because their habitat has been destroyed and turned into subdivisions and mini-ranches. The natural route for 1000's of years was south out of Yellowstone then through the jackson country out onto the Red Desert to winter. But fences, mini-ranches, subdivisions has blocked there route. They are then forced to be fed or starve or eaten by wolves. Right now the later is taking place. Elk are at an all time low. Lowest since 1969. Due to wolf predation. Over 280 in the yellowstone area. It is a sad situation, ten's of $1000's of dollars and many, many, man hours spent improving habitat over 20 to 40 years and 5 years of wolves has all but wiped it out!

Colorado Bob, I did not hunt on a "Game Ranch"! I hunted public land in the immediate vicinity of a feed station, which I believe was State operated. The State of Colorado, or the Feds feed elk to get them through winter without starving. I don't know exactly why, but I found the link to Colorado's state wildlife management site you can check it out yourself if you do not believe me.

www.wildlife.state.co.us/about/wildlifeconserv&manage.asp

Lucs

Actually, I think the elk were cut off from their historical winter feeding grounds for more than half a century ago due to ranching. The ranchers don't want to feed them. Now of course, the mega wealthy have to get in the way with their vacation homes.

Ranching in Wyoming (or I suspect in MT or ID even 50 years ago much less 100 years ago) did not infringe on elk migrations and the ranchers were able to control (to some extent and to considerable effort) the elk eating their hay stacks by using 10' fences around the stacks. Used to see the fenced stacks everywhere.

No, from my 50+ years of observations, the difference and the problem is the vacation homes and the bunny huggers and the effects of their lawsuits on how those of us who live here manage the wildlife we live with (and managed fairly well until the late 70s) not to mention the Disney bred perception of what wildlife is and how they should be managed.

Ya know it makes about as much sense for "outlanders" to tell us westerners how to manage the wildlife species in our area as it does for me to tell urban dwellers how to manage their traffic controls during rush hour.

What would the attitude be in Houston, Chicago, LA or any other major city if us westerners filed a lawsuit and called for a Environmental Impact Statment to stop the renovation of some major freeway through those cities because we thought the improvement would allow cars to drive faster during rush hour creating more exhaust fumes and endanger or kill more pigeons in those cities?

Think about that.

Stop all construction on freeways, lots of construction workers laid off, inconvienience out the wazoo. How would that go over?

[ 03-08-2003, 20:02: Message edited by: Elkslayer ]

Elkslayer... Good point.

Several years ago, there was some environmental clash in congress, where the Senator from Indiana put up a proposal for managing something in Alaska. In response, the Alaskan Senator got up and solomnly proposed clearing the rust belt around Gary, Indiana, and returning it to its natural pre-industrial forested condition.

It's a relief to have someone in the oval office that actually has some idea what ranch life is like... not to mention a VP from Wyoming, who loves to fish.

Wolves in Canada

Open season on B.C.'s grey wolves
Province to allow year-round wolf kill to increase big game herds

Larry Pynn
Vancouver Sun

Friday, March 07, 2003

The wildlife management plan for Muskwa-Kechika grey wolves blames their numbers on years of laissez-faire management, singles out natives for shooting female big game, such as caribou and elk, and warns of the future impact of resource development.

B.C. is increasing the annual bag limit on the grey wolf and proposes to burn 120 square kilometres of bush in the northern Rockies.

The B.C. Liberal government plans to declare open season on grey wolves in the North, allowing them to be shot and trapped year-round while backing more than a three-fold increase in the annual bag limit in a move that would generate more big-game animals for hunters.

Rather than allow wildlife and the landscape to run their natural course in the province's greatest wilderness -- the 6.3-million-hectare Muskwa-Kechika management area of the northern Rockies -- the province also proposes to burn 120 square kilometres a year.

The two-pronged goal is to create grassland habitat while reducing natural predation of ungulates -- Rocky Mountain elk, Stone's mountain sheep, woodland caribou and moose, all species heavily sought after by resident and foreign hunters.

These proposed measures are in addition to the sterilization last month of 13 wolves in five packs in the Muskwa-Kechika, part of a hunter-funded experiment to increase ungulates in the Turnagain River valley. The Turnagain is a tributary of the Kechika River.

"This is retrogressive wildlife management," said Paul Paquet, a Saskatchewan-based consulting ecologist and large-carnivore specialist who has studied wolves in B.C. and throughout North America.

"I thought we were far more sophisticated in our thinking, but apparently not. The motives are clearly to increase the number of ungulates for hunting -- no other reason."

Paquet added in an interview Thursday that it is illogical to conduct an experiment to gauge the success of sterilization then allow increased hunting and trapping -- activities that could lead to the death of the wolves being studied, specifically the breeding alpha males and females. "Those two things are not compatible, and illogical at best," he said, arguing that sterilization is just a "slow way of killing wolves."

The measures are outlined in a Muskwa-Kechika wildlife management plan, prepared by the Fort St. John office of the ministry of water, land and air protection, and obtained in part by The Vancouver Sun through freedom-of-information legislation.

The document blames wolf numbers on "many years of laissez-faire management in the past," adding it will take at least a decade to achieve ungulate objectives.

It also singles out aboriginal hunters for shooting female ungulates, and warns of the future impact of development (oil and gas, logging, mining, commercial recreation), saying "it is likely not possible to maintain existing wildlife values for all areas or all habitat types given the kinds and intensity of development that might occur ..."

The report does not recommend suspension of hunting to rebuild ungulate populations.

Andy Ackerman, the ministry's regional wildlife manager, cautioned that the plan is a draft and subject to change, including scaling down the ungulate population targets. As well, any of the management options could be used in whole or in part.

"There's been human use in the Muskwa-Kechika for thousands of years," he added, and that land and resource management plans in the north have clearly emphasized the need to maintain traditional activities such as hunting and trapping in the region.

Hunting closures can also be spelled out in hunting regulations in specific areas as needed.

"Where you have a conservation concern ... yeah, we'll shut the season down," he said. "Those options are always available."

Still, he emphasized: "The idea is not to produce animals strictly for hunting. The idea is to manage wildlife for all kinds of purposes."

The plan is to reduce the number of wolves in the region -- currently estimated at 850 -- by one-quarter.

At the same time ungulate populations would rise to 30-year-high levels: mountain sheep to 10,000 from the present 5,000; caribou to 11,000 from 4,000; elk to 16,000 from 13,000; moose to 43,000 from 18,000; plains bison to 1,400 from 1,000; and wood bison -- a protected species, not open to hunting -- to 200 from 40.

Once those ungulate numbers are reached, the report estimates the area will be able to support more wolves than currently exist -- 1,100.

"They're guessing at the numbers," said Paquet, a former Canadian Wildlife Service biologist. "Wolves could be half that number or twice that -- they have no way of knowing. That's a key issue."

He also questioned the idea of basing management of the Muskwa-Kechika on producing a maximum number of ungulates. "That's not an ecological approach. There is a huge difference between conservation and wildlife management."

Ackerman said it can be argued that managing for the "higher-order species" will benefit the lower-order species, but confirmed not all scientists agree. "The general concept is that you don't manage one species to the detriment of the others," he added.

The biologist who came up with the ungulate targets is John Elliott, the same biologist at the centre of a controversial wolf-kill program that destroyed more than 700 wolves in B.C.'s northern Rockies in the 1980s. The province cancelled the program amid intense international criticism shortly before Expo 86, and resumed it in 1987 for one more year.

Should the Vancouver-Whistler Olympic bid succeed, would the province's new wolf-kill strategy also raise the spectre of an international boycott?

"I don't anticipate it," Ackerman said. "These are tools that may or may not be used."

Ackerman said it isn't "sustainable" to allow nature to run its course -- allowing wolves and ungulates to find their own population levels. Paquet disagreed, arguing that wildlife management seeks stability in wildlife populations, even though that is not natural.

Created by provincial legislation in 1998 and enlarged in 2000, the Muskwa-Kechika Management Area now encompasses 6.3 million hectares, a roadless wilderness larger than Nova Scotia. Of that area, about 58 per cent is special management zones in which industry can proceed on an environmentally-sound basis, 27 per cent is protected area and 15 per cent is wildlands off-limits to logging only.

Under the B.C. hunting and trapping regulations for 2002-03, hunters in the northern Rockies have an annual bag limit of three wolves per hunter, with hunting banned between June 15 and Aug. 1.

Under the proposed wildlife plan, the bag limit would be increased to 10 wolves per hunter, with hunting allowed year-round, raising the risk that a hunter -- in theory, at least -- could shoot a female wolf at her den raising her cubs.

"That's taking it to the absolute extreme," Ackerman said in response. "I wouldn't even want to comment on that. That's not the intention of the regulation."

Trapping would also be allowed year-round, although the pelts taken in summer would have little market value. Still, some guide-outfitters currently hire trappers to kill wolves as a way to reduce predators in areas in which they guide foreign trophy hunters.

During the 2001-02 trapping season, the average value for a wolf pelt was $116.09, although the retail value of a quality tanned pelt would be closer to $500.

Ross Peck, a second-generation outfitter and biologist whose territory is located in the northern Rockies, is chair of the Muskwa-Kechika Advisory Board, a group that provides independent advice to government on the area. He said the board is waiting for possible revisions to the government draft before taking a position on the wolf-kill issue.

Members of the public who wish to comment on the wildlife management plan should contact Pierre Johnstone, wildlife biologist, ministry of water, land and air protection, 400 10003-110th Ave., Fort St. John, B.C. V1J 6M7 Tel: (250) 787-3332 Fax: (250) 787-3219, or email at pierre.johnstone@gems1.gov.bc.ca