When will these states(Wisconsin-Minnesota-Michigan)allow Wolf Hunting,these states have plenty of Wolf.There is some talk but when...

When the Judicial process is exhausted.

Grizz

when the devil gets pneumonia

We don`t need Tags.

I would hope it's soon.

couple years back somebody tagged a collared one. they hid the collar in the game wardens truck

The people who are making these decisions for wisconsin-minnesota-michigan on the wolf subject are more then likely liberal's....

I would love to be the frist person with a legal wolf rug in and from Wis.

quote:

Originally posted by capebuf:
The people who are making these decisions for wisconsin-minnesota-michigan on the wolf subject are more then likely liberal's....

NOT more than likely, but rather most definitely.

The Obama administration pulled another stalling stunt just last week. They put everything associated with states having the right to manage the destructive animals we are forced to live with every day of our lives. This time, almost a the 11th hour, they decided to do more studying of the wolf pack in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and the UP of Michigan. the deal now is that the Obama administration is studying all wolves from here (northern MN) east to determine which wolves are grey wolves and which wolves are something else.

The federal government has always "known" the sorry bastards that we have to live with every day were grey/timber wolves UNTIL ... the latest legal maneuvering of the anti-hunters (anti everything, not just wolves) came to a dead end in the legal system and the control of the wolf population was getting close to becoming a state controlled matter.

And lest you think it is just the Obama Administration, be involved with someone in the US Fish and Wildlife Service or The Forest Service or any other dealing with the outdoors/land/timber, fish, and wildlife matters and you will find out just how liberal all of the agencies are. They are good little boy and girl scouts and try to portray themselves as totally neutral and apolitical on every issue, but get them behind closed doors at home or socializing with co-workers and a person might think they are at the headquarters of the Democratic National Party, PETA, the Sierra Club, or a similar organization’s national headquarters.

They don't need to be wiped out, just controlled like everything else. I have lived in 3 houses in MN and have seen wolves out the windows of every one of them and had wolves so close I have many times heard them howling while I was in the shower. They have to be close to be heard over the running water, so please believe me when i say I have to deal with them every day of my life.

BTW-The federal government itself says that there are currently more wolves in Minnesota than at any other time in world history. Even when Columbo landed in the New World there were not this many wolves in land that would later become Minnesota. And this is coming from the US government agencies filled with far left people.

skunk out

Liberalisum is a sickness.........

quote:

Originally posted by capebuf:
Liberalisum is a sickness.........

What liberalism causes is worse.

There will only be a public wolf hunt in Michigan when our elected officials in Lansing vote and allow it now that they have been delisted.

A hunt will very likely not happen in the near future.

Only problem animals will be addressed and that will be done by the DNR.

It will happen in WI as soon as they get an accurate count. Right now the DNR needs to pull their head out their cuss and realize that there is more than 500 wolves in WI. As far as legal hunt, its legal if they are caught destroying livestock or endangering human population. The first buck I ever shot, I had to fire off a round to deter the wolf that found it before me.

Nope, Michigan and Wisconsin can count all of the wolves they want to and they will still not be able to have a wolf season. The Obama administration is "investigating" all of the wolves from Minnesota eastward to determine what subslecies exist, how many there are of each, where they are locasted, and only then will they even consider going to the states to let them manage the animals.

BUT...this new classification and count program will allow the anti- hunting groups to start their legal maneuverings all over again. the years of court rulings we have endured over the past several years will be meaningless and we will start at zero yet again. Plus the Obama administratiobn can basically drag out the genetic study and then the count of each subspecies for as long as they want.

In my earlier years I listened to wolves on more than one occasion yelping at the moon. A much lower voice than the coyotes that do the same thing.

Wonderful sounds. Its good to know they are out there.

I say leave them alone.

quote:

Originally posted by 22WRF:
In my earlier years I listened to wolves on more than one occasion yelping at the moon. A much lower voice than the coyotes that do the same thing.

Wonderful sounds. Its good to know they are out there.

I say leave them alone.

Leave them alone.

That's because there not in your backyard, harassing and killing. Walking in the yard 50 feet from the house coming after my wife's dog's and livestock at 10AM.

In the early 90's I feed 400+ deer in my winter deer yard,you would here of one or two wolf's seen all winter. Last winter I feed 11 deer, I could here wolf's almost every night from Dec-April.

I had to quit night hunting coyotes because, I would call in wolf's 3 out of 5 times out.

Wolves need to be controlled.... not running around doing what they damn please!

i also LOVE to hear them howl, especially when i am in the woods after sunset and it is a dead-still evening. this often happens while sitting on a bear stand in the last minutes of shooting time after official sunset. My most favorite wolf howling memory was back in November of ’04. It was the most unreal northern lights I have ever seen. This was before my spine was stabilized (to a degree anyway) and I had to lay on the ground and stare at the light show above me. I mean it was some bodacious northern lights uber more intense, large, and moving lights than whatever night is #2 in my book. Anyway, while laying on the ground for a total of over an hour, two wolves cranked up in the swamp just a few hundred yards away. The howling made night so much better.

I have spent roughly half of my life in both large cities and very rural areas. Plus my travels all over the world have exposed me to so many other large cities and some of the most extremely rural places on earth. It boils down to what coyote wackjob said. I mean he hit the nail exactly on the head. When I lived in cities i read about, talked to folks from, and went as often as possible to rural places. That isone of the reasons that even in childhood I realized that folks living where I wanted to live (very rural) had to deal with things every day of the year. I went back to my city home and did not have to fool with any of their annoyances or outright problems. I would hear folks who had lived in a city all of their life and had limited to no experiences in the wilderness and with rural people talk about how X was wrong and you should not kill some animal, or the situation Y had to be where rural folks must do this or that with water sources, plants, bugs, or whatever. The city people did not have to deal with it every day of the year, so it was no skin off of their nose and the negative impact on rural people was something they honestly did not care about. Form my life experiences I say most of it is pure ignorance, some of it is a power trip the desire to tell people what to do (people they will never see face to face and the city folks will not be on a power trip to a rural person’s face when standing the rural person’s front yard) , there is much genuine arrogance and a feeling of extreme superiority to rural folks, a lot of it is ignorance caused by “information” campaigns from liberal/animal rights/anti everything groups.

I have no idea of kevin kolosky (aka 22wrf) ‘s life history and experience. Maybe some of the reasons listed above are what he is thinking or doing both consciously and subconsciously, or maybe none of them apply to them. One thing I do know for a fact – the 651’ers, Citieits, city folks (people who live in the Twin Cities in Minnesota) come up here for a few days a year and then try to get laws passed that restrict us 24/7-365. We laugh our asses off at how ignorant and stupid they sound when they try to give us an explanation why bears, deer, wolves, coyotes, bobcats, etc. should be managed . they want to hear wolves howl, coyotes yelp, see bears or whatever for the 4 days a year they are up here. They don’t give a damn how much money, time, and trouble the animals cost us every year.

Even hunters are prone to act like this. I have seen many times and laugh in their face because they are stupid, stupid meaning ignorant and incapable or unwilling to become educated. The best examples are deer hunters who can bait with corn. They love wild hogs when they see them from their stand and have a live target to shoot at. But when hogs go 100% nocturnal and they can no longer get a chance to shoot a wild animal, they want to hog hunters to bring the dogs and kill all of the hogs. The hogs are eating all of their corn and they cannot shoot them, so they want them out of there.

Same thing with bobcats. They love to have a live target to shoot at, but when they see their trail cameras show bobcats chasing off deer out of their corn, then they want the trappers to come in and catch all of the cats.

These hunters are just like the Citieits who come up here and want the animals around them when it makes their experience better, but they do not want to deal with them every day of the year. One of the funniest things we “rural idiots” love to see is when a bear, wolf, coyote, or whatever stray a little south. The animals do what they do 365 days a year – they eat their pets (our favorite one to see), get in their garbage, break into buildings or cars, and other stuff like that.

When a wolf swallows their prized poodle whole, animal rights advocates all of a sudden want the wolves controlled.

Let a bear kill an expensive foal that a 651er just bought and see how fast that animal rights advocate all of a sudden wants that bear killed.

Rural folks know exactly what I am talking about. Some city folks understand, but a hell of a lot do not

quote:

Originally posted by coyote wacker:

quote:

Originally posted by 22WRF:
In my earlier years I listened to wolves on more than one occasion yelping at the moon. A much lower voice than the coyotes that do the same thing.

Wonderful sounds. Its good to know they are out there.

I say leave them alone.

Leave them alone.

That's because there not in your backyard, harassing and killing. Walking in the yard 50 feet from the house coming after my wife's dog's and livestock at 10AM.

In the early 90's I feed 400+ deer in my winter deer yard,you would here of one or two wolf's seen all winter. Last winter I feed 11 deer, I could here wolf's almost every night from Dec-April.

I had to quit night hunting coyotes because, I would call in wolf's 3 out of 5 times out.

They were near my backyard for the first half of my life when I lived in rural north central Minnesota, and I suspect that on occasion they still run across property that I own there. I saw their tracks many times in the winter while out trapping coyotes.


Those than complain that wolves ruin their deer hunting should take a look in the mirror each monring. Man is a far far far bigger predator to deer than wolves are. Drive down the highways of any nothern state in the early fall when the rut starts and you will see hundreds if not thousands of deer lying on the side of the road hit by cars, not to mention all of the poaching that goes on every fall. And what of the hunting seasons themselves?

If a person chooses to live in a certain place, then that person must accept the laws that are in place for that place! With regard to wildlife, the overriding factor is that the wildlife, at least in Minnesota, belongs to all of the people.

Apex predators are what makes the wilderness wild. It's not my backyard being talked about but we do have wolves in Alberta LOTS of em. I think if the 500 number is correct it's way too high for a small place like Wisconsin. Some should be shot for sure but some should be left too it keeps things wild.

As far as feeding deer in the winter that's a bad thing to do, if they were allowed to be winter killed you wouldn't need wolves to keep the numbers down. Feeding deer sound like a good idea because we think it allows more for hunting but an unnaturally high animal population puts too much pressure on the environment they live in. That's exactly why the wolves were brought in to reduce an unnaturally large population of elk in the park.

The northern 1/3 of Mn. has 3000 wolves.

I belive the last count was well over 700 and that was before this years pups.

I was out checking a fields for tomorrow morning goose hunt about a mile from the house. When I drove up the feild I saw a all black wolf standing about 150 feet away.

We just looked at each other for about two min. I got good look at thru the binos. Didn't have camra with me

Less then 200 yards from the nearest house. They don't need willderness to live in.

Here in Upper MI they started management years ago via SSS.
One need only read the news paper during the fall to find articles on wolves being shot.

I have never understood either side of the wolf debate. Probably never will.

Right now in Minnesota we have an estimated 3000 wolves. A number that's probably more of a minimum estimate than an best guess estimate of actual numbers. Based on my experience with them, my travels in areas they inhabit and my observations I would not be surprised to see an actual number of more than twice that.

I have never see wild wolves that were not man shy, well more so than bears for instance. Wolves will on occasion or in the case of the occasional dumb one not be so man shy, but by and large they are very, very smart and very, very man shy.

Wolves, people and livestock just don't mix well for any of the parties involved. The simple act of shooting wolves is a good thing for the wolves and for the other parties involved. Even back in the bounty days when a higher percentage of Minnesota's population was still rural we could not kill them off and we employed a lot of means in the effort. We got down to maybe 750 or so wolves in the state and held a relatively stable number considering the bounty and the price of pelts. Returning to those practices would not eliminate them. All it would do is get rid of the dumber and less man shy individuals. If we establish seasons and try to regulate the numbers killed we might ell be doing the species more harm than good. If we just remove them from ESL and remove all protection once the dumb and less man shy animals are removed, hunting wolves will return to the incredibly difficult task it used to be. I personally do not believe that there are enough people willing to put in the time and effort it will take to seriously reduce numbers over the longer term when the reward drops to what will be very low success rates.

People do not hunt bears without dogs or bait for a reason: They just don't succeed often enough. Hunting a smart man shy animal in heavy forest is not easy. Wisconsin bear hunter who use dogs have found out that wolves can put a serious crimp in your day when they decide to take out a dog or dogs. I would bet a lot of money that hunting wolves without bait, without traps and during daylight hours would be most unlikely to noticeably reduce the population. It might at best limit growth. The best opportunities will be in mid winter. It takes a tough SOB to hunt out in the woods for any amount of time in the middle of a Minnesota winter. Limited to hunting on foot, it would take one seriously motivated individual to account for more than a few wolves in a lifetime of hunting them.

I have 2 very good friends that are COs in MN. The real number of wolves in MN is closer to 7000. Man is not nearly as efficient at the elimination of deer or moose. Young of the year deer and moose in northern MN are running about a 7 in 100 chance of survival and 65 of 100 are falling to wolves and yotes. Hopefully more people will begin to practice the 3 S rule.

quote:

Hopefully more people will begin to practice the 3 S rule.

While I think that your motives and information about wolf numbers are right on for MN I think miles58 makes some really valid points about it not being that easy to kill a substantial number of wolves. SSS is great for joe farmer who sees a couple of wolves in his field and whacks them but I doubt sss will ever have an impact on overall numbers here.

Hunters and non-hunters alike need to be honest with themselves about how many wolves there are and what it will really take to substantially change that. Bait, poison, planes, helicopters,snow machines, forest fires, everything should be on the table.

miles58 You do understand the wolf debate and have valid points.

Here in Michigan you can start bear baiting Aug. 10, I have been doing it every day. I do not use any meats at all, but still have wolves coming to my baits. You can use barrels on private land here, if you put your bait on the ground and cover it with logs the wolves will dig to get under them. When I bait I'am not quite when filling a drum and have seen wolves several time this year when walking to and from the baits. I have pictures of bears and wolves at the same time at the baits, wolves eating donuts they like the large cinnamon donuts best. I will not allow my wife a small woman to go near the baits, because I think the wolves have been conditioned to the noise of the barrels, is like a dinner bell. The wolves are so bold that they pee on my blind, marking it as there's, I have even pee'd to cover there pee and it's a contest who can pee the highest on the post.

Someone mentioned there were 7000 wolves in the state??

I dunno where you got those numbers but I'd have to call bullshit on that one. Have you any idea how much 7000 wolves will eat? there's no way in hell you have that many, they would have stripped every living thing that they could find. We have 5000-7000 in Alberta and it's a big area, take a look at the map and compare the size. It's funny how things get distorted and one feller heard from another feller....,

Not gonna believe that one, nope, no way no how.

Ok calgarychef come on down and see what stripped looks like. You come down and look at all the ponds that don't have moose, or even tracks around em anymore. You go to the deer camps that used to (10 years ago) put 20 deer on the pole for most of the last 30 seasons that don't SEE 5 deer in a season the last 5 years. Go outside after dark around Grand Rapids in any direction and just listen. Northern MN is big and it is habitat rich - section after section of woods and loon shit, and it has been stripped. A government wolf count is like your kid telling you he had "a couple" of your M&Ms and handing you an empty bag - Slightly understated to say the least. Granted I have not been out with the paint can to mark and count the wolves, but the COs I am friends with deal with them daily.

If it's 3000, 4000, 5000, 6000, or 7000 what's the difference it's still way more than any other state outside Alaska.

Numbers are for trivia but no one can argue we have a huge wolf problem.

They will not maintain that density. We see it with yotes too. They will have mange, starvation and rabies run through the population and bring it to a sustainable level, but the deer and moose and everything else populations will never outgrow the wolves again without control. The other factor there is the range is expanding. We are seeing wolves further south and west in MN than ever before.

Our DNR estimated that we had a wolf population of 800 this spring-- before they had their litters. It may be close to 1000 now. And they do disperse. One of our conservation wardens told me that several years ago, when the population was around 500, a wolf collared in northern Wisconsin was killed on a highway near St Louis. The wolves we have now originally migrated in from Minnesota.

I think my point is if you want to make an intelligent argument on any topic it's wise to use real data rather than hearsay. When we start throwing around unrealistic numbers the basis of our argument is lost.

I'm not suggesting that the wolf numbers aren't too high. I wonder why folks haven't just started shooting them. Coming from the most gun happy society in the world I don't know what y'all are waiting for

"I'm not suggesting that the wolf numbers aren't too high. I wonder why folks haven't just started shooting them. Coming from the most gun happy society in the world I don't know what y'all are waiting for."

One very likely reason for the reluctance to shoot wolves is fear of getting caught. There is a belief that most wolves have radio telemetry devices. It's as if people think wolves are either born with tracking devices or there's an army of state and federal officials that find each and every one of the 1000's of wolf pups born yearly and attach the devices to them.

That's not to say there aren't some "wired" wolves out there. But the percentage is very small and the tracking devices are there for dispersion studies, not to wolf protection or law enforcement. Also, the technology isn't as advanced as believed. For example, there's no such thing as an implantable microchip that contains a GPS transponder. (Implantable microchips only contain identification data and they must be read at very close range with a scanning tool.) GPS transponders are (still) fairly bulky collars with limited battery life and they're expensive. Radio ear tags are more common but they only send out 'pings,' not location data. The only way to locate a radio tag is to track the signal with a directional antenna and it takes a lot of time and effort to do so. One interesting feature the radio tags often have is a "mortality sensor." If the tag isn't moved in some way for a day or so it sends out a different "ping" frequency to indicate the passing of it 'owner.'

Telemetry devices can be disposed of in a lake or river. The devices are waterproof but submersion greatly limits the signal strength.

If the "3S" rule is observed (especially the last "S") the chances of getting caught are slim, VERY slim.

Here in Michigan U.P. the DNR plane is out looking for collared wolves every Monday, that its not raining or snowing. You can tell where there is a wolf, when the plane starts making tight turns about 500 ft. up.

I'm not trying to be a smart@$$, but have you personally seen the airplanes? Are you absolutly certain that they belong to the DNR and they're being used to monitor wolves exclusively? Power companies, gas and oil pipeline companies and timber companies all have routine inspection flights. Drug enforcement also makes use of aircraft to spot pot farms and meth labs in remote areas.

Wolves aren't the only critters being studied. Research via radiotelemetry is done on bear, moose and even deer. (Of the latter two, there's probably more interest in how many calves and fawns end up as wolf farts than anything to do with the welfare of the animals themselves.) This sort of wildlife research is often done by universities.

I'm sure the DNR is very happy to have so many people believe that Officer Friendly is out there guarding wolves and monitoring the whereabouts of each and every one of them. The rumors of "so and so's brother-in-law" getting busted because of an implanted microchip seem to be working very well.

It is a fact the plane belongs to the DNR! I talk to the wolf biologist several times a year, and she told me that is what the plane is for. The registration number is to a state owned plane.

The DNR also buy's time on spy satellites for wildlife research.

quote:

Posted 08 September 2011 16:13 Hide Post
Someone mentioned there were 7000 wolves in the state??

I dunno where you got those numbers but I'd have to call bullshit on that one. Have you any idea how much 7000 wolves will eat? there's no way in hell you have that many, they would have stripped every living thing that they could find. We have 5000-7000 in Alberta and it's a big area, take a look at the map and compare the size. It's funny how things get distorted and one feller heard from another feller....,

Not gonna believe that one, nope, no way no how.

Hey chef you don't live here. We have wolves within thirty miles of Minneapolis/St Paul. They occupy a little better than half of the state right now with established packs, not dispersing animals. We have had them here, although not established packs at all times, since forever. In the area I hunt deer my deer camp is at the intersection of three packs' territories and there are more deer there now than when we had no packs in the area. The same is true of where I hunted as a kid, except the wolves never were eliminated from that country. The wolves along the north shore of Lake Superior have never managed to eliminate the deer from that country, not even close. In fact, they have never even approached the point of controlling deer numbers in that part of the state.

I don't get these self proclaimed experts sometimes. If wolves were so efficient at killing everything there never would have been deer moose and elk here when the state was settled. I don't know from Alberta. I wouldn't begin to hazard a guess as to how many wolves there might or might not be in the province. I do know from Minnesota however, and I just recently sat down and did a rough calculation of where I knew there to be wolves and extrapolated the my estimate of the density in the east central part of Minnesota to the broader range I know them to occupy. When I asked a biologist who'd spent the summer surveying wolves in another part of the state if the numbers I came up with were possible he would not disagree with them. At their lowest numbers we had between 750 and 1200 wolves at a time when they were trapped, shot and poisoned. There was a bounty on them and the hide brought good money. At that time they occupied perhaps 1/3 to 1/4 the area they do now. Figure a substantially reduced density on a greatly reduced area and it gets pretty easy to see 5000 to 8000 animals being present. I have established packs within thirty miles of my house, and all the way north to the Canadian border. When I was in my twenties I had to go 150 miles north to find an established pack. The area I hunt deer in now had about no deer back then and was really awfully poor hunting. Now, with a lot of wolves, we have an abundance of deer, so many that I can shoot five legally this year. Last year the wolves killed two deer within 300 yards of our deer camp that we found the remains of. I have no idea if there were more or not.

quote:

Originally posted by miles58:

quote:

Posted 08 September 2011 16:13 Hide Post
Someone mentioned there were 7000 wolves in the state??

I dunno where you got those numbers but I'd have to call bullshit on that one. Have you any idea how much 7000 wolves will eat? there's no way in hell you have that many, they would have stripped every living thing that they could find. We have 5000-7000 in Alberta and it's a big area, take a look at the map and compare the size. It's funny how things get distorted and one feller heard from another feller....,

Not gonna believe that one, nope, no way no how.

Hey chef you don't live here. We have wolves within thirty miles of Minneapolis/St Paul. They occupy a little better than half of the state right now with established packs, not dispersing animals. We have had them here, although not established packs at all times, since forever. In the area I hunt deer my deer camp is at the intersection of three packs' territories and there are more deer there now than when we had no packs in the area. The same is true of where I hunted as a kid, except the wolves never were eliminated from that country. The wolves along the north shore of Lake Superior have never managed to eliminate the deer from that country, not even close. In fact, they have never even approached the point of controlling deer numbers in that part of the state.

I don't get these self proclaimed experts sometimes. If wolves were so efficient at killing everything there never would have been deer moose and elk here when the state was settled. I don't know from Alberta. I wouldn't begin to hazard a guess as to how many wolves there might or might not be in the province. I do know from Minnesota however, and I just recently sat down and did a rough calculation of where I knew there to be wolves and extrapolated the my estimate of the density in the east central part of Minnesota to the broader range I know them to occupy. When I asked a biologist who'd spent the summer surveying wolves in another part of the state if the numbers I came up with were possible he would not disagree with them. At their lowest numbers we had between 750 and 1200 wolves at a time when they were trapped, shot and poisoned. There was a bounty on them and the hide brought good money. At that time they occupied perhaps 1/3 to 1/4 the area they do now. Figure a substantially reduced density on a greatly reduced area and it gets pretty easy to see 5000 to 8000 animals being present. I have established packs within thirty miles of my house, and all the way north to the Canadian border. When I was in my twenties I had to go 150 miles north to find an established pack. The area I hunt deer in now had about no deer back then and was really awfully poor hunting. Now, with a lot of wolves, we have an abundance of deer, so many that I can shoot five legally this year. Last year the wolves killed two deer within 300 yards of our deer camp that we found the remains of. I have no idea if there were more or not.

So you are saying more Wolves equals more Game animals.Funny it does not work that way in Wisconsin or Montana.We can not firmly establish an Elk population here because of Wolf and Bear predation.Where I hunt Elk in SW Montana,you are lucky to see a Cow where we would see up to 100 animals a week as little as 10 years ago.

I don't now about the rest of Wisconsin, but i do know there's no shortage of either deer or wolves in Northern Polk county, Washburn county and Burnett county. I also know that it wasn't always like that.

I wouldn't speculate as to why 30 miles either side of the St Croix has high deer and wolf populations simultaneously now, but 40 years ago there was some pretty poor deer hunting there. Today I can drive from Danbury to St Croix state park and pass through the territories of 8-10 packs and count as many as 45 deer out feeding in the evening.