Here's the article...

http://bozemandailychronicle.com/articles/2003/11/08/news/03elkcalvesbzbigs.txt

I'll post the same thing I posted last year.

"The Gardiner elk hunts will become a thing of the past within two to three years due to wolf predation".

Two years left IMHO. What a shame.

FN in MT

I couldn't agree more Frank...

"About 40 percent of what wolves kill in the winter is elk calves," said Doug Smith, the park's top wolf biologist.

I remember them telling us it was only the old and sick Elk that the wolves would kill.

Snapper

Hunting in NW Montana last year I had the opportunity to listen to a discussion between the outfitter and a local expert. According to him, the feds claim that the 18month old elk is not at risk to wolves. Wolves kill the young and old... So, how many calves make it to 18 months. They were also told by the Feds that there were no wolves in the immediate area. Guess that was coyotes on steroids that two of the other hunters and the outfitter saw leaving their den....

Elk VS wolves... let me think... i'll take the elk not the wolves. If the wolves aren't exterminated the elk will be!!!

I hunted moose near Ninilchik on the Kenai in alaska this past september. In the week I was there I never saw a cow with a calf. There were wolves all over the place and everywhere you looked there was wolf scat filled with moose hair. The locals told us that the wolves had virtually wiped out the calf crop this year. It doesn't bode well for the moose population over the next few years.

There was a reason the wolves were driven to extinction in America.

Brad - you know we have tried to point this out numerous times before on this forum only to be told that it is HEALTHY for the environment to have wolf depredation. We have been told how Isle Royal is THE shining example and how the moose and the wolves live in harmony in Alaska.

Nothing we post or quote will convince those amoung us that Y-stone and its extended regions are any different.

I say let the wolves do their thing, nearly wipe out the ungulates, and then get the elk posted on the list. But,

elk hunting as we have known it is over I'm afraid. Sad day.

I agree with Elkslayer! Many of us here in Wy have been preaching openly to the G&F, and letters to the editor about the run away wolf population. All to no avail. Now the guru's have posted what every one was saying all along. It still won't matter. I wonder what happend to the states involvement and pending law suit??? I think our govenor just talked BS to appease everyone.

I visited Y'stone in June of 1998 and again in June of 2001. The difference in the number of elk calves observed was dramatic. Now I don't know if other factors were at work such as a cold wet spring etc. but you would have to be a blind man not to notice. I was so intrigued by the decline that when having breakfast in Gardiner I asked a local if it was just me or was there a decline in elk numbers. You can imagine the answer I got. I agree with you Frank. This gentleman told me that the herd was virtually half of what it had been and was declining quickly. Gardiner late season...RIP.

Am I the only one that noticed that fully 2/3rds of the calf predation was by BEARS?

More than half of that by BLACK BEARS?

Kinda silly to go on a rant against wolves when there are "bigger fish" to fry? I don't care much for the buggers, until I get a tag, but come on, let's at least be rational about our prejudices... Dutch.

First off I will say that I am for controlling the wolves when the need arises, but after finishing a hunt in an area with an active healthy wolf population� and the area being the driest that I can remember since maybe 1988� Crying �wolf� may be a little premature�

The jury is still out with me on the wolf population issue with me. The area that we have hunted for the last 50 years has had a resident pack of wolves for about three years now! There are still more elk than there has ever been, we also saw more mule deer than we could remember in years and not to mention more antelope than in probably 20 years� Lets just say that this resident wolf pack and the two migratory packs that will show up in a month or two haven�t even put a dent in the elk population that we could see anyway� I assume population dynamics will show us what we wanted to see if the calf recruitment is as bad as they say it is�

After a recent elk hunt in SW MT: My honey hole had very few elk and a lot of wolf tracks� but there had been a chit load of elk in there from about two-three weeks prior. There was sign absolutely all over the place.

We switched gears and headed to the next drainage over to see if we could find some elk� Low and behold there were at least a dozen wolves in that drainage and MORE elk than had been seen in that area than anyone could ever remember seeing.

Now this could be attributed to there not being any elk in my honey hole but who can say for sure the elk in my area frequently move to other drainages� We easily saw over 200 elk in just a few days. It was pretty hard for me to believe that the elk were all eaten up by the wolves, when there appeared to be more than I have ever seen in that drainage.

I talked with a few of my friends that hunted that area as well. They said the exact same thing, they saw wolves about every day and more elk than they had EVER seen. So it looks to me like the wolves aren�t wiping the elk out as of yet. The herds appear to be more than healthy even with all the wolves around and all the crispy dried up grass.

As far as the Gardiner late shoots go, they�re about as far from elk hunting as you can get in my opinion� How healthy can an elk herd be, or the habitat be for that matter, which needs over 2000 elk culled out during January and February just to maintain a healthy ecosystem/ population??? Yeah how hard is it to hunt elk when they don�t have enough energy to run away from the road in 2-3� feet of snow??? Come on, IMO if they ended the late hunts for whining pussies who can�t kill an elk during the regular season it wouldn�t be any to soon! The Gardiner hunt was sooooo bad last year thats why they filled 30% of the tags, while the rest of the SW part of the state only filled 20%. I'm supprised they found any to shoot. Hell its not like you don't have 3 months to put your tag on an elk in MT, buy they have to extend the season another 3 months for all the lazy fat asses that can't hunt one during the regular bow and rifle season!

The "End of the late season Gardiner hunt"... looks like the gave out quite a few more tags this year than last year.

Supprising when the people that are actually out counting elk allocate the number of tags and not the locals operating the diner/gas station, that see a few elk every once in a while.

How many of you have been to the park and seen the moonscape??? Most of the park is severely overgrazed by the 12,000+/- elk, and over 3000 bison that live in it. The riparian areas are finally starting to come back and the stream banks are starting to stabilize once again since the wolves have pushed the elk up away from the water. But to most people the only thing that matters is the ELK, the song birds, fish and other animals that inhabit the same area are meaningless unless they can get their fat asses an elk off the road!

All we hear about is how the elk in Yellowstone are declining� everyone jumps to the conclusion that the �wolves did it�� There are a multitude of things that could account for the decline of elk in the park� Let me list the first few that come to mind�

The bison population is back up to an all time high�They eat a hell of a lot more grass than an elk does and destroy the habitat when not allowed to migrate. The estimated population for elk in 96 was at an all time high around 19,000 due to many things one bein the bison had been culled down to half of what the population is today. Personally I think that if they could cut the bison population down by 50% and get it back to what it was 10 years ago, the estimated elk populations would be back up to what it was in 96� But then there would still be too many elk in the park! The second being all the fires, shit over half the park burned providing excellent habitat and forage for the elk.

There are more bears in the park than ever before� both grizzlies and black bears and not many people hunt the blackies around the Greater Yellowstone area. Bears eat a hell of a lot of new born calves� If you do the simple math the wolves will never kill as many elk as the bears do according to their numbers�

We are stuck in a drought� I couldn�t believe how dry the grass is. I have a feeling that if we get a bad winter there is going to be a lot of animals die off. You know who is going to get the blame� that�s right the wolves are going to get blamed for killing thousands of elk� just wait and see, its been happening in UT with the mountain lions� oh but that�s a different story cause they aren�t in a drought, and everyone you talk to in UT sees mountain lions just about every time the go hunting� yeah right

All most all the hunting districts in SW MT didn�t even come close to selling the allocated cow tags. Most of them only sold about half of the allotted tags. Hell my area only sold about 25% of them� I�m not saying the FWP knows what the population is but, I think they have a better idea than the self proclaimed elk/wolf biologist on this board� Most of those areas went to either sex during the first week of the season as well. Looks to me like the FWP thinks they have way too many elk even with all the elk the wolves have killed!

Did you all miss the part of the article that stated that 61% of the elk calves where killed by bears??? How many of you have gone out and killed a black bear lately??? I will be willing to bet that 95% of the whining is coming from the guys haven�t even hunted bears let alone killed one! How many have killed a lion lately� hmmmm I�m guessing even less. Grizzlies have always killed a lot of calves� Did anywhere in the article state that the grizzly population is almost twice what it was 15 years ago� They out number the wolves, I�ll bet 2:1 now.

Do you really think that it�s going to make a difference if they allow wolf hunting, hell most of the whining is coming from guys that can�t even kill an elk in areas that have more elk than there has ever been in the history of this nation!

There are guys in AK who are professional wolf hunters that do nothing but trap and shoot wolves that only get a dozen or so a year. I personally don�t think that there are many people around that could kill a wolf, hell most of them are complaining about the 100,000 elk in the greater Yellowstone area or I should say lack there of that they can�t kill cause the wolves ate em all� Do they really think they are going to find one of the supposed 400 or so wolves that live around there??? They will no doubt be some of the same people that call the Gardiner shoot a hunt� Shit 20 years ago we didn�t have any problem killing elk and the population was only about two thirds of what it is today, maybe�

Let me just end with this� I agree that something may have to be done with the wolf population at sometime in the future, but right now it doesn�t look like they are hurting the elk much to me, there�s to damn many anyway. Looks like if we could cut the bear mortality down then the calves would have a better chance to make it to the winter months to be eaten by a wolf and the population would stabilize�

Now flame away with all your unfounded facts and emotions, cause only time will tell what is going to happen with the wolves. Its been over 7 years since they were released and the number of elk permits has done nothing but go up and unsold!

Ivan

Ivan, no flame here. Thats your opinion and thats fine. My opinion is "SSS"

Nice post Ivan. I agree with you 100% But duck 'cause this is not a subject on which you rationally debate on this forum.

Brent

Personally I feel that the report about the bruins and the elk calves is a bunch of horse apples..just my gut feeling speaking here.

One last thought--in the last few years the area 310 late hunt has gone from 500 cow tags to 50 or 80 or something like that. I am pretty sure they've had bruins around for quite a while. Now lets see that 500 number has gone down to the 50 or 80 since when-oh yeah since they brought old Canis Lupis into the country. Hmmm I wonder if there is a connection? Nope it has to be those pesky bears! Guess we need to put out some more picnic baskets this spring.

"GET TO THE HILL"

Dogz

Ivan

Did you stop to think , maybe , the wolves could be the factor that has tipped elk calf recruitment over the edge ? Yellowstone has always had lots of bears , and unless the elk herds there consist of 30 or 40 year old animals , LOL , calf survival used to be alot better a few years ago .

As to the Gardiner late hunts , did you ever think maybe they gave your fellow hunters , fat ass pussys or not , a chance to harvest PARK elk , that were out of reach to legal hunting during the regular season ?

If elk are so friggin thick in Montana , why does it take a non-resident 3 or so years to draw a tag ? It seems your DNR is missing out on alot of revenue . I'd bet half of the non-residents that do draw employ professional guides , and I'd bet at least half of those come home empty handed . I guess all those folks are lazy fat asses , as well as their guides.......

I do agree with you completely , that if and when a wolf season is set , it will do absolutely nothing to control wolf numbers . I doubt you'd see 5% success.........

Brent.......speaking of rational thought on the wolf issue , is it completely rational to expect to populate the Iowa cornfields with wolves......?

[ 11-11-2003, 17:04: Message edited by: sdgunslinger ]

Brent.....I would not be worried the wolves won't find enough groceries......there is little doubt of that . What I would be concerned about is the folks whose livelihoods will be providing a large amount of wolf groceries , namely the livestock producers of your current state . Take a drive 80 miles or so south of Ames and look around southern Ia. , wolves are just not compatable with the livestock business there . Something wolf proponents don't seem to think about , or just don't care about .

From where I sit , YOU are just not rational on this subject..........

If you are interested in the Ia lions , do a search , I believe there is web page on Ia lion sightings . Lots of them are showing up in the Loess hills .

[ 11-11-2003, 17:02: Message edited by: sdgunslinger ]

SDGS, that you find I'm not rationale is the best compliment I can hope for from you. Livestock in any serious fashion in Iowa is penned at least and inside generally. Southern Iowa has a little pasture beef and about 10 sheep, but they are not really economically viable nor long for this world, wolves or no.

In the meantime, wolves, mt. lion and bears exist in good numbers in lots of places that raise livestock. Obviously, it is realistic.

I am well aware of the webpage on lions in Iowa. I don't understand how you are letting so many slip past you and your predator-hating pards.

Brent

Just for fun I'll toss in this thought about the issue of success on killins wolves (when the times come).

Personally, I feel that the average Joe/Jane or whoever will not have much luck in taking wolves. I've seen the same thing when it comes to killing yotes.

Now I do believe that when it comes to man the true predators (talking about a breed of hunter different than many). The ones that have success calling and killing yotes will see the same success in calling wolves.

So far I have called in two different packs of wolves for fun. Neither pack appeared to me to be rocket scientist. Now they will get smarter no doubt once the shooting starts-but I do feel that for the true predator/callers and hunters of the world will make a dent!

Personally my calling buddy and myself take between 50-60 yotes a winter-I can't wait to get after them.

Just my thoughts-whatever your thoughts-make it your best day.

"GET TO THE HILL"

Dogz

Now Brent , lets get real here , we were trying out a rational debate on this topic, remember ?

A quick scan of USDA market pages tell me that roughly 12000 head of calves moved thru southern Ia auctions just last week alone . Over 1000 sheep at only one auction . Almost all those animals would have began their life on pasture . I'm sure the hundreds and thousands of Ia producers that get a good portion of their income from their stock will be happy to hear you consign them to the boneyard......or maybe I should say , would throw them to the wolves........

You may be right though , those folks are eventually doomed , at least as long as enviro-luney tunes are running the show..........

[ 11-11-2003, 18:26: Message edited by: sdgunslinger ]

I am with Mark on this one pure B.S. There was a picture posted last spring in Livingston at Yellowstone sports of 6 elk calves killed in Paradise valley by wolves and not even eaten.The ranch I work on has lots of bears and some mountain lions, as well as a large growing elk herd and we have seen no loss of calves elk or angus to either of these predators.We do see a few deer that appear to have been killed by lions. w/regards

Ivan: You are a lone prophet. but not without some risk of being right on effect but wrong on cause.

Points I agree on: hunters will not dent the wolf population. I spent four years in Northern Minnesota, two of those assiting with a wolf trapping program. hunters were the one and only external source of mortality for wolves, yet the packs stay at saturation density and fairly stable numbers inspite of "SSS".

Even on our trapping area, we only succeeded in trapping two of an eight wolf pack, in two months.

Both of our radio-collared wolves were shot illegally within a half year, but the pack was not diminished.

I agree that the Y-stone bears were reported to be observed eating more elk calves than wolves, but this does not mean to me that the bears killed all these calves. I have been a professional biologist for thirty years, and there are few govt biologists in the US Park Service or the US Fish and Wolf Service that can be expected to be completely unbiased or totally objective about what they report when their sympathies tend toward wolf reintroduction. They require a rancher to witness a wolf killing a livestock calf before he can claim predation. They consider a wolf eating a dead calf to be scavenging unless seen in the act of predation. Witness the differences of opinion between state fish and game biologists and federal fish and wildlife services.. The deer I saw killed and eaten by wolves in minnesota left NO TRACES but red snow scat and footprints and a few bones within minutes of being run to ground. The reports from Ystone wait four hours of non-movement, than the biologists go after the dead elk, and then it must take a few hours to find them... A bear may take longer to devour an entire carcass. Bears are in hibernation all winter. There is no proof, but little doubt in my mind, that at least a few, and maybe more than some of the kills attributed to bears were leftovers meals or takeover meals from wolf kills. ITs awfully hard to tell unless there is snow cover.

This does not alter an observation that I agree with: there are and will be plenty of elk to hunt and shoot in the future. We are not to be calling out like the sky is falling. we are not to be blaming wolves becasue we cant find or shoot elk. We can however, point out that a wolf eating an elk a week is over 52 elk a year per wolf. ANd we can also point out that there are a lot more wolves around than the ones that are collared and counted...

However, the elk was a herding plains animal when the wolf was last prevalent, and LEwis and Clark talked of herds of lowland elk, not alpine elk. The dilemna now is that the plains are farms and ranches and ranchettes, and the alpine is the sanctuary for elk, and the elk calves are sitting ducks for wolves in timber. And easy prey for bears in timber. How could a bear ambush an elk in a meadow or open park? not as readily as in forested areas. What I think we see is movement of elk by wolf predation back into higher risk bear predation areas. In wolf country last fall, I saw one cow elk that was tongue hanging, hard breating, and obvious predator run.. she outran whatever was chasing her, but at some cost of energy and fat reserves, which are tough to replace in middle October. Easy prey for a bear if one happened onto her.

What will happen is that wolves will start (increase) their self-regulation of populations when the excess and easy pickings start to decrease. We will see wolf-on-wolf predation increase (like mountain lions), and also see packsize adn litter sizes decline. The wolf biologists have underestimated the exponential growth rates of the packs, and overstated the self-regulating mechanisms of one-female reproduction, and litter size limits so far in this epidemic repopulation explosion. My prediction is two-three years from now an internal crash is coming in wolf numbers. then
the political shit will hit the fan because a hungry wolf will find something to eat. ANd it wont matter where or what it is. The dogs in town were going the way when I left Minnesota in 1982, and even ones that were tied to the porch.

Of course all this is just opinions and observations.

Get rid of national parks and you won't have these east and west coast cocksuckers,releasing shit like wolves.All national parks are,is a goverment funded test site for these fuckheads to develope their pet projects.You can protect these "national treasures",without making them national parks. But the damage is already done.

Before the wolves were released,biologists were constantly noting that both grizzly and black bears were the number one predator to elk calves. The release of wolves did nothing but kill even more calves.

With all that said,we still have an over load of elk. The most we've had since man started management of the species back at the beginning of the 20th century. People have have just plain got spoiled by having that many elk to hunt. Twenty years ago in my area,the majority of hunters you ran into were hunting deer and elk kills got alot of press. Today you have assholes that do nothing but road hunt,killing elk consistantly. Everybody cried about bowhunting,when it first took off.Now the same assholes are bowhunting. Then atv's became popular and they were the cause of low success,till the same assholes bought atv's. Now wolves are reintroduced and they want to blame their own lack of hunting skills on wolves.

In my area,the game and fish is getting hammered for their favortism of elk. They spend more time managing elk then anything else,because thats what the public is crying for and most of you're game and fish employees hunt elk also. As one biologist has already pointed out,elk hunting made the state the most money back in the 1970's and its never caught back up since then,its steadily declined. Since the mid 1990's,there has been a dramatic increase in elk numbers through out the west and like eveything else,these elk are cycle out and numbers are going to drop,even in areas without wolves. Anytime you reach these type of high's,you're going to eventually see numbers crash back down.

Things will definately get worse,there was a reason why man killed off all the wolves to begin with and today we have a fraction of the wild places they had back then.

Well jameister,there are methods to kill wolves. That will net more then 2 out of 8 wolves in two months. I've seen first hand what cynide guns and various drop baits do to coyotes and you could apply that to wolves. Denning also does wonders. It comes down to how cold hearted you want to get. Personally wolves are about like prairie dogs, house cats,skunks and porcupines. I could handle killing them with a fuckin' claw hammer and not feel guilty.

As for elk being a plains animal originally. I believe thats mostly fantasy. Lewis and clark no doubt saw elk in the lowlands,mainly because there were so many animals in the area,that they filtered everywhere. Hell I can show you elk in the red desert of wyoming,the powder river region and various coal mines around gillette wyoming that have good herds of elk. Elk still prefer the steep and deep. The same goes for antelope. Thirty miles from my house,is a herd of antelope that spend most of year on the mountain at 7500 to 8500 feet. All because of huge sagebrush basins that are nothing but high elevation prairies.

IMO every prey population needs a predator to keep the population healthy. When man eliminated the predators he chose to replace himself in their place. We do a poor job of that because while in general the predator does take the young, sick, and old, we do not. We take the top of the lines.

That said, an imbalance of one or the other is not good either. Disease in either is usually nature's balancer of populations. I wonder what happened before we arrived on the scene to these populations? How did they survive without us?

Hats off to Jameister: the report about the bruins killing those calves is an INCORRECT conclusion of the facts in evidence.

The study examined carcasses and remains to determine what ATE them. Not what KILLED them. To me, it is very clear that the law of unintended consequences holds here, too. The grizzlies are doing better, because they are able to continue to scavenge into the summer, after the winter kills have been consumed. More wolves means more grizzlies for that reason, I am convinced. JMO, Dutch.