Bad To Worse For Washington’s Wedge Pack

Posted: 26 Sep 2012 

It didn’t have to be like this. On Friday, Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife announced its plans to remove the entire Wedge Pack, and we found out yesterday that at least two had already been killed.

The state’s decision to take out up to eight wolves came on the heels of continued reports of cattle losses blamed on the Wedge Pack—some fairly, others not. We don’t fully understand the basis for this decision since some of our questions still haven’t been answered, but the state is moving forward nevertheless.

 While we continue to support the state’s wolf management plan when properly implemented, it’s disappointing to see this pack being targeted unnecessarily. If the state had taken swift action after the first depredation reports to deter further attacks, this whole situation might have been avoided. This is the reason that we fought so hard to include nonlethal conflict management provisions in the plan, and it’s the reason we asked state officials last month not to pursue lethal removal of the pack.

Our bigger concern, however, is that we’re likely to see the same scenario play out in the future unless proactive steps are taken to prevent conflict before it happens. What will happen next year if a new pack moves in and unguarded cattle are still grazing in the area? From decades of work in the Northern Rockies, we have learned that lethal control alone doesn’t resolve these conflicts—it only perpetuates the loss of more livestock and more wolves.

Setting up electrified flagging, known as “turbofladry,” is just one of many nonlethal tools that can help prevent conflict between livestock and wolves.

While the state claims to have exhausted all their options, the root cause has still not been addressed. We have made numerous offers to the state to assist with implementing nonlethal deterrents and better animal husbandry practices. The state has used our equipment such as turbofladry in other areas, but it remains unclear what nonlethal measures, if any, were used with the Wedge pack.

Unfortunately, we do not have control over the fate of this pack, and it’s too late now to save them. But we stand ready to partner with the state and local ranchers to help make sure the Wedge Pack doesn’t die in vain. This is an important lesson for us all about the value of working together in advance to prevent conflict. In order to coexist over the long run, we need the willing participation of all stakeholders—state wildlife managers, national forest managers, ranchers and the conservation community. That’s the best and only way to ensure a future for wolves in Washington.

What You Can Do

Next Friday, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife is hosting a public meeting in Olympia.  Part of this meeting will be used to address the department’s handling of the Wedge pack situation.  If you are able to attend this meeting, please plan to be there.  Those arriving in time to register will have three minutes to express their concerns to the commission.  Click here to see meeting details.

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Colorado Wolf and Wildlife Center Monthly Newsletter

Greetings Fellow Wolf Lovers,   Our new series of the Colorado Wolf and Wildlife Center newsletter is now posted! September's newsletter is available by clicking on the link below or view from the newsletter page on our website. Also, be sure to check our web page from time to time for updates on events and other happenings. http://www.wolfeducation.org/newsletter_archives/Newsletters/2012/PDFs/SEP%202012.pdf Please note: The newsletter is over 1.5MB in size and may take a few seconds to load. Colorado Wolf and Wildlife Center www.wolfeducation.org

Two wolves from Washington state gray wolf pack killed for preying on cattle

A wolf pack in eastern Washington state has been targeted for elimination by the state's Department of Fish and Wildlife. KING's Gary Chittim reports.

By Miguel Llanos, NBC News

Updated at 9:50 p.m. ET: Two gray wolves in Washington state were killed from a state helicopter Tuesday afternoon after officials decided the entire pack -- believed to be at least eight wolves -- needed to be killed because of repeated attacks on cattle, officials said.

An airborne marksman with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife killed the two wolves about seven miles from the Canadian border -- a week after marksmen and wildlife biologists spent days looking for the pack.

A major conservation group working with Washington state to manage its gray wolves agreed that the pack should be culled but also blamed a rancher in the area for not doing more to protect his cattle.

Gray wolves are listed as endangered under state law because they were nearly wiped out a century ago by settlers.

In the last decade, however, gray wolves have started to re-establish themselves in Washington due to recovery efforts in nearby states and dispersal from Canada.

At least eight packs are now established in the eastern half of Washington, which also has a conservation plan in place — one that aims to restore wolves in the wild without those same wolves preying on livestock. The state compensates ranchers who lose livestock to wolves, but that hasn't ended the tension.

"Wolves are recolonizing our state relatively quickly," Dave Ware, a Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife spokesman, told NBC News. "Managing conflicts is one of the most important objectives for recovery so that people don’t take things into their own hands."
Officials last July killed one pack member to see if that would have an impact. The decision to kill the entire pack came after the pack's attacks on cattle continued. Since July, wolves are believed to have killed or injured at least 17 calves and cows despite non-lethal measures to deter them, according to the state wildlife office.

Conservation Northwest, a group working with the state, agreed that killing the pack was best for long-term recovery of gray wolves in the wild.

But director Mitch Friedman told NBC station KING 5 that rancher Bill McIrvine, who lost part of his herd to the pack, "has total responsibility for the problem" for not being as cooperative as other ranchers with programs aimed at keeping cattle and wolves apart.

The wildlife department, for its part, "has not been as firm as it needed to be," Friedman added, especially since McIrvine's cattle graze on public land.

McIrvine, for his part, earlier told KING 5 that he believes groups with "a radical environmental agenda" are conspiring to introduce gray wolves in order "to take our (grazing) lease from us."

"We have the right to protect our property," McIrvine said, adding that he considered the wildlife department "a rogue government agency" that was essentially saying "we got to sit back and do nothing while the wolves kill our livestock."

Ware said efforts to get rancher cooperation for "non-lethal methods of preventing conflicts" have improved in recent weeks. Several agreements with ranchers should be in place for next year that will hopefully "avoid a repeat of the Wedge Pack situation," he said.

One obvious question is why not just move the wolves to a wilderness area away from livestock?
"Experience from other states with recently recovered wolf populations indicates that survival of relocated wolves is not very high, especially if there are other wolf packs in the area where they are moved, which appears to be the case in most of northeast Washington," Ware said.

On top of that, "once a pack becomes habituated to eating livestock, moving them only moves the conflict" since wolf territories are larger than any wilderness area the state could ship them to, he said.

"Lethal removal is being conducted in every" state with gray wolves, Ware added, while acknowledging that since wolf recovery efforts are new in Washington "the concept of killing an endangered species to promote recovery is difficult to understand or accept."

"As wolf recovery has progressed across the West, lethal removal has been an important part of that recovery and it has obviously not impacted wolf numbers or expansion of their range," Ware said. "We don’t expect it to be an impediment in Washington’s wolf recovery either."

"The Wedge area is good habitat, so wolves will likely recolonize relatively quickly over the next year or two," Ware said.

A department wildlife veterinarian will perform necropsies on the wolves later this week. Their hides and skulls will be used for educational purposes, according to a statement on the state's wildlife management website.

Video available here at source

Image of the Day

Golden Eyes, a photo by hmmm let me think on Flickr.

An Iberian wolf at Blackpool Zoo

Helping Hands for Wolves

September 24, 2012

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. - Mexican gray wolf proponents say the animals do a lot of good for the environment. That's one reason the New Mexico Wilderness Alliance is acting to focus attention on this symbol of wild land.

Stephen Capra, executive director of the Alliance, says the wolf suffers due to longstanding myths, subsidized grazing on public lands, and politicians. The cattle growers pressure Republicans about the wolves and the Democrats have remained silent on the issue, Capra says.

"The vast majority of people in the state support wolves being re-introduced into the wild. However, ranchers are creating opposition to wolves in the wild. What they don't want is a real discussion about the subsidies they're receiving."

Those subsidies allow their cattle to graze on public land at greatly reduced rates, Capra explains.

In an effort to raise money to promote education and understanding about wolves and how they balance the ecosystem, the Wilderness Alliance is presenting classical pianist and wolf supporter Helene Grimaud in concert in Santa Fe on Oct. 23. The funds raised will be shared with Grimaud's Wolf Conservation Center in South Salem, N.Y.

Only about 57 wolves live in the wild in New Mexico, Capra says, but some 300 more are in pens where they have been waiting to be released for the past four years. He adds that many New Mexicans support wolves but their voices are not being heard. The concert is part of an effort to get what Capra calls the "quiet majority" to speak up as one, in an orchestrated campaign.

"The passionate voice of this quiet majority has got to come out very loud. That's when politicians are going to begin to listen. Up to now, they've just been hearing from a lot of ranchers. Wolves are like the 'third rail' of conservation: They don't want to touch it."

Capra says the wolves are an important part of the ecosystem in places like New Mexico and the Northern Rockies. He points to Yellowstone National Park as an example of how reintroducing wolves rebalances the ecosystem.

"Where streams were just denuded, we're seeing willows now that are towering, which is helping fish, which is bringing more birds back. That's what we need to see here in New Mexico. But you're not going to do that when you have only 57 wolves."

The event is scheduled for 7 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 23, at the Lensic Performing Arts Center, Santa Fe. Information is available at www.nmwild.org.

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In Depth: Life with wolves

Minneapolis News and Weather KMSP FOX 9

Posted: Sep 23, 2012

by Jeff Baillon-

HINCKLEY, Minn. (KMSP) - Just an hour north of the metro, a motion-detection camera mounted on a tree takes a snapshot of a wolf on the prowl at a sheep farm just a stone's throw from the freeway outside Hinckley, Minn.
"I can't tell you how many there are, but they are regular visitors here," said the woman who set up the camera on her farm.

The first time Janet McNally actually heard a wolf howling, she was both amazed and alarmed.
"What took my breath away was it was answered by an uncountable number of puppy voices," said the sheep farmer.

That was 21 years ago, but the last time she heard the soon-to-be hunted animal was this past spring.
Many generations have followed that first pack she heard, a sign of the wolf's comeback in Minnesota. The last year the year wolves made a feast of McNally's sheep was in 1999. She lost dozens in just 10 days. She had to do something dramatic to protect her flock, so she started to use dogs to help protect her farm animals.

"They often can be seen cuddled up with the lambs, which is just what we're looking for," said McNally.
The dogs are descendants of a special breed that guarded sheep for thousands of years -- Maremma sheepdogs (Italian), and a crossbreed of Mastiff (Spanish) and Tatra (Polish). The animals stay together for life because after the puppies and lambs are weaned, they become roommates. The two sets of animals become so close, the dogs consider the sheep part of their pack, according to McNalley

The dogs can smell a threat coming from a half mile away. When they sense trouble, they start rounding up the sheep and move them away from the danger.
"The wolf just looks at this crazy dog that is just frothing at the mouth and decides there is probably an easier dinner someplace else," McNally explained.

For added protection, McNally surrounds the grazing area with electrified netting. She says predators like wolves and coyotes typically go through fences, not over them, so the electrical shock they get from the fence is another reminder to move along.
It is still a lot of work to move the protective tools. Every two or three days, the dogs, sheep and fence are located to a new grazing area. It takes two workers and a couple hours to move things, but the payback is worth it.

"We haven't had any losses, but our neighbors are losing calves," McNally told FOX 9 News.
All across the Northern section of Minnesota, livestock and pets are being killed by wolves. In the past year, the state has paid out more than a $150,000 to compensate residents for losses, which included 165 cattle, 4 horses and more than 300 turkeys. That's one of the reasons why the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources is planning a hunting and trapping season on wolves this fall.
"From a conservation standpoint, a regulated hunting and trapping season has never been a threat to wolf populations and it won't be," said Dan Stark, with the DNR.

Until recently, wolves had been on the endangered species list -- and some groups aren't thrilled that they're going to be hunted so soon after being taken off. Howling for Wolves, a group against the hunt, put up billboards in the Twin Cities and Duluth and organized a petition drive in the hopes that it may pressure the DNR to cancel it.
"We are just going to trap an iconic, legacy species? It is wrong," said Maureen Hackett MD, from Howling for Wolves.

Howling for Wolves and the Center for Biological Diversity also filed a lawsuit that aims to block the hunting season which is scheduled to start in early November.
More than 23,000 people have signed up for a chance to get one of the 6,000 hunting licenses the DNR will issue by lottery. The season allows for the taking of 400 wolves roughly 13 percent of the total population in the state, according to the DNR.

"I am neither here nor there on having a hunt. The number is too small a number to have a benefit for degradation." said McNally. "It's not going to help farmers out, I don't think."

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Reader's view: Shooting and trapping wolves a form of greed

 Published September 24, 2012,

The rush to shoot and trap wolves without a five-year study period seems like a form of greed.
Over 70 countries have outlawed the leg-hold trap.
Anyone who watches “Nature” on WDSE-TV Channel 8 may have recently seen a photo of a wolf whose legs were entrapped from a set of more than 100 traps placed close together. Does that sound “all-American?”
The rush to put aside a serious environmental impact study and cast the Environmental Protection Agency as an enemy of mining jobs also seems like greed. Anyone who has read any sort of serious magazine or who has viewed documentaries may have seen instances of lifeless environments in the aftermath of mining.
Aggressiveness itself is a form of greed. I’m troubled that so many of my fellow citizens are excited about voting for greed.

Karen Moore
Duluth

WTG Karen. I'm right there with you!
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Top Predator on the Plains: Wolf, Bear or Human?

Posted by American Prairie Reserve on September 24, 2012

Looking back in time, who was the top predator of the American prairie ecosystem? Wolves, grizzly bears… humans? As I continue my research of historic wildlife populations in northeastern Montana (read my first post here), it is important to consider how changes in human populations were affecting the ecology of this area. There was a tendency among European and American explorers to romanticize the landscapes they encountered as pristine paradises flourishing with wild animals and vegetation. In fact, this land had been inhabited by hundreds of thousands of humans that had shaped the ecosystem in variable ways.

Aboriginal peoples in the Northern Plains hunted a variety of game animals, but buffalo was certainly the fundamental source of food, clothing, tools and shelter. Archaeological evidence indicates that humans hunted buffalo in Montana as early as 11000 B.C., but it was during the middle prehistoric (4000 to 500 B.C.) that cultures made wide use of buffalo jumps – cliffs over which humans could drive a whole herd of buffalo for slaughter. Archaeologists estimate that humans killed up to 200,000 bison a year in Montana using this method, whereas wolves only killed 25,000.

View from a buffalo jump as it exists today on the Charles M. Russell National Wildlife Refuge, just south of American Prairie Reserve in Montana. Photo by David Driscoll.

Attempting to measure how significantly Native Americans restricted wildlife ranges and constrained population sizes is controversial. Some researchers theorize that aboriginals had a tremendous impact on wildlife and that it is a mistake to view Native American cultures as “conservationist.” (Alvard 1993, Kay 1994). An entry from William Clark’s journal has been used to support this hypothesis. On August 29^th 1806, near Chamberlain, South Dakota, Clark comes across a herd of buffalo that he claims must number 20,000 and writes, “I have observed that in the country between the nations which are at war with each other the greatest number of wild animals are to be found.” This observation has prompted academics to consider whether large populations of wildlife were funneled into “buffer zones” between warring tribes where they were safe from human threat (Martin and Szuter 1999, Laliberte and Ripple 2001).

Other experts think that this theory is overstated or completely wrong. These scientists and historians point to huge climatic changes and biogeographic differences that could have accounted for the wildlife distributions observed by Lewis and Clark (Yochim 2001, Lyman and Wolverton 2002). Most notably, from 1500 to 1850, advancing glaciers created something known as the Little Ice Age on the Northern Great Plains. Species like pronghorn, elk, and deer would have been particularly affected by colder temperatures and increased snow depth.

“Hunting of the Grizzly Bear” by Karl Bodmer, 1842. Source: National Museum of Wildlife Art.

I sat down recently with Yellowstone historian Paul Schullery to discuss grizzly bear populations in Montana. Instead, we spent much of our time discussing changes in the prairie landscape over time. “Nothing is stable,” Schullery said. “Things change all the time, and they had already changed because of the horse . . . [Lewis and Clark] were not seeing an unaffected situation.”

Horses allowed man the element of mobility and precision that had never existed previously. Northern Plains tribes like the Blackfoot, Crow, Mandan, and Hidatsa had access to the horse starting in the mid 1700’s. When Lewis and Clark arrived, these tribes were going through a massive cultural shift, and the effect of that transition had not been fully realized.

“Assiniboine hunting buffalo,” painting by Paul Kane circa 1851-1856. Source: Learn NC.

While the horse made the Plains Indians much more effective hunters, small pox was simultaneously devastating their populations. European explorers brought to America a slew of Old World diseases for which Native Americans were immunologically unprepared. Lewis and Clark spent the winter of 1804-1805 at Fort Mandan in western North Dakota, where an estimated 90% of the population had been wiped out in the preceding half century. This extreme effect on a top predator would certainly have influenced the population dynamics of other species in the ecosystem.

Dynamics within human populations such as disease, tribal warfare, and integration of the horse help to both muddle and clarify the historic range and abundance of wildlife..
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Image of the Day

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Image of the Day

wolf, a photo by lesbunyan on Flickr.

Photo of the Beta male of the Canyon pack in Yellowstone taken in August 2010