Hunters are killing Wisconsin wolves at a dizzying rate, pushing another season toward an early end.
The season began on Oct. 15 and is slated to last until Feb. 28 or until hunters reach a 150-animal statewide kill limit. As of Thursday morning, just eight days into the season, hunters had killed 103 animals, nearly 70 percent of the limit. State wildlife officials have closed four of the six wolf-hunting zones where hunters were quickly approaching zone-specific harvest limits or had reached or exceeded them.
The season began on Oct. 15 and is slated to last until Feb. 28 or until hunters reach a 150-animal statewide kill limit. As of Thursday morning, just eight days into the season, hunters had killed 103 animals, nearly 70 percent of the limit. State wildlife officials have closed four of the six wolf-hunting zones where hunters were quickly approaching zone-specific harvest limits or had reached or exceeded them.
Dave
MacFarland, a large carnivore specialist for the Department of Natural
Resources, said hunters didn't reach the 70 percent mark last year until
two weeks into the season. The kill limit was higher, at 251 animals,
but the DNR issued about 1,000 more tags than this year. Hunters needed
34 days to reach the 70 percent mark in the inaugural season of 2012,
when the quota was 116 animals and 1,160 tags were issued.
MacFarland
attributed this year's fast pace to more hunters heading into the woods
early in the hopes of bagging a wolf before their zone closes. More
hunters are using traps, perhaps the most efficient means of hunting
wolves, he added. Of all the wolves killed so far this year, 85 percent
were trapped, compared with 70 percent in 2013 and 52 percent in 2012,
he said.
He also noted that the DNR issues 10 tags for
every wolf counted in the quota, putting more hunters on the landscape
than for other species. For example, the agency authorized 1,500 wolf
tags this year compared with about 10,000 tags for 4,700 bears, a ratio
of almost two hunters per bear, he said.
The 2012 and
2013 seasons each ended on Dec. 23, two months ahead of the February
stop date. MacFarland said he wasn't sure when this season might end.
Hunters
were still 32 animals shy of the quota in Zone 3, a corner of
northwestern Wisconsin, and 28 wolves short of the limit in Zone 6,
which encompasses most of southern two-thirds of the state.
MacFarland
said the kill rate is typically slower in that area but DNR officials
are watching for signs that they may have to shut the hunt down early to
compensate for the over-quota numbers elsewhere.
"It's
definitely going quick," he said. "We'll have to wait and see if that
trend continues. It's going to depend on how much people are motivated
to get out in the two remaining units."
Upper Midwest populations rise
The
gray wolf population has increased slightly in the Western Great Lakes
District — Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan — even as two of the three
states have begun allowing wolf hunts.
A recent report by
the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service shows the wolf population throughout
the three states has grown from 3,678 to 3,719 in the past year. This
is good news for continued wolf recovery efforts in the Upper Midwest,
L. David Mech, founder and vice chairman of the International Wolf
Center told the Mesabi (Minnesota) Daily News. The data indicates state
wolf-management policies are working well, he said.
Gray
wolves are expanding their range outside of the states in which they
were initially found, according to officials at the Ely-based Wolf
Center. At least one wolf made it from Minnesota to eastern North
Dakota, and a Wisconsin wolf was found dead in Illinois, they said.
The
wolf populations in all three states are in good shape, based on
criteria used to determine if they are in trouble. The DNR estimates a
population of 2,423 wolves in Minnesota as of last winter.
Minnesota
wolf hunts run from Nov. 8-23 and Nov. 29-Jan. 31, 2015. The DNR is
allowing the killing of 250 wolves, 30 more than last year.
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