HOW WYOMING MISPLAYED ITS HAND
Wolf Delisting: The Neverending Story
If Wyoming would've played its cards differently, it could have gotten everything it wanted, but the wolf delisting issue would still be far from over.By Bill Schneider, 3-11-09
 |
|
 | |
| Photo courtesy of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service | |
|
There isn’t much agreement when it comes delisting the wolf from the protection of the Endangered Species Act (ESA), but alas, it seems there might be one point pro-wolfers, anti-wolfers, wolf agencies, and a whole lot of people who’d like to see something different in the news can agree on. We should call it, “The Neverending Story.”
Or perhaps, more apropos, “The Neverending Story--Because Wyoming Keeps Helping Enviros Make It So.” The subtitle could be: “Wyoming’s Livestock Industry Continues Helping Colorado Establish Its Wolf Population.”
Last week, our new Secretary of the Interior, Ken Salazar, infuriated pro-wolfers, most of whom voted for his new boss, by essentially re-submitting Bush’s disputed delisting plan, with one exception--the wolf would remain an endangered species in Wyoming. (Click here for the story.)
Idaho and Montana welcomed the news and started dusting off plans for wolf-hunting seasons this fall at the same time pro-wolf groups rushed to the media with threats of litigation. Within two hours of Salazar’s announcement I received four press releases from greens vowing to immediately sue to stop delisting in Idaho and Montana.
Here, for example, is a quote from a PR I received from the Sierra Club even before Salazar’s teleconference ended: “Northern Rockies wolves should be treated as one connected population. It’s short-sighted and inappropriate to delist wolves state-by-state. Wolves don’t know political boundaries. The Sierra Club, along with other conservation groups, plans to challenge the wolf delisting decision in court.”
A hour or so later, a Defenders of Wildlife release followed suit (pun intended): “We are outraged and disappointed that Secretary Salazar has chosen to push the same, terrible Bush administration plan for wolf delisting just six weeks into President Obama’s administration. Americans voted for change last November. Today Secretary Salazar gave us more of the same discredited approach to conservation followed by the Bush administration for the past eight years. All the reasons why this plan was a bad idea when the Bush administration proposed it still stand today. If this rule is allowed to stand, nearly two-thirds of the wolves in the Northern Rockies could be killed. We all expected more from the Obama administration, but Defenders of Wildlife will now move to sue Secretary Salazar as quickly as possible.”
The other PRs mostly regurgitated the same reaction; you get the picture.
I believe, as do most biologists, that delisting on state lines is about as unscientific as you can get, which virtually guarantees the greens will win again in court and keep the Big Dog on the endangered species list. If that isn’t Salazar’s true intention, it might as well be.
Perhaps it’s Wyoming’s real plan, too. Either that or the cowboys have seriously misplayed their hand.
Wyoming insists on a dual-status for the wolf, declaring it “trophy game” in the northwestern corner around Yellowstone National Park and a predator in the other 90 percent of the state. In Wyoming, predators, especially wolves, are extremely susceptible to lead poisoning.
I realize the following is merely Thursday morning quarterbacking, but I wonder how much political savvy you can find under all those Stetsons because here’s what Wyoming could’ve done.
Several times, politicos in the Cowboy State had an opportunity to say, “Okay, Uncle Sam, we give up. We accept your control over us. We’re sorry for being so stubborn and uncooperative, but we’ll be good from now on, promise. We accept the supreme council of the federal government and agree to make the wolf a trophy game animal throughout the entire state.”
That sounds like something a politician in Wyoming would say, don’t you think?
What would happen next? I speculate the delisting plan would’ve moved rapidly forward. Greens would’ve still sued, of course, but without the Wyoming issue, they might not have won. The other issue responsible the court overturned delisting last year was “genetic connectivity,” but that’s harder to argue with news that at least three wolves have moved all the way from Yellowstone down to Colorado, with one collared female there right now looking for a lonely male to create a “breeding population,” the trigger for Colorado to experience the full force of the ESA. Given that young female’s 1,000-mile journey through hostile territory, it’s hard to buy the idea wolves aren’t traveling back and forth between northern Montana, central Idaho and the greater Yellowstone area.
Assuming the feds whopped the enviros in court, presto, Wyoming would have had complete control of its wolf population. Then, shortly after gaining control, the legislature could’ve implemented its dual-status law, which is already on the books, Wyoming Statute 23-1-302(1)(ii), declaring the wolf a predator in 90 percent of the state.
This would be sort of nasty, underhanded politics, no doubt, but how unusual is that when dealing with the wolf issue? The green groups and Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) would be livid, to put it mildly, and they’d immediately sue Wyoming and say really bad things about those cowboys in the press, but would Wyoming care?
Not really, I suspect, and in the meantime, they’d have power over wolf management, perhaps for years, while the litigation inches through our court system, which commonly moves at a snail’s pace. The state would be the defendant instead of the plaintiff and be litigating from a position of strength.
Along the way, they’d probably kill most wolves in the predator zone, duh! And the FWS would probably try to relist the wolf as an endangered species in Wyoming, but relisting would be tough nut politically. And it might also take years, more time for the cowboys to have their way with the master predator.
Compare that scenario with what those cowboys have now--no control and no chance of getting it any time soon.
And probably getting a few nastygrams from their brethren down in Colorado.
It’s virtually guaranteed that a male and female will soon have a liaison down in Colorado and the cowboys there will face decades of federal wolf management and the greens pushing for wolf reintroduction in Rocky Mountain National Park to control the elk overpopulation will have their dream come true--all thanks to Wyoming.
All hypothetical, of course, but plausible, don’t you agree?
However you slice it, Wyoming has, intentionally or unintentionally, right or wrong, delayed delisting and played into the hands of green groups who would want to keep the Big Dog on the endangered species list.
Like this story? Get more! Sign up for our free newsletters.
Comments
The states, but especially Wyoming ,would not be granted full management status immediately. They have a 5-year probationary period ( e.g. assure Wolf recovery goals are actually met in the field going forward ) before they are handed the Deed to the Wolves therein. Your presumption that Wyoming could feign to agree to USF&WS;criteria, be granted Delisting and state management status, then revert to statutory Shoot On Sight cannot happen.
More later. That's just one thing that jumped right out.
At this point, under Federal listing, it does have advantages, the Wyoming Game and Fish doesn't have the headaches, and ignorant like you folks pickup most of the cost of removal, rather than the tax payers and hunters of Wyoming.
You folks really think you know?
I do remember about 40 years ago ODFW transplanted some fishers to eat porcupines that were raising holy Ned with ponderosa pine plantations. I don't know if they are still here or not. It was found that the highest concentrations of pine martens in science were found in association with big slash piles, unburned, in the pumice flat lodgepole pine bug kill logging.. Those large (20' tall and 30 or more feet in diameter) slash piles from whole tree log processing become home to no end of birds and rodents, and the martens make a good living within and around those piles. The best habitat known, it has been said---but not too loudly.
The wolves are coming, and the balance of nature is going to be upset once again. Disturbance. The life blood of biological workings. And someone will shoot a wolf and not get it buried quick enough. Or someone will shoot a wolf and tell a friend who will tell another friend. Bad deal. If you think wolves are not being shot by happenstance anyway, you are probably not correct. Big coyotes have big hides.
The issue is that the wolves are out migrating, and have been. Oregon has at least one reproducing pair and most likely a second. Utah has to have some wolves being that close to the Tetons. Hell, I can see the Tetons from the top of Steens Mtn. in Oregon on a clear day before the I-84 auto puke in the Treasure Valley gooies up the air. A wolf can run much farther than I can see. That is the reason they were put in Jellystone. And they are doing just what they were supposed to do. And if they get to be too many, they will get culled one way or another. No big deal. This is not a century ago, and every rancher, farmer, miner, hunter, person out for a sunday drive, was a wolfer in one way on another. The wolves are doing way too good. They are unmanaged, except by the Feds....and that is the way Americans in the majority want the country run---by the Feds...That is why they elected the Obama. And he is doing his best to make sure the Feds do manage it all, own it all. There should be little discontent from the masses....except those close to retirement who have less than half of what they had a couple of years ago..or the ones who don't have college money for their kids next year...Bernie Madoff got it all. Or Lehman Brothers.. Wolf biology is not real important when you are losing your house. Or you can't send your kid to Megastate U. The wolves will do better than the Dow Jones in the next 5 years. Watch. The Dow is less than 7000. Wolves will beat the Dow to 12,000. And they don't care if it is a bull market or a cow market, just as long as there is something to consume in our consumer dependent world.
Whether or not the enviros are successful, something will happen. The general public is about to become involved as the wolves are getting close to populations. Last week 3 wolves were killed just above Avimor outside of Boise.
Politics and economics driving management is the unfortunate reality. That said, of course, the reality does not make it right.
I've heard the rumors of wolves coming south, but so far they've been nothing more than word of mouth. I'm hoping that your claim has more teeth.
http://fishandgame.idaho.gov/cms/wildlife/wolves/wklyReport/weekly.cfm
I thought that we had become more aware that members of the animal kingdom,even if we don't like them,are necessary to keep our environment viable.
Aircraft hunting will be illegal in Idaho, just as it always has been.
But I'd like to know why you think delisting is inherently wrong?
Wyoming loves being the bad boy because it's easy, cheap politics to be against the feds. The wolf lovers benefit by having a Wyoming to beat up and to keep the feds in control with continued listing.
Please keep in mind the distinction between a protected wolf, a problem wolf, and "trophy" wolf, and in Wyoming's case, the varmint "predator status " wolf ( a distinction they enjoyed for only a few weeks before Relisting last year). Wildlife Services will ALWAYS be allowed to eradicate "problem Wolves" under any management scenario proposed thus far. Wildlife Services is the janitor and butler of the livestock industry, and will do the nasty wet work of taking out any wolf ( or more likely its entire pack) if they are even suspected of harming livestock. It's also Napoleonic Justice---those Wolves targetted by WS are presumed guilty . That is one huge issue I have with Wolf management...wolves not known to be threatening wildife can still be taken just for being seen in the vicinity of cattle or whatever. Makes no sense to me...if you have a wild wolf that is within a few miles of cattle but not encroaching on the cows or harming them , that is a behavioral trait that would likely be passed on to the pups. Wolves are by their very nature wary of people, but they are still guilty and sentenced to die for little more than being alive and present in conflict zones. The cattlemen have stacked the deck against the wolf. But to hear the cattlemen ( and comemrcial outfitters) scream you'd think they were being persecuted beyond recompense just because the wolf exists with a hundred miles of them at all. ' Kill ' em all ' is not good wildlife management dictive.
Funny story . A few years ago a guy used his personal heicopter to set his son down on a ridge during an Elk hunt west of Cody WY after spotting some Elk. Other hunters tracking same Elk on foot observed and reported. The guy had his helicopter confiscated , and it was sold by Wyo Game & Fish at auction. It was one of the first applications of a new law that allowed G&F;to confiscate anything used in the commission of an illegal hunt.
----
Delisting is not wrong. Just remember it is designed to recover the animal and allow it to thrive as Wildlife , not to provide moving targets for hunters and plinkers. A few Wolves wandering far and wide are not " recovering" until they find a mate not related to them , den adn have pups, create a pack , adn some of those animals fork off and go find other unrelated wolves and begin a new. Wolf 314F that somehow made it from southern Montana to central Colorado this past winter is not " colonizing" or proving any genetic dispersion. Takes a lot more than one or three Wolves going " Walkabout". Please recall that the Wolves reintroduced to Yellowstone were done in two stages in two different years from two different packs, and were colalred and tracked and studied in Yellowstone, adn their progeny that went ouside Yellowstone were ( attempted to be ) trapped and collared and tracked and studied, till the collars went dead or fell off , anyway.
BUT---the Idaho population reintroduced at about the same time were released straightway into the big wilderness area(s) as a wild dropoff. And prospered beyond anyone's wildest dreams. I cannot really speak to the Idaho situation , let alone Oregon or North Cascades. I am in northwest Wyoming .
What I know is Wyoming is Dead Wrong on their approach to Grey Wolf Recovery in their portion of the northern Rockies. Was Salazar right to partially Delist in Montana and Idaho but not Wyoming. I don't believe so, becase it goes totally against the grain of biology , ecology , recovery , and sustainability. It does , hwever, take a virtual 2 x 4 and smack Wyoming up alongside the head to remind them to Get With The Program. IF the environmental coalition and conservatioists are successful at litigating the Salazar's executive branch partial delisting order as being counter to what Judicial branch says need be done , Wyoming will be clubbed by many 2 x4's. That is not necessarily a bad thing...
Janet, you really need to read more, and not just environmental propagands and ditzy celebraties.The wolves just finished mating and here is the Yellowstone report in case you have read and believed that fable about only the alpha pair mating and their dedication to each other. Nonethe less I doubt this would satisfy Malloy as to genetci diveristy, what it should do is put to rest the BS that wolves mate for life and only the alpha pair, like all canines they will mate were ever and whoever presents a opportunity.
http://www.wolves.wordpress.com/2009/03/10/wolf-mating-season-on-the-greatly-reconfigured-yellowstone-northern-range/
Also wolves and coyotes have been hunted by plane for years, in fact the original wolves captured from the Canadian wilderness to introduce them in Yellowstone and the surrounding inhabited area may have been shot from choppers for capture. USFWS has killed far more of the introduced wolves for "control" since they were hauled in than were killed in all of Yellowstone during the 42 years they were controlled, in fact they probably kill more in a year that that 42 year figure.
FWS has made the decision that Alaskan wolves need to be controlled and that decision was made long before Sarah Palin came along.
You win again, Marion!
Oh, and just in case you missed this:
http://fishandgame.idaho.gov/cms/wildlife/wolves/wklyReport/weekly.cfm
Hunted (and hazed) wildlife populations stay farther away from humans. Safer for wildlife, safer for humans. Our wild country is not a zoo. One of the worst things that could happen to wolf restoration is a documented wolf attack on a human in the continental US. The public relations fall out would be disasterous, and illegal wolf killing would spike. The sooner wolves learn to keep their distance, the better.
By opposing delisting in states that have acceptable management plans, environmentalists are losing credibility. Wolves were reintroduced with the promise that they would be delisted when they reached their population goals. That occured in 2003. Let's keep our word and let this move forward.
A delicate and valuable alliance has been forged between environmentalists and ranchers due to energy development. Let's try to cool down this controversy, so it doesn't jeopardize some the truly amazing collaboration going on right now.
Bill, you made my day! I needed a good laugh. Despite getting the ESA a little wrong on relisting, this story illustrates nicely how Wyoming's shooting themselves in the foot. I think I'm okay with giving wolves a headstart in Colorado :) All those Texans in Steamboat should get to know the real West.
Erin
do you mind defining "acceptable management plans" for the rest of us? Because there is some serious doubt about that.
On top of that, you've missed some stuff in the ESA, you know, the whole basis for stopping the delisting after 2003? Corridors and little minor stuff like that.
Are you refering to Judge Molloy's reason for issuing a preliminary injunction to relist the wolf - lack of evidence of genetic exchange?
horst: how were you able to decipher his post? I just passed on by as it seemed so much gibberish
If a person neglects gibberish at this forum one reads very little.
Molloy is one that cited the lack of genetic exchange, or at least ruled on that evidence. Other injunctions that could have easily won as well focused on the management plans' lack of accountability for a satisfactory amount of breeding pairs, also in the ESA. The plans that Montana and Idaho have put forth are not comprehensive, in the view of many conservationists, and will likely lead towards a rapid decline in wolf populations, such that if a serious disease were to hit again (2003, 2007) the population could be endangered or possibly extinct.
Don't people see that if they allow 'hater-hunting' the wolves that are actually IN the wilderness, doing what wolves are meant to do, will be shot and those are the ones that should be left alone. It's really sad when humans can't control themselves yet they think they can control animals.
There IS a happy medium, But leaving the wolves to multiply and get into the livestock without being 'managed' is NOT right nor is killing every one you see. How does a wolf in my yard, (or a Bison) affect any of you?
Now don't get me wrong, if a wolf were to attack any of my livestock it would be dead and buried, before the recoil was done. But that doesn't mean I'm going out 'gunning' for them. Because you see, I'm one that actually keeps an eye on my livestock, and pets, and can live among the wild without destroying it.
Temple Grandin is saying wolves don't live in packs. They live in defined family groups. I believe that has been said about bison. And is probably true about many mammals. There are good families and bad families. Good citizens and bad. That could perhaps be said about wolves. Family background is important.
I did read in a book on reindeer herders of the European and Russian north, that they bell their neutered male reindeer, the ones they ride and use as pack animals. So their loose herds of reindeer come with the tinkling of bells. That noise, and the very real noise that comes from gun shots, are supposed to go hand in hand, and to a great extent, do. The wolves prey very much more on the wild caribou, which are no different than reindeer, except the reindeer are domesticated. And can go wild if left unattended over time. We don't know how many avoid belled reindeer. All we know is that ones attracted to the bells do get shot at, with the intent to kill.
What would follow, then, is that belled livestock could attract predation, at which point the predators get wiped out. That we would know about. But the predators who go the opposite way when they hear bells, how would that be documented or proved? But if that were in fact, the truth, then bells and guns would produce wolves that did not predate on livestock for the most part. "For the most part" is an acceptable societal sum to pay for having apex predators. The trade-off is buying bells, and allowing shooting AT, and around, wolves that are attracted to bells. The ones that are not attracted, and perhaps avoid bells, are of no importance to predation, but quite valuable in the Darwinian sense of it all. A predator living with man, not off of man.
So you know that an idea like that will go over like a lead balloon, because zealots stand their ground. And is why so little progress is ever made. Nobody has the 'nads to step out of the box, and work with behavior more. Even lethal behavior. Those great thinkers, the wolves, do understand that they have to take precautions to stay alive, and if they don't, it is time they learn.
A lot has been written about the family unit of wolves and how only the alpha male and female mate.....ha! So much BS. Read this report on the wolf breeding season in the Lamar of Yellowstone where wolves are never hunted. Not only are there multiple litters and have been for several years, but it sounds like multiple fathers of each litter of pups.
http://www.wolves.wordpress.com/2009/03/10/wolf-mating-season-on-the-greatly-reconfigured-yellowstone-northern-range
Interestingly Wyoming had the only wolf kills as predators last spring, and guess what they had the lowest wolf kill and lowest livestock kill. Maybe hunting anytime keeps them afraid of humans and works to prevetn damage from them. It's too bad, that the states could not have been given at least a year to see what worked.
Some rebuts:
1. Last spring's brief Wolves as Unprotected Predator killfest in SW Wyoming proved absolutely nothing. Had some comedic value, though... It takes a lot longer than one year to determine anything on biologic trends. Try 12 years - maximum realistic lifespan of healthy wolf in wild. Wolves have been roaming outside Yellowstone for only 12 years. It's way too early to make any long term prognostications about Wolf recovery ( or Grizzly for that matter). Only men insist on thinking and acting according to timetables , erroneously.
2. Got a surprise for you . Most of our NW Wyoming Elk herds have calves from different fathers , too. It isn't the biggest strongest 6+point bulls doing all the breeding these days. The 4-point teenage bulls are horning in. Consequentally , the genetics are drifting out of balance there. Trophy hunting does not help.
3. Your notion of Private Property is far more limited than you might believe. Your only truely private realm is within your four walls and under your roof..your " castle". And possibly your garage or horse barn. That is about as far as you can claim private property rights, really. It really doesn't extend to your farmed or forested or range land . Absolute property rights are a myth. ( Ever heard of Eminent Domain?) And by the way , is your real property even really yours if you refuse to pay the taxes on it ? Ha!---skip a couple tax payments and the Sheriff will be selling " your" property on the Courthouse steps. So that means at best , you simply lease it from the state at the state's leisure. Nobody owns anything. Everybody stewards everything. In England, home of the Magna Carta, every piece of property has a public byway thru it. In Scandanavia, all private holdings have byways for people to come in and pick apples or mushrooms, among other things. The notion of private property is very very conditional under Common Law , as it should be. Some things ( resources) are simply too precious to be trusted to the feudal overlordship of individuals and the so-called Landed Aristochracy. The more egalitarian system is called Commonwealth and it is a very good thing. We Americans somehow lost that . Darn that Greed virus anyway....
First of all alpha pairs mate for life only in rare and extreme conditions is there mating with other members of the pack. You make it sound like it is normal for wolves to go around humping anything warm and moving. Get real! If wolves were mating like you make it sound their population growth would be well above 20%, and it isn't. And the reason Wyoming had the least amount of livestock losses has very little to do with the hunting of wolves. Livestock losses due to wolves are incredibly tiny. Respiratory infections, thieves, and domestic dogs all individually are responsible for more livestock losses in one of the three states than livestock losses due to wolves combined in all three states.
Wolf, do you have any proof other than conjecture that the sex lifes of Yellowstoen wolves with lots to eat is any different than it would be in the wild? I don't understand your reference to elk having different fathers, I don't know that anyone has ever claimed they are mongamous, certainly no one who knows anything about them.
Wyoming is Wolf Country.
All Wyoming has to do is lie, lie, lie until they get what they want, and then DO what they want. Again, that's usual practice. So this is a good column. I hope the Wyoming leaders read it.
Well my sources are nothing reliable, just the USFWS and every piece of scientifically backed research on wolves since the turn of the century. You might want to look up the summary of the "general wolf information" on the USFWS website. Its short enough even you should be able to read it and comprehend most of it.
Wolf, try reading Ralph Maughans site, researchers are admitting they were all wrong about the wolves. Kind of a fairy tale as it were.
-----
If I had your real e-mail address, I would send you a graphic I did for the Big Wolf Meeting they had in Cody that was attended by over 600 folks as Delisting loomed ( the first time, May 07). But I'll just have to describe it to you , and you can make your own.
On a sheet of letter sized paper , sideways , draw a rectangle about 8 inches wide and 6 inches tall. This is WYOMING.
Subdivide this rectangle into little squares... 40 across the top , and 35 down the side, for a total of 1400 little squares ( and they really are very small...1/5th inch on a side ! ). Each of these tiny squares represents 1000 HEAD OF CATTLE.... bulls, steers, cows, heifers , and calves. A thousand cows in each tiny square, totalling up to 1.4 million in WYOMING, the big rectangle. 1400 little square pasture-boxes , each full of 1000cows that spent some part of the year 2006 born or raised or shipped from Wyoming.
Now, draw a new smaller rectangle inside the big Wyoming rectangle that excludes about 800,000 cows worth ( 800 tiny squares). Everything inside the small rectangle that covers about 40 percent of the State of Wyoming is a 1000-cow unit inside a County where Wolves are actually present. It's a graphical way of showing that Wyoming had 650,000 cows that were in the vicinity of a known Wolf...the northwest and western counties' worth. The excluded cows do not come into the discussion much except in statewide context .
Still with me ? Hope you haven't mixed a new highbal yetl, becasue here's where it gets interesting.
In the upper left corner, black out 41 of the tiny squares. Just 41.
Those 41,000 Cows were ALL LOSSES OF CATTLE DUE TO ALL CAUSES...bad birthing, respiratory , lightning, rustling, disease, accidents, and of course PREDATORS . 41 squares out of 1400 is 2.9 percent. That represents what any rancher can expect to lose in the course of a year...start with a hundred head of cattle and you make it a year with 97 , all things considered, statewide. Not bad.
OK , Marion , NOW you should have that next highball. Are you sitting down ? Good .
Because how many of those tiny little 1000-Cow squares inside the Great Big Wyoming 1400 Square Herd were cattle lost to Wolves ?
Get out your Old Timer penknife and slice just ONE of those little squares , and remove 1/8th of it with tweezers. That's right...about 125 cattle taken by Mr. or Mrs. Wolf.
In other words, Wolves don't take SQUAT for Wyoming livestock. Out of 1400 squares each representing a thousand head, all those rampaging bloodthirsty Wolves devouring their 1/8th of a square managed to take 0.09 of One Percent of Wyoming's precious cattle herds. Not even 1/10th of 1 percent.
But to hear you and the ranchers whine and kick and scream about it , you'd think they were being put out of business irrevocably by the Devil's Own Dog.
When you do all this up as a proportional black and white graphic for all to see, it's very very apparent that the Wyoming livestock producer does NOT have a case against the Wolves. It's all just hyperbolic rhetoric and foofawraw on the Stockmen's part, but toally unspported by the numbers, dollars, and declarations.
Yet somehow, almost 45 percent of ALL WOLVES outside of Yellowstone were removed by Mnagement Action that same year...USF&WS;or Wildlife Services.
The Wolves took 1/10th of 1 percent of Wyoming's sacred cows, and for that they saw 45 percent of their own population taken with extreme prejudice.... that's almost a 500:1 kill ratio by weight of percentage. And that was BEFORE we had a state management plan...just business as usual.
Can I make it any plainer , people?
---------
My souce data was USF&WS;Wolf Recovery Annual Report for 2006 ; USDA ; Wyoming Livestock Board. The numbers in the two years since seem more weighted for Wolves than 2006, since Wyoming had more cattle on the hoof and fewer losses due to Wolves statewide.
It does not matter how many of few head of livestock is killed if it is your livestock and your money down the drain, just for the entertainment and feeling of power of enviros.
I doubt the wolves will ever be delisted at any number, enviros never had the slightest intention of honoring their word. That has been my opinion since day 1, it still is and I was at the meeting.
Facts mean nothing to Marion. does not matter if it is wolves, welfare ranchers. or the time of day.
all you will get back is falsehoods, blather and hyperbole.
that what EOD does.
But the anti wolf side are really out of this world, They just want to wolves dead because they kill elk in such a horrid and painful way? Yeah it's crazy. I mean the things they say about wolves is really unrealistic and one of these creeps even attempted to make a documentary about how wolves are killing their elk even though the majority of the movie was all Wolf hybrids? "Different species idiot"
I think wolves are cool and deserve a place in the lower 48 states, I understand hunting is needed to keep balance. I'm abit questioning the delisting, but least Wyoming is being left out. They should be worried more about that volcano in Yellowstone than wolves LOL
That's Idaho for yea, they only care about the elk so they could tape their hunting shows for VS. These are the kind of people that woulf freak out about a wolf passing their yard than a giant grizzly breaking in their house.
I read the article on Ralph's site and it seems to me that 472F is a very promiscuous female wolf. But just because she bred with more than one male doesn't mean she is going to have more than one litter of pups. 472F also just formed a new pack and she clearly hasn't chosen an alpha male yet. If male wolves were going around doing what 472F is doing I can see where there would be a problem. The fact is it doesn't matter how many males she does it with she is only going to have one litter. It was an interesting article, but no where did it say that researchers admitted they are wrong and that this one time occurrence is going to climatically change backed up wolf behavior. Marion I respect you for coming on to this site and voicing your opinion in the face of so much opposition, but I'd probably never concur with your politics. I'd also like to ask you a serious question. Why do you hate wolves so much?
Dewey
That square thing is pretty incredible. Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't cattle losses from wolves less then 1% in Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming.
Jeff
Couldn't agree with you more.
That tax should be their source for recompense of wolf predation.
A sort of enforced self-insurance...
But I have a much better suggestion. All we need to change is one word in the bedrock laws regarding livestock. One little word...change " Out " to " In" , as in make Wyoming ( and Montana , Idaho ? ) regulate their livestock as a Fence IN state instead of a Fence OUT.
As it stands right now, if you don;t want a rancher's cow in your yard or wandering onto your graze or allotment or whatever property , urban or rural, you have to fence that animal OUT, even if that animal has escaped its own enclosure and is running loose. Neither the animal nor the livestock owner can be held responsible for that loose animal's encroachments , etc. For some reason , this is YOUR fault under the Fence Out mandate. This is even applied in town if you neighbor's bad-ass dog keeps coming into your yard or tearing up your poodle...it's YOUR responsibility to keep the bad dog OUT , not the owner's.
However, by changing that to a Fence IN system, the livestock owner is always fully responsible for his animals. It's up to him to keep them where they belong, and if they get out it's his responsibility to deal with the consequences that animal creates.
So, technically , either should work for managing Wolf-Livestock conflicts---IF Wolves are treated as wildlife. The rancher who doesn't want Wolves coming in on his herds would have to fence them out , or cowboy them out, or guard dog them out...whatever. As you might guess, this is not the method applied by modern range managers and brand inspectors, etc. , when it comes to Wolves. Wolves are guilty coming and going, or even for just being seen.
Under a Fence In mandate, the livestock would have to be secured and protected 24/7/365 by their owners. At least to a reasonable means.
Unfortunately in Wyoming's case, our Constitution was largely written in the 1890's by a hegemony of railroad tycoons and ranchers. This Fence Out mandate is at bedrock in our laws. It's basically a Free Pass for livestock owners to press for neglience and compensation both coming and going when their stock gets hammered. Even when the rancher did little or nothing to prevent the problem; to protect his own property.
I'm surprised that Cows were not given the Right To Vote in Wyoming via proxy to the ranchers before we gave it to women...." I own 5000 head of Herefords , so therefore I get 5000 votes..."
My friend Al Simpson , retired US Senator, has a coy expression about all this : " We have many Sacred Cows in Wyoming. Some of them are even cattle...."
" Ralph Maughan Says:
March 12, 2009 at 4:13 AM
The reality of wolf mating, which would probably have only been discovered with a restoration of wolves to Yellowstone, is that it is just not true that only the alpha pair mates or has pups. The old wolf “literature” was just plain wrong when it said only the alpha pair mates.
This not mean a wolf population explosion, however. For example, in Yellowstone last spring there were many multiple litters of pups in the various wolf packs. Almost none survived. Pup survival was so poor that the Park population of wolves dropped substantially."
Horst, I guess I don't understand why after having the taxpayers spend millions to import wolves from Canada for the enjoyment of those who like to watch them, you now feel the ranchers who are being forced to provide food for them should be taxed? Why? Because you do not like ranchers?
Forget that the ESA required that wolves be repopulated. Forget biodiversity, forget healthy ecosystems. It is all about the Californian hippies that just want to watch the wolves.
And nice way to try to spin Horst's argument, Marion. How long did it take you to come up with that one?
I still feel that the ranchers are getting LAZY as well as greedy. They don't want to take the effort needed to be a GOOD rancher. Oh I know, there are a few Ranchers that still actually do Ranch. but they are so far and few between they don't count anymore. Kind of like parents that give their kids video games etc, just to keep the kid occupied instead of being a 'family'. Parents that don't have any idea what their kids are into or 'texting' or searching for on their computers, See the similarity? Parent/Rancher Pasturing cattle/video games. Whatever it takes to keep from having to get INVOLVED with their 'charges' (kids/cattle). Like I've said before If you can't manage your livestock on YOUR land then downsize that's what they want done to the wildlife. It would be easier to downsize the cattle than an entire ecosystem. I know I take precautions to prevent damage to my livestock so why don't the Ranchers? I have wolves, grizzlies, Bison, Moose, Elk etc all around me, That's why I LOVE it here. I know they are here so I adjust MY living to fit into the area around me. When it snows 3-4 feet I remove the snow I don't wait for the Government to do it. I don't expect the Gvt. to change the weather because it hinders year around grazing. You, as in third person, choose to live in an area, then 'you' should be capable of doing what is necessary to live there, and not expect handouts, or the Gvt., to change the area to better suit you.
Wolves are here, they're staying here and they don't need fogies like yourself making up things because you have nothing better to do.
Marion is a He, not a She. Lives in Greybull, WY. The Wallace Stegner of Bentonite .
I live in an area that supposedly has no wolves. Not true. We have wolves. The Game and Fish tries to deny it, the politicians deny it, people who have never been here and don't live here deny it.
The people in our neck of the woods that spend a great deal of time outside and that have any power of observation have indeed seen wolves. They are not dogs or coyotes. They have always been here, so why is the government trying to re-introduce a species that is already here?
Yes, we have had trouble with predators from mountain lions to the wolves. When we lose one of our animals to a predator it hurts us financially and I can tell you from experience, trying to collect for damages is difficult and most of the time results in no action. We have had three horses killed by a lion. The last time it happened we notified the powers that be. They took so long to respond that all sign had disappeared and even though the colt was shredded and the windbreak that the cat killed him in looked like a slaughter house from the blood sprayed by the colt as he was trying to escape, we were denied any recompense for the colt. Game and Fish officials had seen the cat in the daylight in the open not far from our place as well as other antelope hunters.
The colt was killed 400 yards from the main house on our ranch.
I resent the comments that the majority of ranchers are lazy and greedy. We live and breathe for the land. We do tend to our animals and we work hard year around. We work seven days a week from daylight until after dark much of the time. We don't expect the government to bail us out when we make stupid financial decisions and we certainly don't expect the government to come plow us out or rescue us when something goes wrong with the weather. I don't know what you consider a rancher, but we sure don't have what you described around here.
When we lose an animal to a predator, it is like some one getting to your source of income and taking a chunk out of it. If a thief stole your money or something that you value was destroyed you would want to be compensated for it.
Most ranchers don't want all predators destroyed, but on the other hand, we don't want to suffer financially when the populations get out of hand.
There is a balance, but as long as people refuse to see any other view than what they want to see, neither side will win and everyone will lose, including the animals whether they are domestic or wild.
I'm not going to try to twist your words, but have you ever read the ESA or do you have even a slight grasp of the topic? Because it sort of sounds like you're misinformed about a few things it contains.
15 wolves in an area about 1/6 of the lower 48 states is not a sustainable, nor viable population. It becomes endangered. Under the ESA, that grants the USF&W;certain powers.
I don't really care who denies that you have wolves. Whether the wolf population is there, pumas, grizzly or mountain coyotes, you're going to lose animals to predators. With a new population of wolves, the puma population will drop, so will the coyote population (severely). So loses to those will drop while wolf predation may increase.
The main topic here is how to build up a viable, self-sustaining population without returning wolves to the endangered species list. Unfortunately, some ranchers and their advocates have taken to exaggeration and outright lying in order to make some sort of anti-government stance. Those ranchers frustrate everyone and so biases are increased and words start flying.
Do ranchers work hard? Yes. Have they changed their tactics in the last 60 years to take advantage of low predation numbers to make necessary headcount reductions (manpower)? Yes. Are the lower manpower hours also increasing the predation counts? Yes. It used to be that herds were well guarded, watched over and protected by their owners. That has changed, and with that change is coming confrontation between man and man, man and beast, and beast vs. beast. That confrontation hopefully will lead to new thinking, new methods and new understanding, but threads like this don't give many hope of that.
But please, don't take the same tact as Marion and attempt to use your own microcosm of experience as the same as what is happening all over the Northwest. Don't pretend that all ranchers are the same, or all environmentalists or conservationists are the same.
They invented sheep and pig fence to keep them in so why not get predator proof fencing too? Because it would take too long maybe? Too costly? Well get your priorities in order and figure out what is more important, protecting or cleaning up. No better time than the present to get busy. It can be done because, remember, HUMANS are (supposed to be anyway), the smarter of the species.
And yes we have lions here too you name it we have it.
I 'm sorry you 'resent' the comment about laziness and greed, but if the shoe fits, wear it, Maybe you aren't one, but there are plenty out there that are.
Predation is part of nature, and man has become the dominant critter by use of animal husbandry to ensure a constant food supply. We are controlled predators. Why deny our brains and species development by quitting grazing? Man can control predation. The insanity is to think that it can be eliminated. So this argument is always presented by the anti-grazing people in the worst case scenario which is extirpation of the predator species. Ranchers don't want that. They want a reasonable opportunity to husband their livestock.
I have never heard the livestock people campaigning to eliminate predators in this century. They only want a predictable level of certainty in their ranching effort, free from very misinformed zealots who have stepped in a cow pie once in their lives, and don't understand how their urban sewerage disposal has fouled every river in this country, thus making them the shit problem of consequence. Last week, the Obama administration, in a purely political move against environmental good, relieved the City of Portland from EPA constraints on the hundreds of millions of gallons of sewage that flow into the Willamette River in metropolitan Portland each time it rains more than a quarter of an inch, even while they are still working on a billion dollar collector mega sewage tunnel. The Bush administration was "punishing" them for pollution and that was not "fair." They got an Obama permit to shit in the river for an undetermined time into the future. The Environmental President. Oh, and in the meantime, poor Portland, too financially strapped to be able to keep up with their poop pollution, has spent $$4 Billion on light rail and dropped bus lines, so in fact, their public transportation system has declined in bodies hauled per hour capacity but by using electricity from BPA dams. Clean, green, and get rid of those dams. And, the light rail has proven to be very democratic as it has spread crime to the far ends of the lines, as they don't seem to know why a half dozen transit cops can't even keep people from not paying fares by the tens of thousands....Oh, they did catch a girl who could not get any of three automatic change makers to produce the coins for her fare. She took the Transit cops to court and won on the basis of non-working auto change makers. Evidently, a pocket full of quarters is a must to ride public transportation. So what green mines produce the metal? Which green smelter?
So, all this begs the question of tyrannical urban majorities and their desire to run all things on rural land, and public land, for their benefit, while not taking the pains and financial sacrifice they demand of public land grazers, farmers, rural residents, to cowboy up and fix their urban pollution driven, crowded, water fouling, air stinking, noisy, diverse environment and fixing that before they micromanage the rest of the world. This is just a polite admonition to walk your talk before you venture outside the urban environment of your creation. (It has never been lost on this guy that the money to drive the whole of the environmental movement comes from town, not the country...not enough people on rural lands making enough money to make TNC the largest land owner outside government or to fund the myriad other groups to the tens of billions of dollars).
I love the blame the urbanites angle. It is so recognizable as a diversion, though, that you might rethink the wording so it isn't so blatant. If you don't understand how urbanites pay for their fair share through higher prices and taxes that go towards the EPA and many projects to make sure agriculture has clean water from the source, then I can see how that rant might have be somewhat useful. On top of it, since the fees and donations from urbanites, to groups that focus on watershed projects and ecosystem measures, greatly outweigh anything that the rural people put into projects that won't directly have a monetary feedback to them.
As well, many conservationists and environmentalists are working diligently to create alternative transportation, raise community awareness and create a lot of the green businesses that are walking the walk, you don't seem to have much to stand on. The greed and pollution isn't from the left end of the spectrum, it comes from the guys that rural Republicans all seem to support.
As well, you once again ignore the ESA and how that is the driving force behind everything that is going on. Instead you blame others for "micromanaging" something that you never identified. The disgust for "urbanites" is plainly evident in this thread, blaming them for never using the wilderness, and when they do, they are dirty and cause more damage (sure, whatever).
Need I remind those of you that think you're better than urbanites, that they pay for the beef and lamb that you grow? That they still pay higher prices when supply is scarce, and that your lifestyle would be unlivable without them?
We are told that the J. Q. Public owns those animals. Well, maybe you can tell me why we are just supposed to absorb losses caused by those animals when they cause damage to us?
You all make this huge issue about ranchers being responsible for damages caused by livestock. Listen to your own words.
Why are you comparing PROPERTY DAMAGE to west nile or the weather. No one claims to own those things.
How would like it if some one or some thing came onto your property (that you own or pay for) and caused you a lot of material damage? I would bet that you all would scream bloody murder if something like that happened to you. Don't lie.
Property damage from natural causes happens all the time, most intelligent people make sure they are insured for those eventualities.
Whether it is a wolf, snake bite or anything else, it is a natural cause.
Seems to me you are trying to place blame somewhere. Why would that be? Also, just like bearbait, please be aware that you are ranting against the actions specified by the ESA. How can you attribute that to blaming environmentalists and conservationists, I'm not sure.
"The EPA notified the city of its intention to drop the case in a phone call last month, just days before George W. Bush was to leave office. The agency also sent a letter to the city.
The investigation began after complaints from a group of Oregon's rural lawmakers, who had long grumbled about a perception that Portland wanted to impose more environmental standards on their districts while the state's largest city escaped scrutiny for huge sewage spills."
So a politically motivated investigation by the Bush clan is ended days before the Bush clan is to vacate the White House and you blame Obama? How pathetic.
I deal with what you reference in your last paragraph every stinking spring. from the DOL. They trespass, cause Bison to destroy fences, stampede them through residential neighborhoods putting children, pets, and property at grave risk. It doesn't do us a damn bit of good to complain because they are doing it for the RANCHER. When there are NO cattle anywhere around for miles. NOBODY actually owns their land as has been proven by the DOL and Stockgrowers. So If I can't have my wishes on my property respected what gives YOU the right to have yours respected?
The worst poop situations I see are geese in public parks and playgrounds, sea lion crap on docks and the frigging sea lions (ESA protected at their historical high population) being very aggressive if you want to walk on THEIR dock. Dogs on the sidewalk and grass. Cats in the garden. The real poop problems are in town. The real environmental problems are in town. It is town that demands the food, materials and energy, that produces the pollution. So why the constant pressure on rural livelihoods and lifestyles? Jealousy? Or is it that your tyrannical urban majority just can do what they want to others?
Today the Oregonian is again ranting and railing against farmers burning their fields to reduce fuels, use of fuel, fertilizer and pesticides, on less than 50,000 acres. NOT ONE FRIGGING WORD ABOUT THE MILLIONS OF ACRES OF FOREST AND RANGE BURNING EVERY YEAR BY THE FEDS...PURPOSEFUL BURNING. SETTING BACKFIRES ON PRIVATE LAND, FAR FROM THE FIRE FRONT THE CHICKEN SHIT BASTARDS WON'T APPROACH FOR "SAFETY" REASONS. AND THEN THEY GET HAZARD PAY FOR RUNNING AWAY. But forest fires are good. They clean the forest. That kind of horsepucky reasoning is why we are up to our asses in an economic mega downturn, and people losing homes because they lost their jobs, not because they had a liar loan or a sub prime mortgage. We are in the second stage of going into depression, deflation. The collateral damage from the liar loans, the lack of banking oversight, is now on us. And the paper is about the health issues of field burning. Evidently, there is no health issue with Wildland Fire Use, with Appropriate Management Response (a plan written on a napkin in a cook tent). All that forest and range that goes up in flame in the now tens of millions of acres is not a health issue, not a clean air issue, is just ducky from an environmental standpoint.
So if you have any spare money, take a poll of rural people and ask them about unfought forest and range fire, to find to what extent rural folks support that program. Then go to the liberal urban areas, and ask the people who don't have a dog in the fight, who don't live in the rural areas, don't have property next to public lands, don't have a rural livelihood or lifestyle, how they feel about unfought, "natural" fire. Have any idea how that would pan out? Any inkling of where the support for WFU really is? Any idea that forest and range smoke, from many, many times the tons of fuel per acre burned, from fires that burn for thousands and thousands of hours, and not 15 minutes like a field burn. You can bullshit some of the people some of the time, and maybe you call bullshit all of the people by use of majority rules, but you are still bullshitting. The wolf deal is bullshit. The logging deal is bullshit. The fire deal is bullshit. The grazing subsidy is bullshit. The economy and stimulus is bullshit. The $190 million bonus deal at AIG is nothing. AIG making $12.9 BILLION in payments to Paulson's GoldmanSachs is bullshit. The Congress bails AIG for $139 BILLION to now, which is really no more than a transfer payment to GoldmanSachs and many other investment banks. Lied to again by the left. And the right.
Yeah. I rant. Turnabout is fairplay. It is not like I haven't heard the same crap from the polar opposite view. But since I do manage a farm, I do have a dog in the fight. I am one of the few who are feeding you today. You had better understand that the people who are feeding you are important. Either that, or get good with chopsticks because that will be all you will have to feed yourself the daily bowl of rice with a Humane Society scrap in it. I wonder, in the time of 50 million bison, why Lewis and Clark, et al, ate so much dog meat?
There are a lot of things to discuss in your newest rant, most of which have absolutely no pertinence to this discussion. Your frustration about urbanites seems to come from the fact that you are slightly put out by some of the legislation and activities. You feel that you and yours should be exempt from ecological concerns, if they are made by "urbanites". It appears you are trying to marginalize your opposition, or those you think are your opposition, by changing the topics and playing with a lot of outrage and emotion, in lieu of actually having an argument.
On top of it, you use all CAPS to try to make yourself seem more than you are. At this point, you seem to only be proving that you have nothing to add to this discussion except a lot of outrage and pent up frustration.
Just a hint: I've owned a farm. I've lost cows to natural causes, lost a few dozen chickens to coyotes and wild dogs, chased down horses at 3am and had someone set fire to 1/2 ton of hay. So please, stop acting like you're the only one that understands losses on a farm and that your view is somehow more legitimate because of it.
1991: 6 billion gallons per year, sewage and untreated storm water runoff combined, into the Willamette and Columbia rivers. EPA gets on Portland under Bush Sr. 1994...an agreement and a Federal SUBSIDY of $1.4 Billion to build the Big Collector Tunnel (Greedy urbanites get subsidized to not shit in the river by minority Republican President Bush, Sr.) By the time the tunnel is finished in 2011-12, the volume of combined sewage and storm runoff will be reduced by 96%....sounds good, no? That means that it is OK to have an annual discharge of 360,000,000 gallons of combined untreated storm water runoff and sewage, with all the detectable hormones and antibiotics from pharmaceuticals humans shed daily. 45,000 tanker truck and trailer loads. All ending up in the ocean. In just a few days. And migrating salmon smolts and returning adults swimming in that stew of human excrement and street junk. The untreated storm water runoff from Los Angeles and Ventura counties in SoCal put enough cat feces in the fresh water layer on the ocean, that a parasite in that cat shit infects grooming sea otters and kills them. That is why they are having no luck getting sea otters established in their southern habitat. Unregulated urban cat shit and untreated storm water runoff.
So the solution for Green Portland is that in two years, only 360 MILLION gallons of combined sewage and storm water runoff will flow into the the two major rivers.
Part of the remediation, in a treaty with the Oregon Dept of Environmental Quality (all Democrats, mostly from Portland area---have been since 1984 to present--apptmnt. by Governor) the city installed many "sumps" that collect storm water runoff, don't clean it, and allow it to percolate into the groundwater. The EPA (under Bush--the elected by majority President) challenged that decision, and that was what the ongoing argument was all about. Portland's Mayor, groomer of a male child, an intern, (by his admission when caught by lefty weekly Willamette Week--{the Oregonian ignored the story for a year}) for his sexual conquest at age 18, Sam Adams bragged to the City Club that the agreement with EPA means the city will save $250,000 a year in clean up costs. So how can you be the "Green City" and brag about avoiding clean up costs?
Sorry Jay. Two sets of rules. One for the liberal urban majority and one for the rural conservative minority is not what democracy is supposed to be about. I am regulated to NOT use pesticides that are sold over the counter to city homeowners and that chemical is part of the untreated runoff. A pesticide in the water is ALWAYS a farm chemical, even with an urban use. But those chemicals can now only go into the water table or maybe the river, as untreated storm water runoff combined with sewage. Permitted. OK...not a problem. The problem is farmers burning grass straw in summer, and the red herring is health issues. No health issues with WFU smoke for months on end. No health issues with making the conscious decision to NOT fight forest fires. The double standard, determined by someone else, far away. The wolf deal is just that. Uncontrolled predators unleashed on the few growing food. Not in town. Anytime a predator that might constitute a danger gets to town it is immediately killed. Nobody in town killed by a cougar yet. Nobody in town killed by a bear yet. Only in the rural areas does that happen. And then the animal is protected and the victim made the villain. Two sets of rules.
As for grass burning, there are true concerns about health issues with a rapidly growing elderly population. Grass burning is done close enough to urban areas that it poses great risk to children and old people, as well as a growing population of adults with breathing issues. I understand why it is regulated and why they are constantly changing.
What you are doing is whining about change. You don't like it, so you lash out at it, and it seems you do so blindly.
Adults have a responsibility, to teach the young what they know, to pass on the history and lessons learned. Are all of your lessons about blaming them darn city folk for anything that doesn't suit you?
"Uncontrolled predators unleashed on the few growing food."
Uncontrolled? Yeah, right, whatever. This thread has enough evidence against that already.
Unleashed? nice emotional word that doesn't convey any information.
"the few growing food"? Oh come on, this is just ridiculous. Less than 1 percent of 1 percent losses, and you think everyone should just take your side? Respiratory problems cost farmers more than wolves ever will. Heck, poison kills more cattle than wolves. Sounds like you just want to be angry and you found a trigger in wolves.
this discussion is bringing in a lot of topics and emotion. i thought we were talking about wolves. well, i guess we are.
look, like it or not we are all in the same boat. whether we live in a 500 square foot apartment or a 50, 000 acre ranch. my main concern (and certainly your main concern) is that the boat doesn't sink.
certainly we are in trying times and we have been for a little while. if we didn't know it that, we were all made aware on sept 11th then a flag waving march to "war".
our nation and world has experienced trying times in the past, the civil war, world wars. and as my dad says, "we need cool heads to prevail".
frankly, for me and my family's sake i'd rather not stoop to the bottom into more wars and chaos and pain.
so for me the golden rule usually seems to be a good starting point when you are stuck in a boat with others under stressful circumstances. "treat other as you would like to be treated"
i've traveled to other places on this globe in my life and trust me we have it good here in the usa, almost all of us. AND we are in a jam now. What we need is cool heads to focus, remember the golden rule and make steps toward solutions...regarding wolves or you name the topic.
i've got to run to work now.
good luck.
Overall numbers in the three states combined saw Wolf population increase 8 percent , to an estimated 1645 animals. In years past , that increase has been three times that rate, 24 percent. But the population inside Yellowstone dropped dramatically , from 359 to 302 due to inter-Wolf rivalry and an outbreak of mange killing the bulk of last year's pups. Breeeding pairs in Yellowstone dropped from 10 to 6. Yellowstone hosted only 124 Wolves total at the end of the year.
In Wyoming outside the Park, there were 172 Wolves in 30 known packs with 8 loners. Four Wyoming Wolf packs outside Yellowstone were zeroed out. The 172 Wolves tallied in Wyoming includes those residing on or near the National Elk Refuge near Jackson.
A table in the report showed that to the best of USF&WS;knowledge, Wolves were confirmed to have killed only 41 cattle and 26 sheep in Wyoming last year. The report states that in the three state area , Greater Yellowstone + Central Idaho Wolves killed 61 cattle total and 11 sheep, so the bulk of the livelstock losses were in Wyoming.
It becomes interesting when you look at management/ control / eradication numbers. Eleven Wolves were shot by citizens during the brief "Predator Season" last Spring , mostly in SW Wyoming. Agencies or permitted ranchers removed 5 more Wolves in Wyoming than Wolves took Wyoming cattle ( confirmed losses only) ... 46 to 41. ( But 63 Wolves went " missing". ) USF&WS;has a statement in the report that for every known confirmed loss of cattle to Wolves, it " presumes" there are 8 unconfirmed losses. There is no data in the report to back that claim up. The biggest hit by Wolves on Cattle occured in the always contentious Upper Green River drainage , which has had a long history of Grizzly-Cattle conficts as well. (It's probably a forest zone that should see its grazing allotments go away if the ranchers can't absorb the losses to natural predation on public lands ---personal opinion ).
The Bottom Line in Wyoming is the various Agencies ( Wildlife Services, USF&WS;, Wyo G &F;, country predator control , etc) reoved 27 percent of Wyoming's Wolf population residing outside Yellowstone ...46 of 171. Wolves, on the other hand, "removed" 22/100ths of One Percent of Wyoming's cattle population---and by the way , I factored in the 8 presumed kills for every known kill.
Wolves would have to kill 378,000 of Wyoming's 1.4 million cattle to reach parity with Agencies eradicating 27 percent of the roaming Wolf population.
Sounds like "Wolf Management" is doing right well in Wyoming in the absence of a federally approved State management plan. Given the numbers in this current report, I'm not sure I want Wyoming to have more such "authority" over Wolves... the state is collectively eradicating problem Wolves and bystander Wolves in great numbers as is. Its existing predator control program extended to Wolves is already ruthlessly efficient.
You can read the complete USF&WS;annual reports on Wolves for the three states , separately and colelctively tabulated, at: http://www.fws.gov/mountain-prairie/species/mammals/wolf/annualrpt08/index.html