New West Feature
Wyoming Declares War on Wolves
The state opts to treat wolves mostly as predators, not trophy animals, but implementation will take time.By Brodie Farquhar, 8-09-11
![Cowboys capture a gray wolf in Wyoming, 1887. Photo courtesy of Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, John C.H. Grabill Collection, [LC-DIG-ppmsc-02636].](/images/articles/cache/02636v-300x0.jpg) |
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| Cowboys capture a gray wolf in Wyoming, 1887. Photo courtesy of Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, John C.H. Grabill Collection, [LC-DIG-ppmsc-02636]. | |
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An agreement reached last week between Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) Director Dan Ashe, and the State of Wyoming will allow treatment of the wolf as a predator that can be shot, trapped, or run over at any time throughout most of the state.
Interior has agreed to remove Wyoming wolves from the threatened and endangered species list, and give the state authority to manage wolves under a unique and widely criticized dual management plan.
Wolves would be safe from hunters in Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks and on the Wind River Indian Reservation, and managed as trophy animals in the surrounding national forests, subject to regulated hunts. Beyond the trophy area, however, anything goes in killing wolves.
Immediately, the air was filled with salvos on both sides of the debate.
“Wyoming has once again succeeded in strong-arming the FWS into submission, giving tentative approval to an approach to wolves that harkens back to years gone by, when wolves were virtually exterminated in the western United States,” attorney Doug Honnold declared for Earthjustice. “After all the efforts to promote wolf recovery in the Yellowstone area, this is a major step backward.”
Suzanne Stone, Northern Rockies representative for Defenders of Wildlife, also blasted the plan.
“Sanctioning aerial gunning and the killing of pregnant females and newborn pups is not only a clear violation of fair-chase hunting ethics, but also a drastic and unwarranted step that could seriously harm the long-term viability of the population.” she said.
Stone said she was appalled that the Obama administration had done something that she would have expected from the Bush administration.
The Interior press release that announced the agreement avoided the word “predator,” ignoring the reality of what predator status means in Wyoming, which is the only state in the Lower 48 that does not treat the wolf as a trophy animal by establishing regulated hunts.
A release from Wyoming Governor Matt Mead did mention the wolf’s predator status, but said nothing about killing wolves, only wolf management. Mead obliquely referred to sacrifices by cattle and sheep growers and the loss of “significant numbers of elk and moose.”
Mead’s statement, but not Salazar’s, referred to the seasonal flexibility of expanding the state’s Trophy Game Management Area about 50 miles to the south from its current location near the Wyoming/Idaho border. The expansion area would be managed as a Trophy Game Management Area from October 15 to the end of February, when wolves disperse into new areas.
Any wolves that attempt to establish a pack south of the flex line can be shot on sight again as soon as denning season starts in the spring.
Inside the trophy zone, the agreement allows livestock owners to kill wolves attacking their sheep or cattle. It also allows Wyoming Game and Fish to use aerial gunning to: control livestock depredations; achieve ungulate management objectives if wolves are determined to be a significant cause for not meeting those objectives; or address human safety issues.
Gray Wolf. Photo by Gary Kramer, USFWS.
Interior and USFWS have long maintained that Wyoming wolves should be managed as trophy animals, meaning hunters would have defined seasons and would have to purchase hunting permits. Federal officials, even in the Bush administration, regarded Wyoming’s predator status for wolves as problematic.
But Wyoming’s legislature and the successive administrations of Democratic Governor Dave Freudenthal and Republican Governor Matt Mead refused to drop the dual classification of wolves.
Wyoming retains management of wolves as long as wolf numbers do not fall below 150, including animals in the national parks of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. Stone noted that with a current population of 246 wolves outside the park, that means almost 150 wolves—nearly 60 percent—could be eliminated.
Based on the latest population estimates, there are 97 wolves within the boundaries of Yellowstone that will remain protected while they are in the park.
The flexible expansion area is supposed to allow Wyoming and Idaho wolves to expand into each other’s state, presumably increasing genetic diversity in both states. Stone said no biologist she knows believes the Interior/Wyoming plan will benefit wolves or wolf genetic diversity.
“A lot of wolves are going to die in our national forests,” she said.
The last time USFWS was politically pushed to approve Wyoming’s dual predator status for wolves, the animals were immediately attacked, she said. She recounted one instance in which a snowmobiler chased a wolf for 30 miles before killing it.
Just a few months ago, in an unprecedented move by Congress, an estimated 1,000 wolves in Idaho and 566 in Montana were “delisted” or removed from Endangered Species Act protections, along with wolves in Oregon, Utah, and Washington.
Meanwhile, Wyoming’s Senator John Barrasso had put a hold on Ashe’s nomination as director of USFWS, a hold that was lifted a few weeks ago after Salazar and Ashe visited Barrasso with assurances that a solution in Wyoming would be aggressively pursued.
The agreement is the first step in a process that could take up to a year to finalize.
On Sept. 7-8, the Wyoming Game and Fish Commission is slated to vote on changing state regulations to conform with the agreement. That has to happen before USFWS can publish a preliminary rule in the Federal Register to delist Wyoming wolves.
Mead and Salazar have jointly set Oct. 1 as the deadline for the preliminary rule. A year-long federal approval process would then begin, including public comment.
The Wyoming legislature will have to approve the new management plan worked out last week, which it presumably will consider in the next session.
Meanwhile, the Wyoming congressional delegation intends to pursue legislation that would prevent conservation groups or federal judges from getting involved. Rep. Cynthia Lummis, R-WY, recently inserted a no-litigation rider into a 2012 appropriations bill.
Brodie Farquhar, who has covered the West for decades as a specialist in resource journalism, lives in Casper, Wyoming.
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Comments
Wyoming had to resort to dirty politics and Congressional blackmail to achieve its unworthy goals, because they sure couldn't win on science and law...
Without the radio collars and helicopters, the playing field would be level , advantage Wolf.
Yes, and the wolf could continue to take full advantage of the other wild life they obviously dominate. Wolves could and will continue to take advantage of private property, those night raids for the slow elk, riding stock, and trained and or pet dogs, on the mans land.
And Wyoming can continue to decrease non resident hunting opportunity, evident in my Wyoming hunting regulations collection over the years. I cannot speak of the resident rules, have not looked at those for years. Idaho has made large hunting opportunity cuts in several hunt units over the last five years, again, as evidenced in those hunting regulations.
One wonders about all of these declines coming about, blame it on whatever you want, except it sure doesn't say much for your science to over look the several issues causing wild life to decline, while at the same time adding wolves to the scenario, a wolf might ask who needs superior predators with guns, when those science gurus that moved us into this eco system failed to mention the food supply to sustain wolves here has several issues leading to wild life failures, some friends they turned out to be.
Maybe the hunt in Wyoming will send wolves into Colorado, yeah man, Colorado needs them some wolfy love.
Remove the hunting, remove all management, I'm for it, because I want to see who you blame next.
Only 8 posts into the comment thread and we are at DefCon 4 in the thermonuclear name calling , " personalization" and polarization of a broadly lit public topic...
Godwin's Law-- all fervant discussions on internet comment threads eventually resort to someone calling someone else a Nazi--- seems to have become a du rigeur when the topic at hand is wolves.
On days like this I am ashamed to be Homo sapiens , because that " sapient" part is rare in these parts. So many trolls...
You live there, you illuminate us. I do give you the benefit of the doubt as you are witness to your state, and your area. If you believe you are seeing a successful wolf-and all other predators relationship with their prey base, you're seeing elk herd growth in the positive, I might be inclined to doubt the states biologists you apparently disagree with and take heed of your perspective over theirs. I think different areas obviously must be having different results. I am very unhappy with the results here, in my area, and very unhappy with IDFG.
I've waded through the conspiracy arena separating the wheat from the chafe, if you've not done that, why the constant negative comments towards me concerning my interest in truth versus nonsense? Not judging evidence without investigation are you ? If you have not studied it, how could you, being an intellectual, articulate superstar, have an opinion of any of that topic?
It seems to me, you are unhappy with government, are you nuts ?
Elk herds in the Cody WY area are growing; way above objectives. And we have a LOT of wolves. I have just gotten new elk census numbers but have not yet digested them. The annual late summer aerial census of "local" elk is proceeding as we speak , and those numbers will be forthcoming in early September. I suspect the trend will hold: elk herds growing but demographics skewed. It isn't a matter of Not Enough Bulls, it's a matter of Too Many Cows.
The unbalance in the elk herds is/has been due to poor management by Wyo G&F;... overhunting of trophy bulls ; overreliance on Yellowstone migratory elk as a feed stock ; failure to manage "local" elk for sustainability apart from migratory ; unbalance induced by acquiescing to ranchers over the crucial needs of wildlife ( winter range issues) ; just plain managing elk herds for financials, not biologicals. It's a long list.
The wolf is the best 24/7/365 wildlife manager out there, if we humans would only allow it to be. There's plenty of game , but nobody wants to pay $ 6000 for a guided cow elk hunt, do they ? But why should any of us throw our support behind the narrow economic interests of outfitters if it means sacrificing other values equally worthwhile but harder to put a dollar value on ? Why doesn't Wyoming address the issue of TOO MANY OUTFITTERS in a confined space when their economic model is so poor ?
I am very unhappy with Wyo F&G;, as you seem to be unhappy with Idaho's elk farmers. It wasn't that long ago that I was a huge supporter of Wyo G&F;. What changed? Politics, pure and simple. Then along came the wolf and the big wedge was driven. My state wildlife agency went over to the Dark Side just to keep its paychecks coming.
Wyoming's professional game managers are mighty poor WILDLIFE managers as it turns out, because they a re money driven rather than following accepted conservation and biological methodology these days. The wolf can go a long ways towards correcting that and will do more to restore the viability and diversity and strength of resident elk herds; just not at the artifically high "put and take" numbers of elk heretofore that have been wrongfully driven to appease the hunting public and especially the commercial outfitters.
I am trying to espouse the longterm view of wildlife management in Wyoming...fifty years plans. Nobody invested in wolves or elk seems to be able to see further ahead or behind than a single season, and that does not work. One year, one incident is next to meaningless on the requisite time scales of genuine wildlife conservation, especially in the face of climate change and curve balls like pine beetles as a result of that. But it takes several generations of hunters to get where we need to go from the mistakes and bad policies of the past. The wolf is critical to the future if you also want elk, because the two species are codependent on each other , if we are doing it right by them and allow them to both be agnostic towards humans.
Man is the last animal to get it , to figure it out. And the very last to realize he's not the solution but rather the problem. The BIGGEST component of the problem, actually.
Teddy Roosevelt's vaunted North American Wildlife ( Big Game it isn't) Conservation Policy is in need of a dire overhaul, to version 2.0 And that revision just doesn't want wolves in abundance, it needs them.
If you can't deliberate on that argument, there's nothing more I can say to you.
The enemy of wildlife is men , not wolves.
I can't help but think geographical differences of some areas might turn out different results concerning predation issues, it seems to me Wyoming should have one season statewide because the open range country is to easy for men to hunt. Where here its vertical right off the porch. Another aspect of my experience here is those controlled hunts often relied upon migrating ungulates leaving open hunt units from some pressure, but most often snow.
I'll retract and change the question, if we are dissatisfied with government and vigorously work to expose the problems and demand solutions, are we nuts? Ha ha. I think some of us just do it on different levels.
There won't be much success killing wolves here, like I've said before, my observations over the years, including witnessing the declines in elk, deer, the wolf population explosion ended here, where I am living and hunt, in 2007-8.
For me personally, this decline here is unacceptable. Right wrong, still unacceptable. Huge area, most of it is expert hiker type off trail very vertical geography, with far less elk now.
Salazar is the best Sec or Int in a long time.
Hunters for Obama!
I guess outside the zone you wouldn't even need a small game license. Out of staters who feel like shooting a wolf would be welcome to it.
http://www.codyenterprise.com/news/sports/article_fcb744ea-9072-11e0-affa-001cc4c002e0.html
Mr. Huard, the reason the 10/100 number is used is because that is the number of wolves environmental groups said they wanted and the states agreed to when the wolves were imported, so Wyoming is actually offering to feed mroe than the agreed upon number. That number actually was to include the Yellowstone wolves. We now have 15-30 times the number originally agreed to. Dr. Mech estimated about 3000 several years ago
Are you talking about the Cody herd declining in quantity or qualitatively , or what ?
WHICH Cody herd / Sub herd ?
What exactly ?
I don't agree with a lot of that article. COnsider the source. I have the same numbers. How grossly unfortuante that the Cody ELk Task Force is made up entirely of professional or avid hunters, and ranchers, only. Plus the Game & Fish guys, all of whom are from the hunting and taking of elk side of the equation. The nonconsumptive elk advocates or Other Wildlife intrests are not even at the table. It's a straw group for hunting and ranching interests. Elk lose coming and going.
But having said that , there's something that happened this year that will very likely skew the Cody area elk herd count for years to come. The rivers stayed treacherously high for many weeks longer than normal, and I fear many elk calves were lost trying to swim the rivers on the migration back to YNP or Thorofare or....
That's why the current late summer pre-hunt aerial elk census is so important.
Now that we know the Cody Elk Task Force was made up of outfitters, ranchers and other predator hating people- the real question is whether Gov Mead goes to the bathroom without getting approval from these "people that demonstrate those Wyoming values" that the rest of us find so tragic......
These "imported" wolves have been migrating south from Canada since the early 80's or even earlier, but that was a nice try.
And actually there were wolves seen in Wyoming and the one mistakenly shot outside of Yellowstone in 1992 had DNA matching no other wolf in the data bases. Many, many people beleive the weolves already present were teh supposedly extinct Irremotus. Mr. Bangs refused to let any other wolf caught during the "re"introduction period be tested, including the wolf roped near Pinedale. It was sent to Texas and died there.
Again, so why spend the millions to get some mroe?
If kinds of wolves don't matter why are they trying to raise "Mexican wolves" in NM and Arizona?
Just more anti-hunting, anti-human rhetoric. The cash cows days are numbered on the list, there is no denying that, you had your 11 extra years of protections from the point of scientific recovery, you have widened your destruction of wildlife and you held on so long, you destroyed your created science, exposed the ESA's short comings, and exposed the EAJA abuses like no other. No one to blame but yourselves for the overreaching for tax dollars.
Wyoming's plan has been found to be scientifically sound in not endangering this species. The numbers in the entire region far exceed any valid scientific bar to consider them recovered, it is time for them to come off the list and become another animal in the state wildlife management programs region wide.
Anyone not agreeing with that statement are the ones really denying valid science. "war on wolves"? How laughable!
So what are the wolf worshipers really upset about in this plan? It really is easy to see and understand, they just lost their last straw in their never ending string of law suits. Even if the rider is appealed and found unconstitutional (which I happen to believe it is), with Wyoming now having a plan, we no longer have a split DPS, which was their last straw they desperately grasped at. they get delisted either way.
The delisting of the wolf, a success of the ESA, and the death of a cash cow for the watermelons.
Now, to end amend the ESA and the EAJA to make sure this level of abuse never happens again. If this program didn't succeed in proving anything else, it has pointed out the need for those amendments.
Happy wolf control...............
You people are always talking out of both sides of your mouths. Science of convenience. It applies here, but not there.
I am sure they would have tried the same thing here to attempt to keep them delisted, had they not spent 16 years trying to convince people they never violated the ESA and a wolf is a wolf is a wolf.
There is some evidence emerging that shows they were moving wolves out of Northern Canada and dumping them off just north of our border. It might explain why they all of a sudden decided to 'migrate' south after 50 years of just standing there looking over the border. Or were they really here all along?
And of course we all know now that Bangs was dumping his problem wolves in NW Montana long before he admitted it, an interesting migration south from southern Idaho to NW MT.
That's an interesting comment Dewey, are you saying we are incapable of removing wolves without collars and helicopters?
Or are you just taking another emotionally driven cheap shot? It seems it was largely accomplished once before without either of those.
Your wolf will be okay, the laws are in place to insure it will continue to be in the lower 48. Maybe not at the insane levels most wolfies would desire, but the species will be do fine and populations will remain within the science that was written to consider them recovered.
And that is about as accurate as the wolf counts are.
Or do we use the SAME models they concocted for counting elk? You have to love those models, just change the programming to spit out whatever result you desire. It is very interesting that those models were changed just prior to the wolf relocation.
"It may be worth mentioning that the wolves were actually well on the way from coming all on their own from Canada into the western states. There were wolves killed already south of Yellowstone and that was well before the re-introduction ever took place into Yellowstone. So they were coming on their own and the re-introduction just simply speeded things up."
So, as you see, whether wolves were brought back by humans or not, they were well on their way down on their own from Canada as admitted by Dr. Valerius Geist.
Nope, that would be theorizing, I think they probably did, so does Val. I'm pretty sure wolves travel by truck, and Helicopter also, its that management thingy again.
Strange, why would wolves walk past abundant elk, seeking abundant elk. Oh looky, I theorized a tad.
If there were no packs in Montana how come they brought 10 yearling cattle killers to Yellowstone to try to same them? They left to go after cattle right fast and still had to be killed by FWS.
If it reduces the profits of our weathiest residents, then it must go.
Signed: The payed for politicians of Wyoming.
P.S If you don't agree don't write your congressman.
The war is really not on wolves, or about wolves, but about a far larger issue, that of self-determination, which in turn is a fundamental right of not only governments, societies, cultures, but of individual citizens.
Wyoming has chosen to fight for that right, with wolves being the catalyst -- no more, no less. And I support Wyoming's leaders and citizens for doing so.
Show me the law on that ( and please don't quote Genesis 1: 20-27 or anything like that ).
Wolves are not a state's rights issue...but they might be a state's wrong. In Wyoming's case, that's ferdamnsure.
There is no more money and in truth there hasn't been for decades. It's all a debt-wrapped lie and you chose to believe it.
Hell is coming and we brought it on ourselves. We have a warfare-welfare state that has spent decades robbing its own citizens, and since 1971 we've robbed the world to pay for our debt-fueled largess. As a nation we now manufacture virtually nothing and have become a debt-laden, materialist culture, importing our egos from abroad. Even those who claim to eschew such somehow manage to find the monies and the time to drive their kids thousands of miles across Idaho and Montana for junior league hockey and nature hikes in far-flung locales. Others pride themselves on their trips to Moab with the kiddies for bicycling vacations, ignoring Abbey's comments that he would rather have the ranchers and miners back than the self-righteous yuppie scum that have invaded the Colorado Plateau. I remember Moab back in the 1970's and you people have loved it to death. It is destroyed. "Movements" are driven by "present moment consciousness" and institutional memory has been cast to the wind.
Orwell was right. Huxley was right. The Leviathan you helped create will be the monster that will destroy us tomorrow, and damn near the whole lot of you will not see it until the moment you are devoured. At least, you shall think and think wrongly, "I meant well."
Maybe you should retire back to your underground bunker
I corrected some of your misspellings.
The GOP Stands Up for Downtrodden Minority: The Super-Rich
by Jim Hightower
Who says that Republican congress-critters don't care about minorities in our society? Why, at this very moment, they are pushing hard to pass a $372 billion federal program to lift the economic fortunes of just one minority group - a far more generous proposal than Barack Obama has even dared to contemplate.
The focus of the GOP's generosity is a true American minority: the richest one-tenth of one percent of our people. Living in penthouse ghettos like Manhattan's Upper East Side, this tiny minority of about 120,000 people (who have an average annual income of $8 million) would get some $3 million each over the next decade from the Republican proposal. Doesn't that just make your heart bleed with empathy?
This windfall will go to the most un-needy among us if the GOP gets Congress to renew the Bush tax cuts for the superrich. Yes, the same Republican lawmakers who have opposed even modest funding to keep schoolteachers and firefighters on the job are wailing that we should take hundreds of billions of dollars from our public treasury and hand them to some of the richest people on the planet.
What's at work here is the narcissistic psychosis of the privileged - the delusional belief that they are entitled to special treatment because they're ... well, they're rich and therefore consider themselves to be both superior and especially deserving.
This attitude was expressed in a recent letter to The New York Times by a guy with the rather foppish name of Mr. Standish Fleming. He deplored any effort to deny these special tax giveaways to the elite, declaring that such efforts "discriminate" against the minority of wealthy and "productive" members of our society, thus rending America's "social fabric of trust and respect."
Of all the crying needs in our country today, these Republicans are wringing their hands over the discrimination against the wealthy minority. Sometimes, I don't know whether to laugh or cry or go bowling!
This is one of those times.
Is it possible that these pampered ones and their congressional pamperers haven't noticed that "America's social fabric of trust and respect" has already been rended by three decades of policies knocking down the workaday majority? America is now in a Great Jobs Depression that already has lasted 10 years and continues to rage unabated across the land. This Depression has devastated our country's middle class.
Yet, it took two months and endless compromises this summer for Senate Democrats to woo a few Republican votes needed to pass even a weak and meek jobs bill to help deter mass firings of schoolteachers and firefighters by local governments. Pious, purse-lipped Republicans - who have eagerly backed Wall Street bailouts, needless wars and other budget-busting expenditures - demanded that other programs be cut as the price of saving these essential public-service jobs.
So, what program did our stalwart senators choose to loot? Food stamps!
Yes, even as millions of Americans are stuck in long-term, relentless unemployment, thus increasing the urgent need for family assistance, our well-fed, big-butted solons grabbed nearly $12 billion from the supplemental nutrition assistance program. This puts the "dumb" in dumbfounding!
Because of the economic collapse caused by the reckless greed of Wall Street bankers, there has been a 50 percent increase in the past two years in the number of Americans relying on food stamps. In the coming months, more and more people - including schoolteachers and firefighters - are going to lose their jobs, and many of them will need the helping hand that Congress has now so stupidly and callously withdrawn.
Instead of stealing funds from our country's essential food stamp program, Congress should get the money for its jobs bill by taxing the multibillion-dollar bonuses that Wall Street bankers are paying out to themselves. And if that's not enough money, cut the pay, pensions and health care freebies that congress-critters give to themselves - most of them need to go on a diet anyway.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,776985,00.html
Or, is it only her private property she concerns herself with? It obvious she could care less about yours or mine.
Like most extremist, she has one viewpoint, and the less it affects her day to day life, the better. But of course, those of us who live thousands of miles away from her must adjust to her so called 'values', or your just another redneck, inbred, scum conservative.
We have seen what her likes have brought upon this country, it is time to just dismiss them.
Once again.....the excuses are over,the dogs are recovered, they have over populated the available habitat, and those of us who live here will manage them as we see fit, as long as we stay above the legal threshold, it's really our business now. The wildlife does belong to the citizens of the state of Idaho alone, and yes, I do have that code if you are interested Dewey.
No citizen of this country should be subjected to a violation of their private property rights for ANY animal. Period.
No recourse, no reparations, nothing, just loss of some of what little income and property they have.
But, it is easier to try and marginalize the well off, while ignoring the middle and lower class. Boy Wilma, how hypocritical are you in your 'progressive' views. Maybe you could cut the check for the losses these people have suffered. No?
We have politically protected a faux endangered species from day one'
Experimental? Not anymore
Non-Essential? Absolutely.
You are correct. Governors and legislatures pander to hunters. They pander to ranchers. They have abandoned ethical fair chase hunting. Hunters like Barry are used to killing their elk and deer from the back of their pickup trucks in between beer burps. When the animals move because they are aware of the predators presence the hunters scream- OUR game herds are decimated. They always spell "decimate" wrong!!!!
Since everyone, including the most argent wolf loving environmentalist lives whre wolves once roamed and were killed off by whoever, you surely in your angst are willing to make any sacrifice necessary for them. Could you explain to us exactly what you yourselves are doing to make a home for the wolf where you are, what are you willing to give up yourselves? Once more environmetnalists lead us by example, not dictate.
Paula, it is only through the failed and unconstitutional ESA that wolves were listed as endangered. A politicians definition, nothing more, nothing less. Wolves have never faced extinction as a species, therefore they have never been endangered. Just as I stated above, Ed Bangs had to PROVE that before he brought wolves from Canada.
And as far as non-essential, that was the scientists determination, not mine. You are very outnumbered by scientists in your opinion.
Is that the best you have Wilma? No counter to your lack of concern for a citizens private property? I guess that pretty much shows my description was spot on now doesn't it. You know I am right, so I expected the failed ad hominem that is your trademark.
Why don't you give us your opinion about how the people of Idaho should be hunted too. I have seen your advocating for murder on more than one occasion, now that is an extremist view.
Over 6 BILLION awarded to these faux groups of welfare lawyers in this issue alone.
The truth is, the EAJA is next folks, we are not going to be abused like this again. Hold on tight the truth is being exposed. And I wouldn't ever hold my breath expecting any support in any future 'endangered' species. You folks ahve seriously become your own worst enemies.
Seems like there are more of the canids than the ungulates. like true canines, wolves hunt in packs.
kind of difficult to be a moose, bull elk or anything else when there are 6- 10 wolves on your butt, taking turns.
Just my opinion. See it daily.
The spotted owl, like the wolf, is a bio weapon targeting rural people and their ability to work,live, own property and recreate in rural areas.Families were destroyed,unemployed logging people died from suicide, substance abuse, etc.when all the mills were shut down and the entire Pacific NW timber industry essentially destroyed forever; now those forests burn in cataclysmic fires. NEPA was supposed to protect them. It did not.
Dr Taylor predicted Jan. 11, 2000 to an audience of 600 including U.S. Senator Conrad Burns and Lt. Governor Martz and representatives from Rep. Rehbergs' office and the heirarchy of Mt. FW&P;and USFWS wolf project coordinator Ed Bangs at the Mt FW&P;hosted "Predator Management Symposium" in Billings, that the wolf program would end in violent bloodshed. Eleven years ago this was considered unthinkable and "extremist" . Dr. Taylor is too classy and smart to now say, "I told you so" . The permanent record should reflect that Dr. Taylor in a letter written on behalf of FOTNYEH ,asked Ted Turners' man Rep. Mike Phillips who aspires to be in the Montana Senate to facilitate adaptive management meetings and negotiations back in 2000. Phillips said "no" in writing.
To debate ad nauseum the Progressive left, the pro wolf freaks, the bureaucrats , the NGO's, academia, or give any credibility to anything that they assert, is simply being sucked into their meaningless & dillatory "critical theory" debate.
Face it folks, we are at war for the survival of the American West. Those on our side who piss away time & energy being diplomatic, posturing as the cool headed centrist to pamper his own vanity & ambition or playing "smartest guy in the room" 15 years later with wolf populations still growing at a 30% rate is sabbotaging any chance "our side" has left .
Signed by the 3,742 members ,
Friends of the Northern Yellowstone Elk Herd,Inc.
.
Friends of the Northern Yellostone Elk herd- "Where humans are the only ones entitled to kill em"
Gee Whizz- Conrad Burns, Denny Rehberg... the real pillars of environmental and wildlife protection huh fatboy
"Wildlife Cynics R-Us", maybe.
I would ask Fanning if the science he bought and paid for was ever peer reviewed or challenged by other academics. When , where, published as such ?
'Fanning' the flames, he's long forgotten why he started the fire in the first place.
They don't call them welfare ranchers for nothing.
Wolves certainly do not bring out the best in homo sapiens.
If cattle ranchers are welfare ranchers, I guess that makes all beef eaters welfare food recipients too doesn't it? Or do you think that ranchers can and should raise their beef and sell it for less that it cost to raise so you eat at a reasonable price.
Once more why are enviros targetting the food and energy producers, which will mean shortages and high costs in both for consumers?
I'm not a welfare beef consumer if I eat Wyoming beef , because I'm not, and I generally try not eat Wyoming beef to begin with. I only eat local beef from those ranchers who are expressly tolerant of predators and don't actively seek and recieve undue subsidies.
When the Wyoming Stockgrowers and western cattlemen's associations drop their boneheaded antiquated attitude towards predators and especially wolves, I would be happy to purchase their product. I care little that they are Socialists in flannel and Stetson , because most of the beef I buy comes from socialist countries anyway ...Brazil, Canada, Argentina. No different here.
The amount of subsidy we lavish on our western ranchers is outright socialism. Admit it. And they produce so LITTLE of the nation's beef supply to start with. How much Wyoming-grown beef is actually sold in Wyoming anyway, if you don;t do your own cutting and wrapping ...it's all shipped to the out of state feedlots than put into the corporate packing industry pipeline. That pound of burger you bought at Wal-Mart might have meat from a thousand different cows in it.
We enviros do not "target" all ranchers , and we certainly do not do it to imperil our own food supply. We do it to reform the cattle industry and bring it into the 21st century . The real ire and activism should rightfully be directed at the packing plants and corporate meat industry , and Food Inc. , not the small rancher. But that small rancher cannot have it both ways, either.
In last night's Cody Enterprise, top of the fold, was a story about a horse killed on the South Fork by a grizzly. That much is off topic for the purposes of this article, HOWEVER---the closing statement by the rancher who lost the horse says it all . He says dealing with bears [ and by rote, wolves] is a fact of life in ranch country : " "I'm sure we have grizzlies on our property 365 days a year," Bales said, adding that he and his family members have never felt personally threatened by the bruins. "
Cattle losses due to wolves and even bears are so small as to be a virtual zero in the statistical Big Picture. yes, the individual rancher is impacted when he loses stock, but that animal can be lost in many ways, not just by predation. Given that western higher elevation ranching is always marginal in even the " best " years, you have to asky why the rancher would even want to stake his life on an economic model so fraught with uncertainty and potential issues. Wolves and grizzlies are just two of many, many things that can ruin your rancher day . But since wolves and grizzlies also have a positive value and are needed in their own place, the rest of us citizens and taxpayers should not be held hostage to paying the rancher's bail and balance when there are alternative ways and means. It's simply not fair to the rest of us to support western ranching wholesale and guarantee that rancher a paycheck regardless of the final fate of his stock. Animals are raised to be slaughtered. Sometimes you get paid for that , sometimes you don't--- it's called ' Cost of doing business'.
Ranchers are not owed a living, especially when they use so much public resource and pay so little for it.
If only I could get the equivalent of those generous subsidies and tax breaks....
Everyone who uses public land receives benefit for themselves, I maintain that those producing fuel and food transfer that benefit to all of us. I cannot see any benefit from recreational users to anyone except themselves.
Why does a public land activity have to produce a saleable raw commodity before it counts for something? That is s-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o- narrowminded. The guy who guides wild horse viewing tours has three employees , two vans and an office, and grosses well over $500,000 a year. That probably beats the economic contribution of a few cheep or cattle hands down , and he takes nothing away from the land in doing it. Just one example.
All work and no play.....
By your (il) logic, we should convert Yellowstone Park to geothermal greenhouses and grow tomatoes yearround , graze nonnative English cattle there, log it, mine it , hunt it , ad
oh never mind...it is impossible to have a reasonable discourse with you .
absurdum.
The rancher who has a state or federal grazing allotment is paying nowhere near the true cost to the PUBLIC for his graze. he gets $ 500 worth of meat packed on and gives the US Treasury only $ 5.40 for it. Such a deal. Grazing fees are an insult.
Every cow and sheep grazed on public land could disappear tomorrow and the market would barely flinch, and the shelves would still be stocked. Do you have any idea how many total Cow-Days are spent on public lands by the nation's beef and dairy herds in a year ? It's less than 2 percent, Todd.
By the way , we ALL pay to use public lands.Banish that notion once and for all, just because you don't pay an admission fee at the gate or have to buy a permit. We all pay. It's called " taxes". Commonwealth . Distributed costs. PUBLIC lands.
2 I can have a more enlightening dioalogue with a tree stump. Bye Todd
3. Without exception , all commentaries on newWest when the topic is Wolves degenerates into volleys of babble. I don;t exclude myself when i say that , but I can and will check out of this thread for the good of all and my own sanity and respite from my fellow man's degeneracy.
adios
Whatever the case, the facts are that Wyoming is about to score it's legitimate rights. Then people like Dewster are going to have to go back to the old ways of trying to convince fellow citizens that XX number of wolves in AA region are a good thing. Kind of the way a free society works.
No more imposition of unacceptable burdens upon others via the law, because the law is going to change. And that's a good thing.
So I guess that would mean that the wolf is telling us that the Northern Elk range of Yellowstone (Millions of Acres) can only hold around three thousand elk (4600 elk with calf ratio's in the teens = 3000 some elk at the most ).....
Dewey , I'll let the folks here in Wisconsin know that your superior wildlife biologist the wolf will be dictating population levels of our whitetail. I'm sure most land owners here will be disappointed to know that the wolf will likely bring in a new population goals of 4 deer per square mile as they have implimented in some zones already. Most land owners in Northern WI were use to what the highly paid armature state biologist says. (15 deer per square mile)
Dewey, Maybe you could have the head (alpha) wolf send a memo to our DNR & inform them that the biologically sustainable goals they had set back in the 1940's are no longer the rule of the land! That sustainable natural resource we love here is now going to be feed to the dogs!
Dave Skinner both of your articles in the new Range Magazine are great, the photos are pretty stark. Makes one wonder who is greedy, the person finding their animals torn apart that way or the folks who insist they deserve to have wolves every where.
You can twist a political argument anyway you want, but from a biological standpoint you have nothing. A bad and unconstitutional law, written by politicians and abused by welfare lawyers.
And again Wilma, you make some serious assumptions. I haven't hunted elk since 1995, at which point I realized we had a serious problem on our hands, I turned to hunting predators to do my part in protecting our resource. You see, I am the one you really hate, for I am the predator of the ones you worship. I am an elk lover, a deer lover, a moose lover, I even love the predators when at appropriate populations. I love all wildlife, and I will not over look the whole for the one. Nor will I buy into false science when I know it to be false.
Sadly it is fools who can not see that an uncontrolled non-human predator can be successful in creating any sort of balance in our modern limited ecosystems, it is only fools who can not see that we are in the midst of a atrocious mistake. The same thesis that Dr. Mech asked, had been answered, and yet it seems it is only him who will be honest about it. Natural balance in a multi-prey ecosystem is a fallacy. They based their failed science on the Isle Royale model where only one prey animal and one predator resides. That model does not exist in the RMW, and before we see any type of results that would mimic it in any way, we will have to remove all other prey species, cattle and humans from the ecosystems here. I hate to break this to you, but that isn't going to happen sweetheart. Wolves have already permanently removed one species from the Idaho landscape, and that is more than should have been accepted.
You people should have listened to Mech a long time ago, he warned specifically about the very situation we are in, and he was spot on. the only thing is, the welfare lawyers were making way to much money on it.
In all honesty, the best thing for the long term survival of your precious is to bring them into the management with all the other wildlife. Only emotionally intoxicated can not see that. You people are the real wolf haters, you are going to love them to death. Not one species has been hunted into extinction in North America in the last 90 years, including wolves. Whine about hunting all you want, the model has proven itself far more reliable than the fairy tale we see from the people who continue to clamor for wolf protection.
The Yellowstone elk herd is now lower than at anytime in recorded history, that can not be denied. The 'experts' predicted a 20% reduction, not 90% and falling. You want to fix Yellowstone? Open a hunting season and bring some real balance to the place. the most dire and sick ecosystems we have in the lower 48 are National Parks, so much for the benefit of the no human intervention or no hunting mentality.
When Yellowstone, Glacier and the others are empty, you will have no one to blame but yourselves and you will have no foundation in claiming any of your faux science valid. You people left science long ago and started clinging to legal loopholes to try and silence both the science and the truth.
Only a few weeks left before we begin correcting the worst mistake in wildlife management in this nations history. Do not mistake my pursuit of wolves as hate driven, it is merely my role in the ecosystem as the apex predator, capable of thinking outside of raw instinct, to apply the valid science to our proven management model. No wolves will be removed in hatred by me, but simply out of my understanding they need to be controlled so the other species may also prosper.
I agree, lets remove the cattle. Then we have no need for the BLM as that is what they were created for. Then we can just return those lands to the states it rightfully belongs to.
You really want to talk about shortsighted positions, you want your cake and eat it too. ALL lands must be managed as YOU see fit, no multi-use, just your use. The government worshiping fools who believe in non-management as the new management are hilarious.
Just think about it, all that BLM land converted into real estate for the likes of JeffE to pedal for trophy homes to the likes of Marvel. Cha Ching! Oh what a wonderful landscape that would make for the few. The very home you live in, destroyed wildlife habitat pal, the roads you drive on, the store you shop in, all of it. Yet you squabble over every piece of lands that cattle run on like they are the only ones who have ever affected habitat in any way. Those lands were set aside for THAT purpose, you want pristine wilderness? We have thousands of acres of that also, go see it.
It really isn't that hard to understand if you have more than one rung on your logic ladder. You just don't seem to grasp that simple thought.
Listed by a politician, under a law written by a politician, in complete disregard for the species as a whole. There is a reason they were introduced as non-essential, they are. Under your logic, all species should be listed simply because they do not live inside NY city limits when at one time they did, sans rats
I don't find anything beautiful about it, and no real American would.
( Especially paragraph 10). it doesn't apply to wolves at all, but very definitely puts the crosshairs and spotlight on your own extractive consumptive " Man runs this planet" ideologies:
http://www.hcn.org/wotr/the-return-of-the-lords-of-yesterday
Four billion years of life on this planet, before the arrival of man, would beg to differ. Man did not create the ecological conditions necessary to bring about crude oil (which is evidence that life on earth did pretty well for itself before man came along to MAN~AGE it) any more than man brought about man himself. Your ilk tries to make gods of man. My ilk is at least humble enough to see mankind for what it is... flawed and not the creator nor the manager of nature. We are part of nature. Whether you believe we were created in an instant by an all-powerful God or purely an accident of evolution, or evolved over time by the hand of God, these facts remain: you are not God and mankind is not a collection of gods. Certainly wolf killers alone are not gods any more or less than wolf protecting enviros are gods. A wholesale lack of human humility has lead to the state our planet's largely unbalanced ecosystems. Those humans that continue to believe and try to persuade others that humankind is more intelligent than God, than the sum of all nature, than the billions of years of evolution that came before us, and/or than the balance nature finds for itself are not humble nor informed on the laws of physics or biological matters. For example, Barry claims: "Sadly it is fools who can not see that an uncontrolled non-human predator can be successful in creating any sort of balance in our modern limited ecosystems, it is only fools who can not see that we are in the midst of a atrocious mistake." Barry does not understand that any predator in a natural environment (without interference by man) is self limited. The natural predator/prey relationship is a self-limiting relationship. This is basic biology. As in physics, balance is the resting state of nature. The "atrocious mistake" humans are making lies in man's effort to artificially determine how many wolves should live in a given space (or what the balance should be). The more we meddle the more we tangle nature's natural web of life and the nature is programmed to achieve.
Barry goes on to say, "Natural balance in a multi-prey ecosystem is a fallacy." Any biologist worth his or her salt knows this statement is utter nonsense. Natural systems are, without exception, a highly complex system of predator/prey relationships ranging from microbes to the highest trophic levels (top predators). Barry writes as if an authority on the subject but his own words betray him. His understanding of nature is poor because he cannot or will not understand how raw nature functions absent interference by man. He would make a good wildlife biologist (one, that is, that earns his/her living by man-age-ing wildlife according to artificial human criteria). NOTE: Not all wildlife biologists MAN~AGE WILDLIFE. Many of them actually study the raw nature of wildlife. The latter are the wildlife biologists that care about and best understand wildlife in the true sense of wild~life.
Barry also says, "Wolves have already permanently removed one species from the Idaho landscape, and that is more than should have been accepted."
Barry, please elaborate on this topic. The more detail the better. I'm still listening.
"so the other species may also prosper."
So you can kill them.
"And the sticker shock has only been exacerbated by fears that wolves have cut elk numbers and by the overall state of the economy, said Virgil Moore, the new director of the agency that manages the state’s fish and wildlife.
Idaho hunters and outfitters have been telling anyone who would listen that wolves are “decimating” the state’s game herds.
Wolves are taking their share in some areas like the Lolo, but there are still a lot to go around, Moore said.
“We have ample elk in most of our zones,” Moore said."
I find it rather hilarious how hunters whine about the wolves killing all of the elk. There is no doubt in my mind that wolves are better hunters than humans with guns. They are able to find elk while hunters on 2 legs whine about how they can't find elk to kill. Kill wolves, so us hunters can kill more elk/deer/etc. Hunters have a tendency to exaggerate quite a bit whether it's the size of wolves or their impacts on elk herds.
During the Christmas holidays my mother took my brother and I to visit one of her cousins who lived just across town. Turned out her son was the gangleader who had so terrorized me--and so many of the kids in first and second grades. My brother was not yet able to attend school; so was very charmed by the young terrorist. It only took a few minutes for me to join in their play; and I was never again intimidated by him.
But I didn't join in with his gang of terrorists either. From then on I was able to play at recess without fear. And it was not long before the rest of the first grade boys were not any longer intimidated, either.
This crowd of anti-wolfers strikes me as reminiscent of my first-grade self. If they weren't so fearful they could easily accomodate themselves to the presence of the unknown terror-- and enjoy life without having to carry a rifle in the back of their pickup trucks...
Once more wolves were border to border and shore to short, so unless you take your share, you are the worst kind of hypocrite, forcing others to pay your share.
And thanks to corrupt legislatures all over this country that kiss hunters' asses, they have become spoiled and used to getting their way, despite being in the huge minority in most cases. When they don't get their way you see the true colors of he modern day hunter- threats of gut shooting, SSS, and other ridiculous comments by illiterate bullies.
I did as you suggested, and would ask you reciprocate in part by going here:
http://www.flatheadbeacon.com/articles/article/money_isnt_everything_but_it_sure_helps/23949/
The rest of you might find it interesting as well. Royalties are fine, but the fact remains that there's more to life than royalties, severance taxes and scenery.
http://www.suite101.com/content/american-family-farmers-feeds-155-people-each-2-americans-farm-a231011
http://www.casperjournal.com/mobile/article_99233f77-c17a-53a6-8681-517f551c24b4.html
Your turn Dewey et al, provide us a link to what wolves provide for the American people other than the entertainment of watching them tear a living animal apart.
It's unfortunate indeed that these slime balls are mistaken for real hunters/sportsmen.
That is kinda how nature works huh Todd?
It's called "welfare ranching" because livestock ranchers are heavily subsidized with taxpayers" dollars. County, state and federal property is routinely leased to ranchers at well-below market prices. The federal grazing fee, for instance, "is notoriously underpriced, often eight to 10 times lower than fees charged on comparable private grazing land," says Wuerthner. "For many years, the federal grazing fee has been set at $1.35 [per animal per month]—less than it costs to feed a gerbil for a month."
In addition to dirt-cheap grazing fees, livestock ranchers are also the beneficiaries of low-interest farm loans, and taxpayers support them with emergency bailouts and other state and federally funded programs.
The ecological price tag for welfare ranching is steep, with many environmentalists and scientists now calling it the single most destructive use of public land in the country. "If you look at the cumulative effect of livestock production, no other human activity has a larger negative impact on the environment in the West," says Wuerthner, who cites the effect on water quality, soil erosion, exotic plant invasions, and endangered or threatened animal species.
Thanks also for the reference to the Casper Journal article. Heartiest congratulations to Keanna “Keke” Kelly for winning the first “Try Award.” And if, as the article suggests, there is enough beef in Wyoming alone to produce ½ billion quarter pound hamburgers each year, then I guess if a wolf (or a motorist) kills a cow, Wyoming could be down to around 499,998,400 quarter-pounders that year.
But statistics like that only trivialize the effect of wolves on cattle. We all know that across the entire Northern Rocky Mountain region the effects of wolves on cattle are truly minimal compared to disease, weather and even motorists. However, to an individual rancher who loses several head of cattle to wolves it is not minimal at all. Killing a wolf doesn’t bring my animals back. That’s why I’m interested in the animal husbandry measures by which we could protect our livestock.
Man has forever changed the landscape, on that I think we can all agree. the difference is, I am willing to accept that and the realities that those changes mean. We do not have even one COMPLETE ecosystem in the lower 48, therefore the fallacy that they will somehow fix themselves is ignorant. And even if they did, there would be no balance, we would continue to see species come and go just as we did before humans entered the picture.
Natural balance is an oxymoron, a fallacy, a pipe dream......a fairytale. It is perhaps the biggest lie ever perpetuated on the human race.
To further explain my other comment. One other lie shoved on us by welfare biologists is the claim that predators will never eliminate a prey species. That's simply garbage science, and only applies to ecosystems that have one predator and one prey species. When more than one prey species inhabits an ecosystem, predator mediated competition will allow for the complete removal of all but one of the prey species. It is simple science and simple logic. And the only ecosystem I know of that exist is such a condition is Isle Royale, ironically the the mecca of created wolf science based on apples and attempted in an orange grove.
You let this wolf issue play out, deny management long enough, and I will be shown correct and you will be exposed as the worshiper of created and false science.
Natural balance....seriously. Banff, YS and the Lolo are perfect examples of my position.
Maureen......you are so wrong on so many points I am not sure where to start. First, it is obvious you are another human hater, why is it none of you people that scream overpopulation are ever willing to do your part in fixing your claim? What? You only want to remove OTHER humans and their families? Somehow yours is exempt? Get a grip on reality.
The hunters have not removed species sweetheart, your government did. Bison.....the governments war on the indians, not hunters. Wolves....the governments war on wolves. Elk? wow....elk now inhabit more areas in NA than they ever have. Thanks you hunters and your money.
You really need to do some research.
You continue to throw fire bombs, yet offer nothing to any conversation outside of that. I find it ironic you label others illiterate, when you are completely intellectually unarmed. You have nothing and contribute nothing but hate and personal attacks. I often wonder if you're nothing more than a Jr. High student, or just a completely socially frustrated, gender confused hater.
You are just another woman presenting herself under a male name. You never have anything productive to add to a conversation. You have little real knowledge of the subject at hand. And you hate anything that doesn't fall under your communist viewpoints.
I really have nothing further to say to you, unless of course you actually bring something valid to the debate. I will no longer feed a troll.
Nature balances itself.... if we allow it. Trouble is... many humans don't want natural balance. Many humans want nature to serve humans exclusively. That's where the trouble begins.
Well said, funny how Barry ignored your post.
We lost a real threatened species in Idaho, now hinging on real endangerment throughout it's habitat at the hands of a faux one. And people still want to think this wolf issue is about wildlife, nothing could be further from the truth. The real agenda....how about the 6.8 billion tax dollars that have been transferred to welfare lawyers working for camouflaged law firms known as 501(c)3's
In all honesty, I have no issue with wolves having a place in our state, I just have an issue with the thugs that are using them as a tool. A tool of income and a tool to force their point of view on the people whom live here. They are just another animal, I have no ability to 'hate' an animal, it is not their faults cretins decided to exploit them. We just need to make sure they are not allowed to run amok outside of the parameters of the systems we have.
Remember, they were never "essential", they were never truly "endangered", they were considered scientifically recovered at 100. That was 9 years ago, I will never again be duped by dishonest people. I will never again trust or support anything put forth by these people, no matter how valid it may seem, as they have proven beyond any doubt they can not be trusted or believed.
We came into this by making a compromise, the wolf people are the ones that changed the goalposts right from the start. You do realize we are still keeping our original word? Even after ALL of the lies, deceit, corruption, stolen funds, and lost wildlife. We are still standing on our deal of allowing 50% more than the recovered number called for. And yet.....it is still NOT enough. Still the thugs demand unchecked, and complete protections for a scientifically and legally recovered animal. I am always amazed at the unwillingness of the pro wolfers to use logic and any form of character. They throw Molotov cocktails while we just want the original agreement honored. There may be those who wish the wolves removed, and then there are those who wish them to overrun the ecosystems to the point they end up starving off, neither of those positions holds any water. They are here to stay, that's fine, but management is also prudent. When neither sides walks away completely happy, both sides usually walk away with something. You get your wolves, we get our lives back.
I am out of here.....I have scouting to do this weekend. The mountains await, and they are far better company that any of you :-)
YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK – On Jan. 12, 1995, at approximately 8:30 a.m., the first gray wolf to set foot in Yellowstone in more than 60 years stepped through the gate of a shipping container and into the cold mountain air atop Crystal Bench.
Norm Bishop, 77, of Bozeman – then a Yellowstone National Park ranger and principal interpreter for wolves and their recovery – carried the second container housing the alpha male that day. In the presence of U.S. Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Director Mollie Beattie and Yellowstone National Park Superintendent Michael Finley, the wolf was released into the Crystal Bench acclimation pen where it would remain for 10 weeks before being released into the wild.
“It was a feeling of exultation,” Bishop said of that moment while driving through Lamar Valley during the predawn hours last Thursday. “These were the first wolves that had set foot in Yellowstone since maybe the 1930s. It was an impressive moment, certainly for me.”
Now, some 15 years on from that cold January morning, Yellowstone’s wolf population has flourished with estimated numbers today hovering around 100 wolves in the park. The reintroduction of wolves ushered in a new era of wildlife management, not only within Yellowstone, but also in the neighboring states of Wyoming, Idaho and Montana where wolf numbers have risen above 1,000 in recent years.
While 15 years is a relative blip on the evolutionary radar of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, evidence of change in the park is becoming increasingly apparent, perhaps answering the question: What good are wolves?
“Wolves are a keystone species,” Bishop said. “That is to say that they have impacts on the system beyond what you might expect based on their numbers within that system.”
That impact has become remarkably and controversially apparent in the reduction and redistribution of elk populations within and around Yellowstone.
Back in the 1870s, Yellowstone National Park was being market hunted for wolves, fox, coyote and other wildlife. Market hunters would place strychnine on the carcasses of animals they had killed and skinned, returning the following day to retrieve the animals the poison had killed. Wolves, among the species that would hone in on those carcasses, were hard hit.
Yellowstone was established as a national park in 1872. The U.S. Army arrived in Yellowstone in 1886 to protect the park and its wildlife from market hunting and other exploitation, staying through 1918. During that time period, wolf populations experienced a resurgence, prompting a concerted effort on the part of the Army to eradicate wolves from the park. That policy was carried on by the Park Service following the Army’s exit until 1926. The killing of the last two wolves by the Park Service occurred on a bison carcass near Soda Butte in 1926.
With gray wolves gone from the Yellowstone ecosystem, elk populations – free of their main predator – ballooned. More than twice as many elk grazed on Yellowstone’s northern winter range in 1932 than had in 1914. The belief that overgrazing on the northern range is harming vegetation and thereby causing erosion has persisted among some observers to this day.
Beginning in 1935 and carrying through 1968, elk, pronghorn and bison populations were artificially regulated by shooting or trapping conducted by park rangers. In the 1960s, new evidence suggested that the northern range was not being overgrazed and that elk populations could be selfregulating, with numbers on the northern range affected mainly by cycles of drought.
In 1966, the idea of wolf reintroduction was first posed to Congress as biologists expressed concerns over the high elk populations in Yellowstone. A wolf recovery plan team was established in 1974 and the first official recovery plan was brought before the public in 1982.
“One of the reasons that wolves were restored to the park was that park visitors said having wolves in the park would improve their experience and that wolves belonged in Yellowstone because they are native,” Bishop said. “And the population of elk was very high. There were people who considered that they were so high that the park was being mismanaged. “The entire dynamic of elk use of the landscape has been changed by the presence of wolves.”
Following the reintroduction in 1995-1996, elk populations have indeed shifted within the park. And numbers have declined.
According to a report on the Yellowstone National Park Web site, “Computer modeling of population dynamics on the northern winter range predicts that 75 wolves would kill 1,000 elk per winter, but that elk would be able to maintain their populations under this level of predation, and with only a slight decrease in hunter harvest.”
In a special edition of Yellowstone Science issued in 2005 documenting the first 10 years since wolf reintroduction, elk numbers had deceased about 50 percent from approximately 18,000 in 1993 to approximately 9,000 in 2005. Elk herds in the park dipped due to a variety of factors including predation from wolves and other carnivores, human hunting and possibly drought. A harsh winter in 1996-1997 was responsible for the death of thousands of elk, dramatically reducing the herd.
In the Yellowstone Wolf Project’s 2008 Annual Report, wolf predation numbers on elk in the northern range following 2000 averaged 0.9 elk per wolf per 30-day period. That report indicated elk populations on the northern range had dipped to around 6,000 in 2008 with wolf numbers just below 100.
Rick McIntyre of Silver Gate, a biological technician for the Yellowstone Wolf Project, said the decline in elk numbers has shown some positive signs for the ecosystem.
“I think it is fair to say that (the decline and redistribution of the elk population) was a gradual process and one that makes sense,” McIntyre said last Thursday while observing the Silver Pack in Lamar Valley. “Say the wolves have been here in Lamar Valley for a few weeks and have made several kills, then the elk seem to shift away from the area. Eventually, the wolves have to shift with the elk.
“The two species are interacting with each other and responding to one another.”
Elk on the northern range have shifted from congregating in large groups to smaller groups, often taking refuge in timbered areas rather than open swaths of country typical of the Lamar Valley.
As a result, the spread of diseases among the elk population may be in decline as population density is more widely distributed in the park.
The modified behavior of elk herds in the park has also impacted vegetation with populations of willow, aspen and cottonwoods on the rebound. Those vegetative species provide habitat for songbirds and beaver – another of Yellowstone’s keystone species.
“In general, you could say that for vegetation it is best for grazing and browsing animals to be on the move a lot,” McIntyre said. “If they stay in one spot, they pretty much eat everything and move on. Having the wolves back is a motivation for the elk to move on.”
The wolf reintroduction has also had an impact on many of Yellowstone’s other predators and scavengers Bishop . explained that, “one of the things that happens when a major keystone predator is removed from a system is that there is a phenomenon called a mesopredator release that takes place.”
The hypothesis of mesopredator release states that when a dominant predator is removed from a system, the medium-sized predators that have been suppressed by the dominate predator move into that niche.
“In the case of Yellowstone, that species is the coyote,” Bishop said. “Coyotes took over much of the role of wolves in the park. They were killing a number of elk in the northern range prior to the reintroduction of wolves. Coyotes were killing elk, cougars were killing elk, bears were killing elk. So the wolf stepped back into that role and modified the situation, for one thing taking the coyotes down to about half their prior number.
“What that did was reduce the coyotes influence on foxes, which they regularly kill because they are close predators. It also provided many more small mammals for other predators.”
The trickled-down effect of the wolf reintroduction has brought elk and coyote numbers more inline with healthy estimates for the ecosystem, and boosted the population of foxes, cougars and other predators.
Among the surprising benefits to Yellowstone and surrounding communities has been the economic impact of the wolf reintroduction. Even on the coldest days of winter dozens of wolf watchers gather in Lamar Valley for a chance to see the predators.
According to a twoyear study issued by John Duffield of the Department of Economics at The University of Montana in 2006, wolf watching in Yellowstone generates around $35 million for the local economy.
“It certainly has become a major factor, especially during the winter season,” McIntyre said. “It is a great thing for the local communities, because otherwise it might be a time of year when they are not getting a lot of business.”
McIntyre, who spends hundreds of hours in Lamar Valley each season, has seen wolves everyday for more than eight years. He said the last time that no wolf sightings were reported in the park for an entire day was Feb. 8, 2001.
“One of the things that we simply had no clue about was how visible the wolves would be,” Bishop said. “That was pretty much a total surprise to all of us. I had no idea that we were going to be seeing wolves daily the way we are in Lamar. Threehundred-thousand or so people saw wolves in the park last year.”
Recently, the wolf ’s popularity with park visitors eclipsed that of Yellowstone’s other large predator – the grizzly bear. Wolves’ communal nature and visibility have factored greatly into the increased interest. Revered by some, loathed by others, the wolf ’s presence in Yellowstone – and the impacts of its presence – continues to evolve within the complex web of interactions between the park’s diverse plant and animal species.
Still, nearly any conclusion drawn in the short frame of 15 years is subject to debate.
“Field studies are difficult at best, because there are so many variables,” Bishop said. “But, the field studies that are ongoing in Yellowstone are unparalleled in terms of any previous observations of wolves.”
Undoubtedly, conservation and controversy will continue to parallel the wolf ’s story in
There will never be any agreement on the validity of the wolf plant when one side has all of the problems and all of the cost and the other side makes money and enjoys watching them and going home and leaving the problems behind.
It is a lie that wolves had not been in Yellowstone for 60 years, one was killed just outside of the park to the north when hit by a car in 1988, another was part of a pack of 5 animals killed by a hunter who mistook it for a coyote in 1992 in the Thorofare just outside, and that pack had been recorded by rangers inside of the park, but the info not publically released. One was videotaped and another still photographed shortly both inside of Yellowstone, before the wolves were loaded. Alston Chase mentions photos of a 6 pack taken in the 1960s inside of Yellowstone, I've not seen those photos.
They paid a bounty in Yellowstone during the time the NPS was in charge from 1912 to 1926, during that period they recorded bounties on 56 adults and 80 pups.
The Washburn Expedition estimated that they saw approximately 30,000 head of elk in 1871 during their expedition, granted it was during the time of rut when they would be the most visible. The did not see wolves although Mr Evarts who got himself lost for 30 days with out food or any way of taking care of himself did record hearing wolves howling the night before he was rescued when he wrote his memoir of that expedition some 30 years later. They did report frequent mountain lions.
By william huard, 8-12-11
Barry is just misunderstood. He loves wildlife.....And Tom Remington is Jimi Hendrix
Sometimes the truth of a matter is best captured with a bit of humor.
Thanks William Huard... for cutting to the core.
Gotta love it.
http://www.thatvideosite.com/video/mimic_octopus
At some point you just realize that it is impossible to reason with some people. Barry knows that he is full of it. Calling my views "communist" or calling me a gender confused hater.....I have debated the facts with these "people". They will always revert back to their ego driven mindless states rights "hunters know better" line. These hunters know squat. Anyone that doesn't hold their archaic kill them to save them idea is either "communist" "foreign" or my favorite "anti"...
Barry is afraid to admit that it might well be one of his inbred dirty smelling relatives in that 1887 Wyoming picture......and he's just like them
Can you tell us what si your responsibility to the environment that you yourself must do, not what you force soemone else to do in your place?
Yellowstone is the poster child for perfect environmental management, the wolves are diseased, killing each other, eliminating their food supply, spreading disease,....all of the things desired by the wolfers and it seems hard for enviros to understand why the states do not want to manage them the same way.
http://trib.com/news/state-and-regional/article_ce1f475f-16eb-52d3-b806-68633f31772a.html
http://www.nationalparkstraveler.com/2008/09/brucellosis-solution-kill-all-elk-and-bison-yellowstone-national-park
If the elk are indeed spreading brucellosis or have the capability of doing so, wouldn't wolves killing them be a good thing for ranchers? I don't think ranchers would be happy with elk spreading disease to their cattle.
It should be time for your medication. You talk about wolves "killing animals off". I'm not sure if you can read but the latest wolf report came out of Wyoming....There have been 16 confirmed depredations by wolves on livestock in all of 2011. There are 150,000 freaking elk in wyoming. You sound as if wolves are not allowed to kill their natural prey> Why is that? Who says the elk are yours? You people are so funny! Ranchers and Hunters.... The two most pathetic complainers on the planet. NO NO NO that's my elk wah wah wah
Yellowstone scientists now say they are transitioning to a bison based ecosytem instead of the elk based system That existed since before the white man entered the picture. They seem pleased to have redesigned it. You will have to go to near the end to read that part. Be sure to notice the color photos and all of the white denuded patches where the bulls roll in the dirt.
http://www.nps.gov/yell/planyourvisit/upload/YS_19_1_sm.pdf
What you said about hunters is largely true of most of the entire species.
Homo sapiens have had it pretty much their own way since they dropped from the trees millenia ago. But, for that very reason, things are about to change again.
I am afraid their damage is so pervasive there will soon be no remnant of life to mark what this cooling ember had ultimately become.
That will be regrettable.
Careful- you will be labeled a "communist" for standing up for wolves and the environment. I agree with your post. God help us if Perry or any of the other Conservatives take control in 2012. Environmental protection will be a distant memory. I bet you just can't wait for the FU&*^ing vampires in the private health insurance market to be able to discriminate against people with pre -existing conditions...... Lets repeal and offer nothing constructive in it's place- sounds like a Texas thing to do. Good ole Republoman- repels facts, impervious to reason, resists compromise, complete with anti tax increase micro fibers and a hatred for the environment
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/11/19/tracking-taxes-environmental-lawsuits/
Tell them you want the following:
*Up front non refundable fee to contest a delisting.
*Up front non-refundable fee to list a new animal/bird/etc.
*Change wording so that an animal as destructive as the gray wolf is not treated the same as the Black footed ferret.
*A process that allows states to take over management early in the process so state endangered programs can manage to the will of their people.
MAKE THE LAW ENVIRONMENTAL OBSTRUCTIONIST unfriendly - not their cash cow!
ESA change is coming & apparently some of the biggest offenders are starting to back pedal. Keep pushing William you and your ilk are the make it that much easier to make grounds for change!
"Pencil neck" Hemming,,exit stage right
"Honey-wagon" Dickinson.. the old manure spreader below the moustache is turned on full bore.
Bob "south side chicken little" Fanning, the Chicago elitist shilling the lawsuit to no-where.
Altered Reality, from Wisconsin of all places. Can you say "that 70's show" and just as moronic.
last and certainly least,
"little" barry coe, desperately trying to portray a level of intelligence unattainable.
A veritable smorgasbord of village idiots
A road hunter,{JEFF E} someone that parks along a road, or at a trail head, and walks a little ways, usually 2-3 miles, and turns around to return to the vehicle, especially before it gets dark.
Good, you're not welcome here, keep your funny FERAL money, its done enough to wreck this place as it is.
Idaho was here before tourism was invented, and Idaho will still be here when tourism dies right along with that FERAL "money" that's breathing its last now. And guess what Wilma, I'll still be here.
I'll be watching the trophy yuppie homes falling apart.
I find the right has come to celebrate the basest ignorance still weighing down on our civilization; but the left has become a bully as it pokes fun at that ignorance--instead of trying to educate...
Timmins is little Barry Coe.
Jed-
Trying to educate ignorant fools is pointless.
Conservatives are ideologically driven, and as you just saw they could care less if your401k implodes or the country goesinto a massive double dip recession.
The global warming debate is a perfect example.... How's that been working out?
All they do is a pay some science whore to say whatever they want. This is a no nothing movement of backward hicks, racist southerners, and 50 something fat white people that hate the fact that there is a black man running this country. They hate wolves the same way. it's a cultural thing. They can't help it. They want to take the country back! Take it back from what? Or who?
As for boycotting Idaho spuds, if teh enviros keep working to destroy the food production in this country, we probably will not want you to have potatoes from anywhere....in fact there will not be enough to go around.
Take the country back from who ?
How can anyone take something back which was never theirs in the first place ? And if you believe in that fallacy why is it you behave as its yours and not theirs as well ?
Saying I don't care about your 401Ks and hoping they implode is redundant, the default, will happen no matter what or who manages the government.
You're blaming the other half of the party you believe in for everything that is wrong with this country, and you're half right.
Your philosophy thinks the debt is limitless, no end to it. It ends. You'll see. There is collateral for all debts.
I'm sorry but I'm not going to agree with your extremist "government is bad" argument. The people that created this debt crisis are now blaming the current administration for this massive debt. We had a balanced budget 15 years ago and a projected end to this 15 trillion debt nextyear. Bush gave all the money back to the wealthy as they go on with their lives oblivious to how real working people live. Add in two unpaid for wars and an unfunded drug prescription plan and an economy shedding 700,000 jobs a month which required a stimulus and here we are. Meanwhile the no nothing party is claiming that cutting will grow the economy.....The unfunded Medicade, Medicare costs can be tweaked and adjusted without cutting benefits. Social Security is solvent for two more decades. The Republican party thinks that to grow the economy you have to cut taxes, take away regulation, and magically the economy will grow.... Meanwhile Lummis, Simpson and other airheads in Congress are passing light bulb legisltion and trying to strip the EPA and Clean Water Act..... We need a common sense moderate plan for the future not a repeal of the New Deal and decimation of entitlement programs.
Somehow this Global effort seems a mite large for a few right wingers working in a controlled congress, and few hunters. You're a tad bit late to the show Wilma.
Quigley Carroll - Georgetown University Professor, Historian who lucidly explained the plan of the New World Order ( Return to the Dark Ages pre Reformation in truth, under the dictator ship of the Pope, the HOLY SEE, Caesar of the NWO) and how the CFR is implementing it. The book is Tragedy and Hope, over 1400 pages, I still have mine, should have been named Tragedy and Dictatorship.
“There does exist and has existed for a generation, an international Anglophile network which operates, to some extent, in the way the radical Right believes the Communists act. In fact, this network, which we may identify as the Round Table groups, has no aversion to cooperating with the Communists, or any other groups, and frequently does so.I know of the operations of this network because I have studied it for 20 years and was permitted for two years, in the early 1960s, to examine its papers and secret record. -Carroll Quigley, Georgetown University history professor (deceased), in Tragedy and Hope: A History of the World in Our Time, 1966, p.950
[...] In addition to these pragmatic goals, the powers of financial {Collectivist not Free Market} capitalism had another far-reaching aim, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole. This system was to be controlled in a feudalist fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert, by secret agreements arrived at in frequent private meetings and conferences. The apex of the system was the Bank for International Settlements in Basle, Switzerland, a private bank owned and controlled by the worlds' central banks which were themselves private corporations. The growth of financial capitalism made possible a centralization of world economic control and use of this power for the direct benefit of financiers and the indirect injury of all other economic groups.”
-Tragedy and Hope, p.324
Resources for substantiation of the world wide conspiracy; United Nations Parliamentary Assembly, over seventy years of data. The European Parliament, centuries of documented data. The CON-gress of the United States of America, and the CON-gress of the U.S. Government Corporation.World Historians, University Professors, both openly acknowledged and suppressed. Evidence in fact, no theorizing required. Its out in the open for those with minds, eyes, and ears, requires determination and motivation, apathetic persons need not apply. The Inquisition against the freedom of man continues.
This is the real world, the one you ignore.
They must crash the global economy to attain their goals, if you insist on blaming me, giving me credit for this great feat, so be it then, some idiots will blame the wrong people with their last dying breath.
First of all we need to end all foreign aid except emergency aid for starving folks. We need to end all grants and awards of federal money for anything. We need to end tax free status of multi million/billion dollar businesses. We need to end income tax and go to a national flat sales tax. You buy it, you pay tax on it.
Finger pointing at either party does nothing, politicians are all too willing to buy their offices with money taken out of our pockets, no matter what party they belong to. Term limits and no benefits beyond health insurance while employed and payments into SS, no retirement.
We simply must stop the assault on our food and energy supply, we will be the ones in famine like Africa.
I wouldn't wish that on any of you.
You'll see, they hate Liberty.
The research is out there which proves Rick Perry is a fraud. His Environmental record is pathetic. His jobs record includes luring minimum wage jobs away from other states. He closed his budget deficit with Federal stimulus dollars that he consistently bashes and rails against..... They are at the bottom of the heap as far as insured citizens and towns in Texas have laid off their entire police force.....
Timmins- I will investigate this Tragedy and Hope. I bet we have more in common than you think.....As far as hunters go, I have never ever criticized hunters that kill to eat. it's the lazy pathetic trophy hunters that I despise, those that are always taking shortcuts and hunting unethically. Believe it or not, I used to hunt in my earlier years
I also know that the BLM spends 64 million dollars a year on horses is part of the "welfare" equation. I also know that the BLM is spending tons of money defending law suits brought on by your ilk driving up the cost of BLM lands. These frivolous law suits are part of being under the microscope of the environmental obstructionist that look for anything any technicality that can be sued for to keep their 1000s of environmental lawyers/employees (obstructionist) paid by Equal Access to Justice Act (taxpayer) dollars, again part of the welfare equation. I also know that bleeding hearts are making it more and more difficult to control coyotes and wolves THEN have the audacity to complain about the cost to the BLM & its effect on so called "Welfare" ranching.
Please Tony, enlighten me! What do YOU know about "welfare" ranching..... You're your worst enemy.... I believe you are just like William Huard & only believe the garbage you and your cohort spew on the anti-hunting anti ranching hate sites ...... where Huard leads the chorus! I've seen enough of his vomit on these sites to only conclude that the man cannot and will not see reason!
Tony, please read the part about public opinion.... it's filtered out on the anti hunting anti-ranching hate sites.
http://kuow.org/northwestnews.php?storyID=139507259
William please let us know when you have trained the coyote and especially the wolf to be civil, respect the fences, property and property lines it crosses in its daily wanderings! Until then, expect the rancher defend himself and his neighbors with bias!
I read a book years ago called "Incident at Eagle Ranch" Man and Predator in the American West..... you can find it on ebay for less than ten dollars.....There were these sheep ranchers.... they were millionaires, but came off like they were living week to week and always whining that coyotes were putting them out of business......They would have the FEDS poison everything....hawks, bobcats, wolves, eagles just to keep their paranoid delusion of predator control alive. It blew my mind when this one section described how they would kill coyotes, open them up and put sheep fur inside their stomachs so they could document coyotes killing their sheep- these people are the real environmental terrorists
I wonder why they would sabotage themselves like that, unless that was their purpose all along, who looks foolish ? Ranching, subsidized or not.
In Order to have a Global Governed Society "they" who Researchers such as Quigley identifies must first convince the masses Nationalism is toxic. Where does this environmentalist dogma arise from ? From " them." On the surface it looks great, we delve into it and its nothing even the most rabid environmentalist would want themselves. Its Global Tyranny. The evidence shows that "they" are not building a Global Democracy, a Global Conservative Republic, not even close. Hungry people will accept "their" Global Dictatorship. I could except a Global Democratic Society, or the Global Conservative Republic, so could most researching this agenda. Its not going to be. And we can't stop "them." They have mass ignorance on their side. Most won't believe this until its a done deal. Others believe its going to be Peaceful Utopia finally, unfortunately man cannot create Peace, never gonna happen. 5500-6000 years of men trying, some of us get it.
{ "} Utopians are wishful thinkers par excéllence. They believe in building houses out of ostensibly good intentions. They choose their actions because (1) the immediate results please them, and (2) they find within their beliefs a rationale for the actions. They believe the rationales make their actions reasonable, they avoid countervailing thoughts (in particular, countervailing beliefs), and they expect others to do the same. When substantively criticized, they often condemn the critics as “name callers” engaging in “personal attacks” — utopians' flimsy proxies whereby they condemn judgement per se (evidently too obvious a self-contradiction to be spoken aloud, or thought, plainly and consciously). They cultivate and practice an enduring denial of the many obvious faults and failures apparent whenever and wherever their programs are put into practice. They persist in their rationally insupportable convictions in large part because the expectation of sublime reward is itself pleasurable, and doubting one's cherished convictions is inherently painful. Because utopianism is so militantly shallow, and because of the inherent contradictions among the practical mechanisms on which the various utopian objectives are predicated, and furthermore because the wage of earnest utopianism is economic ruin, utopians all exhibit breathtaking hypocrisy and self-contradiction. Their chief protection from charges of hypocrisy is their refusal to spell out their principles (“Yes we can!”, cried the Obamanistas, but their slogan scrupulously omitted their position and aims). Their self-contradiction is unsurprising in any case because of the philosophical and practical dissonance of the paradise concept with the predicates of viable life. In short, Utopia is no-place, so to exist while espousing Utopia is intrinsically hypocritical. Utopian socialism is, in a word, self-defeating.{ "}
Get ready for the Republican promised Utopia shortly, "Yes we can return America to its foundational beliefs."
Yeah right.
What kind of RETARDS exist in this world that would let anyone get away with this?
We live on a planet that has an ecosystem. Animals eat other animals. We do it all the time. Why try to wipe out a species in an area just because you want to?
Fucking disgusting. Makes me sick to know people like this ever get power. Wolves are beautiful creatures in nature and we have no business "declaring war" on them
Can they be called in using electronic varmint calls just like a coyote? Is trapping on the table too?
Todd, you don't see the comments you want to see because wolves are NOT "devastating livestock," period. All this wolf hysteria or crying wolf is pure myth. Sure, a wolf attacks and kills an occasional cow or sheep... so do unruly ranch dogs on occasion. Documentation of wolf predation on livestock is hard to come by. Claims of wolf predation are plentiful but seek documentation and you just rarely get it. Ranchers are compensated by the government or environmental groups like Defenders of Wildlife to the tunes of hundreds of thousands of dollars. What are rancher's crying about, anyway. Always ask for solid documentation of the claimed wolf kill and you will receive documentation so rarely it will open your eyes.
Somsai- Are you actually inferring that you have the skill and or intelligence to actually bag a wolf? As you probably know wolves and coyotes are smarter than the average knuckle dragging trapper- but maybe you can take a picture
http://www.fws.gov/mountain-prairie/species/mammals/wolf/WeeklyRpt06/wk072806.htm
The Caribou were native here, we brought more in from right across the border, not from several hundred miles north where a DIFFERENT species of Caribou roams. Are you denying the difference between the woodland caribou and the barren ground caribou? Is a caribou, a caribou, a caribou also? Nice try though. And yes, there disappearance has been directly linked to wold predation.
Simple minds seem to let obvious details escape them.
Another assumption I see, sorry Wilma, but I haven't been around a computer since last Friday when I left to spend the weekend in the mountains you 'claim' to spend so much time in. Another SoCal two week a year wildlife and nature expert. Yet, has the gall to attempt to marginalize those who actually live here and spend one to two hundred days a year up there.
Perry, if you want to see wildlife, get off your rear end and hike, wolves are rather easy to find if you have any knowledge of the area and the gumption to put a few miles on your boots. I found them, got one all picked out for next month. If you think your 'seeing' is more important than the management, you better be willing to fork over some money for a change. Wildlife 'watchers' are non-contributing beneficiaries of the hunters who bear the costs.
You all REALLY need to get a life........it was a beautiful weekend in the great outdoors. You all want to whine about it, but never seem to actually get out there. Maybe that says all we need to really know about it and whom is really being affected by this debacle.
That's the problem with wold's, you have to watch them every minute...... WTF is a wold........
That's just a fact of life here in Wisconsin! The funny thing about your natural cause's theory, you wouldn't expect it to spike on ranches where predators are thick as thieves. That's what your buddy Mech said testifying in court!
Todd, Yes, I would love to see an article on that. The running of cattle threw fences, the cattle that abort from the stress, the vet bills, hiring more help to watch over cattle in wolf prone areas, the stress on cattle that refuse to go into certain areas where food is plentiful & so are predators, lower selling weights of cattle coming out of these areas. Hey William Huard, did Carter mention all this stuff in his book? If not, they must not exist for Carters book is the gospel on predation!
Most of these nutters have direct ties or direct advocacy for Western Watersheds Project. Which is simply about driving ALL people off the lands with their delusional wildlands project.
Wolves......wolves are nothing but tools to these eco-terrorists.
I am anything but a hypocrite. Woodland caribou were native to Idaho, as WAS spp.irr. You are the one claiming apples and oranges.
I wouldn't support them importing barren land caribou anymore than I support the importation of spp. occ.
Or...are you actually claiming wooldland caribou and barren land caribou are the same? You ignored the important part of the facts for the delusional twisting of what you WANT to see.
You ignore the FACT, that pre-introduction of wolves, it was suggested by SCIENTISTS, that wolves should be brought from the great lakes region to the West as they were more representative of the native wolves here. It has only been since that time that the 'science' was rewritten to fit the agenda and make the claim a wolf is a wolf is a wolf. It is ironic that the very criminals that conducted the crime were the ones in charge of rewritting the 'science'
"Using this example he did dispel the notion hunters and myself have had that the wrong wolf was used for introduction. Dr. Geist said we could have used a smaller wolf but with the enormous food supply available any wolf put into this environment would grow quite large and have a similar impact on our elk and moose."
You see I actually post under my real name, I do not hide behind anonymity, nor do I pretend to be something I am not. Call them.......I have hammered them on a multitude of non-native species, including turkeys, quail, pheasants, brook trout, rainbow trout, pike and the list goes on and on. And I have also had at least a dozen conversations with them about shutting down our cow elk seasons. If anyone wishes I wouldn't make a peep, they work for IDFG. Have you ever wondered why they so quickly came out with the 1000 wolves numbers, when for years they walked the PC line of "at least" 750. It had to do with a little catching them on video in a conversation I and another person were having with them. A real "oh shit" moment for IFANGS
If you really want to bring Geist into this, we sure can. Because I am sure you deny about 95% of what he says don't you? Just more cherry picking Salle, nothing more, nothing less. How about his opinions on management of wolves? or diseases? or their real impact on other wildlife? or the plethora of his other information? Nope, of course not, lets pick out one comment, and one that is theoretical to boot, and hold it out there like some trophy. The fact still remains, the USFWS went against recommendations by biologists and brought in a different wolf.
You remind me of one of those people who pick out one line in the bible, and attempt to twist it around to serve their purpose. BUt, then again, this is your religion, so I am not really surprises.
The fact remains, the caribou transplant was apples for apples, the wolves were not. And the fact remains, wolves were the nail in the coffin for the woodland caribou in N. Idaho. You can try and deny it away, but that is an exercise in futility. It was so very hard for them to come clean with that information, but they eventually did. Just another victim of predator mediated competition.
Which species is next?
I swear, I believe some of you folks would shoot "to kill" your own mother if she inconvenienced your cows. Of course, I'm exaggerating to make a point.... but for God's sake guys.... the sun does not set on you and your ranch or farm. No matter how much you wish it... it just ain't so. It's ok to you to bring in cattle by the millions and displace deer, elk, and other native herbivorous animals by allowing and encouraging your cattle to eat everything in sight all over Wyoming or wherever possible. But a thousand native wolves where tens of thousands used to roam make you cry like babies. This is the reality for the rest of us (the vast majority of citizens), even those that might, like me, eat your delicious beef from time to time... And we pay dear to eat it. As big as those ranches great-great-great grandpappy & grandmammy left you are, the world is much bigger still. The sun does not rise and set on your Ponderosas. There are thousands of other "ways of life" to consider than your own selfish, privileged lives. Some pof started with zero land and will die wil zero land. So what are we? Vermin in your eyes? There are roughly 300,000,000 of us in these United States of America. Be careful, ranchers. You don't want to "P" off too many of us ya know. We buy your beef, subsidize your ranches and farms, pay for wolf kill, bail you out if a blizzard, flood, drought or other natural dsaster stikes your operations. Pretty cushy conditions if you ask me. But of course, you did not ask me. Not many businesses and especially the majority of the 300,000,000 of us get subsidies when disaster hits, or if we get dog bit on the way to work or get hit by a drunk driver on our daily drive to work on hazardous highways. Most of us have to eat the risks of living and making a living. What makes ranchers so special? I really want to know. Educate me.
Obviously protected predators do not realize when they are killing another endnagered species. Ravens are protected by the migratory bird laws and yet they are preying severely on sage grouse that enviros want listed.
It is time for the ESA to be tossed, and start using a little common sense instead of fund raising out of taxpayer pockets for enviro groups to contribute nothing but brain washing the suspecptible and harassing food and energy producers.
If you do not like beef don't eat it, but leave other folks alone.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2763790/posts?page=1
And there we have it, the very foundation of the ideology and opinion of the eco's.
Freedom and private property rights, you can not have the first without the second, as they are the very crux of what this country was founded on.
Freedom......it is really nothing more than my not having to be subjected to your opinion in the ways I run my life, spend my money, or what can be done with the property I buy with that property (money).
These malcontents would obviously be completely content with the government owning 100% on the west, driving every human and their property off of the landscape so their opinion could be implemented. See the 'Wildlands Project'
The theft by the federal government of what we now refer to as public lands was done under the premise of multi-use and managed resource use and development. Now you people come along and want that reduced to 'your use'. They now consider 'multi-use' as allowing both hiking and biking, maybe even horses. But they are working to eliminate biking because you can technically meet the definition of multi by having two, no need for three.
Freedom may not be perfect, but it is a damn sight better than the alternative. So, yes, the sun does rise and fall on my private property, for my freedom is reliant on it doing so. The emotional position of the author claims people are declaring war on the worshiped wolves, which is bunk. But there is definitely a war on freedom in this country, and this issue is but one of the tools.
Let me tell you about some of the other 'ways of life'. Mine has now changed forever as I have now been forced to become diligent in my participation in a process that steals huge amounts of time away from my family and the other things I would rather be attending too. I now spend hours reading outcome based 'science', writing and talking to politicians, and watch dogging game departments. You folks have already changed my 'way of life' and enough is enough, you will not also steal my rights.
Your cattle and sheep dogs came from wolves. Show wolves a little respect. Talk about folks that are control freaks. Ranching is all about control of everything... land (even public lands), water, animals and those folks in Cheyenne and D.C., folks we call legislators. Ranchers would do well to spend more time out watching their cattle and sheep (like their ggggreat grandpas did) and less time in the halls of congress, at both state and federal levels.
"Little Barry Coe", you did never explain why the caribou were put on the endangered species list in the first place? Care to now? You are aware that they were put on the esl LONG BEFORE WOLF REINTRODUCTION RIGHT??? It was not because of the wolves and you know it. It was because of human activity and human activity alone. There ya go cherry picking again. I know of no species that was put on the esl solely because of wolves. You clearly have some kind of hate for the wolf. Yeah, continue to deny it all you want...
Another LIE.
There is more than just the physical difference between irremotus and occidentalis--there also have been behavioral differences. Irremotus may have been more similar in behavior to another southern gray-wolf subspecies, the Mexican Wolf, then to the wolves to the north.
In the Mexican Gray wolf Recovery Plan, the behavior of this wolf subspecies, Canis lupus baileyi, was described as being very different than Canadian wolves. "Mexican wolf packs contain smaller and fewer individuals and are less cohesive in nature than the case reported for northern subspecies of wolves...Mexican wolves are found singly or in small packs of two or three, but usually not larger than five or six at the most. They are NEVER in the larger packs as reported of wolf subspecies of Canada and Alaska, which can run in numbers of 20 or more.
Sightings reported in Yellowstone Park from 1836 to the 1990's pre-introduction, paint a picture of wolves without cohesive pack behavior.
In the early 1900's federal trapper Vernon Bailey reported that there were never in western Wyoming were usually found in pairs. Bailey wrote of his visit to the Upper Green River Valley in March, 1906: Fresh tracks were seen almost daily, USUALLY of wolves as pairs, but in one case a band of nine. Between March 24 and April 21, 1906, four dens, containing 32 wolf pups, were found, with two old wolves at each den; and evidently there were two or three other dens in the valley.
"Men who have made a business of hunting wolves for the bounty report that two wolves would be doing sentinel duty by dens."
Of the 148 reports of wolves in Yellowstone from 1836-1926, where the number of animals could be determined, only ten reports were of six or more animals together in a wolf pack. None of these ten reports occurred late in the year, and could be explained as an adult pair with their pups of that year.
In addition, all of the 881 reports of wolf occurrences in the park from 1927 -1993 pre-introduction, were of one to five animals in a pack.
In summary, the large pack size or pack cohesiveness is a behavioral characteristic unique to the Northern Variety of wolves and the subspecies that was imported in from Canada.
Canada wolves are hunted and trapped, and still retain the larger pack size. This is thought to be an inheritable trait, which is markedly significantly different than the indigenous Southern wolf variety that lived in Yellowstone and the Rocky Mountains, known as irremotus.
The large pack cohesiveness reported as common in Canadian wolves was NOT reported for the wolves native to YNP.
Yes, facts really bother those whose opinions cannot be supported by facts..
I read your comment. Ranchers are generously reimbursed for livestock depredation by wolves?
Please explain how this program works? I'm interested in your "real life experience of dealing with USFWS/DOW compensation programs.
GEIST: There’s no question about that that this is part and parcel of the nature of wolves. When they have the opportunity to kill in excess, just simply kill and leave, kill and leave, and go on killing, they will do so. This has nothing to do with Yellowstone wolves, Russian wolves — this is a universal characteristic of wolves, period. By the way, grizzly bears will do the same thing.
outcome-based science.... I have to laugh.
CSPO vision statement
How can science and technology most effectively contribute to an improved quality of life for the greatest number of people?
You clearly do not know about science. You may have a PhD but so what if you don't know the history and essence of scientific inquiry. Science is anything but outcome based. Science is the one domain where bias and agenda have no place. Sure imperfect human being allow their bias to creep in but scientists worth their salt as such do their honest best to keep pre-conceived notions and agendas out of their work.
Innocence about Science is the worst crime today.
Sir Charles Percy Snow (1905-80) English novelist and scientist.
Great scientists are those rare individuals who see answers before others see the question. They do not need a bunch of blathering bureaucrats telling tell what to study or how to study it.
I beg you Barry, if you have the attention span, to read all of this lengthy comment thoughtfully.
Barry you are so misapplying the CSPO vision when you bring it in to this discussion. the CSPO is a G. W. Bush era conservative think tank vision of how science should be pursued and applied in terms of the best collective good for one species and one species only "human beings." I am not saying that this consortium of folks in ill-intended but their vision is what is it is. and again here it is, "how can science and technology most effectively contribute to an improved quality of life for the greatest number of people?"
I feel apologietic for even addressing this topic in the context of wolves and yet obligated to expose the insidiousness of your bringing "outcome-based science" into this discussion.
First of all, the idea of outcome-based science is an insult to science itself.
But, Barry, I am going to show this Forum's readers what you are talking about sir.
Below is the CSPO's own discussion: My comment will be between the ~~~ lines... a way for me to distinguish my comments from the CSPO's discussion. Fair enough?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
CSPO vision statement
How can science and technology most effectively contribute to an improved quality of life for the greatest number of people?
~~~
greatest # of people: one genus, one species... people there is no mention of wolves or wildlife in the CSPO's discussion of its mission... it's all about people.
~~~
This is the organizing question for the consortium for science, policy, & outcomes (CSPO). The consortium is devoted to enhancing the capacity of public policy to link scientific research to beneficial societal outcomes.
~~~
mistake #one (and a G. W. Bush era agenda) mixing politic and science
~~~
The consortium creates knowledge, cultivates public discourse, and fosters policies to help decision makers and institutions grapple with the immense power and importance of science and technology as society charts a course for the future.
~~~
CSPO portrays science as a powerful problem to be "grappled with." Laughing. Technology yes, science no. Most folks honestly do not know the difference between the two... not even some so-called scientists.
~~~
introduction
Man's power to achieve good or to inflict evil surpasses the brightest hopes and the sharpest fears of all ages. We can turn rivers in their courses, level mountains to the plains. Oceans and land and sky are avenues for our colossal commerce. Disease diminishes and life lengthens. Yet the promise of this life is imperiled by the very genius that has made it possible.
~~~
The above paragraph is quite true.
~~~
nations amass wealth. labor sweats to create, and turns out devices to level not only mountains but also cities. science seems ready to confer upon us, as its final gift, the power to erase human life from this planet. – President Dwight D. Eisenhower
~~~
Eisenhower is insightful above but it is not science or scientific knowledge that threatens to "erase human life from this planet." It is what humans do with that knowledge that is the threat.
~~~
science and technology (S & T) have become the most powerful transforming forces in society, allowing people to escape fundamental need; fostering innovation and economic growth; fighting scourges like smallpox, polio, and aids; and joining billions of people together in information and communication networks that serve democracy as well as commerce. but the profound changes brought about by S & T have led as well to negative impacts–often unanticipated. from the industrial revolution to the information revolution, the march of scientific and technological progress has left in its wake unemployment, cultural dislocation, economic inequity, environmental destruction, even war and disease.
~~~
the above is true but it is not science or scientific knowledge that brought about the destruction, it is what humans have decided to do with that science that has created the havoc. in other words, technology is the outcome of science and it is at the level of deciding what to do with scientific knowledge that technology offers a fork in the road in terms of how society will apply what it knows (or thinks it knows).
~~~
Just as science and technology affect our world, they are affected by public policy decisions about how research funds are allocated, priorities established, the research enterprise organized, knowledge communicated and applied, and accountability maintained. Policy decisions influence the societal consequences–the outcomes–of scientific research in realms as diverse as the economy, the environment, health, governance, national security, and social structure.
~~~
Do you see the waters of science being muddied yet?
~~~
While it is clear that S & T contribute to large scale societal transformations, our current understanding of how they do so is inadequate, and this leaves us unprepared for the task of planning for the future. Today, decision makers lack the tools necessary to plan for, respond to, and integrate into public policy the dynamo of S & T progress that continually reshapes our world.
Our incomplete understanding of the impacts and effects of S & T leads to such paradoxical outcomes as aids drugs that work in post-industrial cultures but are thus far largely irrelevant to the developing world due to challenges of cost and distribution, and genetically modified crops that have the potential to boost nutrition and agricultural productivity but are fiercely opposed on cultural and environmental grounds.
~~~
Above are great examples of the why science should drive politics and not the other way around. Science is, compared to politics, pure and undefiled by opinions.
~~~
Our lack of understanding also results in disparities between science goals and achievements. In the u.s. and abroad, much publicly funded science is explicitly promoted and justified in terms of the quest for specified societal outcomes, such as those listed in the table below. The enormous challenge of using science to contribute to such desired outcomes rests upon the ability to implement appropriate science policies.
~~~
opinion and desire whether individual or society are not outcomes of science nor necessarily guided by it. the quest for knowledge is the beginning and end of pure science. the application scientific knowledge is unfortunately tainted by politics. for example 31 known individuals of the Wyoming pocket gopher exist on the entire planet and thousands of oil wells are slated to cover essentially every acre of this small creatures known habitat. science (even common sense) says these creatures are destined for extinction in the near future. The ESA USFWS says the USFWS must protect them if this is the case. yet the usfws found these 31 known creatures, "not warranted for protection under the ESA." this is a clear case where politics drove science, the opposite of how we should apply science. if we continue to fail to respect the value of pure and unadulterated science we humans, in fact, as Eisenhower put it, may use the technology science made possible, "erase human life from this planet."
now, reading on will open the eyes to the fact i stated earlier. this mission of the CSPO is to lay groundwork necessary to control what science is deemed "good" or "bad" for society. Only the blind will not see the connection to the G. W. Bush era efforts to diminish the reach of science. Knowledge is not good or bad in any sense. People are good and bad in every sense,
the fact that this so-called scientific think tank dares use the term "outcome-based science" makes their mission and their scholarly banter laughable. if this group wishes to advance science, period, fine. but this group wants the power to steer funding toward science that benefits a purely human-oriented agenda and to use politics to do it. i think everyone on this forum might agree that there is already too much politics involved science. i give credit to this group for being smart enough to realize they cannot control all scientists interests. so they have decided that if they can control their funding they control the scientists and drive them investigate scientific matters important to the human oriented group. it's classic G. W. Bush era strategy.
~~~
desired societal outcomes promoted by national science agencies increase quality and years of healthy life.
eliminate health disparities. (us health and human services department)
ensure a safe and affordable food supply. (us agriculture department)
foster a reliable energy system that is environmentally and economically sustainable. (us energy department)
reduce the impacts of hazards caused by natural processes and human actions. (us interior department)
conserve and manage wisely the nation's coastal and marine resources to ensure sustainable economic opportunities. (national oceanic and atmospheric administration)
improve the health of the european population. (european union biomed 2 program)
while the existing science enterprise includes highly effective mechanisms for judging the quality of science itself, there are few mechanisms aimed at understanding and assessing the linkages between scientific activities and desired outcomes. such assessment processes are necessary to ensure progress toward goals. growing demand for accountability can be recognized in congressional action (e.g., the government performance and results act) and in public advocacy and activism (e.g., controversies over stem cell technologies, genetically modified organisms, and environmental regulations).
~~~
And if you cannot see where this is going, pity. We are already living in a strangely scientifically sophisticated dark age, where science discovery has taken a back seat to "technological entrancement" (Thomas Berry, Dream of the Earth). CSPO wants to use politics and public to control scientific curiosity.
~~~
Arizona
CSPO is the only intellectual center dedicated to understanding the linkages between S & T and its effects on society, and to developing knowledge and tools that can more effectively connect progress in S & T to progress toward desired societal outcomes. The center draws on the intellectual resources of Arizona State University and other institutions for the scholarly foundation to assess and foster outcome-based policies across a broad portfolio of publicly funded scientific research. The center's core commitment is to generating useable knowledge for real-world decision making.
~~~
What the CSPO is really saying is that, "the center's core commitment is to determine what is useable knowledge for real-world decision making." Then, they will generate that science. Good plan... if you are Hitler.
~~~
Science lessons
Science and technology are demonstrably objective and effective; but they're unquestionably bound up with power relations as social systems. – Richard Rhodes, Pulitzer prize-winning historian.
~~~
What the CSPO is really saying is this: but we don't like demonstrably objective and effective science. Note: the CSPO is very wrong to claim that technology is objective. Unlike science technology is agenda driven and rightfully so. Science and technology are almost always mentioned in tandem but they are, in fact, two very different endeavors.
~~~
Federal science policy since world war ii has been dominated by the idea that more science automatically generates better societal outcomes. But connections between scientific advance and societal outcomes are complex and often surprising. Consider the following examples:
desired outcomes can drive science: for 50 years, the goal of materials research in the u.s. has been to produce smaller and faster devices for advanced military use. desired outcomes were visualized in military terms alone, and focused on durability, radiation protection, and other specialized attributes. the military definition of the problem drove the science toward sophisticated silicon-based, high temperature materials with tremendous capacity for miniaturization. we committed to this path and remain on it, without having considered if it is optimal for a broader set of outcomes, such as environmental sustainability or electrical efficiency. similarly, in the 1960s the world set out to increase agricultural productivity, and scientific research gave us the green revolution. but research agendas did not consider environmental, cultural, or socioeconomic impacts, and so the same research breakthroughs that helped to feed the world also led to environment degradation and the destabilization of small farming communities world wide. CSPO will help decision makers craft research agendas that respond to the broadest possible range of desired societal outcomes.
~~~
While I agree with virtually everything in the paragraph above, it is unconscionable that scientific curiosity and inquiry be subjected to the whims of a group of, perhaps, well-meaning folks to decide who and what get funded for research. Talk about impairing one's "way of life." For example, the next sentence below addresses this.
~~~
The societal value of new knowledge is determined by how it is used, and by whom: consider the consequences of advances in atmospheric science that now allow the effects of El Niño to be predicted up to a year in advance. In Peru, for example, industrial fisheries used el niño forecasts to track the migration of fish. The result was economic gain combined with more serious depletion of fish populations. Moreover, while companies that owned large fishing vessels could take advantage of the forecasts, local fishing communities could not. The forecasts thus undermined sustainability and magnified inequity. Again, the difficulty comes from a narrow definition of the problem that did not include consideration of social context, and thus did not lead to desired societal outcomes. No one asked what type of climate research would best contribute to sustainability and social equity. CSPO asks such questions.
~~~
But of course... the above paragraph assumes that knowledge, if it does not immediately benefit everyone is somehow unjust. This is a deeply flawed view of knowledge and science.
~~~
The definition of the problem helps determine the relevance of the research: combating aids requires more than an understanding of the virus. Yet our research program on aids began with a narrow, biomedical definition of the problem. Because of that definition, society now is unable to help most of the tens of millions of aids patients throughout the world: the remarkable drugs created by biomedical research to slow the course of the disease are so costly that they are available only to a tiny fraction of aids sufferers. Fifteen years ago, if we had envisioned aids as a problem of socioeconomics, culture, and globalization, we could have developed a very different science policy agenda. combating the virus would have been one part of a comprehensive approach that also would have addressed distribution systems, intellectual property, and human behavior. our current science policy precluded such a broad perspective. CSPO will work to encourage policy makers and scientists to include societal context in the definition of scientific problems.
~~~
I am astounded. Science and the history of science demonstrates this clearly, was never intended, necessarily, to be a solution for social ills. Rather science is a tool that most often moves our understanding of our world in grains of sand sized increments... and on very rare occasions moves a mountain. This group is so steeped in politics and social agenda (perhaps with great intentions) that it has lost sight of what science really is. They, of course, are not alone.
~~~
These examples have important implications for policy design. The materials science story indicates that choice of science objectives in the short term can constrain our options in the long term. The case of climate forecasting shows that knowledge about the potential users of information can help determine what types of information would be most broadly beneficial. The history of aids research suggests that integrating societal context into the definition of research problems can amplify the benefits of the research results.
~~~
The CSPO is attempting to fill the clear waters of science with the mud of opinion and/or the poison of politics. In either case you cannot see through it or swallow it (or shouldn't).
~~~
A New Approach
We are being propelled into this new century with no plan, no control, no brakes. – Bill Joy, co-founder and chief scientist, Sun Microsystems
~~~
Interesting tidbit; Bill Joy once eagerly repaired my jeep's windshield wiper mechanism during a blizzard on I-17 as I and my sister and mother were driving to Flagstaff from Phoenix. Super guy!
~~~
Despite the formative influence of S & T on the character and quality of modern life, there has been no institution devoted to understanding and enhancing the connections between the advance of science and technology, and the achievement of desired societal outcomes. the consortium for science, policy, & outcomes represents a first step toward filling this vacuum. The consortium aims to foster new knowledge, public discourse, and policy formulation to help decision makers grapple with the immense power and importance of S&T;as democratic society seeks to chart a course for the future.
~~~
The potential for good or bad outcomes from CSPO's efforts is determined by the people that comprise its group. The jury is out on this, of course. The troubling aspect is that this group seeks to control scientific inquiry. This is a very scary notion. No less frightening than when the religions of the world resist with words and weapons, the progression of science.
~~~
How is it that a force of such overwhelming power and significance–the transforming power of scientific and technological advance–could be so neglected in the realm of public policy? The most important reason lies in the pervasive assumption that more knowledge and innovation lead directly and automatically to desired societal outcomes. In reality, S&T;makes its way into society through institutions, enterprises, and other social structures that are themselves changed by the course of scientific progress. This is an entirely dynamic system, complex and nonlinear in its essence.
~~~
Again science is portrayed as a "force to be reckoned with" or, i.e., controlled. It is all about control with this group.
~~~
There are uncommon opportunities now to harness the synergy between science and public policy to address contemporary development issues such as the growing divide between rich and poor, the feminization of poverty, overpopulation, [and] climate change. – M.S. Swaminathan, "Father of the Green Revolution," 1999 Volvo Environmental Prize Laureate
~~~
But Swaminathan does not propose to squelch or quash scientific curiosity or inquiry via the manipulation of appropriations, except, perhaps, to increase funding generally.
~~~
Until now, our policy regarding S & T was focused almost exclusively on increasing the supply of knowledge and innovation. This system has led to disconnects between scientific progress and societal progress: spectacular advances in biomedical research in the u.s. have been paralleled by skyrocketing health care costs, expanding inequity in access to health care, and mediocre levels of public health. Similarly, astonishing gains in information and communications technologies have been accompanied by declining educational achievement and stagnant levels of public awareness of issues of political, scientific, and cultural import. While science is not the cause of such problems, outcome-based science policies could make science a more effective contributor to their solution.
~~~
It is good to see the CSPO, late in its discussion, acknowledge that, "while science is not the cause of such problems, outcome-based science policies could make science a more effective contributor to their solution."
I can agree that making wise decisions about "what to study" is well, wise, having a relatively small group decide what is wise is a slippery slope and could produce bad outcomes as well as good ones. In the right hands good, in the wrong hands, bad.
I believe in a free and fair market. I believe, more-so, in free and fair scientific inquiry. We simply don't need to regulate scientific curiosity. If anything, we need to nurture it.
~~~
Historically, society has been content to react to the complexities created by advances in S & T as they arose. Yet the acceleration of scientific and technological progress increasingly renders such a laissez-faire approach untenable. the potential of such fields as information technology, biotechnology, and nanotechnology to transform society in a very short time challenges our ability to understand and shape our common destiny. there is an urgent need for open discourse and creative thinking to avoid the reaction, backlash, and disruption that can compromise both technological promise and civil society. the consortium for science, policy, & outcomes was created to address this need.
~~~
Please people... read the history of science. Political and religious leaders, since the rise of man, have done all sorts of evil to scientists ranging from hanging them to ostracizing them.
It was heresy to claim the earth was round, that rats do not spontaneously generate from dirty rags, that disease was not due to some evil one had committed or one's father or mother, or that the sun did not revolve around the earth. It was heresy, too, to suggest that women could be accomplished scientists, or that black persons could live free, or that dinosaurs actually roamed the earth. All of these scientific facts would have been accepted centuries before they were and thousands of human lives would have been saved and been improved had not some self-righteous, self-serving and arrogant politicians decided said science was "bad for society." Regardless of how well-intended this group might be, the CSPO is leading us back into those dark ages.
The worst idea ever is to put religious leaders, politicians, and worse, zealots in scientists' clothing in charge of scientific curiosity.
~~~
If Barry had his way, it appears there would never be any more public funding for studies to objectively measure the overall costs of domestic sheep or cattle wolf kills to society at large. That public funding would likely be directed to more ranching subsidies or studies showing how to more effectively speak to the public to get them to hate wolves too.
Barry, you are being found out and you don't even seem to realize it.
WHAT IS SCIENCE? Listen to some of the best in history.
Science is organized knowledge.
Herbert Spencer (1820-1903) English philosopher. Education.
Science is the systematic classification of experience.
George Henry Lewes (1817-78) English writer and critic.
Science is simply common sense at its best that is, rigidly accurate in observation, and merciless to fallacy in logic.
Thomas Henry Huxley (1825-95) English biologist.
Science is nothing but trained and organized common sense differing from the latter only as a veteran may differ from a raw recruit: and its methods differ from those of common sense only as far as the guardsman's cut and thrust differ from the manner in which a savage wields his club.
Thomas Henry Huxley (1825-95) English biologist. "The Method of Zadig" in Collected Essays IV.
Science is nothing but developed perception, interpreted intent, common sense rounded out and minutely articulated.
George Santayana (1863-1952) U. S. philosopher and writer. The Life of Reason.
Science is facts; just as houses are made of stone, so is science made of facts; but a pile of stones is not a house, and a collection of facts is not necessarily science.
Jules Henri Poincaré (1854-1912) French mathematician.
Science is the great antidote to the poison of enthusiasm and superstition.
Adam Smith (1723-90) Scottish economist. The Wealth of Nations, 1776.
Science is what you know. Philosophy is what you don't know.
Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) English philosopher, mathematician.
It requires a very unusual mind to undertake the analysis of the obvious.
Alfred North Whitehead (1861-1947) English philosopher and mathematician.
[Science is] the labor and handicraft of the mind.
Francis Bacon (1561-1626) English essayist, philosopher, statesman.
[Science is] the literature of truth.
Josh Billings (Henry Wheeler Shaw) (1818-85) U. S. humorist.
[Science is] practical philosophy.
René Descartes (1596-1650) French philosopher, mathematician.
[Science is] a series of judgments, revised without ceasing.
Pierre Emile Duclaux (1840-1904) French biochemist, bacteriologist.
[Science is] the desire to know causes.
William Hazlitt (1778-1830) English essayist.
[Science is] an imaginative adventure of the mind seeking truth in a world of mystery.
Sir Cyril Herman Hinshelwood (1897-1967) English chemist. Nobel prize 1956.
[Science is] the knowledge of consequences, and dependence of one fact upon another.
Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) English philosopher, author.
[Science is] piecemeal revelation.
Oliver Wendell Holmes 1 (1809-94) U. S. poet, essayist, physician.
[Science is] a great game. It is inspiring and refreshing. The playing field is the universe itself.
Isidor Isaac Rabi (1898-1988) U. S. physicist. Nobel prize 1944.
[Science is] not belief, but the will to find out.
Anon
In essence, science is a perpetual search for an intelligent and integrated comprehension of the world we live in.
Cornelius Bernardus Van Neil (1897- ) U. S. microbiologist.
I venture to define science as a series of interconnected concepts and conceptual schemes arising from experiment and observation and fruitful of further experiments and observations. The test of a scientific theory is, I suggest, its fruitfulness.
James Bryant Conant (1893-1978) U. S. Chemist and Educator.
Science can only ascertain what is, but not what should be, and outside of its domain value judgments of all kinds remain necessary.
Albert Einstein (1879-1955) U. S. physicist, born in Germany.
triuck stop chandie joined the party.
thank you for your contribution, however it may be coming apparent that it is more effective and even a more intelligent conversation if was conducted with a fence post.
"you know what is worse about Texas and also Wyoming, not only are we not PC, we are the states not running a deficit. How do you suppose that happens with so many conservatives in those states?"
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/15/opinion/the-texas-unmiracle.html?_r=1
the perfect example of this poster knowing absolutely nothing of which she posts. no thought, no research, no discernible intelligence. only that some newspaper article agrees with her hate and bias then it has to be fact which is all the more apparent if the subject is what she hates; wolves, or what she worships; cows.
Popcorn fodder galore here.
Gopher, you may think science operates in a cultural vacuum, but it doesn't. Science is a social field, although there are many who philosophically can't stand the idea.
The truth remains, however, that science gets respect from the lay public because science applied has improved the human condition.
You didn't mention one of the main factors: Pack cohesiveness including difference in sizes of the packs between the two subspecies, which is one of the main traits that make occidentalius an unsuitable fit for our tiny fragile ecosystems in these individual states.
Also why was there all the lies and fraud of the EIS and FEIS about the existence of reproducing indigenous pre-introductory wolves pre-introduction carried out by all the federal and state agencies in the EIS phase, if a "wolf" is a wolf.
You guys are WELL aware we had wolves, and enough (only two breeding pairs had to be located), and why this was all covered up in the first place?
So can you tell me why these agencies, including Ed Bangs tried so hard to destroy the indigenous populations of wolves? Why did IDFG not report that they had not processed this information or made it public?
I'm not talking about one person that submitted 18 individual wolves to the IDFG to be entered in their data base. There were others that made reports that weren't processed.
I would suggest reading: Wolves of Central Idaho, if you read that detailed study, there were plenty of pre-introductory wolves to "study." Not to mention the Yellowpine wolves, that caused the USFS to try and close a road in that area.
So let's start there. Why?
Not to mention this is where it all begins with the fraud. Now we have Echinoccous granulosus in the state of Idaho. USFWS sure doesn't want to touch that fact with a 10 foot pole. They have handed all their disease information about the wolves back to the state.
Could this just be, why we have Echinoccocus granulosus now in Idaho? We're talking about saturation levels two counties, and statewide 63%, back in 2005. Another little FACT that was covered up by our IDFG, and certainly the USFWS. Heck the USFWS won't even discuss the Hydatid tapeworm diseases, they handed their database over to IDFG.
Hi Jeff E. Be happy to introduce you to the locals in Potlatch, after they read your comments. We'll buy you a coffee, how about that?
I'm sure you'll fit right in.
The ranges of irremotus and occidentalis which are subspecies of gray wolf overlapped. The wolves of north america said that irremotus's range INCLUDED ALBERTA CANADA. Occidentalis's range included into the northern rockies. Irremotus according to the wolves of north america was ""A light-colored subspecies of medium to rather large size." So the claim that irremotus was a lot smaller than occidentalis is a lie and incorrect. And to say that occidentalis is not native to Idaho is a joke when its range included Idaho which means it WAS IN IDAHO way before wolves were ever reintroduced into central Idaho.
Honey Wagon Dickinson says,
Jeff E. Nice name calling. Is that all you can throw out are names like your buddies Wilma or William Huard. I read your comments last night to IDFG Mark Gamblin on R.M.'s site about the upcoming wolf hunt. You guys have never hunted in your lives by reading those comments. You don't have a "clue" about archery hunting-period, let alone rifle season.
I would hate to see you with a muzzle loader. lol
http://www.phd1.idaho.gov/clinical/diseaseinvestigation/wolves.cfm
look up what Robert Rausch and William Foreyt has to say about granulosis. You might just learn the truth.
You're incorrect about the densities of wolves in Idaho, especially in my area of Northern Idaho. We historically never had wolves in Latah County, let alone other neighboring counties like Whitman. I can't find any bounty records for our counties. I have four branches of pioneer relatives that settled in the 19th century, pre-statehood on my mother's side alone, not one relative mentioned wolves. They mentioned bears, and my great grandparents only mentioned mountain lions were a concern out side of Viola, Idaho, as witnessed by them and their great grandparents, my great, great, great grandparents.
Now cross that over to the Nelsons, fourth generation and not one word about wolves from any of my Swedish pioneer relatives about wolves in Latah County, or the Lynds.
What we are looking at is not "natural" it is man-made government "state" and "federal" wildlife disaster.
I also would suggest reading the: Clearwater Story, Lewis and Clark never saw wolves passing from west, or back east across the Lolo Pass.
Oh, should we mention Echionoccocus granulosus again? If we had all these occidentalius migrating south from Canada, which none of us witnessed this massive migration, until Bangs & Co. started helicoptering and trucking them south from Central Idaho up to our area, why do we have a historical epidemic, which is what it's going to be right now. We have hydatid levels that are way higher than Australia. Should I post the Salmon, Idaho tapes?
This whole non-essential experiment has been based on scientific fraud. Should I post Dr. Charles Kay's video in Salmon, Idaho too?
You have a better chance of getting shot by a hunter than catching a tapeworm from a wolf. Look at how many people are killed and hurt by hunters and compare those with those who are infected with granulosis.
Thank you. I'll take record of your indepth thoughtful reply. County Commissioners are going to love this.
That is just one major negative impact, a health crisis and a wildlife crisis for our ungulates, as well as our rural dogs and livestock.
So you are comfortable with the wolf introduction, introducing a non-native tapeworm into Idaho. Totally acceptable to our watersheds?
Lets see all your verifiable documentation.
While there might have been something positive possible from wolf introduction, that was contingent upon active management once the population goal was met. Didn't happen, so now there's a "trophic cascade" equivalent to placing a team of poachers in the midst of game and livestock herds.
Getting back to the topic, the war isn't about wolves, it's about self determination in a free society. The people of Wyoming, like the other affected states, have undeniable rights. Such a shame that Wyoming was the only polity to have the guts to stand for those rights and provoke the needed confrontation.
Wolves of Central Idaho, Kaminski & Hansen
Clearwater Story
Yellowstone Wolves, Cat Urbigkit
Salmon, Idaho Dr. Kay Presentation
Salmon, Idaho Dr. Clay Defletson
Today is Ours, Pioneer Family, Elsie Nelson
Didn't use the Outdoorsman this time, but you're wrong George Dovel is extremely well researched and thorough with his research.
Jeffery when are you going to drink coffee with me?
Dr. Delaine Kritsky looked for it, in the 70's, in southeast Idaho.
hmmmm.
Also I am glad you brought up Goldman and Young's "Wolves of North America".
If you would, please, find what Goldman decided,all on his own, the ranges of the different subspecies of wolf, which he decided thereof all on his own, and tell me what is the northern extent of what Goldman decided all on his own, was c.l. irremotus.
As for coffee, i was just in Potlatch recently. Where were you?
"Distribution--Northern Rocky Mountain region, and high adjoining plains, from southwestern Wyoming north through western Montana and eastern Idaho at least to Lethbridge, Alberta."
From the wolves of north america 1937
So, the wolves of north america CLEARLY SHOWS that irremotus range included Alberta Canada and likewise, occidentalis's range included the northern rockies, so how on earth does someone make the argument that occidentalis was never in Idaho when the wolves of north america shows that their range included the northern rockies?
Actually the map of Irremotus range in Goldman's book shows the northern extent quite a bit north of Lethbridge. I believe he used the Athabasca river as the faux boundary.
Something to think about for tonight.
Hence the first law that was broken, among all the others. You just can't stand it that this program was based on fraudulent science from day 1.
"In addition, researchers note that although the gray wolf (canis lupus) was once divided into many subspecies, so many subspecies have become extinct that most scientists no longer differentiate between subspecies.264 Scientists now typically classify wolves as belonging to one of two species: the gray wolf (canis lupus) or the red wolf (canis rufus).265
With regard to the assertion that “Canadian” gray wolves are neither threatened nor endangered and therefore are not appropriate for use as a reintroduced population, the ESA itself speaks to this charge.266 It is a unique feature of the ESA that it applies state by state.267 “Hence the abundance of wolves in Alaska, Canada, or Russia has no legal bearing on the question of their endangeredness in Idaho, Montana, or Wyoming.”268 Thus, that gray wolves are abundant in Canada has no bearing on their status in the individual United States, and they are therefore acceptable for use as a reintroduced population.269
[*PG455] Accordingly, the defendants’ use of Canadian gray wolves for the reintroduction program did not violate section 10(j) of the ESA.270 The conclusions of the Wyoming district court, the Ninth Circuit, and the Tenth Circuit should be upheld if this issue is appealed to the Supreme Court."
No laws were broken Chandie. That is only something in your head that you believe. People like you will always try to discredit wolf reintroduction just because you didn't want wolves back roaming around in your state.
there was wolves in Idaho, just not a viable, breeding population. I know that there is all the "rumor" of all these documented wolves but where is the proof. Just post it. Put it to rest once and for all. If it is a fact it is a fact period.
Also the wolves that were in Idaho were not just some "special" wolves unlike any other in the world. They would have multiplied like any other wolves in the world, or any other species for that matter. Why did they not.??? Please educate me.
Ken you answer my question, why do you think it was fine to violate the ESA act, and introduce this northern variety on top of a population of indigenous wolves in Central Idaho?
Why do you think the agencies refused to process reported sightings, even from IDFG employees, outfitters, trappers, ranchers, etc.
Why do you think the USFWS hired two inexperienced girls right out of college to lead the Native wolf investigation in 1993-1994, hand picked by Ed Bangs?
hmmmm?
I suppose no matter how much correct information you are given Chandie, you will dismiss it and discredit it as you are going to believe what you want to believe regardless of what the real truth is. No laws were broken and reintroducing wolves was very much LEGAL.
"With regard to the assertion that “Canadian” gray wolves are neither threatened nor endangered and therefore are not appropriate for use as a reintroduced population, the ESA itself speaks to this charge.266 It is a unique feature of the ESA that it applies state by state.267 “Hence the abundance of wolves in Alaska, Canada, or Russia has no legal bearing on the question of their endangeredness in Idaho, Montana, or Wyoming.”268 Thus, that gray wolves are abundant in Canada has no bearing on their status in the individual United States, and they are therefore acceptable for use as a reintroduced population.269
[*PG455] Accordingly, the defendants’ use of Canadian gray wolves for the reintroduction program did not violate section 10(j) of the ESA.270 The conclusions of the Wyoming district court, the Ninth Circuit, and the Tenth Circuit should be upheld if this issue is appealed to the Supreme Court."
"With regard to the assertion that “Canadian” gray wolves are neither threatened nor endangered and therefore are not appropriate for use as a reintroduced population, the ESA itself speaks to this charge.266 It is a unique feature of the ESA that it applies state by state.267 “Hence the abundance of wolves in Alaska, Canada, or Russia has no legal bearing on the question of their endangeredness in Idaho, Montana, or Wyoming.”268 Thus, that gray wolves are abundant in Canada has no bearing on their status in the individual United States, and they are therefore acceptable for use as a reintroduced population.269
[*PG455] Accordingly, the defendants’ use of Canadian gray wolves for the reintroduction program did not violate section 10(j) of the ESA.270 The conclusions of the Wyoming district court, the Ninth Circuit, and the Tenth Circuit should be upheld if this issue is appealed to the Supreme Court."
I think it's possible that a few irremotus remained. There is no way to tell the difference between irremotus and occidentalis. You would not tell the difference between them if they were both put right in front of you. The esa applies to SPECIES, NOT REALLY SUBSPECIES.
"With regard to the assertion that “Canadian” gray wolves are neither threatened nor endangered and therefore are not appropriate for use as a reintroduced population, the ESA itself speaks to this charge.266 It is a unique feature of the ESA that it applies state by state.267 “Hence the abundance of wolves in Alaska, Canada, or Russia has no legal bearing on the question of their endangeredness in Idaho, Montana, or Wyoming.”268 Thus, that gray wolves are abundant in Canada has no bearing on their status in the individual United States, and they are therefore acceptable for use as a reintroduced population.269
Not at my finger tips. who is the author?
By the way did you know that the total P&R;funds, authorized by congress, spent on wolf re-introduction amounted to about 200,000 dollars? Can easily be found with a bit of research.
Secondly: Wolves of Central Idaho, written by Tim Kaminski and Jerome Hansen 1984. This is the blueprint for locating wolves, and the wolves subspecies referred to as Canis lupus irremotus. It is divided up into every region they were going to introduce them in Idaho.
Most people don't have this copy because you can't find it anymore. My copy is loaned out to a legislature right now.
Ken if wolves from Canada are native to Wyoming and Idaho are people from Canada also natives of Idaho and Wyoming? If not why not?
The whole thing is part of a push to eliminate the food and energy producers. There are a million excuses for doing it, but no real jsutification.
By the way. why do you give that racist any credence at all? A irect quote from his talk in Boise some months ago was that the Agency did not start to go down hill until they started to hire women and minorities. and yes I was there and heard it with my own ears.
Chandie,
please read the "Remarks" at the end of this paper and note the date,1959.
They weren't considering introduction exclusively in this study but a natural recovery of existing remnant populations of wolves.
The highest amount of sightings were in Central Idaho, which correspond with reports you get from the regional local people from those areas. Also in Wolves of North America, Central Idaho was the area that was historically had the highest density of wolf populations in Idaho of the indigenous wolf, irremotus. The map doesn't show a southern migration coming out of Canada of populations of wolves in Northern Idaho.
Young and Goldman's, The Wolves of North America maintained that the subspecies of wolf native to the Yellowstone region was Canis lupus irremotus, a light colored subspecies of medium to rather large size, with skull having a narrow but flattened frontal region." In the same work, Canis lupus occidentalis, the subspecies of wolf introduced into Yellowstone and Central Idaho, is described as, "the LARGEST of the North American wolves, with a LARGE and MASSIVE SKULL."
Young and Goldman noted that the irremotus differed from occidentalis in its "decidedly smaller size."
Wolf Skulls-In addition after examining hundreds of wolf skulls, they noted that the cranial abnormalities in the larger number of specimens were few, but did find an abnormality that was specifically associated with the subspecies irremotus.
Nowak proposed that wolves in North America belong to only five subspecies. As stated earlier, he placed C.l. irremotus among a southern group of wolves names C.l. nubilus while C.l. occidentalis was retained as another, more northerly group.
Nowak classifications of the Yellowstone wolf was not contested by other taxonomists, and was supported by studies of other researchers, all of which suggest that a major systematic north-south division of wolf subspecies existed along the Canada-US border in western North America.
Nowak sent a letter commenting on the DEIS concerning the wolf introduction, and very clearly pointed out to FWS that the wolves native to Yellowstone were "substantially different" from the Canadian wolves, that there is a "subspecific distinction" between the two, and that the DEIS improperly suggested otherwise.
FWS knew that the wolves had survived in the Yellowstone region. FWS also knew there was a pronounced subspecific difference between the native wolf, C.l. irremotus, and the released northern wolves, C.l. occidentalis.
It should be of no surprise that in wolf killed by a vehicle north of the park in 1988, according to Nowak, "looks more like a member of this original US population. Its measurements fall mostly within the range shown by the subspecies Cl.l. irremotus of the northern Rockies."
That, "Kaminski and Hansen compiled 600 unconfirmed reports of wolves in Idaho between 1973 and 1983. Of these 238 were classified as probable.
Of these they estimated there might be between 17 and 40 wolves.
After a two year effort to gather physical evidence of wolves in the state, they found evidence of only 1 to 4 wolves. After analyzing all the data they concluded that no more than 15 wolves were present in central Idaho from 1974 to 1984."
They will also tell you that they noticed wolves in areas that are consistent with Wolves of Central Idaho, and other pre-introductory reports given orally, as well as some hand-written accounts, that the wolves that were observed prior to introduction, exhibited different cohesive pack behavior. Never were packs found, like after Canadian wolves were introduced in sizes of 10-20, including packs of even up to 35 mentioned by a Salish Indian in Montana, who even admitted these are different wolves.
The eye witness accounts don't match up with your "text book" references of what is happening on the ground. That is why you think the people of Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming are stubborn because what they are experiencing in their life-times, and their father's life times, and history passed down through generations isn't matching up with the government USFWS and State Agency "politically manipulated research and models."
Then when you add stolen Pittman Robertson Funds, No 3-177 Forms filled out, purging of IDFG data base information of pre-introductory wolves, "data" not processed by other reports made to IDFG, and read the Charles Lobdell Letters, and after hearing all the misconceptions and distorted lies who are you going to believe. Your own eyes, relatives, neighbors, and local people, or a bunch of government biologists out of CA working for NASA?
The "native wolf population was gone or nearly gone by the time of wolf reintroduction.-Ron Nowak
just answer the question. a simple yes or no will do
These are passages taken out of the forward of Cat's book.
Foreward By Ronald M. Nowak pg vii
Cat's book may provide the most lucid and revealing account available of the consequences of taxonomy on conservation. She shows how a practice, usually restricted to museums, laboratories, and technical journals, came to dominate the fate of the western wolves. But in a sense, she continues a longstanding debate. For many decades taxonomy has had a key role in our approach to wolves, perhaps more than any other animal.
Most zoologists recxognize only two full species of living wolves, the gray Canis lupus and the red Canis rufus. The gray wolf is by far the more wide-ranging of the two; found almost throughout all of North America and Eurasia it sometimes has been divided into dozens of subspecies or geographic races. However, my own taxonomic assessment of North American wolves, based namely on cranial morphometrics, distinguished only five subspecies of the gray wolf, together with the separate red wolf in the southeastern part of the continent. All six kinds kindled the taxonomic battles that have engulfed wolves in recent years.
The original Yellowstone wolf population, sometimes designated Canis lupus irremotus, is or was part of a wide-ranging subspecies, which I referred to as Canis lupus nubilus, of mid-sized wolves throughout much of the western and central parts of North America.
A key argument in Cat's book is that the subspecies is distinct from C.l. occidenalis, the subspecies that is round to the north in western Canada and most of Alaska. C.l. nublius presumably also is represented by the population in Minnesota and on Isle Royale. There is is the subject of further taxonomic issues, some zoologists claiming it is actually part of another species allied with the red wolf and/or has been intensively hybridized with coyotes.
I also assigned the population of the southeast Alaskan panhandle to nubilus. When conservation groups petitioned to have that population protected through the ESA, FWS tried to AVOID the listing by citing MY WORK as EVIDENCE that it was not a distinctive subspecies. In so doing, FWS ignored the Act's requirement that the distinct population segments, as well as subspecies, must be listed.
Other three North American subspecies of gray wolf I recognized are C.l. lycaon and C.l. baileyi, and C.l. arctos. Canis lupus lycaon is the small timber wolf of southeastern Ontario and southern Quebec.
The grand plan to move wolves from Canada--from another subspecies--to Yellowstone in the 1990's was not a TRUE REINTRODUCTION but the INTRODUCTION of a non-native and aggressive life form that would genetically swamp the surviving native wolves.
Introduction, as opposed to reintroduction, can be, and usually are, devastating to natural ecosystems. Alien house cats, foxes, and mongooses have destroyed or endangered entire species of native birds and small mammals in Australia and goats in Eurasia have wiped out the vegetative cover and forage needed by the indigenous wildlife. Red foxes brought from Europe have replaced or crossed with original subspecies throughout the conterminous U.S.
The proposed introduction of gray wolves from Canada into the Yellowstone area was a scheme involving an unusual alliance. Hard line conservation groups pushed for wolves, lots of wolves, in Yellowstone and adjacent country as QUICKLY AS POSSIBLE and at any COST.
Bureaucrats went along with this pressure. Cat subtly implies, not because they cared about restoring wolves or what kind of wolves they would be. They only wanted to take advantage of a regulatory quirk that would allow an introduced wolf population to be declared, "experimental" and thus be free from the usual protections offered by an official endangered classification.
What may seem to the advantage of a particular animal population at a particular time may not be in keeping with the original intent of the ESA, which places foremost priority on long-term maintenance of natural ecosystems. Cat has shown us a scenario in which the possibly well-meaning were misled.
These are passages taken out of the forward by Ronald M. Nowak.
Show me the required federal forms that Bangs filled out.
Until you produce them, you are WRONG. It is a federal violation to import ANY animal into the united States without said paperwork, federal employes are NOT exempt.
The was an employee from the Smithsonian that actually did prison time for an explainable typo on those forms. Yet bangs brings his wolves in and not ONE form, not ONE documented file to list exactly how many wolves he actually brought here.
yes, the laws were broken.
This is not what Ron Nowak told me. He said he doubts there is much difference in aggressiveness between irremotus and occidentalis. He also says it is hard to say if the reintroduced wolves are non native. He clearly says that "native" wolves were gone or nearly gone by the of reintroduction and that the reintroduced wolves were well on their way down here in the northern rockies. There is also no evidence according to Nowak that suggests that the reintroduced wolves killed the "native" ones.
Chandie,
just answer the question. a simple yes or no will do
How come you dance around everyone of my questions? Let's see for example why would Ed Bangs USFWS, and cooperation of the state agencies refuse to confirm documented and mapped wolves in Central Idaho pre-introduction, if they were going to follow the rules of the ESA?
I tried to post the link to that article written by the trapper, and New West wouldn't accept it, claimed it was spam.
google: Differences of Varieties of Wolves, BBB. Since I conveniently can't leave the link, and answer if you think the purging of this "data" was scientific, legal, moral, correct, etc?
Ken, Can you prove there wasn't irremotus? It would of been easier if this information wasn't destroyed, but it was.
Oh, and I hated our resident pre-introductory wolves. Right. I never even knew they existed until the late 1980's when I heard them howling on a camping trip in the Northfork of the Clearwater. Yes there was a pack of them howling. My dad said, those are wolves. I never heard them before in my life, and I actually was excited. I never grew up in "wolf country" I was raised four and five generations from four branches on my mother's side alone in Palouse Country, where there is no record of wolves. My family moved here pre-statehood, and they had to clear the land. They even had Palouse bands of Indians digging camus roots on our farm. If there were wolves I would of heard or read about it in the local history books, and by the hundreds of people I know and am related too here.
Not one person I speak to mentions wolves around here, except in the mountains up by Kelly Creek, Weitas Creek, and many of these people are loggers or outfitters that spend their daily lives in the woods.
I don't agree with the introduction, because it was based on fraud and lies. That's why it will always be controversial and a failure, and the people that live here are not experiencing the success story you out-of-state residents, NGO's, government biologists are apparently enjoying.
I don't even know how to dance. We were having a conversation and you brought up Kaminski so I quoted a synopsis of what he did, and asked if that is what you meant. No reply from you. Just come back with a bunch of different related subjects but no reply. By the way I would assume that the 600 unconfirmed reports would originate from many sources including the outfitters you bring up.
If you want to have a conversation lets do it but maybe get thru one issue at a time instead of trying to lump them all togeather at one shot.
Sorry Wyoming, but science is a fraud, especially the recent science and especially the science created for this wolf program.
Peer review has become nothing more than a gaggle of like minded fools patting each other on their backs. Unproven and even disproved theories have been used as a foundation for studies that were intentionally done to create a known and specific outcome. That......is not science.
Take for example the study done in Yellowstone to 'determine' the decline of the elk populations far more sever than the 'experts' predicted. Of course they didn't want their wolves to be shown to be the culprit. So they conducted a 6 week study, beginning at calving time (the only time bears have any real impact on elk) and they rolled up shop about the time the bears could no long catch a calf elk. Then low and behold......bears are killing all the elk!
Wow, what science that is! When such obvious studies are conducted, and even manipulated, let us not forget one biologist was actually booted out of YS for intentionally skewing data. Please do not preach to me about 'science'. We were warned by a leaving president about two dangers in this country. One was the industrial military complex. The other was government controlled science. And now we are seeing the results of both.
The truth is, it doesn't take a PhD to understand this wolf project was a dismal failure. People who had no real knowledge of wolves, including Mech, were put in charge of administering their Farley Mowat wolf opinions. Of course we now know that ol' Farley was a complete fraud, more emotional science for ya. A fiction work presented as non fiction, and still to this day emotionally intoxicated fools by into that garbage work.
These self proclaimed experts chose to ignore any and all opinions from others who actually worked with and had real knowledge of wolves in the ecosystems. they just took their broken and apples for oranges knowledge they had from Isle Royale and administered it into ecosystems that were completely different. And they wonder why nothing they predicted was even close.
The only one who got it right was Charles Kay. Going back and reading his work pre wolf introduction, he hit every prediction. It is almost like he wrote it last week instead of the last century. Yet, the arrogant and elite fools in charge of this mess attempt to dismiss him amd marginalize him. We are suppose to wrap our arms around their opinions when they have proven to be 100% incorrect, and ignore a guy who is batting at least in the .900 range.
So you rant on about how valid your science is, and I will suggest one thing to you.........follow the money. In the very beginning of this insanity, Wilma claims that science can be bought. As much as this wants to make me vomit, her and I agree on that. When the very grants you need to continue are held over your head, you will put out whatever answer they want. And you will continue to put out whatever answer are needed to keep the money flowing in, no matter private or government, money is money and created science is created science. The only way to determine who was lying and who wasn't is to look back after time has pasted and see whom got it right. Well, in this case, it wasn't the pro wolfers nor the government scientists who brought these wolves to the RMW.
So, do we just continue to make decision based on broken science, or emotion, or a mixture of both?
I just read a study that was conducted that considered trophic cascade as proven science, which it IS NOT. When a study is conducted on such a fallacious foundation, a true scientist sure wouldn't consider it valid. Yet you fire it off to a bunch of other agenda driven colleagues and have them stamp their atta boy on it and call it 'peer reviewed'. Woot woot and the grants keep rolling in.
So.....puleeze....science has died right along with the media, freedom and decent education in this country.
"It's not a non native tapeworm. As I told you already, granulosis is found in all places where they are wolves. You can clame it was never found in Idaho, but the fact is it was probably there"
Sorry Ken......."probably" doesn't cut it. There were people who looked very hard for this long before wolves. It was not to be found. Now it is everywhere. If your logic ladder has more than one rung on it, it is pretty easy to see, the wolves not only brought it, they are spreading it like wildfire in USFS managed timber.
deny, deny, deny, probably, maybe, at least. I love all the disclaimers you people who speak the 'know facts' always throw into your comments.
Ken....can YOU PROVE it was here in Idaho, in the wild, pre wolf introduction?
So until you have that, it is a lot like your other failed claim about the illegalities involved. You talk out your anus and present it as undeniable.
After taking a closer look, I have come to the conclusion that most, if not all, of these accusations are delusive at best.
So let’s take a look at one of the accusations; the one that form 3-177 was not filed.
First we should understand what form 3-177 is.
What form 3-177 does is provides a means of documenting the import and export of plants and animals, or parts thereof, to and from the United States. The primary focus is related to commercial activities and to limit the trade in threatened and endangered plants and animal, BUT there are a few very notable exceptions to having to file this particular form.
As noted from the USA importers Manuel by Edward G Hinkleman:” permit exemptions. A few imports of endangered species products are exempt from ESA permit requirements. For example, if a species is listed as threatened or as an experimental population, special rules may allow otherwise prohibited activities.”
Does that term “experimental population” ring a bell with any one?
So let’s see what the ESA section ten say’s in regard to exceptions;
EXCEPTIONS
SEC. 10. (a) PERMITS.—(1) The Secretary may permit, under such terms and conditions as he shall prescribe—
(A) any act otherwise prohibited by section 9 for scientific purposes or to enhance
the propagation or survival of the affected species, including, but not limited
to, acts necessary for the establishment and maintenance of experimental
populations pursuant to subsection (j); ……
{..and the infamous 10j rule. Note in particular the phrase (and related transportation)…..}
(j) EXPERIMENTAL POPULATIONS.—(1) For purposes of this subsection, the term “experimental population” means any population (including any offspring arising solely there from) authorized by the Secretary for release under paragraph (2), but only when, and at such times as, the population is wholly separate geographically from non experimental populations of the same species.
(2)(A) The Secretary may authorize the release (and the related transportation) of
any population (including eggs, propagules, or individuals) of an endangered species or a threatened species outside the current range of such species if the Secretary determines that such release will further the conservation of such species.
(..This is exactly what he did as detailed in the final rule published in the Federal register on 18 November 1994.)
“Specimens used to establish an experimental population may be
removed from a source or donor population, provided their removal is
not likely to jeopardize the continued existence of the species, and
appropriate permits have been issued in accordance with 50 CFR 17.22.
Gray wolves for the reintroduction will be obtained from healthy
Canadian wolf populations with permission from the Canadian and
Provincial governments……Consequently,
the Service finds that wolves to be used in the reintroduction effort meet the
definition of ``non-essential'' (50 CFR 17.80(b)) because the loss of the
reintroduced wolves is not likely to appreciably reduce the likelihood of survival
of the species in the wild.”
(So the conclusion is that there was never any legal requirement for form 3-177 to be filed and therefore it was not.)
Barry, if you have proof that Ed Bangs broke the law, why aren't you doing anything about it? Why isn't Ed Bangs in jail?
Chandie, I don't believe you cared about irremotus one bit.
Truth is Ken Cullings, is I don't believe you CARE about irremotus. That is a substantiated fact, since you aren't even upset or concerned over the efforts that were made to purge the existence of this truly endangered subspecies.
I think that is a "shame," and is also a reason we can't entrust the ESA act anymore, since this introduction was carried out so irresponsibly.
"I do in fact hate ranchers much more than I hate hunters...."
I rest my case. This nutty woman is the one who claims everyone else is a hater.
Hate in any form is an ugly trait, a cancer. One that spreads to completely consume ones life. And I think that is pretty easy to see in Ms. Huard's posts and opinions.
While I may vehemently disagree with another human, hate never enters into it. It is a sad possession and one that prevails in those that lack true understanding and education. Which is also why the childish name calling from the other kindergarteners only serves to make me laugh.
Dr. Joel Berger did a bang up job of demonstrating that a few years ago when his research showed that jackrabbits had been extinct from Yellowstone since 1971 & needed to be "reintroduced" again. His article which is still available was "peer reviewed"
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/02/080214130317.htm
He was going great guns until....Yellowstone biologists read the article and reported the commonly seen rabbits had not disappeared at all.
The great wolf experiment has made a huge amount of money for environmental groups and I'm sure "researchers". Look at the books that Doug Smith has written and he can't even count. In the March 2010 National Geographic he was quoted as saying that the No. Yellowstone elk herd was down to 10,000. He made the same statement at the BBHC in a talk in late 2009 too. They have been below 10,000 since I believe 2004, so was he lying or he had no clue?
What about the wolf that killed all of the livestock in eastern Montana, over 100 animals I believe, and supposedly that DNA matched every wolf that ever lived in this part of the world....so of course DOW kept their money.
Contradict yourself often ? Who busted these locals for killing an endangered species ? Evidence to support this claim please ?
I have no idea if Bangs did or didn't fill them out, but what I do know is there was NOTHING illegal about reintroducing gray wolves into central Idaho and yellowstone.
"With regard to the assertion that “Canadian” gray wolves are neither threatened nor endangered and therefore are not appropriate for use as a reintroduced population, the ESA itself speaks to this charge.266 It is a unique feature of the ESA that it applies state by state.267 “Hence the abundance of wolves in Alaska, Canada, or Russia has no legal bearing on the question of their endangeredness in Idaho, Montana, or Wyoming.”268 Thus, that gray wolves are abundant in Canada has no bearing on their status in the individual United States, and they are therefore acceptable for use as a reintroduced population.269
[*PG455] Accordingly, the defendants’ use of Canadian gray wolves for the reintroduction program did not violate section 10(j) of the ESA.270 The conclusions of the Wyoming district court, the Ninth Circuit, and the Tenth Circuit should be upheld if this issue is appealed to the Supreme Court."
Say what you like but I really don't think you care about our indigenous wolves, or the fact that information was purged by your beloved colleagues that work for the USFWS, under your hero Ed Bangs, who also ordered an irremotus "shot" and another female in estrus that was roped sent off to Texas "pronto."
hypocrite.
Ravalli County Meeting, Part 3. A man testifies in this testimony at the County Commissioner's Meeting about our native timber wolves, and how he was treated by a USFWS agent in Montana.
Did you ask Ronald M. Nowak why they didn't introduce the C. l. nubilus population, which he recommended that could be trapped close by in Minnesota for introduction instead of the largest Northern variety of subspecies Canis lupus occidentalis which Ronald M. Nowak took issue with in Cat's book?
This would of been of course if there were NO remaining population of wolves in Yellowstone, which Ed Bangs claimed, "finding a bigfoot would be more likely than a native wolf," in Cat's book, until Jerry Kysar shot the Teton wolf in 1992. Ed Bangs tried very hard to cover-up that "wolf" but the press got a hold of that story too soon. He made darn sure that didn't happen in 1993-1994 when he hired two college girls, fresh graduates, with no experience to find and locate indigenous wolf populations of the Rocky Mountains. This was set-up.
And you might want to get up to date, we do now have documented cases of EG in Idaho. More than one actually. Interesting.....none before wolves, now, well, we have some sick people. While this may not be of importance to the likes of you or the government that brought it here. I would suspect, no, I know the people infected have a very different opinion.
The bottom line is this, they knowingly brought a transmittable disease to Idaho. If it is a 'known fact' that EG exists everywhere wolves do, then they had to make the calculated decision to expose citizens of the dump area and all areas of dispersal to this disease.
Isn't there a law against things like that? I would bet my bottom dollar that if any non-government employee dropped, oh lets say, ebola, onto citizens in this country, there would be hell to pay.
So, I take it bioweapons administer via faux endangered animals is now somehow acceptable?
But as Jeffy pointed out, they used loopholes to ignore the required paperwork. I appreciate you typing it our Jeff, you pointed out some very important points in defending why they didn't need the paperwork. The most important being that these wolves are non-essential to the ecosystems here, therefore nothing that is done with them as far as management or even their removal has any real impact on the species. And two, as was written in the very rule you cite, 100 wolves is to be considered "recovered"
Now, for the big test. Can you show me even one more example of this? I have found some pretty obscure paperwork and it seems to me, this may be the only project that this little, we don't need no pesky paperwork, was done. They did the same thing to keep from directly violating the lacey act. Even if they didn't violate the laws directly, they definitely violated the spirit of those laws. And we of course still have the question of the fact that not all wolves were under 10(j), and yet Ed dumped his problem dogs right on top of that population.
I have also yet to see the required state permits, vet inspections and proof of tattooing of each wolf that was brought into Idaho. That is a state law. Or are the feds now empowered to violate any old state law they would like or don't want to be bothered with?
I always love how they turn back to the ESA for their defense of their actions against the people of this country. A vile and unconstitutional law. It is exactly why I now focus on the movement to have it eliminated, along with the EAJA. One is obviously illegal under our constitution and the other has been abused by welfare lawyers. They both need to go. Bad laws do not make a valid defense of action. Legal, maybe(for now). Tyrannical, obviously.
As far as Ed goes, I will work tirelessly to see his retirement is diverted to restitution. What he owes us, is an apology and he owes the people who have become sick from his imported EG a hell of a lot more than that. Sadly, he concerned himself with one species, he is an admitted liar (even defending his dishonesty) and he ignored anyone who challenged his so called 'expertise'. He wrote a broken rule and was unable to implement what he did write. Ed Bangs is the administrator of perhaps the largest failure of wildlife management in the last 90 years.
And there is another point. If this program would have went as written if 50CFR part 17. I don't think this issue would have ever exploded to the level it has. A few hundred wolves and strict management of those would have went all but unnoticed. It was only when the lunatics and welfare lawyers grabbed onto it to shove their agenda that it became the mess it is.
What has been the outcome of this debacle?
1. You will never again get support for ANY species recovery from citizens or sportsmen here.
2. We have exposed the science for the fraud it is.
3. We now have a diseased ecosystem.
4. We have private property being destroyed without either compensation or the right to even protect it.
5. We have reduced hunting opportunity, and thus the needed monies to fund both management and real research.
6. We have exposed the truth that advocates are more interested in money than wildlife. There is NO scientific data that supports continued listing of this non-essential species. Yet they keep suing and seeking loopholes to keep the funds rolling in.
7. You have emotional articles as this one, designed to keep the fraud moving forward. You people should have listened to Mech. He told you this was going to happen if you people overreached. But the greed of the eco-terrorists just could not be contained.
8. It has created even further divisions between people who should have actually had common ground. But when it is exposed that the animal is a tool to be used to eliminate your 'way of life', your private property and perhaps even you life itself, I guess that division was inevitable.
Good vs. evil? You bet
Freedom vs. tyranny? Yeah, that too.
It's a pretty sad state of conditions in this nation, when one portion of the populous will use any tactic, any animal or any action (legal or not), and law (unconstitutional or not) to force their opinions onto another citizen(s) with the intent of destroying their rights and freedoms simply because they do not agree with them.
There is no such thing as "ill science", that is an oxymoron. Science is black and white, it is either valid or not. It can not be used to created the desired results or outcomes and still be considered science in any way.
You can bet your last frn, that had the wolf science been correct, and when science is incorrect, it was obviously manipulated, that you would have never heard from me in this issue. Had we only seen a maximum of 20% impact, or we still had sustainable growth numbers in other wildlife, I wouldn't have batted an eye. I have nothing personal against wolves, I have no issue with them being here. But dammit man, go out into the mountains and look around. It doesn't take long to see we have a real freaking problem. Elk, i don't care what they are trying to peddle as far as numbers go, they are in serious decline and growing older, calves are almost nonexistent. The moose are even worse than that. I am seeing cougar behavior changes that are actually amazing to witness, like standing there in the wide open and watching you. The bears are getting meaner, I am not sure if it is from harassment from wolves or hunger, but their temperament has definitely changed. Just lots and lots of issues wolfies keep ignoring or making excuses for.
One thing that always bothers me a bit in this, that in the end, the wolves you people seem to think need all this protection, and buy into the 'natural balance' scam, are going to pay the biggest price of all. Mech was right in that. At some point we need to take the advocacy out of this and implement real science and some common sense.
People who make decision based on their hate for the affected individuals, will never be the purveyors of a real solution.
So.....I stand by my assertion that science, is in fact, dead.
Dangers of Hydatid Disease by Valerius Geist and dangers to humans.
Ken Cullings I didn't even know about wolf introduction. Had no clue and since we didn't have wolves, or never did on the Palouse, why would I even think about them. We were struggling to survive like everybody else in a logging town, and I was teaching at the time. Didn't have computers back then, and I got 3 TV stations out where I live on a good clear day. That is changing the antenna direction every time I wanted to watch one of the 3.
To get channel 3, I had to got out behind the wood shed, turn the antenna towards Gold Hill, where they trucked wolves and dumped them behind my house in 2007, witnessed by a rancher on his cattle allotment.
To get channel 4, Old snag behind the barn.
Channel 10-, Chicken House.
Husband was a sawyer working high production logging.
Working Ken Cullings.
1. Preparation Phase
2. Attack Phase
3. Consolidation Phase
4. Maintenance Phase
Dr. Dethlefsen repeated again that the focus of Western Predator Control was to produce Data that would enable Western States to accurately determine the degree of contamination of their ecosystems at the county level and at three demographic interfaces, those being Wilderness, Urban, and Residential. The point was clearly made that the Eradication Plan would be carried out most stringently at the Urban and Residential interfaces and that the “Protocols” were VERY EXPENSIVE!!!!!
At this juncture ,the rather disturbing issue of “Pet Protocols” was brought up. Since the country of Turkey was most advanced in designing regulations for treatment of domestic animals including cats and dogs, in this aspect, Dr. Dethlefsen reviewed what was required for our cats and dogs. The animals must be kenneled during the duration of the Protocol, their feces would need to be collected and destroyed to prevent re-infestation and the kennel area would need to be properly sanitized upon completion of the drug treatments. The drug Praziquantel was used and administered three times at two week intervals at an estimated cost of fifty to sixty dollars per treatment per animal (This is what Ed Bangs SHOULD have done with his wolves but did nothing!!!!!) This would put the cost of the drug treatment alone at over $150.00 per animal with the added expense of the kenneling. In Turkey the disease is considered so dangerous both health wise and economically that the treatments are funded by the government. The meeting then turned to the issue of the Scope of the Eradication Program. At this point both Dr. Ward and Dr. Dethlefsen concurred that all “sister” counties MUST be involved in the same control efforts if there is to be a successful elimination of Echincoccus granulosus. This would include sister counties across state lines. Dr. Dethlesen covered some aspects of sampling of canines, ungulates, and avian species that volunteers could do in lieu of training that WPCA would be giving for those people in each county that were interested in helping out with sampling. A very interesting issue came up at this point , Dr. Dethlefsen made the statement that it was just as important to find out with the sampling effort what areas had NOT been infested YET as it was those areas that were infested. He reiterated that by finding “clean areas” we could determine where the parasite was being carried from and we could put great emphasis on keeping those areas “clean” and pursuing the infestation where it was occurring.
Sadly another case of “deliberate incompetence” on the part of Ed Bangs came up when a question was fielded regarding the types of “care” given the Canadian Gray Wolves before they were released into our states. Dr. Dethlefsen stated that NO significance was given to the Echincoccus issue as a health threat to humans in the introduction areas and as a consequence the only treatments given the wolves for both the hard and soft releases were for THE HEALTH OF THE WOLVES!!!!! Everyone in the audience realized instantly that we had been allowed to believe that the wolves had been screened and treated for any threat to humans from diseases they were carrying , but in reality NOTHING had been done in this regard!!! The audience at this point was very visibly angered!! At this time a man from the audience stood up and faced the room and remarked that to Ed Bangs and Company the tapeworm was a non-issue, but to his family it was an extremely devastating disease, since his wife had just had a Hydatid cyst removed from her liver. He stated that the family was hoping and praying that there were no more cysts that the doctors had missed. The gentleman remarked that his part of the cost for his wife’s surgery was 63,000 dollars!
Question and answer time came next, with both Drs. Dethlefsen and Ward fielding the questions. An outfitter asked why Canada was not having a problem with Hydatid disease and if cougars and bears were also carriers? Dr. Dethlefsen responded that Canada was having a problem with Hydatid Disease at the present but that it was hard to extract the data from them because there was a lockdown on Canadian medical stats and he was not sure why. He responded to the second question that bear and cougar did not appear to be a significant carrier of the disease and that indeed in Asia there was a porcine strain of Echincoccus that bears carried but that it was not an issue here in North America. The conclusion of that question and answer was that the sampling being done would be very revealing as to which species in our ecosystems were the greatest carriers of the tapeworm and that when the data was in, Western States could take appropriate actions, but the actions must be science driven. An overhead was used during this time that showed the sampling data that WPCA had generated so far in testing Wolves from Ravalli County , Montana, from Lemhi and Custer Counties in Idaho, and from areas in the Yellowstone Ecosystem. The level of infestation was from 62% to 84% with the samples generally well distributed over the sampling areas. Clearly our counties in Idaho have a very serious problem to deal with since a 2006 report on Echincoccus in the north central part of Idaho showed over 60% of wolves as carriers of this tapeworm. Senator Jeff Siddoway asked some very pertinent questions, and then concluded that Dr. Dethlefsen was telling us that the only way to deal with wolves as the main carrier of Echincoccus granulosus was for Idaho to kill ALL the Canadian Gray Wolves. Again Dr. Dethlefsen was very firm in replying that he did not tell us that, but was showing us that we had a POTENTIAL health disaster to get prepared for and that WPCA could help by revealing to the counties where the carriers were and had come from. At this point Mrs. Bartell, yours truly, asked a question I had been waiting a long time to ask of somebody with the background to give us an authoritative answer. I asked Dr. Clay how the Echincoccus tapeworm traveled thru the hosts body and if could become systemic to a point that the tissues or meat of the carcass was contaminated. I think his shocking answer finally got through to our local cattle producers who have had their heads in the sand. He answered that upon ingestion of shed eggs from the gravid section of the tapeworm, the eggs hatch and mature and some migrate thru the intestinal wall and usually get into the blood stream. From the blood stream the worm can end up in several organs, such as the liver,lungs, or brain. Other viable worms can end up in the capillary buds thus contaminating the tissues of the carcass!!!!! Dr. Dethlefsen stopped for a few seconds to let the impact of this sink in. He then continued by stating that if the Hydatid Disease is found in either wild or domestic ungulates the days of asking , “How do you want your steak done?” are over!!!!!! The meat if eaten MUST be WELL COOKED!!! That was as close to a rancher’s wakeup call as I ever think I will ever hear!
In closing, Dr. Dethlefsen advised us to look into designing local ordinances, to study our State C Constitutions and local ordinances that are already in place for controlling infectious diseases. Also briefly discussed at the meetings end was the abuse of NEPA mandates which dictate by law that “HUMAN HEALTH AND SAFETY BE CONSIDERED AS WELL AS ECONOMIC IMPACTS BEFORE A SPECIES IS PROTECTED OR RELEASED IN AN AREA OF CONCERN”.
We have people in Idaho with Hydatid Disease now.
Ken Cullings you are misquoting me. Where did I ever say irremotus NEVER caused problems? Post it here please.
Ken Cullings watch that video again carefully. Pay CLOSE attention to how this man was treated by the USFWS. This is a consistent pattern throughout the Northern Rocky Mountain States, that was replayed over time and time again, to force wolf introduction on us.
There's a lot more people out there like this man that are READY to talk. I can guarantee you that. Both AGENCIES STATE and FEDERAL and employees inside them were part of this carefully orchestrated cover-up of indigenous wolf populations.
It wasn't the good people of Idaho, Wyoming, or Montana that destroyed this species, it was your "ilk" and your colleagues.
Pay close attention what this guy is saying, and how he was treated, and learn from it. We will never forget it.
Jeff E darn we missed each other. I guarantee you next time don't be a coward and look me up. I'm easy to find. But I guarantee you I'll enjoy introducing you to everyone.
Here is what I have a real problem with concerning EG. If by chance it was in Idaho, which it wasn't, but just for the sake of argument lets say it was. It wasn't found in elk, deer, moose, which it now is. I have been around and handled dozens of coyotes, no indications of it there. And now all of a sudden, it is everywhere. Why in the world would we want an animal that spreads this and so many other diseases? Hell, coyotes carry it too, we had a hell of a lot more coyotes here than we ever have wolves, yet EG just wasn't found nor was it spread out throughout the entire state.
It would be on par of me advocating for the complete protection of rats in the big cities. I know they carry disease and attempting to control their populations are in the best interest of the people who live there.
Should I really insist that they be protected to the endangerment of the people who actually have to live with them? I would never in a million years do something like that. maybe it is because i am more grounded, less emotionally based and haven't been convinced to turn against my own species, that I am like that. But, no animal should be placed in the midst of humans if it is to the detriment of those people.
Logic just doesn't support your position on this. And it is pretty dishonest and somewhat vile to consider it not a problem. I would suspect if it were you or one of your family members that came down with hydatid cysts, you would probably feel very much different about it.
Under what mentality of thinking does one intentionally endanger the health of humans over a non essential animal? Was this really the place for them considering the human populations that are established here? Was dumping wolves here really scientifically sound?
Sadly, it like so many mistakes made in our ecosystems it was short sighted and emotionally based. Our ecosystems were not unhealthy, and the ones that were could have easily been fixed without wolves. Why is the opinion of wolf worshipers more important then those who actually have to live with the decision of dumping a disease ridden animal into a limited ecosystem? More gaia worship? Emotional intoxication? Complete disregard of your fellow human beings? Why the dire need to somehow remove man from his role in nature?
When I break all of this down to it's nuts and bolts, it became apparent to me that this had nothing to do with wolves. When I began to research the people who supported this program it became evident that their agenda was the goal. To remove humans from the western landscape, plain and simple. They hate everything human and have bought into the Walt Disney, Farley Mowat mentality of animal worship over everything else. If only we coule return to those days before whites landed on this continent, all would be so much better, if we could just wipe out the majority of our own species, wouldn't it be such a grand place.
I am sorry, but thinking like that is a mental disorder in my opinion, and one that many who have posted here suffer from. They consider our ancestors ignorant, but those people understood far more about nature and cohabitation with wildlife than the silly folks who hail from the big cities of today.
I no longer try to reason with the unreasonable, nor do I try and find middle ground with people who have proven they have no interest in compromise. While I still support and stand behind the original agreement, the people who have continually moved the goalposts still continue to overreach and write articles as the one above. They just can't stand the thought of their wolf being managed, they would rather watch it starve than to allow hunting and habitation of the west continue. It turns my stomach to watch these people exploit an animal in the manner they have.
And you are basing this off of the fact that delane kritsky didn't find it in the few coyotes he tested. Yeah, whatever you say. I love it how you ignore the fact that this tapeworm has been found in every midwestern state that has wolves and it's found in Alaska and Canada and just about all other places where there are good size wolf populations. Just give it up. You're making yourself look foolish and bad. Get a clue. Minnesota and Wisconsin have had their granulosis infected wolves for 30-40 years according to disease expert William Foreyt and guess what, not one person has been infected with it or killed by it. You continue to live in denial.
Barry, you really do expose yourself. It wasn't in Idaho? Care to prove that? No, you can't nor will you ever. Please, give it up you phony. You're making yourself look bad. You are ONLY BASING THIS on Kritsky not finding it in a few coyotes he tested. Here is the proof that I have on my side
Ken Cullings, Yes we'll prove it. Take me a few min. or tomorrow to find the studies. I don't see your "data" anywhere.
Ken, You're interesting me. Care to go on a live radio show and discuss your "expertise" on this issue. We'll let you choose who you want to debate against. We'll do a nice "round-table" discussion for the "sake" of fair-play. Show will be live and taped.
Hope you don't mind a legislature or two as well, add some biodiversity to the discussion.
Let me know. cb