Wolf Weekly Wrap-Up

A pair of long feature stories came out this week attempting to summarize and draw insight from the events that led to the delisting of wolves in the Northern Rockies. Both offered a mix of novel assessments and standard argument about who’s to blame for the current plight of wolves.

The first story, in Earth Island Journal, explains the dire situation on the ground, where wolf advocates have been threatened with violence by an increasingly wild-eyed bunch of wolf haters. The author attributes the eventual delisting to the belligerence of anti-wolf extremists, who created tremendous animosity and fear in response to false propaganda throughout the region and further politicized what was essentially a wildlife management issue. The story credits Defenders and other national groups for fighting hard at the national level to stop the improper and unscientific delisting. Unfortunately, it fails to recognize all the hard work that went into promoting tolerance of wolves at the local level.

The second story, in High Country News (subscribers only—sorry!), painted a far bleaker portrait of environmental groups, essentially blaming Defenders and other wildlife conservation organizations for pushing too hard to protect wolves. We agree that litigation is not always the best tool, but we tried every other available option and were left with no other choice for protecting the recovery of wolves in the region. A valid recovery plan must guarantee a healthy, interconnected wolf population. However, Interior Secretary Salazar wasn’t willing to apply the best available science to make sure wolves in the northern Rockies would be adequately protected after delisting. Now that wolves have lost most federal protection in the region outside of Wyoming, it’s up to the states to show they can manage wolves responsibly.

Sad, that has not been the case so far. Even in Montana, where wolf management has tended to be more even-handed, the state is starting off with aggressive control actions. This week a horse was allegedly killed by wolves at the western edge of the state. Federal agents with USDA’s Wildlife Services speculated that wolves had chased the horse into a fence, even though there were no visible signs of attack. As a result, Wildlife Services has been authorized to kill another pack of wolves.  In just the last three years, this agency has killed more than 400 wolves in the state.

Herder and guard dog protect a flock of sheep in Big Wood River Valley, Idaho.

In Oregon, the state wildlife agency is taking a much more proactive approach to reducing conflict between wolves and livestock. Nearly 40 ranchers in eastern Oregon are now receiving daily text messages from Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife telling them when wolves move into the area. Hopefully this advance warning system will eliminate the need to issue permits that allow ranchers to kill any of Oregon’s two dozen wolves caught in the act of attacking livestock.

Like Oregon, wolves in eastern Washington no longer have federal protection, and the state is still moving forward with recovery plans of its own. Last week, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife revealed its revised plan to restore 15 breeding pairs of wolves (an estimated total of 97 to 361 wolves) to the state. The revised plan is similar to previous version, though the required distribution of packs changed to provide for wolf restoration in the Southern Cascades and Northwest Coast region, important parts of the wolf’s historic home range.

Farther south, wolves will have a much tougher time. Utah state wildlife managers have standing orders to kill any packs found in the northeast corner of the state where federal protections no longer exist. However, as Brandon Loomis with the Salt Lake Tribune points out, that leaves the rest of the state wide open if wolves can make it that far. Let’s keep our fingers crossed.