Wednesday, May 31, 2006

Wolf Hybrids Headed For Colorado Sanctuary

Bridgette Bornstein

(WCCO) Some very lucky animals are about to make the long trek to their final home. Last week, investigators seized 20 wolf hybrids from a farm near Danbury, Wis. They're all very sick, and a couple still might not make it even with all the tender loving care at the Animal Humane Society in Golden Valley, Minn.

"They're really fluffy so it's hard to tell their true condition, but when you can get in there and touching them through the cages they are really boney. They're malnourished they just haven't been fed properly," said Animal Humane Society Manager of Veterinary Services Kathie Johnson.

When investigators found the wolf hybrids, there was no running water on the property, hardly any food, some were on short chains, and most were close to death. Investigators think the owner might have been breeding wolves and dogs for decades. The property was under foreclosure when she died.

"I think wolves were her passion and she just got in up over her head. We've been fortunate enough to raise funding to at least give these animals one last shot," said Animal Humane Society Investigator Keith Streff.

It will take several thousand dollars to move all these animals to a sanctuary in Colorado, but donations have been coming in. So the trip to their new home could happen as soon as tomorrow. "They are so lucky, the outcry from the public has been absolutely overwhelming," said Johnson.

In Wisconsin, it is legal to have exotic animals. There are more restrictive laws in Minnesota.

  • WCCO-TV
  • Tuesday, May 30, 2006

    Call of wild is wolf pups' past, future


    Brian Peterson, Star Tribune

    Surrogate motherhood can apply to wolves, as a Minnesota captive wolf adds three wild-born wolf pups to her family.

    Tom Meersman - Star Tribune

    When the rate of beeping doubled on his radio, Don Reiter knew there was trouble. It was the "mortality code," which sounds when a wolf with a radio collar hasn't moved for four hours, meaning that it is probably dead. The fish and wildlife director for the Menominee Indian tribe knew the radio frequency belonged to a female wolf who had borne pups a few weeks earlier -- the first time that had happened on the northeastern Wisconsin reservation in 75 years.
    Reiter rushed to find the female, confirmed the death and began searching frantically for the den. About 100 yards from her body, in a hollowed-out trunk, one of Reiter's assistants found five pups, hungry and waiting for their mother.

    The discovery set off a scramble that has brought the orphan pups to Minnesota for an unusual test: Can wild wolf pups be raised in captivity for as short a time as possible, then be returned successfully to the wild? "This has never been done before that we know of," said Peggy Callahan, executive director of the Wildlife Science Center near Forest Lake, which is raising the pups. "There's no guidebook for how to do this."

    The nonprofit education and research center is trying to maintain a delicate balance, Callahan said, in monitoring the pups without coddling them. That means as little direct human contact as possible, limited to a few minutes once a day to take temperatures and weights. The tribe will decide when to take the pups back, she said, probably in about a month. Timberwolves are a sacred and historic part of tribal culture, Reiter said, and the fate of the pups means a great deal to the Menominee.

    Seeking a natural solution

    After finding the dead mother and her pups, Reiter rushed the pups to the Bay Beach Wildlife Sanctuary in Green Bay. They were still too young to eat solid food and were likely to die without milk. So they were fed with bottles and, for a few days, it seemed that they were destined to be raised in captivity. But then a flurry of e-mails and phone calls raised the possibility of placing them with a surrogate mother for a period of time and then returning them to their father in the wild.

    The Minnesota center had a surrogate: Mariah, a 7-year-old female who had produced a litter of three males on April 22 and would be nursing them for several more weeks. For the plan to succeed, said Adrian Wydeven, wolf expert for the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, the time with the surrogate mother will have to be as brief as possible.

    One of the orphan pups died en route to Green Bay; another was very sick. Handling and feeding the pups might already be causing them to lose their fear of people, rescuers feared. Reiter agreed to give the plan a try. A Wisconsin DNR official drove the pups from Wisconsin to Minnesota two weeks ago.

    "I just put them all together that same afternoon," said Callahan, and Mariah suddenly had seven pups to care for instead of three. The ailing one died May 17, Callahan said, but the other pups have gained weight and appear healthy.

    On a recent afternoon, the pups were busy in their new environment. A couple of them nursed briefly, while another nuzzled against a female yearling in the pack. Others jumped on one another or took off on their own, tripping across the ground with all the gumption of toddlers in the early stages of walking. As both mother and surrogate mother, Mariah was simultaneously watching them and a photographer just inside the compound. When a pup would stray too far from her, she'd quickly gather it up in her mouth and bring it back to a safer place. Callahan said the entire pack -- four other adults and two yearlings -- has accepted pups as its own.

    Looking to the future

    How long the wild pups stay with their adopted pack will be tricky to decide, Wydeven said. The pups will need to have grown enough to survive in the wild without nursing, and they'll need not to be rejected by the male wolf that sired them. Reiter said the tribe is baiting the den with deer carcasses to keep the male from abandoning the area. If the pups survive the next few weeks, he said, they will be returned to the den and put in a small enclosure for a few days.

    "We'll be relying mostly on the father to raise these pups," Wydeven said. If the father visits and shows signs of accepting them, he said, the pups will be released. If the father rejects the pups, they'll probably need to be raised in captivity for their own protection. Menominee tribal officials will make that decision, if necessary, at the appropriate time. Callahan said the Wildlife Science Center would be interested in taking the pups again if the tribe requests it.

    "The pups are what we're worrying about right now," said Reiter, the tribe's wildlife director. "This is very important to us."

  • Star Tribune
  • Sunday, May 28, 2006

    Wolf control expansion plan is shortsighted at best

    Opinion by Mark Richards

    Earlier this May, the Alaska Board of Game voted to expand wolf control over the entire range of the Fortymile Caribou herd. From the Chena and Salcha rivers to the Goodpaster and Fortymile rivers, from the Taylor Highway to the Steese Highway, wolf populations are to be "reduced" by 75 percent to 80 percent via aerial gunning over approximately 18,750 square miles. That's the area of New Jersey and Maryland combined.

    In addition to expanded wolf control, the board also expanded lethal control of grizzly bears in the Fortymile River region. Plans call for a 60 percent reduction of grizzly bears over about 4,000 square miles.

    As a longtime, and current, subsistence hunter, fisher and trapper, I strongly oppose this predator control program. It goes way too far. It is much too extreme. This is an issue of supply (of caribou) not meeting the demand (of hunters). It's shortsighted at best to simply increase the supply of caribou at any and all costs.

    Back in the Vietnam War there was a saying that we had to "destroy the village in order to save it." In essence, this is the logic of the Fortymile Caribou Herd predator control plan.

    The goal of this extreme wolf and bear control program is to increase the size of the Fortymile Caribou Herd from the current estimate of approximately 42,000 animals to between 50,000 and 100,000 animals, with the objective leaning toward the higher number. Along with an increase in herd size is a requirement for an increased hunter harvest of caribou. The goals command a hunter harvest of 1,000 to15,000 caribou annually--not just for subsistence hunters in Alaska seeking to put meat on the table but also for non-resident hunters looking to put antlers on their wall.

    Alaska Department of Fish and Game statistics that are used to bolster the need for the predator control plans state that "during 2001-2004, 2,449 to 3,427 hunters annually harvested 693 to 864 caribou." Averaging this out, about 3,000 hunters (both residents and non-residents) already harvest about 780 caribou each year.

    According the department's 2005 Caribou Management Report, over the last three years ATVs and ORVs were the most common transport method used by successful caribou hunters for the entire Fortymile Caribou Herd's range within Alaska. ATVs, or four-wheelers, were used by 37 percent and ORVs (heavier land vehicles) were used by 4 percent. Combined, that's 41 percent of all successful hunters.

    This mode of hunter access has become such a mounting problem that the department's management reports for the Fortymile region have this to say: "Our primary concern is the increasing amount of hunters ... In combination with the increasing number of hunters, increasing access is a growing management concern, especially by hunters who use four-wheelers."

    If it now takes 3,000 hunters to annually harvest 780 caribou, just how many hunters will it take to harvest 2,000 caribou? How many hunters will it take to harvest 8,000 caribou, which is the median harvest goal?

    Extrapolating the hunter success rates published by the department, it would take about 6,000 hunters to harvest 2,000 caribou, and it would take over 10,000 hunters to harvest 8,000 caribou.

    And 41 percent of those successful hunters will be using ATVs and ORVs to access the backcountry, exponentially compounding a problem already known to exist, because the caribou are not going to conveniently line up by the side of the road each season so hunters can harvest them with minimal environmental impact. And if we were to curtail ATV and ORV access, hunters couldn't possibly harvest the required number of caribou.

    If ATV and ORV access is such a "growing management concern," how does it make sense to ensure such a huge increase in this type of access? Can the habitat realistically be expected to absorb these kind of hunter numbers and means of access without widespread and long-term damage?

    I don't think it can, and it's just one (among many) of the reasons I oppose this program. Unfortunately, I seem to be in the minority among hunters.

    Rod Arno from the pro-hunting Alaska Outdoor Council called these expanded predator control changes "wonderful."

    I hope other hunters will join me in putting some common sense back into what "pro-hunting" really means and what we as hunters stand for.

    The role of the hunter is grounded in conservation and stewardship and respect for the land and animals. Not in extreme plans to "grow more caribou" at any and all costs.

    I don't think these changes are wonderful. We need your support to turn things around.

    Mark Richards is co-chairman of Alaska Backcountry Hunters and Anglers.

  • Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
  • Saturday, May 27, 2006

    Wyoming candidate Hunkins wants 'unconditional surrender'

    By BRODIE FARQUHAR - Star-Tribune correspondent

    RIVERTON -- Ray Hunkins, the Republican challenger to Democratic Gov. Dave Freudenthal, threw red meat to a Farm Bureau crowd on Friday, declaring he would seek “unconditional surrender” from the U.S. Interior Department when it comes to wolf management in Wyoming. In April, Hunkins suggested that state officials pursue an out-of-court resolution to Wyoming's dispute with the federal government over wolves -- even if it meant dropping the state's classification of the animals as predators that could be shot on sight outside national parks and adjacent lands.

    Hunkins said the word “negotiate” has taken on "an ugly meaning" in connection with this issue, noting that Freudenthal had called Hunkins' position “capitulation” to the federal wolf position. “Let me tell you what I meant by ‘negotiation.' In 1945, Douglas MacArthur met on the deck of the USS Missouri with representatives of the Empire of Japan to accept their unconditional surrender, ending World War II. That was preceded by negotiations between General MacArthur’s staff and the imperial general staff concerning the terms of surrender. “My friends, this is exactly the sort of negotiation I have in mind. It is not synonymous with capitulate. Hunkins, a Wheatland lawyer and rancher, said his courtroom reputation was not based on capitulation or surrender.

    Hunkins spoke here on the final day of a wolf seminar involving landowners, outfitters, state and federal biologists, lawyers and legislators. At the seminar the day before, Freudenthal vigorously defended the state's wolf management plan, which has been rejected by the federal government largely because it provides no protection for wolves in most of the state.

    In Hunkins' remarks on Friday, Freudenthal's probable GOP challenger in November accused the former Wyoming U.S. attorney of helping bring wolves to Wyoming. In his capacity as a federal lawyer, Freudenthal was involved in defending against a court challenge to the federal wolf reintroduction program, arguing well enough that the agency won that case, Hunkins said. Hunkins said Freudenthal had a chance to recuse himself from arguing in favor of wolf reintroduction in the West, but did not do so. “That was his choice,” Hunkins said.

    In contrast, Hunkins praised the current U.S. attorney in Wyoming, Matthew Mead, who had opposed wolf reintroduction and filed a motion to recuse his office and himself from any involvement with the current wolf litigation. “That motion was granted by the trial judge, and our U.S. attorney for Wyoming in 2006 is not involved in wolf litigation,” Hunkins said. He praised Mead for following his convictions, saying Freudenthal could have done the same and did not. “He (Freudenthal) had his chance. He did not lead. I will,” Hunkins said. Although Freudenthal has declared himself as "anti-wolf and anti-fed," Hunkins said, “the bell cannot be unrung."

    "The ranchers, sportsmen and outfitters in this state should beware of someone who worked to implement (former Interior Secretary) Bruce Babbitt’s policy and before that against the election of Ronald Reagan, and who finds it politically convenient to now be against the feds and the wolves,” Hunkins said. “My friends, beware of wolves in sheep’s clothing.”

    Freudenthal's spokeswoman, Lara Azar, declined Friday to respond to Hunkins' assertions. "(The governor's) track record on wolves -- and the state's track record -- of the past few years is very clear," Azar wrote in an e-mail. "He fully supports the Legislature's actions in developing the state's wolf management statutes and will continue to do so."

    Hunkins told the wolf seminar crowd that a Democrat could be elected president in 2008, and that such an administration would be no friend of Wyoming. “If we don’t have a solution by January 2009, and a Democrat administration is inaugurated in Washington, I fear for the welfare of our ranchers, sportsmen and outfitters, of our big game herds and our livestock,” Hunkins said.

    The Interior Department has refused to downgrade Wyoming wolves from Endangered Species Act protection until the state submits a wolf management plan that is acceptable to the federal agency. The department has already approved wolf plans from Montana and Idaho.

    Declaring that the federal wolf program is “out of control,” Hunkins said a new environmental impact statement is needed to show the impact of wolves on livestock and wildlife. Hunkins said the Wyoming Legislature has enacted a responsible wolf management plan. “I want to be clear as the Wind River on this,” Hunkins said. “I support that plan, and I support dual classification. But I don’t care what we call the wolves, what label we attach to them, as long as we reduce their numbers and their territory.”

    Hunkins urged Wyoming to elect a Republican governor and send him to work with the Bush administration and the state’s congressional delegation to get wolves delisted. “It will take political will and political courage -- and most of all good faith -- to come to a solution," Hunkins said. "My friends, I am prepared to supply all three."

  • Casper Star-Tribune
  • Wolf encounters: What do you do?

    BY KEITH RIDLER - THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

    BOISE, Idaho -- Thousands of vacationers in the West will likely see a wolf in the wild for the first time this summer, often from the road but sometimes while camping or hiking. The federal government and state agencies that manage wolves have concise rules on what is legal in these encounters, and experts who study wolf behavior offer advice on how to handle what is likely to be an unforgettable experience.

    "Wolves don't turn and run away immediately like we're used to with other animals," said Carolyn Sime, gray wolf program coordinator with the Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks Department. "The other thing that kind of makes it unnerving is the intensity of their eyes. It's partly the color, and partly the intensity of the way they're looking at you."

    Wolves nearly always blink first, experts say, but yelling will drive off a wolf as will pepper spray.

    Increasing numbers

    About 1,000 wolves in 140 packs live in Montana, Idaho and Wyoming. Their numbers have been steadily increasing since they were reintroduced in Yellowstone National Park and central Idaho in 1995 and 1996.

    "Even though they're fairly rare in nature, wolves are relatively visible compared to a lot of animals," said Ed Bangs, wolf recovery coordinator with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. "There are never many of them because these are big, large carnivores. But they seem abundant because they travel the same areas people do." Bangs said one study found that more than 100,000 people see a wolf in Yellowstone National Park each year. For comparison, few people ever see one of the 31,000 cougars that inhabit the Western United States.

    Gray wolves also have been reintroduced along the Arizona-New Mexico border, beginning in 1998, but that population had fewer than 50 individuals at the end of 2005. About 3,000 gray wolves inhabit northern Minnesota, and another 500 in Michigan and 500 in Wisconsin.

    Male wolves average about 100 pounds and females slightly less. They often travel on roads, trails, creek bottoms and ridge tops. When resting, wolves like the same types of areas that draw humans. "Because meadows are attractive to campers, you're likely to run into wolf activity," said Steve Nadeau, statewide large carnivore coordinator with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game. "Particularly if the meadow has game nearby -- elk and deer."

    Wolf experts say that centuries of mythology taint present day wolf-human meetings, and that wolves tend to avoid humans. "If you're walking on a dark trail at midnight and you turn a corner and come across a pack of 20 wolves, enjoy them," said Bangs. "Because they'll be gone in a few seconds."

    Dogs

    But wolves might not vanish so quickly if a hiker has a dog along. Northern Rockies gray wolves have killed at least 83 dogs since 1987, and last year, they killed 30 of their own number in territorial disputes. "Wolves consider dogs as strange wolves," said Bangs. "A dog may think that a wolf barking or howling is a dog that wants to play. Trust me, that is not the case."

    Other instances where wolves might act aggressively is near a den or a kill site. "If you come into an area where you see a kill, particularly if it's kind of fresh, back out of there and go someplace else," said Sime.

    Wolf listings

    Meeting wolves can have legal ramifications. Under the Endangered Species Act, wolves in Minnesota are listed as threatened, while wolves in Michigan, Wisconsin, northern Idaho, and northwest Montana are endangered. Wolf populations that resulted from reintroductions are listed as "experimental, nonessential." They include wolves south of Interstate 90 in Idaho, Montana outside the northwest corner, Wyoming, Arizona and New Mexico.

    Scaring wolves off

    "Our regulations allow anyone at anytime to scare a wolf away," said Bangs. "Just run at it and yell at it and it will run off. That's legal to do. Just don't hurt it."

    Pepper spray -- often carried by hikers in grizzly bear country -- can be used on wolves.

    It's legal to kill a wolf in self-defense.

    "Expect an investigation because that is almost nonexistent," said Bangs. "The physical evidence better back up your story." The penalty for illegally killing a listed wolf can range up to $100,000 and a year in jail. Bangs said that about 10 percent of Northern Rockies wolf deaths are the result of illegal kills.

    Delisting

    Gray wolves in the Northern Rockies met the criteria for delisting in 2002. The Fish and Wildlife Service has approved plans by Idaho and Montana to manage wolves, but federal officials rejected Wyoming's plan saying it would eliminate wolves outside Yellowstone National Park. That has stopped delisting so far. If delisted, wolves would be treated as big game animals, possibly with hunting seasons, something Bangs said and other federal and state wolf managers favor. Hunting would not be allowed in Yellowstone National Park, where most wolf sightings occur. But sightings are becoming more common elsewhere.

    "Of all the things you have to worry about in life, wolves are probably on the bottom of the list," said Bangs. "People who don't know any better are nervous about wolves, but most people are like, 'Wow, was that cool or what.' "

  • The Olympian
  • Friday, May 26, 2006

    Let nature handle the return of the wolf to Adirondacks

    OUTDOORS COLUMN BY RICK BROCKWAY

    Over the past few years, several environmental groups have pushed to restore the wolf to the Adirondacks, and possibly even to the Catskills. The thought is to reintroduce the gray wolf to its natural habitat.

    It was thought that the last native wolf was killed in the Adirondacks in 1899. But last year, I told you about a gray wolf that was shot near Northville in the southern Adirondacks in 2002. A DNA test by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service confirmed it was a gray wolf.

    Where did this animal come from?

    The closest wolves are in northern Maine and Canada. Wolves feed primarily on large animals. They follow migrating caribou herds in northern Canada, and in Maine and Alaska, they feed on moose. The main diet for those living in Yellowstone Park is elk.

    The Adirondacks have a small moose population and a somewhat larger deer population. So, what are these large predators going to eat? As far as wild animals are concerned, wolves are at the top of the food chain. Since the eastern coyote is already present, there’s no niche to fill.

    I was thrilled to see a wolf during a visit to Yellowstone Park a few years ago, but the ranchers and residents of that area don’t want them around.

    It’s the same thing here. A recent study concluded that the majority of the people in New York are in favor of reintroducing the wolf. But most of those people don’t live in the sparsely populated mountains of northern New York. Like those who live in the Yellowstone area, Adirondack residents don’t want wolves, either.

    Another problem exists. If the wolf was reintroduced to its native habitat, which wolf would be stocked? Environmentalists want to bring back the gray wolf, but DNA testing of the wolf killed in 1899 showed it was actually a red wolf. Its pelt is in the Albany Museum.

    So how can you reintroduce a specie that may not have lived here in the past?

    As the debate continues, several organizations were contacted to determine their positions on restoring the wolf to the Adirondacks.

  • Oneonta Daily Star
  • Montana Governor defends wolf stance

    By BRODIE FARQUHAR - Star-Tribune correspondent

    RIVERTON -- In full-throated defense of Wyoming’s wolf management plan, Gov. Dave Freudenthal declared Thursday that wolf plans adopted by Idaho and Montana “aren’t worth a bucket of warm spit.”

    The Democratic governor spoke here before Wyoming Farm Bureau members, a handful of state legislators and county commissioners at the start of a two-day wolf seminar: “Wolves, Wyoming’s Reality.” The seminar features panel discussions by landowners, outfitters, academics, state and federal biologists, lawyers and legislators. There was no representation from conservation groups that support wolves.

    Freudenthal noted that the state is headed into the election season, featuring a lot of dancing around controversial issues. “Part of my argument is with the Casper Star-Tribune,” he said, adding that the editorial board of the state’s largest newspaper has said that Wyoming should drop its predator status for wolves -- a similar stance to that recently taken by Ray Hunkins, Republican candidate for governor.

    Hunkins is scheduled to speak before the same group at 1 p.m. today.

    Wyoming is in a standoff over wolves with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which rejected the state’s management plan, largely because it would allow wolves to be shot on sight as “predators” outside Yellowstone National Park and adjacent lands. The federal agency has refused to downgrade Wyoming wolves from Endangered Species Act protection until Wyoming submits a plan that is acceptable to the Department of the Interior, which has already approved wolf management plans from Idaho and Montana.

    The governor said Wyoming has already lost the national debate over whether wolves should even be called “predators.” “I knew we were in trouble when I stepped inside a Cracker Barrel store,” the governor said. There, on display and on sale, was a variety of cute, stuffed animals -- including wolves, suitable to put in a baby’s crib. “We’ve lost the larger psychological battle,” Freudenthal said, adding that basic, scientific facts are no longer relevant to people on the West and East coasts.

    And the governor said he sees little reason to sit down and talk more with federal officials. He said he has done that, and he’s tired of lectures about why Wyoming needs to change its wolf management plan. “All we hear is dissertations from them as to why we need to change. I’ve been through a multitude of those meetings,” including one where Interior Secretary Gale Norton was in his office, he said.

    Freudenthal said he didn’t know if that will change if Idaho Gov. Dirk Kempthorne becomes Interior secretary. “I won’t hang my hat on that thin reed,” Freudenthal said. Ultimately, and probably in federal court, the governor said, he wants a hearing on the scientific merits of the state's position.

    He said the state already has scientific approval for the plan, as 10 of 11 scientists selected by the Fish and Wildlife Service gave the Cowboy State a thumbs up on its wolf management plan. The governor said that scientific stamp of approval has been overridden by politics.

    He noted that Paul Hoffman, the former Cody Country Chamber of Commerce executive who's now an Interior Department official, told Wyoming legislators that they could have a large "take" on wolves through hunting, but only within the context of calling them trophy game animals and issuing hunting licenses. That just doesn’t make sense, Freudenthal said, because trophy animals are managed so there is a continual supply of the animals, and that isn’t what he or the Legislature wants with wolves.

    He said that any hope of keeping wolf populations down, so as to minimize conflicts with livestock, are illusory. Wyoming needs additional tools and tactics, such as aerial gunning, to control wolves, he said. Under a trophy animal approach, Wyoming couldn’t use aerial gunning, he said.

    Freudenthal said the Interior position is political, not scientific. He said he’d like the same flexibility in managing wolves as Wyoming has with managing air pollution under the federal Clear Air Act. “I don’t like being in conflict with feds, but I don’t want to be governor when we just roll over," he said.

  • Casper Star-Tribune
  • Alpha shot- eight wolves die in Arizona in removal effort

    By Arthur H. Rotstein - ASSOCIATED PRESS

    TUCSON, Ariz. – The alpha male of a wolf pack that had been killing cattle on the White Mountain Apache Reservation has been shot and eight other wolves in the pack that were captured have died, including six pups killed by a surrogate parent wolf. The alpha male of the 12-member Hon Dah pack was shot and killed Wednesday after efforts to capture it were unsuccessful. The wolf was shot by a member of the interagency wildlife team overseeing the Mexican gray wolf recovery program.

    U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service officials had ordered the capture or removal of the entire pack of wolves April 19, at the request of the tribe.

    Six pups were captured Friday and transported to the Sevilleta National Wildlife Refuge in Socorro County, N.M., where they were placed with a surrogate pair of wolves that had a two-pup litter, in hopes the pair would care for the captured animals. Although the adult male had been used successfully as a surrogate before, “in this instance the male killed the six in an instinctive effort to protect his own two pups,” said Victoria Fox, a Fish and Wildlife Service spokeswoman in Albuquerque

    The alpha female was captured late Sunday and taken to an Alpine, Ariz., field office for the recovery program. She was monitored overnight and appeared healthy and alert but was found dead early Monday before a veterinary examination, the agency said. One trapped male yearling also died. A second male yearling was trapped and taken to the Ladder Ranch wolf facility in New Mexico, while officials haven't located the third yearling, whose gender is unknown. The fate of a seventh pup is not known.

    Fish and Wildlife said it would conduct an internal review of the circumstances surrounding the wolves' deaths. “The loss of these wolves is a blow to the Mexican wolf recovery program and everyone who is working to recover wolves in the Southwest,” said Benjamin Tuggle, acting regional director for the agency's Southwest region.

    According to Fish and Wildlife estimates, there are 32 to 46 Mexican gray wolves in the wild, not including newborn pups, in eastern Arizona and western New Mexico.

  • San Diego Union-Tribune
  • Thursday, May 25, 2006

    Home on the Range: A Corridor for Wildlife


    By CORNELIA DEAN

    LAKE LOUISE, Alberta — One day in April, a zoologist named Paul Paquet found himself at the tiny railroad station here, in the middle of Banff National Park. Above him loomed the snow-covered crags of the Canadian Rockies, fringed with Douglas fir and lodgepole pine. A few dozen yards away, the Bow River glimmered in the sun.

    He surveyed his surroundings and grimaced. "This park," he said. "It's a national disgrace."

    Sure it's beautiful, he said, and, yes, it is one of the last places where grizzly bears can roam and wolves can hunt the elk and bighorn sheep that are their prey. "But there is a highway through the middle of the park, and development associated with it," he said. As a natural environment, "it's a disaster."

    Dr. Paquet, who works for the World Wildlife Fund and has faculty appointments at several Canadian universities, is part of a collaborative group of researchers, conservationists, government officials and others hoping to improve things — not by removing roads or railways but by mitigating their effects.

    They want to create a sustainable environment for wildlife from the Yukon to Yellowstone, even as people move ever deeper into the Rocky Mountains of the United States and Canada.

    Participants in the collaboration, called Y2Y, have designed and monitored overpasses and underpasses to help animals cross highways safely. They have negotiated limits on access to golf courses and ski slopes so animals can traverse them. They have encouraged the creation of wildlife corridors around or even across towns.

    Their goal is not just a wolf pack surviving here and there, or a few scattered grizzly bears or elk or bighorn sheep, but a landscape in which animals can thrive, roaming and reproducing widely and avoiding the genetic perils of small populations trapped in shrinking habitats.

    When the researchers write up their findings for scientific journals, they call this goal "functional connectivity," said Michael Proctor, a zoologist and postdoctoral researcher at the University of Alberta. He calls it "sex across the highway."

    Around the world, conservationists are embarking on similar efforts. In India, wildlife experts are trying to establish corridors linking fragments of tiger habitat, according to the National Wildlife Federation. Similar projects are under way in Costa Rica and Australia.

    Researchers at the University of Florida, working in an experimental landscape in South Carolina, reported last year that corridors established for wildlife can also help the survival of plants.

    But Y2Y is perhaps the largest effort.

    Dr. Proctor, Dr. Paquet and other scientists were at the Lake Louise station because the Canadian Pacific rail line that carries grain to ports on the west coast is a major killing ground for elk, bears and other animals drawn to the tracks by grain that spills from the hoppers

    There are arguments over who is responsible for the problem, said Mike Gibeau, as he bent to gather lentils, barley and other grain lying in small piles between the tracks. Dr. Gibeau, who works for Parks Canada, the agency that runs the national parks, is working with other researchers for ways to reduce the carnage.

    Here in Lake Louise, the tracks have been fenced off with metal mesh. Where the fence opens at the station, the rail bed has been fitted with a mat of six-inch metal spikes. Trains can pass over the spikes but, in theory, animals cannot.

    "We're going to see if it works," Dr. Gibeau said, and if it does it will be adopted elsewhere.

    Mesh fencing has also been installed along stretches of the Trans-Canada Highway as it slices across the park, and as the road is widened additional fencing will be added. The effort is motivated not so much by concern for animals, the researchers note, but to avoid injury to the drivers of cars and trucks that would otherwise hit them. In fenced areas, hardly any animals die on the road, but they are trapped on one side or the other.

    A project a few miles south of Banff aims to correct that. There, an overpass about 50 yards wide over four lanes of traffic was built a few years ago. Researchers supported by Y2Y are studying what animals are using it and when, in hopes of installing similar crossovers elsewhere.

    Approached from the woods, the crossover resembles any other sloping hill, covered with brushy grass, shrubs, saplings and even a clump or two of pussy willow.

    Earthen berms on either side hide the road and mute the noise of the tens of thousands of cars that pass by daily, winter and summer.

    Animals have worn a trail along one edge and, at the top, leave prints on a cleared stretch of dirt, a so-called track pad, monitored by motion-sensitive cameras with night-vision lenses.

    Wayne Hallstrom, a research associate with Parks Canada, said he and his colleagues checked the pad twice a week for signs of animal crossings. In the last few years, he said, they have counted tens of thousands of crossings by wolves, bears, cougars, elk, deer and other animals. Each year the numbers rise, presumably because more animals are learning where the crossings are.

    He said researchers planned next to install a bit of barbed wire in hopes of snagging bits of fur with hair follicles that will yield DNA for testing. They want to know not just how many times bears cross the road, say, but whether there are many bears or just a few bears making multiple trips.

    "I think it's changed the movement of the elk," Mr. Hallstrom offered, "but it's unstudied so far."

    The overpass project is run by Anthony P. Clevenger, a scientist supported by Y2Y who works with the Western Transportation Institute at Montana State University at Bozeman. Dr. Clevenger is working on installing dozens of wildlife crossings on Route 93 in Montana, south of Flathead Lake.

    "We know that some species — grizzly bears, wolves, elk and deer, also moose, prefer large structures," Dr. Clevenger said. "Cougars and black bears prefer the opposite — very constricted structures with lots of cover." Sometimes a pack of wolves will approach a crossing, but if only some are willing to chance it the pack as a whole may not cross. The scientists are trying to figure out a crossing design that will encourage packs to move en masse.

    Dr. Proctor said there was also talk of modifying avalanche sheds that carry cascading snow across mountain highways so animals can use them as crossovers. Y2Y began in the mid-1990's when some Canadian parks officials and conservationists approached the Kendall Foundation, an environmental grant-maker based in Boston. "They said they had this idea of protecting the wild heart of North America from Yellowstone to Yukon," said Gary Tabor, who was at the foundation at the time and later became the first director of Y2Y.

    The protection offered by national, state and provincial parks was not enough to protect their bears and elk and wolves, Dr. Tabor said they told him. "They said, 'You have to protect larger landscapes to protect such species.' "

    Eventually, Dr. Tabor said, the foundation convened meetings with academic researchers, conservation groups, government agencies and "key stakeholders," like business leaders and American Indian representatives. They discussed what the Y2Y boundaries should be, settling on a region of about 465,000 square miles, most at elevations of 3,500 feet or higher, encircled at lower elevations by prairie grasslands.

    They also talked about what kind of scientific work the organization should finance. Today, Y2Y receives grants from foundations and itself supports the work of established scientists, graduate students and others with an annual budget of about $2 million. (An exhibition on the initiative will open July 15 at the American Museum of Natural History, in New York, where it will run until January.)

    Initially, Dr. Tabor said, property rights organizations and other groups accused Y2Y participants of seeking to drive people out of the Rockies. "That was never the intention," said Dr. Tabor, who left Y2Y in April to head the North America program for the Wildlife Conservation Society. "The intention was, We have to have a regime where people and wildlife can live compatibly." Although parks and other protected areas form the core of Y2Y, "we work community by community," he said.

    "It's not just public lands; it's about private lands in between," he added.

    When people objected that restrictions would harm the region's economy, Y2Y pointed to a study showing that a pristine environment could draw people who come to the area because of its ecological integrity, the so-called amenity migrants, said Rob Buffler, who replaced Dr. Tabor as Y2Y's chief.

    One of the towns drawing them is Canmore, not only because of its beautiful location in the Bow River Valley, but also because it is within commuting distance of Calgary, thriving in Alberta's oil and gas boom, and Banff.

    The growing town, which the researchers call "the Canmore plug," has forced animals that once traveled along the river up the mountain slopes, Dr. Gibeau said.

    To accommodate them, he said, some ski resorts and golf courses are limiting access to people.

    "Grizzly bears come down here to walk down the road in the middle of the night," he said. In April, Parks Canada appealed to drivers to use one major road, the Bow Valley Parkway, only from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. until June 25, to create traffic-free periods for wildlife on the move in spring.

    But the human species does not always embrace all of Y2Y's goals. Hikers camp in wildlife underpasses. Mountain bikers drive animals away from an overpass built over a hydroelectric plant canal, Dr. Gibeau said, and they ruin hillside vegetation by riding their brakes too hard on the way down.

    Such problems sometimes leave the researchers wondering whether their efforts do any good. Dr. Paquet said it was troubling to think that he might simply be "monitoring the slow demise" of the ecosystem.

    Dr. Gibeau carries in his wallet a much-folded piece of paper with words the naturalist Aldo Leopold wrote more than 30 years ago: "One of the penalties of an ecological education is that one lives alone in a world of wounds," Leopold wrote. "Much of the damage inflicted on land is quite invisible to laymen. An ecologist must either harden his shell and make believe that the consequences of science are none of his business, or he must be the doctor who sees the marks of death in a community that believes itself well — and does not want to be told otherwise."

    Dr. Gibeau has this "ecological education," and he knows Leopold was right.

    "People who come here are just so awestruck by the scenery that they cannot understand its ecological problems" he said. "They say, 'How can there be trouble here?' But once you peel back the veneer, this place is like most other places, a human-dominated system."

  • New York Times
  • Wednesday, May 24, 2006

    Yellowstone denning and pup report

    Fresh info on the denning and pup status of the packs at Yellowstone on Ralph Maughan's extensive wildlife site:

  • Ralph Maughan's Wildlife Reports
  • Tuesday, May 23, 2006

    Wandering Wolf Inspires Conservation Project


    By CORNELIA DEAN

    KANANASKIS STATION, Alberta — A wolf gave scientists the idea for Y2Y, the conservation collaborative covering the Rockies from the Yukon to Yellowstone.

    Researchers captured the wolf, a female, near here on a rainy June day in 1991. They fitted her with a collar and satellite transmitter and, over the next two years, picked up signals as she moved north to Banff National Park, and then west into British Columbia, south across the United States border and through Glacier National Park to Browning, Mont., to Idaho and then to Washington and finally north again to British Columbia, where she stayed a few weeks before taking off on another looping trip south.

    The wolf, named Pluie (ploo-WEE, rain in French) wandered an area of about 40,000 square miles, spending time with five packs. "We thought she was on a pickup truck for a while," said Paul Paquet, a zoologist with the World Wildlife Fund, who led the tracking effort. "She was moving so fast."

    In December 1993, near Fernie, British Columbia, Pluie's collar issued its last signal. Soon after, someone sent its battery to Dr. Paquet. It had a bullet hole through it.

    But Pluie was not dead, not yet. Two years later she turned up, with her batteryless collar, outside Invermere, British Columbia, near Kootenay National Park. She was with an adult male and three pups. A hunter had shot them all dead.

    Pluie had shown that despite everything — roads, rails, people and buildings — large carnivores and their prey still roamed the Rocky Mountains. But she also showed that effective conservation must transcend state, provincial and national borders and provide a way to protect animals on the move from civilization's threats.

    The grizzly bear is the official symbol of Y2Y. But Dr. Paquet said it was important for people to know about Pluie. "This was the founding story of Y2Y," he said. "Really, the whole idea evolved out of it."

  • N Y Times
  • Park Service: Colorado Elk Thinning To Cost $18 Million

    "Wolves would best meet environmental objectives"

    (AP) BOULDER, Colo. A 20-year plan to thin the burgeoning elk herd in Rocky Mountain National Park could cost $18 million to kill some animals and disperse others, park officials said. An estimated 2,200 to 3,000 elk live in the park, overgrazing vegetation that is also important to other wildlife including songbirds, beavers and butterflies, biologists say. Elk numbers have escalated because the animals have few predators and no hunting is allowed in the park. The park's goal is a herd of 1,200 to 1,700 elk.

    Park officials outlined the proposed program and its estimated costs during a public meeting Monday. The park's favored plan would involve killing up to 700 elk annually for four years. After that, an additional 25 to 150 elk would be culled annually for 16 years. The costs would come from hiring extra staff or a contractor to shoot elk, building fences to protect vegetation, transporting carcasses, testing them for disease and processing the meat.

    "Doing something like this is not going to be cheap, for sure," said park Superintendent Vaughn Baker. "But we're talking 20 years."

    The park's preferred plan calls for killing elk at night with silencer-equipped guns in part to minimize disturbances to park visitors. Park officials said they recognize that some people are upset by the prospect of killing elk in the park. While most recognize that something needs to be done to manage the population, there are contentious disagreements over the best method, said park biologist Therese Johnson.

    "For and against wolves. For and against hunting. And we have heard from people who prefer fertility control to killing the elk," she said. Congress would have to approve any plan to allow hunting in a national park.

    A draft elk-management plan released last month did not suggest releasing wolves in the park, but park officials have said wolves would best meet environmental objectives and do the least damage. Any proposal to release wolves in Colorado would have to be considered by federal and state agencies and likely would meet strong opposition from ranchers and others.

    Some people at Monday's meeting expressed dismay at the thought of killing elk. Others questioned why the park waited so long to do something about the growing elk population. "Fewer elk are going to help all of us," said Wally Wedel, who owns a cabin near the park. Wedel said elk are crowing out deer and damaging private property.

    The park is accepting public comments until July 4. It has scheduled other public meetings this week in Loveland, Grand Lake and Estes Park.

  • CBS4 Denver
  • Monday, May 22, 2006

    Scotish wildlife park puts down wolf pack

    Wolves at a Scottish wildlife park have been culled and replaced with another sub-species of the animal. A pack of Mackenzie River wolves - a North American wolf - has been a feature at Highland Wildlife Park, Kincraig, near Aviemore, since 1972.

    But experts said the six animals had to be euthanised because they were "not portraying their natural behaviour". The park is now part of a breeding programme involving seven rare Scandinavian wolves. Park owners, the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland, said the cull followed lengthy discussion and research and with the approval of the Animal Welfare and Ethics Committee. The society said that in the past five years the six wolves stopped "portraying their natural behaviour", or pack dynamic, which it said was essential to the survival of the species.

    Society chief executive David Windmill said: "Animal management is a complex, difficult but rewarding work. "With any kind of management, at times difficult decisions need to be taken and this was one of those times. "The welfare of the animal is always paramount in our minds and no decision is made until a full investigation has been carried out, taking into account all aspects of the species and situation." He added: "In the wild, animals are competing in the deadly game of 'survival of the fittest'.

    "Zoos have saved a number of these species from imminent extinction. "The challenge will be to manage them in captivity to the best of our ability in the future, until perhaps one day 'the wild' is safe enough for their return."

    Pack dynamic is the term used to describe how every wolf knows its place within its group. An alpha pair leads the pack and the top male and female have a second-in-command called a beta male and beta female. This hierarchy continues down through the pack to the omega wolf, which is usually picked on by the others. Only the alpha pair is allowed to breed within the pack, but all the wolves take responsibility for caring for the cubs.

    The wildlife park's Mackenzie River pack arrived in 1972 , but breeding of the animals ended in 2000. The wolves were aged between six and eight years old and were put down in January.

    Two new females from Scandinavia have been introduced to the park and will be joined by five males in about a month.

    Ross Minett, director of campaign group Advocates for Animals, said the Mackenzie River wolf pack should have been allowed to "live out their lives in peace". He said: "Zoos have a responsibility for these animals and not just treat them as a disposable commodity." On the pack dynamic, Mr Minett said the wolves would have lost this behaviour because they had been kept in a controlled environment.

  • BBC NEWS
  • Sunday, May 21, 2006

    Researchers get wild at Wolf Park

    By Timothy O'Connor - Summer Reporter

    A steady whirring sound makes its way across the lake on a chilly Sunday afternoon. Barks and howls dance in and out of the rhythmic noise creating a midday symphony for the audience in attendance. The perpetrators, a pack of seven wolves, can be seen off in the distance. A few minutes later, the howling stops and a woman chides the wolves to come closer calling each by name.

    This is Wolf Park, a research reservation in Battleground, Ind. Since Wolf Park was founded in 1972 by Erich Klinghammer, a former professor at Purdue, it has researched social rank hierarchy among wolves.

    The wolves eventually make their way over to the viewing area across a land bridge. Handlers await their arrival and begin playing with the canines. One wolf jumps up on a dead tree stump and looks at one of the handlers at eye level. Their faces touch. Another handler gets down on his knees and allows a wolf to kiss him.

    "There's a lot of politics in a wolf pack," said John Davis, education coordinator. "The way you tell the rank is to watch to see who submits to who."

    After the wolf demonstration, the crowd is escorted around the main holding area to a much larger field where a herd of bison are grazing. The handlers introduce two wolves into the field which immediately begin making their way toward the bison. The bison mostly ignore the carnivores as they walk around the herd looking for weak points to strike at.

    Amanda Shaad, the managing director for Wolf Park, assures the audience that there is nothing to worry about. She says that in all the years they've been doing the predator-prey demonstrations the bison have always won. She is soon proven right when the wolves make their move only to be chased away time and time again by the half ton plus bison. After awhile, the wolves give up and begin exploring the field for smaller, less menacing prey like garden snakes or field mice.

    Shaad relates one of her favorite memories of the bison demonstration. Six years ago, a wolf was chasing one of the calves around the field. In the middle of the chase, the wolf stopped to urinate and surprisingly the calf stopped, too, as if to wait for the wolf to finish. When the wolf was done the chase continued.

    "We want people to see how the wolves test the herd and how the bison protect themselves," said Davis. Davis has been working with wolves for over a decade. As a handler, he's been bitten several times, though he describes the experience as more of a pinch. "To work with a wolf, you have to be equal or greater to them in rank in their eyes," said Davis.

    After the bison demonstration, Davis walks over to another wolf pen that has three inhabitants, including his favorite wolf, Miska. "I'm the only one here who will say Miska, give me a kiss,' no one else really wants them in their face," Davis said. "For some reason him and I just have a thing going." Along with allowing Miska to kiss him, Davis occasionally feeds Miska his favorite treat, White Castle hamburgers. "Without onions," said Davis.

    Davis explains that the allure of Wolf Park is how much easier the facility makes it to do research. One of the goals of Wolf Park is to tame the animals so that they're comfortable around people. In the wild, wolves will flee if humans come within a half mile of them. The wolves at Wolf Park, however, are used to humans they don't run away and are far easier to observe.

    Davis then comes upon a small pen holding two coyote puppies. Playing with the puppies is Andrew Miller, a recent Purdue graduate and staff member at Wolf Park. "We've used everything from pieces of wood that they're interested in playing with to pizza boxes," said Miller of training the young coyotes. The toys help prevent the animals from developing repetitive behavioral problems. Miller said the handlers use clicker training to reward the animals for good behavior. Clicker training is done by pairing a sound with food so that the animals associate the sound with a reward.

    As Davis heads back to the wolf demonstration another staff member walks by holding a plate of frozen mice. While icy white rodents won't sound appetizing to most humans, it's the equivalent of a tasty popsicle for Wolf Park's citizens.

    Wolf Park is located at 4012 East 800 N. Battle Ground, Ind. It is open to the public 1 to 5 p.m., every day except non-holiday Mondays. For more information, visit www.wolfpark.org.

  • Purdue Exponent
  • Mexican wolves may be killed for killing cattle

    THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

    Five endangered Mexican gray wolves may be permanently removed from the wild in Eastern Arizona or shot because they have killed so many cattle. The White Mountain Apache Tribal Council has requested that the pack be removed. The animals have been directly involved in six cattle killings, four probable depredations and one cattle injury on tribal land in the past year.

    "At this point in the game, we're not pursuing the lethal option, but it could come to that shortly," said John Morgart, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's Mexican wolf recovery coordinator.

    A field team captured two of the pack's male yearlings last month and moved them to a ranch in southern New Mexico. One was found dead in its pen five days after arriving. Morgart said the animal likely died of stress, but tests would be done. The team's focus now is on trying to capture the alpha female and her new pups. She has eluded traps twice. The alpha male and a yearling are also still in the wild. The alpha male is the only one of the pack wearing a radio collar, Morgart said.

    Another pair of wolves known as the Nantac Pack is doing well after being released in southwestern New Mexico in April. Morgart said they chewed through a temporary pen within days and are eating natural prey.

  • Arizona Daily Star
  • Saturday, May 20, 2006

    Wisconsin wolf pups get new mom and second chance in Minnesota

    By Scott Goldberg, KARE 11 News

    Nobody knows how their mother died, only that she did. Tribal biologists found them – four tiny, furry wolf puppies – on the Menominee Indian Reservation in Wisconsin, on May 5, after finding their mother’s body. Now, scientists in Minnesota hope to trick the male pups into thinking another mother is their real mother, so the puppies can be re-introduced into the wild after a brief stint in captivity.

    Five days after the pups were discovered, they were transported to the Wildlife Science Center in Forest Lake, Minnesota. "It's very exciting," said Peggy Callahan, the center’s executive director. "(This is) the first litter that was born in 75 years on the reservation."

    Callahan said it is important for the four pups, which range from about 3 to 4 pounds in weight, to live in the wild, because a new litter is so rare. "The folks on the reservation are really committed to having wolves there, so, this is a really -- an experimental effort to try to get these puppies back into the wild," she said.

    At the Wildlife Science Center, the pups were given antibiotics, and microchips were inserted between their shoulder blades, so they can be tracked. "I know," Callahan said to one of the pups, as she injected the microchip under its skin. "No fun." Fortunately for the puppies, Callahan said, a wolf in captivity at the science center had just given birth to three puppies of her own. Callahan and her staff are trying to trick the wolf into thinking the wild puppies are hers, too. "We're hoping that the next step will be, mom will come in and adopt the additional four males, with her three males," she said.

    Callahan let the seven puppies play with each other, so their scents would spread and make it harder for the mother to distinguish the wild puppies from her own. Then, all seven puppies went into the same den. Within two days, all seven were weaning off the same wolf.

    Sadly, one of the wild pups developed a fever and died after not responding to treatment. Callahan said the key, for the remaining three, is avoiding human contact, so the pups don’t get used to being around people.

    She said she hopes the wild pups will be ready to go back into the Wisconsin woods by late June. "We'll see what happens," she said. The pups’ father is still alive, and the plan is to reunite him and the three puppies, once they’re big enough to survive on their own.

  • KARE-11-TV
  • Outcry ends plan to kill Wisconsin Dells wolf

    JESSICA FRANK - Wisconsin Dells Events

    Public outcry over a state Department of Natural Resources plan to trap and kill the so-called "Wisconsin Dells wolf" is prompting the agency to try to capture the animal instead. Adrian Wydeven, an ecologist with the DNR, said the plan is to capture the wolf with a modified foothold trap, tranquilize it and send it to the Wildlife Science Center, an education and research facility in Minnesota. But Wydeven said while there are at least two dozen traps set up around the town of Newport - where the wolf or wolf/dog mix attacked a calf and a dog - they offer no guarantee of capture.

    "We haven't closed the book totally on euthanizing the animal," Wydeven said.

    Frank Wendland, co-founder of the Wolves Offered Life & Friendship sanctuary in Colorado, is driving an e- mail campaign to save the wolf that has yielded thousands messages. Wendland said wolves provide for a balanced ecosystem, often attacking and eating diseased animals such as deer with chronic wasting disease. "They are not a disposable commodity," Wendland said. "They do have a right to their lives. ... They don't have to service humans to be viable."

    Wendland said in an e-mail to supporters he's glad officials might spare the wolf's life , but he wants to know what the Wildlife Science Center has in mind. "We are excited that this is being considered as an option but are somewhat concerned about the fact that this is a 'research facility,'" he wrote. "We want to know what type of plans they have for this animal, if it is sent there."

    Wydeven said the e-mail campaign is unlike anything he's ever seen.

    Earlier this month, a public meeting was held in Wausau over a proposal to remove gray wolves from the federal endangered species list in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan and parts of surrounding states. Only 40 people came to that meeting, Wydeven said. The wolf has not been spotted recently, he said, adding that the search will go on for a few more weeks. If the wolf still is not seen, the DNR will re-evaluate the situation, Wydeven said.

  • Wisconsin State Journal
  • Wolves culled at Scotland's Highland wildlife park

    A pack of wolves at Scotland's Highland wildlife park has been culled to make way for a slightly more endangered breed.

    It has emerged the animals, which were one of the top attractions at the Highland Wildlife Park near Kingussie, were destroyed by vets and replaced by seven Scandinavian wolves.

    It has caused outrage among animal rights groups. Bosses at the park say it was a “difficult decision” to kill the wolves as part of an animal management plan.

  • Grampian TV


  • Highlands Wildlife Park still features a wolf on the home page of their website:

  • Highland Wildlife Park
  • Friday, May 19, 2006

    Wolf foes howl at state managers

    Emotions run high during Fish and Game meeting in Hailey

    by STEVE BENSON - Express Staff Writer

    Sheep, elk and dog carcasses, bones, skulls and wolf tracks the size of a human head—that's what two Croy Canyon residents claim is scattered around their property six miles west of Hailey. "Our dogs were bitten by wolves at three o'clock in the afternoon," said Jennifer Swigert, who lives with her husband Kevin, a fifth generation Idahoan, in a remote area of Croy Canyon. "I love animals, I always have, but this is insane—people are at a total risk of getting fanged up."

    The Swigerts, who attended a wolf management meeting Wednesday night with Idaho Fish and Game officials in Hailey, claim wolf numbers are growing in Croy Canyon and the animals are becoming increasingly aggressive towards dogs, horses, and humans.

    "The behavior of these animals is not what it's made to be," Kevin Swigert said. "They are not the benign, wonderful animals people like to think they are. They are gigantic, very aggressive animals."

    Kevin said he and Jennifer lived in Stanley in the early 1990s—prior to the 1995 reintroduction of 15 wolves in central Idaho—and frequently heard and saw what they referred to as "true" native wolves. "When we lived in Stanley, we thought it was the coolest thing in the world," Kevin said. "They were part of the ecosystem. But (their reintroduction) is a fiasco, a horrendous fiasco."

    The Swigerts, who were part of a sizable anti-wolf presence at the meeting, complained that Fish and Game officials aren't telling the public the truth about the dangers of wolves. They believe someone is going to get hurt or killed if the wolves aren't removed.

    An equal number of wolf supporters were also present at the meeting, which drew about 50 people.

    The Swigerts complained that elk populations have also dropped significantly in recent years, and hunting is not as productive as it once was.

    Roger Olson, a conservation officer with Idaho Fish and Game, said it's no secret that wolves are roaming the sage hillsides in remote sections of Croy Canyon, but that an established den has never been found. He said wolves are wild animals and must be treated accordingly. Dogs should be kept on a leash or at heel, he said. "This isn't anything new," he added.

    The Swigerts said they own 12 shelter dogs, 15 horses and a pet coyote.

    "Wolves—like moose, bear and mountain lions—view dogs as wild animals," Olson said. "And they're very territorial."

    Lynne Stone, a wolf advocate and leader of the pro-wilderness Boulder White Clouds Council, said wolves are essential to "keep the balance" in Idaho's vast, wild ecosystem. She said the fact wolves primarily prey on weak, sick or old elk "increases the overall health" of the herd. Furthermore, Stone said wolves "were here to start with and they are one of the most beautiful, charismatic (animals) we have."

    Idaho Fish and Game officials Steve Nadeau and Michael Lucid kicked off the meeting Wednesday with presentations on the status of wolves in Idaho. Sixty-six wolves were reintroduced to Idaho and Yellowstone National Park in 1995 and 1996. Nadeau, the state's large carnivore manager and wolf program supervisor, said the total wolf population in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming now exceeds 1,000. The targeted recovery for wolves in the three states was 30 breeding pairs for three consecutive years.

    "This is the sixth year in a row that recovery goals have been achieved," Nadeau said. "There are six times the number of animals required in Idaho for delisting purposes. Our goal over the next few years is to de-list wolves and manage them as a big game animal...while maintaining a minimum of 15 packs of wolves in Idaho forever."

    Idaho Fish and Game assumed daily management authority of wolves in January 2006. Montana has also been granted state management authority of the large carnivores. But since Wyoming wants to classify wolves as a predator, meaning they can be killed on sight out of wilderness areas, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is reluctant to lift their status as a federally protected species. As long as wolves are still protected by the Endangered Species Act, they can not be managed as a big game animal, nor can they be opened to hunting.

    "Clearly we would like to delist wolves, that's not anything we're keeping a secret," Nadeau said. He added that the main challenge today is not managing wolves, but managing conflicts, which are becoming increasingly heated between wolf supporters and opponents.

    Lucid said he thinks people are opposed to wolves because of their perceived impact on elk and other big game. "A lot of people complain that the feds came in and reintroduced wolves," Lucid said. "And a lot of people don't like the idea of wolves coming in and eating game."

    But Nadeau said elk, which comprise 77 percent of a wolf's diet in Idaho, generally aren't suffering as a result of wolves. "Of the 29 elk populations in the state, only three are not meeting management objectives," Nadeau said. But, he added, much of the decline can be attributed to habitat changes.

    Nevertheless, Ron Gillett, chairman of the Idaho Anti-Wolf Coalition, thinks that's a lie. A week ago Gillett angered a group of onlookers in Stanley, including Stone, when he approached a wolf that was feeding on a freshly killed elk in a meadow across the Salmon River from the town. He was carrying a small-caliber rifle. Gillett countered that he was on private property and was carrying the rifle as protection against the animal.

    On Wednesday night, Gillett, who's a former hunting outfitter, verbally attacked Jon Marvel, executive director of the Hailey-based Western Watersheds Project and a wolf advocate. He also blasted Nadeau and other Fish and Game officials for not controlling wolf populations.

    "Until wolves are delisted, we can't manage populations," Nadeau said. "All we can do is manage conflicts."

  • Idaho Mountain Express
  • Gillett pledges he'll rid Idaho of wolves

    Anti-wolf founder promises his initiative will be on 2008 ballot

    by STEVE BENSON

    Ron Gillett is determined to rid Idaho of wolves, and he's pledged that he won't quit until he's accomplished that goal. Gillett, the president of the Idaho Anti-Wolf Coalition, unsuccessfully tried to place the issue on the November 2006 ballot. To do so he needed 47,881 signatures from registered Idaho voters. He claims he collected about 40,000 signatures, but only about 13,500 were from registered voters.

    "On this first go-around we didn't tell anybody we were going to get the signatures, we said we'll try," Gillette said. "Mark my word, on this second go-around we will get it, no question."

    Gillett, who lives in Stanley and owns the Triangle C Ranch lodge, said wolves are the "most cruel, vicious predators in North America," and that he's concerned about the safety of his grandchildren. He added that wolves depredate livestock and are decimating elk herds, which is ruining his livelihood.

    Wolves are responsible for about 1 percent of livestock depredations every year, said Steve Nadeau, Idaho Fish and Game's large carnivore manager and supervisor of the states wolf management program. He said that 26 of the states 29 elk populations are meeting management objectives, and that wolves are generally not responsible for those populations that are suffering.

    Gillett disagrees, and claims wolves have thinned elk herds to a point that hunters have stopped flocking to the Stanley area. "I only had four out of state hunters stay in (the Triangle C) last season," he said. "I usually have between 60 and 80 hunters." "If this isn't brought under control, people are going to start getting mean."

    Jon Marvel, executive director of Western Watersheds Project, said it would actually be "beneficial to wolves" if Idaho's voters did some day pass Gillett's initiative. "Because then the feds would have to take over," Marvel said.

    Wolves are managed by Idaho Fish and Game but are still federally protected by the Endangered Species Act. Even if they are delisted, which is a goal of Idaho Fish and Game, Nadeau said they will forever be protected under a federal blanket. If Gillett's initiative ever passed, "that would cause a relisting of the animal," Nadeau said. The state must forever maintain a minimum population of 15 packs.

    "The best course of action would be for people just to get used to wolves," Nadeau said. "They are here to stay. Like the other animals in the state getting used to the new predators, I think the citizens have to as well."

  • Idaho Mountain Express
  • Thursday, May 18, 2006

    Zoo Officials Want Witnesses to Wolf Escape

    Richard Piatt Reporting

    Officials at Utah's Hogle Zoo are anxious to find anyone who saw a grey wolf escape from its cage Sunday. At the same time, they're taking steps to keep it from happening again.

    Back at the zoo, they're calling Maddie, the grey wolf's, escape amazing. It could have been a loud noise or something else that scared her, but at this point, they don't have any idea.

    Maddie climbed and eight foot fence during her escape Sunday, leading zoo officials on a chase through public areas of the zoo. Today, zoo staff are putting a steeper angle to the non-barbed 'slickwire' on the top of the fence. Plus, they're adding another three feet of chain link fence at the top. Around there, keeping the animals in place is crucial.

    Stacey Phillips, Zoo Public Relations: "We're very conscious of that. We want to keep the animals safe, as well as the public."

    Eight-year old Maddie is now isolated in a nearby building, still skittish after her ordeal Sunday.

    The zoo evacuated 4,500 people when they learned Maddie was on the loose. They tranquilized her and caught her an hour and a half later. But one bothersome question remains: What sparked Maddie to jump so high she was able to scale a fence eight feet high?

    Jane Larson, Animal Care Supervisor: "We're baffled about why she would go out of her safe enclosure on a day when it was so crowded. I don't think we'll ever know."

    The Hogle Zoo staff is constantly thinking about keeping animals in and people out. In Mookie's case, there is a 16 foot wall between her and the public. At the zoo's new Asian Highlands exhibit, set to open in about a month, they're installing steel mesh wire all around, as well as fences. Thick glass will also insure the nimble tigers and leopards in the exhibit stay put.

    Stacey Phillips, Hogle Zoo Public Relations: "Because leopards and tigers are climbers and jumpers, and we have to put a top on that."

    The folks at Hogle Zoo know people saw Maddie escape, but they haven't been able to find an actual eyewitness. If you saw Maddie escape Sunday, call 584-1729 to help them out.

  • KSL-TV
  • Virginia Living Museum welcomes red wolf pup


    This female red wolf pup was born May 1 at the Virginia Living Museum.

    She is the first wolf born at the museum. The mother was acquired from Florida in January 2003 and the father was acquired by the museum in November 2005 from North Carolina's Alligator River Refuge.

    In 1973 the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service began a program to restore the endangered red wolf population.

    The Virginia Living museum is helping restore the population by participation in the federal captive breeding program to raise wolves for introduction to the wild. It is one of 38 zoos, nature centers and museums participating in the federal program.

  • DAILY PRESS
  • Wednesday, May 17, 2006

    Michigan Officials Want Gray Wolf Removed From Endangered List

    Marquette, MI - The gray wolf has been on the Endangered Species List since 1974, but that could soon change. Tuesday night the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service held a public hearing about removing the gray wolf from the list.

    Officials with the fish and wildlife service are in favor of the move, stating that the gray wolf's recovery goals have been met and exceeded. They say its time to remove the federal protections and give the states control of the wolf population.

    U.P. residents got a chance to weigh in on this issue at the meeting.

    The process to take the gray wolf off the endangered species list started back in 2000. But the first proposal to do so covered too much of the country, reaching from the Dakotas all the way to the East coast. So officials focused on the Midwest states and released a new proposal last March.

    "The delisting proposal is a geographical proposal," explained Ron Refsnider of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. "It includes this area of the United States, essentially Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan."

    Since the start of this process, the wolf population in those states has grown. Now there are over 3 ,000 wolves in Minnesota, 435 in Wisconsin, and just over 400 here in Michigan. But some local residents don't want to see officials react too soon to take them off the endangered list.

    "I really like the idea of having wolves in my back yard," says resident Ginger Winn who is opposed to delisting. "I really hope there are still wolves to have in my back yard. If they delist them, then they may not be."

    Some say the gray wolf's status should be switched from endangered to threatened. This means the federal protection will still be there, but it won't be as strict. Others disagree. They want control given back to the states.

    "If we put it in the hands of the state where we could have some real management and control of the wolves, I think people will be all for it," says Michigan United Conservation representative George Lindquist.

    Less than 10 people spoke at the meeting, half for the proposal and half against. If you were unable to attend Tuesday's meeting, you can still submit your written comments to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service until June 26.

    Officials expect to reach a decision of whether or not to delist the gray wolf by next year.

  • WLUC-TV
  • Wisconsin DNR receives federal permit for problem wolf control

    Spooner Advocate

    MADISON-- The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources has received a permit for control of problem wolves from the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service. The permit allows both the lethal and non-lethal trapping of wolves that are killing livestock and domestic animals.

    A preliminary count of Wisconsin’s gray wolf population for the winter of 2005-2006 shows that there are from 450 to 520 wolves in the state. “The wolf population apparently increased slightly from last year’s levels,” said Signe Holtz, director of the DNR’s Bureau of Endangered Resources. “The goal of the plan is a healthy, sustainable gray wolf population. This permit is one of several tools we need to help us attain that goal.”

    Wisconsin has had authority from the federal government to trap and translocate or use lethal control on depredating wolves in the past, say wildlife officials, but temporarily lost that authority while the status of wolves across North America was examined in the courts. The permit just issued by the USFWS limits Wisconsin to the taking of 43 wolves in 2006.

    “The ability to remove depredating wolves is necessary in our efforts to address landowner problems,” said Holtz. “The state will use this authority to reduce damages caused to owners of pets and livestock from depredating wolves.”

    Wolves currently are listed as a federally endangered species in Wisconsin. The Wisconsin Natural Resources Board reclassified wolves from endangered to threatened in 1999, and delisted wolves to protected wild animal status on Aug. 1, 2004. The federal listing takes precedence. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has announced its intent to remove wolves in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan and parts of neighboring states from the federal Endangered Species list. Once that occurs, management of the wolf in Wisconsin will be guided by the Wisconsin Wolf Management Plan.

    “Delisting at the federal level is the next step in wolf management in Wisconsin,” said Holtz. “Once that process is complete population management will occur at the state level allowing more flexibility and additional management options.”

    Information about the proposed federal action is available on the Internet site of the U.S. Fish and & Wildlife Service, fws.gove/midwest/News.

  • Spooner Advocate
  • Rare species working way back into news

    David Horst - Appleton Post-Crescent

    Nature seems to be coming back with a vengeance. The news of the past week has been loaded with stories of endangered species making a recovery. Some that were once in trouble are now causing trouble. Let's check the clippings.

    An improved state: The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service heard a unified call to ratchet back the protection of gray wolves in Wausau last Wednesday. The proposed delisting from a federal endangered species in Wisconsin, Minnesota and Michigan would simply mean that the states could trap or shoot a problem wolf.

    We have a couple dozen either side of 500 wolves in Wisconsin, according to DNR estimates. There may have been 10 times that many when settlement began. Thanks to fear, bounties and a basic misunderstanding of how predators keep prey populations healthy, they were eliminated from the state until a few slipped across the Minnesota border in the mid-1970s.

    I had the eerie pleasure of hearing an entire wolf pack howl in central Wisconsin and am forever incapable of arguing they don't belong here. But I have also doted over newborn livestock and know what it would be like to lose one to a wolf, so I would argue we must control conflicts with farms as best we can.

    Adrian Wydeven has devoted most of his career with the DNR to the study of wolves and he says it's time to control the population. His word is good enough for me. But we just have to let science guide the level of control, not the ravings of the kind of hunter who expects to be guaranteed a deer every fall.

  • Appleton Post-Crescent
  • Tuesday, May 16, 2006

    Comment period extended for Mexican gray wolf plan

    ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. The U-S Fish and Wildlife Service has re-opened a public comment period on a five-year review of an effort to reintroduce the endangered Mexican gray wolf in the Southwest.

    The U-S Fish and Wildlife Service began releasing wolves into the wild along the Arizona-New Mexico border in 1998 to re-establish the species in part of its historic range.

    As of the end of 2005, there were an estimated 35 to 49 wolves in Arizona and New Mexico.

    The five-year review of the reintroduction program recommends expanding the range in which the animals are allowed.
    The program is awaiting a response from the Fish and Wildlife Service, which has given the public another 14 days -- until May 30th -- to comment.

    Ranchers have objected to wolf reintroduction, contending the animals threaten their livestock and that expanding the program could jeopardize more ranchers as well as population centers.

  • KPHO-TV
  • Escapee wolf turns Hogle into a zoo

    Talk of the Morning: Whiff of Freedom

    By Michael N. Westley - The Salt Lake Tribune

    Zoo patrons enjoying a sunny Mother's Day among Utah's premier collection of creatures were asked to cut the day short when a 70-pound gray wolf escaped from her pen around 3 p.m. The 8-year-old female named Maddie apparently scaled an 8-foot-tall wall and made her way through barbed wire strung along the top of the enclosure to win her freedom Sunday at Salt Lake City's Hogle Zoo.

    For more than an hour, Maddie darted behind trees and slunk around corners while zoo personnel worked to secure her. An escape protocol, which is practiced monthly and includes almost every member of the zoo's staff, was enforced immediately, said Assistant Director Kimberly Davidson. Those nearest Maddie were herded inside buildings while those on the opposite side of the 41-acre park were shuffled toward exits.

    Shad Harper and Jennifer Morgan of South Weber were in the giraffe building with their two children when Maddie got loose. People began streaming into the building and were asked to stay inside for about 30 minutes, Harper said. Morgan said people were upset and waited a long time before they got any information. "What a crazy day," Morgan said.

    Davidson said the zoo sold tickets to 6,671 visitors Sunday with about 4,500 of them still in the zoo when Maddie bolted. Visitors who were evacuated were invited to return another day using Sunday's ticket stubs. Those who couldn't return were issued full refunds, Davidson said.

    Maddie was captured when she entered an underground tunnel, which zoo staff blocked so they could use a dart to tranquilize her. Maddie is a timid creature and posed no threat to zoo patrons during her romp, Davidson insisted. "She was terrified."

    The wolf joined the 1,100 specimens of more than 250 species at Hogle Zoo about six years ago, said public relations coordinator Stacey Phillips. She was donated from a private owner and was placed with the zoo's other gray wolf, a male. Maddie appeared to suffer no injuries and was recovering well once she was returned to a secure enclosure.

    Davidson said a "significant" escape, such as Maddie's Sunday, might happen once about every five years. Zoo officials relied on witness accounts about how Maddie got out of the pen. "Obviously, we're going to have to take a good look at that fence," Davidson said.

  • Salt Lake Tribune
  • Wanted: Wisconsin Dells Wolf

    Justin Ware

    In mid March, this lone wolf living outside Wisconsin Dells was, at worst, a minor nuisance. It would show itself and walk right up to people, even play with their dogs. And according to the state department of natural resources, that's part of the problem.

    "With these type of atypical situations, they can lead to interactions between humans and wolves that we don't want to take place," said Signe Holtz, Wisconsin DNR. And Holtz says those interactions have been taking place. Holtz says the wolf has attacked a calf, a dog and lunged at a farmer.

    So the DNR made the decision to trap and kill the wolf.

    Then came the emails.

    Dozens were sent to the DNR, local politicians ... even news organizations ...most of them calling for the wolf's live capture and transfer to a sanctuary in Colorado. The co–founder of that sanctuary, says they'll remove the wolf with no cost to the DNR. "Whether that means they capture it and turn it over to us," said Frank Wendland, co-founder, wolves offered life and friendship, "or whether they want us to come out and actually trap it and transport it here to Colorado."

    Holtz says that is a possible scenario, but highly unlikely, because of liability concerns. But, she says they are looking into other options now, that include transferring to wolf to another location and not killing the animal. "We are considering alternatives right now and looking for a way to resolve the issue," said Holtz.

    Wolves are a protected species, but wildlife experts want to point out that sometimes killing a problem animal, is in the best interest of the species as a whole. Because if they don't manage the species themselves, they say other, less qualified people, might take the matter into their own hands.

  • WMTV-TV
  • More wolves, bears in the cross hairs in Alaska

    PREDATOR CONTROL: State expands protection efforts for moose, caribou.

    By ALEX DEMARBAN - Anchorage Daily News

    The Board of Game has strengthened and expanded a predator control program that's already larger than any in decades. The board broadened two of the five areas where land-and-shoot and aerial wolf kills are allowed. It nearly tripled the size of one of those areas, to 18,750 square miles, to protect caribou near the Canadian border. The board also made it easier for hunters to kill bears in the five areas. For example, it loosened restrictions on same-day airborne bait-hunting.

    Predator control now covers about 9 percent of the state. It has not been that extensive since at least the 1970s, said Fish and Game Department spokeswoman Cathie Harms.

    In the three-day meeting, which began Friday in Anchorage, the board also made technical regulation changes intended to protect its predator control programs from court challenge.

    The board's changes are "wonderful," said Rod Arno, executive director of the pro-hunting Alaska Outdoor Council. Caribou and moose numbers fell severely after predator control was stopped for eight years, he said. It was revived in 2003. Drastic measures are still necessary to increase big-game populations, he said.

    But opponents from the East Coast to Anchorage are poring over the new regulations to find an opening for another legal battle.

    Aerial shooters and pilots permitted by the state have killed more than 550 wolves in the three years since state predator-kill programs were renewed. State biologists say moose numbers are up in areas where the program has been in place the longest, around McGrath in the Interior and near Glennallen in Southcentral Alaska.

    "We're staying the course," said board chairman Mike Fleagle.

    Efforts once focused primarily on moose, but the state is now implementing predator control to try to increase a key caribou population. For example, it greatly expanded the predator control program in game management units 12 and 20E near the Canadian border to reduce pressure on the Fortymile caribou herd around Tok. The herd now numbers about 42,000 animals. There are historical reports it was many times that size in the 1920s, said state biologist Roy Nowlin. Killing more predators, he hopes, will help the state to increase the herd to between 50,000 and 100,000.

    The state is also increasingly taking action to limit bears, which kill and eat moose and caribou calves in many areas and are slowing the program to expand game-animal populations, Fleagle said. To kill more black bears in the five predator control areas -- which are located mostly in the Interior and in an area north of Cook Inlet across from Anchorage -- board members waived a long-standing law against hunting on the same day the hunter has been airborne.

    Airborne hunters can now use bait to attract and kill black bears immediately after they've landed. Black bear hides taken from those areas can also be sold. Hunters do not need a special permit, as required by aerial gunners and pilots hunting wolves, to take advantage of the new law.

    The board created a special brown bear reduction area east of McGrath -- an area of about 528 square miles -- and expanded another area near Tok from 2,700 square miles to 4,050 square miles. The board has given hunters in the two areas new incentives to kill brown bears. Unlike in other areas of the state, brown bears can be baited, hides taken in those areas can be sold, and bag limits are more generous. Only three brown bears have been killed in the Tok area under the program, which was created two years ago, Harms said.

    The changes may not significantly hurt bear populations, said retired state and federal biologist Vic Van Ballenberghe, a former Board of Game member and opponent of the state's wolf-kill program. Black bears are hard to kill because they prefer forested areas and reproduce relatively quickly, he said. And while brown bears range over large, open areas and reproduce more slowly than black bears, he's not expecting the number of hunters in the two areas to increase sharply. "The question is still open," he said.

    Others fear the board may go further. It considered, but didn't pass, a proposal to allow bear snaring. The proposal, favored by the Alaska Outdoor Council, will come up again, predicted Valerie Brown, an Anchorage attorney representing Washington, D.C.-based Defenders of Wildlife. "It's really clear they want bears out of these areas," she said.

    The board took one proposal at the meeting -- to let hunters on snowmachines chase and kill wolves a short drive from Big Lake and Wasilla -- and changed it entirely, to allow fall black bear baiting west of the Parks Highway, roughly between Kashwitna and Talkeetna. Brown said that move may have been illegal because it wasn't posted for public notice. Fleagle defended the measure. It wasn't meant for the general public to consider, he said, but was part of an intensive management action to control predators.

    State biologists estimate that Alaska has 7,000 to 11,000 wolves, 35,000 to 40,000 brown bears and more than 100,000 black bears.

  • Anchorage Daily News
  • Monday, May 15, 2006

    Another wolf story from Stanley, Idaho

    Another episode of the evolving wolf situation near Stanley, Idaho from Lynne Stone- her Mother's Day encounter with wolves chasing a cow elk:

    "After a magnificent full moon night lighting up the snow-covered Sawtooth Mountains, I stumbled out of the cabin at dawn. With coffee and camera in hand I drove to the usual vantage points in hopes of seeing wolves. I didn’t have to wait long."

    The full text with dramatic photos is on Ralph Maughan's web site:

  • Ralph Maughan's Wildlife Reports
  • Sunday, May 14, 2006

    Hearings set on wolf status in Michigan

    By JOHN PEPIN, Journal Staff Writer

    MARQUETTE — The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will hold a public hearing in Marquette next week to take comments on the agency’s plans to delist the gray wolf from federal threatened and endangered species lists. “The purpose of it (the hearing) is to get feedback from people about this proposal we’re offering,” said Ron Refsnider, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist in St. Paul, Minn.

    Refsnider will offer a roughly 1-hour informational presentation on features of the wolf proposal and provisions of the federal Endangered Species Act, beginning at 6 p.m. Tuesday in the Michigan Room of the University Center at Northern Michigan University. Fish and Wildlife Service officials will then record testimony from 7:30 until 9 p.m. during the public hearing. Written comments are also being solicited until June 26.

    A total of four such meetings are being held on the wolf delisting proposal in Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota. Hearings have already taken place in Wausau, Wis. and Duluth, Minn., with the final meeting scheduled to follow Marquette’s session Wednesday in downstate Grayling.

    On March 16, U.S. Dept. of the Interior Secretary Gale Norton announced the recovery of gray wolves in the western Great Lakes Region and the Fish and Wildlife Service proposal to remove the species from the protected list. The action, if finalized by the agency after soliciting public comment through the series of public hearings and other communications, would entrust management of the species to state wildlife agencies and Indian tribes.

    Only wolves in the western Great Lakes region would be affected by the new proposal. Currently, there are at least 3,020 wolves living throughout Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin, which is roughly 80 percent of all the wolves living in the lower 48 states.

    “This is a follow-up proposal to one we had a couple of years ago,” Refsnider said. That prior proposal, was deemed by courts hearing lawsuits last year to be too far-reaching in terms of geographic areas slated for wolf delisting. Refsnider said the new proposal is biologically sound in its scope and boundaries. “We believe we are complying with the courts,” Refsnider said.

    The new proposal would lift federal protections for wolves in all of Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan as well as parts of North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana and Ohio. This area is narrowly structured around the core areas where wolves have exceeded recovery goals since 1999 and nearby areas where wolf packs may become established in the future. The distinct population segment also includes surrounding areas into which wolves may disperse but are not likely to establish packs.

    Gray wolf populations would be monitored for five years after delisting. If any drastic threats to the populations arose, emergency relisting could be imposed.

    Following the 90-day public comment period ending June 26, the Fish and Wildlife Service will evaluate all information and make a decision on whether to finalize the proposal. Until a final decision is made, wolves in the western Great Lakes remain protected under the Endangered Species Act. Officials said in March they expected it will take eight months to a year to reach a final decision.

    Norton said some of the benefits to having a recovered wolf population in the region include healthier, more resilient ecosystems, a potential tourism source by travelers wanting to see or hear wolves and the value to children and future generations in knowing that an endangered species was preserved. Gray wolves were first placed on the federal endangered species list in 1974. At that time, there were only gray wolves living in northern Minnesota and on Isle Royale, in the lower 48 states.

    Comments on the western Great Lakes wolf delisting proposal may be submitted by e-mail to WGLwolfdelist@fws.gov

    Letters may sent to WGL Wolf Delisting, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Whipple Federal Building, 1 Federal Drive, Fort Snelling, MN 55111-4056 or by sending a fax to 612-713-5292.

    More information on gray wolf recovery and the delisting proposal can be found at http://www.fws.gov/midwest/ wolf

  • The Mining Journal
  • NY wolf's DNA tests reveal surprise

    DNA tests have confirmed the animal shot in Cayuga County last spring was a wolf, state wildlife officials said this week.

    Ward Stone, senior wildlife pathologist for the state Department of Environmental Conservation, said tests on the 99-pound animal proved what he believed all along. The surprising result was the genetic detail revealed in the tests, performed at the University of California at Davis, Stone said.

    "They showed that it was part arctic wolf, and part Great Lakes variety," he said.

    The wolf is believed to have escaped from a pen, and Stone said he thinks someone was breeding the animal with dogs. He said he would draft a report outlining those suspicions.

    Sterling resident John Yuhas found the wolf on top of his pet golden retriever last April. He shot the animal and killed it, but he was too late to save his dog.

    The tests make the wolf the second one found in New York since 1899. A hunter shot and killed a purebred gray wolf in Saratoga County in 2002.

  • Albany Times Union