I’m thrilled today because for the first time in a long time I followed wolf tracks, three wolves who were on a mission. Why so excited? In the past on this blog I’ve written about following wolf tracks, about watching wolves in our valley in the winter, and encountering them on hikes. But since Wyoming began yearly hunts starting in 2016, wolves quickly became very elusive. They were no longer curious who these 2-legged creatures were. They now knew.
I’ve written about how I no longer hear wolves howling in winter in the valley. Some of these changes go along with habitat changes in our elk herds that dovetails with less snow cover and a quickly changing climate. But overall the change in how wolves are using the landscape coincides with human hunts.
I live in the regulated area of Wyoming where there is a season and a quota on wolf hunting, mid-September to December 31. But in 85% of the state, wolves are classified as “predators”. That’s not a biological designation. Here in Wyoming a “predatory animal”is defined by our state legislature and under the control of Wyoming Animal Damage Management Board and USDA Wildlife Services. All other wildlife falls under management by Wyoming Game and Fish (WGF). Predator status comprises a weird group—coyote, jackrabbit, porcupine, raccoon, red fox, skunk, stray cat and of course wolves (in 85% of our state.)
But in the managed hunting zone, called the Trophy Zone, basically in the Northwest corner of the state, wolves are tightly managed. A bit of background as to how Wyoming sets their quota limit year to year and on what basis the WGF determine what their target number of wolves is.
When U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service began their long process of input from the public regarding bringing wolves back to the states, transplanting and moving wolves had never been done before. They knew they’d be bringing them in from Canada (just an aside, there is no such thing as a “Canadian wolf”. Wolves don’t have countries. These are all Canis lupus who occupied almost the entire range of North America. Only the red wolf is a different species Canis rufus, now almost extinct.) because the lower 48 no longer had any wolves. Since this was a novel experiment, many biologists thought the transplanted wolves would just “home” back to their natal range. They also had no idea what constituted a “minimum” number of wolves that would be viable for genetic diversity, and what number an area could support. So they literally just made up a minimum number of wolves per state and noted in the supporting documents that if the number of wolves, and the number of breeding pairs, fell below those numbers in any one state wolves would be automatically relisted. That number is 150 wolves and 10 breeding pairs. Wyoming was allowed to use Yellowstone Park to help support their numbers. The breakdown is 100 wolves and 10 breeding pairs outside the Park; 50 wolves and 5 breeding pairs inside the Park.
What surprised biologists is that the wolves didn’t return to Canada, but adapted quickly to their new environs. And very soon it became obvious that 150 wolves per state (especially states like Idaho and Montana with a lot of high quality habitat and prey versus Wyoming which has a lot of high desert with isolated mountain ranges) is a ridiculously low number, a made up number that should never have been used as a base metric. Yet the states hold that number up like religion, overjoyed at how low they can go in their hunt quotas.
One other thing to note in the original agreement with the states is something called the 10J rule. Although wolves were protected under the ESA, they were returned as an experimental population which limited some of their protections. The 10J rule was the compromise that got ranchers on board. Basically it said that wolves that predated on livestock could be dispatched by the USFWS. The Service took a while to figure it out. In the beginning they indiscriminately took out wolves, many times the entire pack. But over time they learned how to remove wolves surgically without disrupting entire packs or creating areas devoid of wolves. When delisting occurred, the culling of wolves and all the management was handed over to the states.
Back to Wyoming hunt quotas in our trophy zone…Wyoming Game & Fish manages wolves as a tight science. They want to keep our wolves at around 150, hedging their bets with an excess of 50 wolves outside Yellowstone. They know anything can happen like disease that can quickly decimate a population. One year we only had 11 breeding pairs, dangerously close to an automatic relist. The one good thing about their tight management is that WGF GPS collars wolves every winter, attempting to get at least one collar in every identified pack. Thus they have an exact count of wolves in the trophy zone.
Montana and Idaho, on the other hand, don’t collar, but use either game cameras and hunter success forms or include a sketchy method of habitat suitability with approximate number of wolves. Both states assume high numbers of wolves in the state, set their seasons and quotas long and high. They allow guns, trapping, baiting, night goggles, bounty payments and all sorts of dubious types of kill methods that would never pass for ethical hunting.
Why then has it been so hard to see or track wolves in my area for the last several years. Wolves, like bears, are notorious for using roads for passage. That makes perfect sense as roads are easy navigation through difficult terrain. With wolves wary of humans, that isn’t the case in winter anymore, making tracking or seeing them more difficult.
But there’s another element. More wolves are killed in “controls” for livestock damage then in the annual hunt. For instance, in the 2024 annual hunt report 31 wolves were killed in legal hunts in the managed area versus 43 wolves killed in controls (8 of those in the predator zone by the Agency. That doesn’t include the 51 wolves killed in exclusively the Predator Zone). The main pack in my area, the Beartooth Pack, had 7 wolves killed in a pack of 9 for predation on 3 cows. Basically, almost the entire pack was eliminated. There are thousands of cattle on our public lands during the summer, almost all of them belong to one producer. Cattle die from many things. During that same summer, Game & Fish hauled off the highway 5 dead cows that were struck by cars so bears and other wildlife wouldn’t feed on them. One year over 50 cows were killed by Larkspur, a plant that can be poisonous to cattle. Plus the state of Wyoming pays the producer 7 times the market price of a cow killed by wolves (3x killed by grizzly bears).
All this history, living in the same area for twenty years, living through ten years of wolf protections and 10 years of hunting has given me perspective plus a lot of time to think about what might be a better way of managing wolves. I don’t have the answers, but I have some thoughts as to a start.
What we are lacking is overall federal management guidelines based on good science. These would be binding for all states that have wolves that are delisted and under state management. This would include:
- Humane methods of hunting only (NO baiting, trapping, night goggles, night hunting, limited seasons, no hunting when pups are too young to travel with their pack, no hunting during breeding and pup season, so generally this means Oct-December or January)
- New minimums based on updated science tailored to each state that would trigger relisting
- Areas with large tracts of public suitable lands for wolves such as around Yellowstone Park need to be treated differently than areas with private and public lands mixture. Landscapes with an expanse of wilderness, wolves will self-regulate and there is little need for hunting. [I call them Science Zones]. In addition these areas are critical for genetic exchange. My area used to provide support for wolf packs in the Lamar Valley and vice versa. With annual hunt culling of wolves in this valley, we no longer have that kind of exchange.
- Proven methods and support for livestock producers. Instead of paying producers for losses, pay them for equipment and training for non-lethal methods of protection. Encourage and provide help for Co-ops to buy equipment such as fladry or horns cheaper in bulk. Those methods must be in place before there is any legal take tag given. California has a 2 and 3 strikes rule for a depredation tag for mountain lions, based on where in the state it occurs. That should be mandatory for producers and wolf protections.
- Public education as to the value of wolves. This is a critical piece. There is an unbridled hatred of wolves, leftover from our European background and Manifest Destiny doctrine. Thousands of people come to Yellowstone to get an opportunity of a lifetime to view wolves. Education needs to go hand-in-hand with that opportunity. I still hear people talk about “Canadian wolves killing all our elk” while they watch wolves.
There was a time in my valley, pre Wyoming hunts, when our area had the most wolves in the Northern Range, about 40 wolves in 3 packs. During that winter I watched the packs vie for the best territory. The Hoodoo pack killed off the Sunlight Pack’s pregnant Alpha female. I was seeing these wolves self-regulate, confirming that they didn’t need hunting to control their numbers.
That said, I’m not completely decided on some limited hunting versus no hunting at all. I thought the USFWS did a good job when they were in charge of the 10J Rule with surgical culls. Packs that focus on livestock predation after a producer has honestly tried non-lethal methods can certainly be warranted.
It’s past time for an honest, open discussion about humane and science-based management for wolves, with the vitriol and lies turned off.
Coda: I had the opportunity to measure skulls in the Draper Natural History Lab for a study. I also went to Yellowstone and the Denver Museum of Nature and Science to measure skulls. A few photos below.
Filed under: New ideas | Tagged: animals, nature, travel, Wildlife, Wolves, yellowstone | 1 Comment »
Leslie Patten Books: Wild Places, Sacred Spaces 