Idaho seeks permission to kill 50 wolves to help elk
By JOHN MILLER
Associated Press
BOISE, Idaho — Idaho wants to kill as many as 51 wolves in the north-central part of the state, according to a plan that state Department of Fish and Game managers say will help boost the region’s elk herds.
The killings would take place on the state’s mountainous border with Montana, near State Highway 12. Biologists estimate there are between 43 and 69 wolves there, but too few elk for hunters.
The plan is to initially kill 75 percent of the area’s wolves.
This would be one of the first actions taken by the state since assuming management control of about 600 federally protected wolves in Idaho last week.
Since wolves are still under Endangered Species Act protections, the federal government has final say over whether they can be killed to help wildlife such as elk.
State officials plan to give their proposal to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service by late February or early March, following public meetings in Boise and Lewiston. Federal officials say science, not politics, will govern whether it wins approval.
“In a good proposal, a person should see why (state Fish and Game officials) reached this conclusion that control actions are needed,” Ed Bangs, wolf recovery coordinator for Fish and Wildlife Service in Helena, Mont., said Wednesday. “If they try to give us some political garbage that’s just a ploy, we’re going to give them the thumbs down.”
Bangs’ agency isn’t opposed to wolf control actions. Since 1995, when wolves were reintroduced to central Idaho and Yellowstone National Park, Wildlife Service game managers have shot more than 300 wolves that preyed on livestock.
Idaho’s plan, however, would be the first time that wolves would be killed by agents based on concerns over wildlife populations.
A 1910 fire cleared many of the trees near the Lochsa and Clearwater rivers, creating habitat where elk herds flourished into the 1970s and 1980s. The trees have since returned, however, crowding out the large mammals.
The state is trying to help those herds recover, including efforts to restore habitat in the Clearwater National Forest through controlled burns, by halting most elk hunts and encouraging black bear and mountain lion harvests.
Now, state officials want to kill wolves, which they say are responsible for about 32 percent of elk cow deaths since radio-collar studies began in 2002.
“We believe this will add to the elk population,” Fish and Game Wildlife Bureau chief Jim Unsworth said Wednesday, adding “this proposed management action will not impact wolf recovery.”
Wolves have been a lightning rod for strong emotions since reintroduction.
Groups including the Idaho Conservation League and Defenders of Wildlife argue Fish and Game’s studies are flawed and say state officials should focus on improving habitat. They cite agency studies from 2002 and 2003 that concluded boosting Clearwater elk herds was more than a question of predation.
“We’re going to be looking very strongly at (Fish and Game’s) numbers,” said Suzanne Stone, a Defenders of Wildlife spokeswoman in Boise. “Bear and mountain lions are dying, and now they want to kill wolves too, in an area where we know the primary cause of low elk populations is poor habitat.”
Even so, some hunter groups hail the state’s wolf plan as an important step toward returning the Clearwater Basin, where explorers Lewis and Clark trekked in 1805 and 1806, to its status as one of Idaho’s premier elk hunt areas.
The wolf, in the psyche of many westerners, also provokes fear and suspicion that have historically defined management policies.
“We get a lot of hunters who are actually nervous to hunt there because of wolves, they are afraid to take their families up there and roam,” said Dave Savage, who’s sold hunting licenses at Black Sheep Sporting Goods in Lewiston for five years. “A 12-year-old kid isn’t going to stand a chance against a pack of wolves.”
In the Boise Statehouse, where Fish and Game officials presented their plan Wednesday, lawmakers renewed their call for the Interior Department to remove federal protections from Northern Rocky Mountain wolves.
Some say delisting — and the legalized wolf hunting that Idaho eventually plans — would help cement wolves as an accepted part of Idaho’s wilderness. Then they would be seen as a coveted game animal — not a nuisance that preys on livestock and elk, said Sen. Gary Schroeder, R-Moscow, who owns a fur trading business.
“If they’re the feds’ wolves they’re one thing, but if they’re something someone can go shoot and put a rug on their wall, all of a sudden it’s exciting,” he said.