Stockgrowers buy radio ads against wolves
Associated Press
BOZEMAN (AP) – The Montana Stockgrowers Association has launched a radio
ad campaign here that it says is intended to point out the economic damage
wolves can cause.
Steve Pilcher, the association’s executive vice president, said the
ads are not wolf “bashing,” but are intended to respond to arguments that
the wolves benefit the economy by attracting tourists.
He said the cattlemen group’s ads argue that wolves can have a big
effect on some ranchers and possibly on wild elk and deer herds.
“The purpose is not to get into the bashing of wolves,” Pilcher
said. “The wolf is obviously here to stay.”
Pilcher said that while ranchers are compensated for livestock
losses directly linked to wolves, not all losses are covered.
Wolves cause a lot of “wear and tear on a herd” that isn’t
compensated, he said.
Pilcher cited one case in which a Dillon-area rancher lost about 70
sheep when something, presumably wolves, caused them to panic.
“They started slamming into each other, they started piling up and
they suffocated,” Pilcher said.
The ad campaign is costing the association about $4,000, Pilcher
said. One of the ads talks about the effects on ranchers, while another
focuses on potential affects for hunters.
“It would be foolish for us to ignore the potential impacts to
wildlife numbers,” Pilcher said.
Some have suggested wolves have caused a decline in the number of elk
in the Northern Yellowstone herd.
Norm Bishop, a retired National Park Service biologist who works in
Bozeman with the International Wolf Center, said statistics show wolves
account for only a small percentage of the cattle and sheep losses in the
greater Yellowstone area every year.
“I don’t know how productive it is to get everybody riled up,”
Bishop said.
Federal officials have said they will formally propose removing the
wolf, which was reintroduced in the Yellowstone area in the mid 1990s,
from the list of federally protected species as early as next year.
That would let states manage wolves, allowing ranchers more leeway to
protect their animals and likely creating a hunting season for wolves.
However, there is a snag. Wyoming officials insist wolves be
classified as a predator, meaning they could be shot on sight in most of
that state, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service says it won’t delist
under those conditions.
Pilcher said that’s frustrating for Montana, which has a wolf plan
the FWS has praised.
“I just don’t see the FWS delisting” with Wyoming’s current stance,
he said.