Three-year holdup on MN wolf management
One piece of legislation that passed the state legislature after bitter debate three years ago, still hasn’t been implemented. it’s the state’s wolf management policy.
As breathtaking as the view is from Clyde Hanson’s kitchen table is, there’s one site that takes his breath away.
A couple times now, he has seen wolves, ambling up the shore.
It’s such a precious event to someone like Clyde Hanson, because to him,, it doesn’t seem that long ago these animals were headed toward extinction.
Hanson said, “They’ve made an incredible recovery.”
In fact, the wolf will be coming off the endangered list..
But, Walter Medwid at the International Wolf Center in Ely says that’s been the case for years.
Medwid said, “this process has been delayed… that’s the complication here.”
If it was merely a matter of numbers, the wolf would have been off the list a long time ago. The original goal was to get the number of wolves up to 1,600 in Minnesota. Right now, there are about 3,000.
But the DNR’s Mike Doncarlos is still waiting to implement its wolf management plan the legislature passed back in the year 2000.
Doncarlos said, “the plan is in place, and ready to be implemented when federal delisting occurs.”
Although the Sierra Club is in no hurry to have the wolf removed from the endangered species list, because of state-run management plans.
Hanson said, “In turning management over, it’s like giving the key to the hen house to the fox in some states, back to the bad old days of hunting, trapping and poisoning them.”
Doncarlos said, “I think that when you look broadly at the history of wolves, there was persecution historically, but that’s ancient history, it’s not modern history.”
But both agree, the future of this graceful animal is what’s most important.
Last month, conservationists petitioned the U.S. fish and wildlife service, requesting wolves not be downlisted in the northeast.
The petition will likely push back, any downlisting of the wolf here.