JUSTUS CAUDELL
THE TRIBUNE
Plan calls for population based hunting quota, continued studies
NESPELEM – A newly approved tribal Gray Wolf Management Plan works to balance the needs of a tribal membership’s subsistence culture and the needs of developing gray wolf populations on the Colville Indian Reservation.
The plan, which was approved through unanimous decision in special session, Jan. 19, calls for setting an annual harvest quota to be population-based. It intends to study the animals within the Colville Reservation and North Half of the reservation, with continued monitoring of ungulate response as gray wolves regain control as the apex predator of the region.
“The primary goal of this plan is to outline strategies for conserving viable wolf populations that persist throughout time, while maintaining healthy ungulate populations capable of providing subsistence hunting opportunities to the Tribal Membership and their families,” reads the introduction of the plan.
After three years of tribally-approved wolf hunting on the reservation, the first wolf was harvested in November, and though the current hunting allocation is set at three wolves across the reservation annually, in the past it has been as high as 12 wolves. The new plan calls for the human-harvest quota of wolves within the reservation boundaries to be between 20 and 24 percent of the animal’s annual population.
An allocation table attached as an appendix suggests if the population is between zero and nine wolves on the reservation, no hunting should be permitted, but if there are 10 wolves, CTFW regulations should permit killing one. If there are, 13 wolves, the table suggests an allocation of three, which would be 23.1 percent of the overall population.
Currently, CTFW employees estimate there are 12 confirmed wolves on the reservation in three known packs on the reservation.
Packs include the Nc’icn Pack, near 17 Mile Mountain, the Strawberry Pack, near Strawberry Mountain and the Whitestone Pack, near Whitestone Mountain and Friedlander Meadows area.
DNA analysis showed that one of two adult wolves observed in the Whitestone Pack in 2014 was a former breeding male from the Nc’icn Pack.
With the wolf harvest in November, tribal members within the reservation boundaries may kill two more wolves before the end of the hunting season, March 31, based on current regulations. The current regulations, which permits killing of three wolves annually, are valid through May 31, 2019.
In 2008, Colville Tribal Fish and Wildlife employees first documented three separate sets of large canine tracks consistent with the tracks of a gray wolf, but it wasn’t until 2010 CTFW confirmed the first gray wolf on the reservation through DNA testing of scat.
In Chambers, Jan. 17, Eric Krausz reported that tribal wildlife managers collect DNA samples from wolves on the reservation, through scat and other means, and have created a database of the animals. The plan further explains that DNA samples provide wildlife managers the chance to identify wolves and lineages of wolves on the reservation.
The plan further notes that annual minimum population information can be estimated based on aerial flights, DNA samples, cameras and field observations.
CBC approved the plan through unanimous decision.