Wolf rule is revised
By Anita Weier
To ease farmers’ concerns, the Natural Resources Board voted 5-0 Thursday to revise proposed rules for payments to livestock owners for damage caused by wolves.
The rule will now allow an exemption from a requirement that a claimant for damage payments must submit to Department of Natural Resources research about wolf depredations.
The revised rule says that the livestock owner claiming reimbursement for missing livestock must cooperate fully with the research unless it would cause an unreasonable hardship or a significant economic burden.
A yet-to-be-created three-person panel would decide whether an exemption should be granted. That panel would include representatives of the Department of Agriculture, Trade & Consumer Protection, the Farm Bureau and the University of Wisconsin Agricultural Extension. That panel also would annually determine caps for reimbursement for individual types of animals.
The rule now goes to the state Legislature for consideration. Legislative committees have sent it back for previous revisions, including the one dealing with economic hardship.
Wolf attacks on livestock, particularly calves, have become a prominent issue in Wisconsin as the state’s wolf pack grew in recent years. The wolf population increased from 25 animals in 1980 to 455 in a current DNR estimate.
Reimbursement by the DNR for livestock damage caused by wolves has grown from $200 in the 1984-85 fiscal year to $75,867 in the just-concluded 2004-05 fiscal year.
The DNR previously dealt with the reimbursement issue on a policy basis, but the agency developed a formal rule after wolves and wolf attacks increased.
Another controversial part of the rule that was settled previously by the Natural Resources Board involves reimbursement to bear hunters for wolf attacks on hunting dogs. That policy remains the same, with a reimbursement cap of $2,500 per dog.
This rule does not address another issue that has received considerable publicity and is now the subject of a lawsuit.
The Humane Society of the United States and 11 other wildlife and environmental protection groups filed suit in federal court in Washington, D.C., on Aug. 4 to halt the killing of gray wolves in Wisconsin and Michigan.
“The lawsuit challenged the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service process for allowing Michigan and Wisconsin under a sub-permit to trap and kill wolves when they are taking animals on farms,” said Signe Holtz, director of the DNR’s endangered resources program. “We are still operating under that permit.”
In 2004, wolves killed livestock on 22 farms, according to the DNR, and 24 wolves were killed.