By Mike Koshmrl
Jackson Hole Daily
Few of the dozens of outfitters and conservationists who showed up for a Wyoming Game and Fish Department wolf meeting Wednesday saw eye to eye, or approved of the status of the hunt.
Game and Fish is proposing to target 43 wolves this fall — 17 more than last year — in the state’s trophy game management area. Managers aim to bring the population of wolves in Wyoming’s jurisdiction down to near 160, wolf program biologist Ken Mills said.
“Reproduction outnumbered the number of wolves we actually harvested last year,” Mills said. “Essentially the only thing we’re proposing revisions for is the quotas this year.”
Wyoming-managed wolves absorbed a 43.2 percent human-caused mortality rate in 2013 and increased in ranks by about 5 percent to 199 animals. The wolf harvest in Wyoming’s expansive free-fire predator zone, as always, is not capped.
Hunting outfitter Brian Taylor called for more wolf hunting in the Gros Ventre River drainage, where he also runs a cattle operation.
“Ya know [there are] all these graphs and stuff,” Taylor said. “My eyeballs and a pair of Swarovski binoculars tell me the truth.”
“The Gros Ventre needs more wolf harvest to manage the ungulates,” he said. “The moose are damn near done up there.”
In the state’s two hunt units — areas 8 and 9 — that extend into the Gros Ventre, a total of eight wolves can be killed.
Adam Lackner, who runs and co-owns the Jackson wildlife safari company Brushbuck Guide Services, called for a hunt-free zone in the same areas.
“Our proposal is that units 6, 8 and 9 be designated as what are called science and tourism units,” Lackner said.
“The wolf hunt’s impacted us big time this year,” he said. “I’m fine if you guys want to hunt those [wolves] 15 miles away from the park. … Tourism is part of it. Tourism is part of the economy.”
Doug Brimeyer, Game and Fish’s regional wildlife coordinator, reminded the crowd that elk hunting licenses issued in units north of Jackson have declined from 9,000 to 3,000 over the last two decades. The elk population, Brimeyer said, declined from about 15,000 to 11,500 during the same time frame.
“Wolf hunting and viewing do not have to be mutually exclusive,” Game and Fish large carnivore supervisor Dan Thompson said as the meeting neared an end.
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