Wyoming plan puts stray wolves in the cross hairs
By MIKE STARK Billings Gazette
‘Predator’ classification would remove protection outside park boundaries
Depending on where they roam, more than 50 gray wolves that are scattered
among eight packs in northwestern Wyoming could be killed any time and by
any means under the state’s draft proposal to manage wolves in the future.
In an effort to keep wolves from spreading throughout Wyoming, the Game
and Fish Commission wants wolves to be classified as predators – and
subject to unlimited killing – if they wander outside Yellowstone and
Grand Teton national parks or pockets of designated wilderness areas in
the Shoshone or Bridger-Teton national forests.
A draft plan reflecting that policy is being circulated for public comment
and is expected to be made final early next year.
Although the plan, if enacted, would trim the number of wolves in Wyoming,
federal officials have said they won’t approve it because they need a
guarantee that wolves managed by the state won’t decline to endangered or
threatened numbers.
Ed Bangs, wolf recovery coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
in Helena, said that all the wolf packs in Wyoming outside Yellowstone
likely would be subject to predator classification because they don’t live
fully in the wilderness areas.
The wilderness areas, which tend to be at high elevation, aren’t exactly
ideal wolf habitat, he said. Wolves, which can have a home range of 350
square miles, usually roam to lower-elevation valleys to find their prey.
It’s unlikely the wilderness areas would provide consistent food sources,
he said.
“Right now, none of them live solely in those islands of wilderness,”
Bangs said. “Part of the reason they survive is that they travel over such
a large area.”
Some of the wolves in Yellowstone, particularly those in the southern
portion of the park, also tend to wander. When they cross the park
boundary and are not in a wilderness area, they could also be trapped,
shot or otherwise hunted.
But all the wolf packs outside Yellowstone in Wyoming, to varying degrees,
may fall into the predator classification at one time or another.
Two wolf packs near Pinedale and another near Meeteetse would have the
highest potential of being wiped out because they’re so far away from the
parks and wilderness areas, said Reg Rothwell, director of biological
services for the Wyoming Game and Fish Department.
“They would definitely be in jeopardy, I guess you’d call it,” Rothwell
said.
That would be good news for some ranchers and others who oppose the spread
of wolves in Wyoming because of threats to livestock and large game
animals.
But Rothwell said it’s unclear to Game and Fish how the other Wyoming
packs outside Yellowstone might fare.
“We’ve never been involved in wolf management,” he said. “We don’t know
what’s going to happen.”
Department officials, though, are boning up and trying to gather
information on the home ranges for wolf packs in the state. Rothwell said
he thinks some of the packs spend at least part of their time in the
wilderness areas.
Wyoming’s management plan is intended to keep the number of wolf packs in
the state, including Yellowstone, in the low teens, Rothwell said.
The hope is that the wolf population can be contained to a few isolated
spots in the northwestern corner of the state and still satisfy federal
requirements to maintain a total of 30 breeding pairs in Wyoming, Montana
and Idaho, Rothwell said.
The Fish and Wildlife Service, which has managed the wolves since they
were reintroduced to the northern Rocky Mountains in 1995, said the wolf
population has increased enough to remove them from the Endangered Species
List and pass management to the stat es.
But the director of the Fish and Wildlife Service has already said wolves
in the northern Rockies won’t be delisted in the three states if Wyoming
decides to classify some wolves as predators and others as trophy game.
Despite that warning, the Game and Fish Commission in late October told
its staff to pursue a plan with dual classifications intended to keep the
wolves near Yellowstone and the nearby national forests.
“The question the Service will have to answer to be assured they aren’ t
litigated against and lose that litigation is … is that piece of country
big enough and contiguous enough to support enough wolves for our portion
of the breeding pairs,” Rothwell said. “We have no way to judge that.”
Federal officials say allowing wolves to be killed without regulation
outside the park and wilderness areas will impede Wyoming’ s ability to
hold up its end of the bargain. The biology of wolves indicates that they
need be able to travel large swaths of landscape to survive.
“They could be on top of a mountain today and tomorrow in a valley
bottom,” Bangs said.
But that traveling is a key reason the Game and Fish Commission wants to
allow the wolves to be classified as predators. Supporters say it will
help ensure that the animals don’ t impede on agricultural operations and
will give landowners the ability to take care of any problem animals on
their own.
The Game and Fish Department recently completed a series of open house
meetings around the state to explain its draft wolf plan. The Game and
Fish Department is scheduled to vote on a final version in February.
Written public comments will be accepted until Dec. 12.