Montana Considering Extending Wolf Hunt, Upping Kill Limit

Cross Posted from Great Falls Tribune

HELENA — Montana wildlife commissioners may extend the hunting season for wolves and the number of predators that can be killed by a hunter or trapper.

Fish, Wildlife and Parks is proposing a rifle season from Sept. 15 to March 31. Last year, the season began Oct. 15 and ended Feb. 15, resulting in 128 wolves killed by rifle and bow hunters.

Trappers took an additional 97 wolves, for a total of 225 predators killed.

That is the highest number killed in Montana since federal protections for wolves were lifted for Idaho and Montana in 2011.

The agency also is proposing allowing hunters and trappers to take up to five wolves each, the Independent Record reported Wednesday.

Last year, hunters and trappers could take only one wolf. The state Legislature this year passed a bill that allows the agency to increase that limit.

The changes would allow hunters more opportunities and reduce the wolf population, FWP Wildlife Management Chief George Pauley said.

“We’ve always had a philosophy of incrementally increasing harvest rates and opportunities,” he said.

There were at least 625 wolves in 147 packs in Montana at the end of 2012, a 4 percent decrease from the year before.

Biologists tallied a minimum of 1,674 wolves in 321 packs across the six-state Northern Rockies region, a 7 percent decline.

The commission takes up the proposal at its May 9 meeting in Helena.

Federal Protections Lifted from Fish & Wildlife Service

by Rabb!t / Earth First! Newswire

National delisting of endangered species is on the rise, and flowing up the food chain. As was reported yesterday, the Fish & Wildlife Service has proposed lifting all Endangered Species Act protections from the critically endangered gray wolf. When state protections were lifted from this same species in Montana, Idaho and Wyoming, populations diminished rapidly as hunters flocked to the area to take the lives of these majestic beasts.

Now, yet another predator has been taken off the endangered species list. Recent studies have shown that United States Fish & Wildlife Service populations have reached hazardous levels, causing irreversible damage to their natural biosphere and destroying plant and animal populations at an unsustainable rate. Experts say that the organization’s levels of predation—which were tenuous to begin with—have escalated to such an extent that any protections bestowed upon them would be a danger to the North American continent and the human species as a whole. But it does not stop there. Evidence suggests that the Fish & Wildlife Service is only one small arm of a larger federal system, and that protection of any aspect of this system would be irresponsible and must be removed immediately.

Upon hearing the news, gray wolf populations released a communique declaring open season on all federal agencies.

In Wyoming It’s Legal to Slaughter Wolf Pups in Their Dens

by Maria Goodavage / Takepart.com

The term “wolf denning” sounds kind of warm and fuzzy, doesn’t it? It conjures up images of a wolf mom with various members of the pack nurturing new pups that do nothing but sleep, eat, and play in the den.

But I recently learned that “wolf denning” refers to the killing of wolf pups in or near their dens.

In many parts of the U.S., wolves are still protected by the federal endangered species act, but in certain areas where reintroduction efforts in the mid-1990s have been successful, the animals are fair game.

A New Year for the Earth First! Journal

By now, all you current and former subscribers to the EF! Journal should have seen our 2013 Winter update letter in the mail. For those who have sent back donations, we offer our full gratitude for your commitment to sustaining the media of the eco-resistance.

For those still sitting on the letters twiddling your thumbs, we ask that if you can afford a donation of any amount, please get them in the mail to us soon, before they are totally buried under the mounds of junk mail from whack NGOs with their glossy polar bear pictures who are trying to capitalize off your christmas gift money…

And for those who didn’t see it in the mail, you can subscribe to the Journal right here and now, so you’ll never miss another riveting letter from us again. In the meantime, the text from the letter is below. Also, you can print out the whole thing to make copies and give ‘em to all your friends by clicking on the image to the right.

Yule Season’s Greetings To All You Eco-Defenders
And Earth First! Journal Supporters

It’s been a long, hard year here at the Earth First! Journal office. Despite financial pressures in conjunction with lots of court dates, once again, we have persisted.

Large Predators Moving to the City: Urban Coyotes on the Rise

A coyote (without a metrocard!) takes a ride on a light rail train in Portland, Oregon, in 2002.

The world is undergoing the largest wave of urban growth in history. In 2008, for the first time in history, more than half of the world’s human population will be living in towns and cities.

Many new Urbanites have long, furry muzzles, piercing, yellow eyes and are very, very wily. They’re coyotes.

Until recently, scientists who study wildlife thought coyotes couldn’t live in heavily populated areas. Wild carnivorous animals and humans don’t typically mix. But, as previously reported, those scientists were proven wrong. There have been coyote sightings in dozens of U.S. cities — Chicago, Portland, Seattle, even New York City. Like the fox, the skunk and the raccoon before it, the coyote is the latest predatory animal to make the city its home.

The animal’s presence in urban areas is an early indicator for what is to come: larger predators like wolves, mountain lions, and bears.

Revenge of the Wolves

Illustration by Vin Paneccasio

Delisted and targeted in Wyoming, wolves attack hunters

from the Daily Maul

WYOMING, IN THE NOT-TOO-DISTANT FUTURE — Hundreds of hunters are dead this morning after wolves launched a preemptive strike on their would-be human attackers.

“We’re taking the fight to the terrorists who want to destroy our way of life,” a gray wolf named David told The Daily Maul.

Howls of Reprisal: Wolves Return to the Frontlines

Until their reintroduction in the 1990s wolves were all but wiped out in the Northern Rocky Mountains. No wolves had been spotted in Eastern Oregon since 1946, and further west, the last sighting of a wolf in California was in 1924. 

The formation and spread of the Imnaha wolfpack in Eastern Oregon, however, has returned the apex predators’ howls to the Northwest.  Following the birth of wolfpups in 2010 in the Imnaha region of Oregon, a lone wolf, tagged as OR-7 by Oregon Fish and Wildlife, and Journey, by Oregon school children, wandered over a thousand miles into Northern California in late 2011 with the hope of a wilder future for us all.

But starting in 2012 wolves have been delisted in Montana, Idaho and Wyoming and are well on their way to being legally hunted in the Great Lakes Region further East. The demonization of wolves by ranchers and other interests has already lead to the murder of at least one wolf in Oregon. In California, anti-wolf alliances are already forming should a pack form there.

for more information and analysis on the Imnaha wolfpack and the wolf wars in Oregon read The Howls of Reprisal: Wolf Defense in Oregon by Portland Animal Defense League, printed in the Brigid 2012 issue of the Earth First! Journal.

New Wyoming wolf plan would allow killing of hundreds of wolves

From the Center for Biological Diversity

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced today that Wyoming has passed legislation and an amendment to its wolf-management plan that will meet federal approval and trigger removal of Endangered Species Act protections for gray wolves in the state.

The new law and plan — to take effect later this year when wolves are removed from the federal endangered species list — increase the area of Wyoming where wolves would be designated “predators” and could be killed without limit; they also keep in place a “trophy game management area,” where hunting will be allowed to dramatically reduce wolf populations.

“Wyoming’s wolf-management plan is a recipe for wolf slaughter that will only serve to incite more of the prejudice against wolves that led to their destruction in the first place,” said Michael Robinson of the Center for Biological Diversity, which has been working for two decades to save and recover wolves throughout the West. “Removal of federal protections for wolves has been a disaster in Idaho and Montana and will be even worse in Wyoming.”

While wolves would remain fully protected within Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks, elsewhere in Wyoming they would be subject to shooting, trapping and snaring, including 83 percent of the state where they will be considered “predators” and there will be no limits on their killing. The remaining portion of the state would be considered a “trophy game management area,” where killing wolves would be permitted, with the goal of reducing the population from approximately 29 packs to around 10.

“Along with the killing of wolves in Idaho and Montana, which had their protection taken away last year through a back-door congressional rider, this planned persecution of wolves in Wyoming could be devastating to the beautiful animals’ survival in the northern Rocky Mountains,” said Robinson. “Killing most of Wyoming’s wolves will hurt wolves in Colorado, too, where they’re only starting to return by way of Wyoming.”

Since wolf hunting and trapping seasons opened last fall, 378 wolves have been killed in Idaho, which has no cap on killing and several ongoing open seasons. An additional 166 wolves were killed in Montana, which has now closed its season. Contrary to promises, hunting and trapping have appeared to inflame anti-wolf sentiment, with comments and pictures appearing on the Internet that boast of wolf killing and call for more slaughter.

The Fish and Wildlife Service has reopened a two-week comment period, during which feedback is sought from the public before the agency finalizes the delisting rule.

Background
In October 2011 the Obama administration announced finalization of an agreement between the Fish and Wildlife Service and Wyoming Gov. Matt Mead whereby the agency would remove wolves in Wyoming from the federal endangered species list and the state would only be required to keep alive 100 wolves or 10 breeding pairs outside Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks (which together provide habitat for a few dozen wolves that would remain protected while in the parks).

After pups are born within the next few weeks, it is likely that more than 500 wolves will live outside the national parks in Wyoming. The state plan will allow their unregulated killing throughout most of the state.

The Center for Biological Diversity is a national, nonprofit conservation organization with more than 350,000 members and online activists dedicated to the protection of endangered species and wild places.

Idaho AG Asked to Investigate Controversial Trapping Photos

Nez Perce National Forest employee Josh Bransford poses with a wolf trapped in north Idaho

Grisly images, depicting a badly injured wolf captured in north Idaho, have gone viral. Posing alongside the animal is a grinning Josh Bransford, an employee of the Nez Perce National Forest. The pictures, which surfaced on the Web in March, continue to stir fierce debate over an already-emotional topic. And now, some environmental groups are asking for a formal investigation into possible animal cruelty.

The Moscow-based Friends of the Clearwater and the Portland-based Center for Biological Diversity have banded together to ask Idaho Attorney General Lawrence Wasden, the Idaho Department of Fish and Game and the U.S. Forest Service to look into the incident and the images.

The pictures were reportedly posted to the website trapperman.com. An accompanying description indicates that the wolf was trapped and shot by someone other than Bransford.

“The egregious torture of a wolf needs to be investigated by Idaho’s attorney general and the Forest Service,” said Michael Robinson of the Center for Biological Diversity. “And Josh Bransford should be fined or dismissed from his position.”

To read full article go to source as cross-posted from here

Another image connected to article:

Grey Wolf Hunts In Northern Rockies To Continue, Rules Federal Appeals Court

BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — A federal appeals court on Wednesday rejected a lawsuit from conservation groups that want to block wolf hunts that have killed more than 500 of the predators across the Northern Rockies in recent months.

The ruling from a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said Congress had the right to intervene when it stripped protections from wolves last spring.

Lawmakers stepped in after court rulings kept wolves on the endangered list for years after they reached recovery goals. Wildlife advocates claimed in their lawsuit that Congress violated the separation of powers by interfering with the courts.

But in an opinion authored by Judge Mary Schroeder, the court said Congress was within its rights, and that lawmakers had appropriately amended the Endangered Species Act to deal with Northern Rockies wolves.

That amendment marked the first time Congress has forcibly removed a species’ endangered status. It was tacked onto a federal budget bill by Idaho Republican Rep. Mike Simpson and Montana Democratic Sen. Jon Tester.

“This case has made it clear that those who persist in trying to manage wildlife through the courts, in spite of all scientific evidence that this species has recovered, no longer have a defensible position,” Simpson said Wednesday.

Michael Robinson with the Center for Biological Diversity, one of the groups that sued to restore protections, said a Supreme Court appeal was possible but no decision had been made.

“We’re very disappointed and very saddened,” Robinson said. “Hundreds of wolves have been hunted and trapped and snared, and they are essential to their ecosystem.”

He called the congressional budget bill rider that lifted protections “undemocratic” and said that it set a precedent for future political meddling with imperiled wildlife.

Reposted from Huffington Press