It is time to create a new page of “Interesting Wildlife News.” It has been a long time since we have had a new page. The page and comment loading time has become slow. Do not post copyrighted material.
Here is the link to the “old” wildlife news of April 6, 2018. From there you can access links to older pages still.
Please post your wildlife news in the comments below
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Dr. Ralph Maughan is professor emeritus of political science at Idaho State University. He was a Western Watersheds Project Board Member off and on for many years, and was also its President for several years. For a long time he produced Ralph Maughan’s Wolf Report. He was a founder of the Greater Yellowstone Coalition. He and Jackie Johnson Maughan wrote three editions of “Hiking Idaho.” He also wrote “Beyond the Tetons” and “Backpacking Wyoming’s Teton and Washakie Wilderness.” He created and is the administrator of The Wildlife News.
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SATURDAY, JULY 21, 2018
Chronic Wasting Disease: new experience in Europe
http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2018/07/chronic-wasting-disease-new-experience.html
i thought some of you here might want an update on the cwd tse prion disease.
here goes, it’s not pretty, so don’t shoot the messenger, i am full of holes…terry
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 2018
cwd, bse, scrapie, cjd, tse prion updated November 10 2018
https://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2018/11/cwd-bse-scrapie-cjd-tse-prion-updated.html
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 25, 2018
***> Norway New additional requirements for imports of hay and straw for animal feed from countries outside the EEA due to CWD TSE Prion
https://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2018/10/norway-new-additional-requirements-for.html
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 04, 2018
***> Cervid to human prion transmission 5R01NS088604-04 Update
http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2018/10/cervid-to-human-prion-transmission.html
kind regards, terry
Thanks, Terry.
And will add to your info this recent update on CWD in Montana:
https://kpax.com/news/montana-outdoors/2018/11/09/chronic-wasting-disease-confirmed-in-deer-harvested-in-2-montana-counties/
And just recapping, Terry, for those that might not of clicked on the link, within your link.
Four innocent New Mexico bears will be executed for the crime committed by one irresponsible human; the 70-year-old man admitted to feeding wildlife with cracked corn at his residence. He was bitten by a bear when he stepped outside.
Excerpt: “We will now have to euthanize* the bears because they are habituated to humans and pose a serious public safety risk. My decision to euthanize* these bears could have been completely avoided had the bears not been fed.” ~NM Dept. of Game and Fish personnel
*’execute’ is the correct word
https://sangrechronicle.com/officers-investigate-bear-attack-in-cloudcroft/
Doe the guy who encouraged them get even a wrist slap in all of this? These bears just need to be relocated. How many times do people have to be told, and for the bears to be made an example of, and still people keep feeding them or being careless?
house guest
http://www.foxnews.com/science/2018/07/24/oregon-woman-finds-mountain-lion-napping-in-her-home-this-is-wild.html
http://www.foxnews.com/science/2018/07/24/oregon-woman-finds-mountain-lion-napping-in-her-home-this-is-wild.html
http://www.miningjournal.net/news/front-page-news/2018/07/dnr-biologist-talks-predators/ is a pretty good review of wolf history and wolf political history in MI.
The DNR gets one thing wrong though:
Then there’s the question of who should be in charge of wolf management: trained biologists or voters.
“If you had to have your appendix out, would you like to take that to the voters of Michigan, or would you rather take the doctor’s word for it?” Roell asked.
I always get to make this same point (as do JB and other biologists): Scientists can know what is likely to happen as a result of actions, but we have no special privilege to say what the value of things are. I’m getting to hate it when people use analogies when there’s no need. There’s often a trick being employed.
Rork, You may have missed a more glaring “one thing wrong” ….. “Presenting the program was Brian Roell, a wildlife biologist with the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, who noted there tend to be two polarizing sides to the wolf issue: people who want to protect them, and others who want every wolf dead.” I can honestly say I don’t know ONE PERSON that “want every wolf dead”! PErsonally, I think Roell should be reprimanded for making such an inflammatory binary choice that does not represent those interest in delisting and sound management for all wildlife not just predators!
Sound management? Some would argue if management goes one way and others would argue if it goes the other. You can’t please all the voters, hence majority rules. Does the majority always get things right? Ask all the dead Indians and their descendants. Ask all the dead slaves etc. We often get things wrong. But, sometimes a wrong decision {who decides right and wrong? the majority} is better then NO decision. We can always change OUR minds.
I agree wanting no wolves at all is not very common, but it exists. I took that as just illustration anyway. I do agree that both sides of any debate now often point to the most extreme views of (nuts on) the other side and try to tell you that is the view of the majority of the other side, and that this is a horrible trend.
PS for Hiker: You likely know, that in a strange twist that the article mentioned the majority of voters passed laws to have no wolf hunts. The legislators decided otherwise. They had to do so three times before they found means to override the majority of voters.
Did not know that. So much for majority rules. However, the voters can have the last laugh at reelection.
The “majority” of the most affected voters overwhelmingly vote for the hunt (those in the UP) at around 67 percent. The “majority” of the counties voted for the hunt. ONLY 47 percent (not a majority) of all MI voters voted against the wolf hunt. Around 9 percent elected not to vote on the issue and around 45 percent of all MI voters voted for the hunt. Before the vote even happened voters in the UP collected 300,000 (grass roots) signatures prompting the legislator to pass the law making the referendums mute. HSUS spent 1.8 million dollars on advertising and used PAID signature collectors to get only 200,000 signature for the tax dollar sucking referendums. The VOTE speaks for itself!
“around 45 percent of all MI voters voted for the hunt” True.
“I do agree that both sides of any debate now often point to the most extreme views” By your description Roell (A PUBLIC SERVANT) is taking sides! Hence, my comment. His description of the other side was not as radical.
“His description of the other side was not as radical.”
There’s nuance to language here that I think is being lost. In my experience, the word “protect” (or “protectionist”) gets used by natural wildlife professionals as a pejorative, similar to “anti-hunters”. So while it may not seem as radical a description to lay folk, I suspect many (especially old-timers) in the wildlife profession view the idea of protecting predators as equally radical (to killing them all).
—
Last year John Vucetich led a piece that carefully documents the political controversy surrounding the wolf hunt, and shows why the hunt was ill-conceived. I *believe* it is accessible on scholar.google.com and ResearchGate.
See: Vucetich, J. A., Bruskotter, J. T., Nelson, M. P., Peterson, R. O., & Bump, J. K. (2017). Evaluating the principles of wildlife conservation: a case study of wolf (Canis lupus) hunting in Michigan, United States. Journal of Mammalogy, 98(1), 53-64.
Replace “natural wildlife professionals” with “wildlife professionals”. Apologies!
https://idahonews.com/news/local/watch-eastern-washington-couple-finds-two-cougars-in-backyard
They are trying to pull this crap again. Always the ‘important stuff’. There is still plenty of habitat where wolves can be brought back:
“The bill’s exact language would “remove the gray wolf in each of the 48 contiguous states of the United States and District of Columbia from the list of Endangered Species.” The legislation specifies there would be “no judicial review.””
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/connelly-grizzly-bears-gray-wolves-big-losers-in-house-spending-bill/ar-BBKQ04L
Jon Tester’s legacy. 🙁
Well, no wolves at all may not be very common, but it has been said by a politician or two in the West, and I notice people are careful not to say that out loud so much anymore.
But keeping wolves to unsustainably low numbers and quietly increasing the hunting quotas and expanding hunting yearly, is virtually no wolves at all, and is much more common.
“Wyoming, Idaho, Colorado Billboards Target Yellowstone Grizzly Hunt”
Awesome billboard by the Center for Biological Diversity!
Excerpt: “Wyoming and Idaho should be absolutely ashamed for allowing some of America’s most iconic bears to be senselessly gunned down,” said Andrea Santarsiere, a senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Millions of people come to Yellowstone National Park every year to see these grizzlies. But the second these bears step out of the park, they could be shot dead by a hunter’s bullet. It’s ugly and reprehensible.”
https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2018/grizzly-bear-07-26-2018.php
They have no shame. I wish I could remember who it was that said they wanted no wolves at all, I think it was Wyoming, and then whoever it was backtracked quickly.
We all remember Butch Otter’s comments, and yet he still gets elected, and for years:
https://helenair.com/news/state-and-regional/governor-wants-to-kill-all-but-idaho-wolves/article_2adbc3b8-7069-5c1d-8dfe-53c788c0a723.html
And they are still being used as a political tool:
https://www.gillettenewsrecord.com/news/wyoming/article_699faa54-352b-58e7-a470-f4ea751f25be.html
Kathleen, I thought you would appreciate this. I have been hearing for years a wood thrush in the wooded area behind my home. Over the years I’ve seen what I think is one scratching through the leaf litter, and in the bird bath. I saw one the other day, and yesterday I saw a *pair* of them, scratching in the leaf litter under the bird feeder. There’s been a lot of bird fledging activity too.
Awesome, lucky you! Hopefully they had a brood and you’ll be hearing a symphony. The only time I ever saw one, I had to sneak through the forest to get a glimpse. We have Swainson’s and maybe hermit thrushes out here, but to my mind, nothing rivals the eastern wood thrush singing deep in a deciduous forest. Even HD Thoreau commented on their beautiful song more than once. Just FYI, we’ve been seeing a spotted towhee hanging around our place; lots of lesser goldfinches (put out a thistle sock because I cleaned up a patch of exotic thistles left by the previous homeowners that the birds had been using); scrub & occasionnally pinyon jays, white-breasted nuthatches, a lady Bullock’s oriole, western peewee, finches, mourning doves, etc., nothing else too exotic this year. (Exotic meaning unusual; we also have a pair of Eurasian collared doves for exotic in the bad sense.) Last year we had a little canyon wren come visit.
https://musicofnature.com/video/wood-thrush/
Wow. I love hearing about the birds of the West too. Yes, we’ve got American goldfinch babies and I had a pair of towhees too.
I actually heard a wood thrush singing somewhere in the outskirts of a McDonald’s parking lot, of all things, recently. Adaptability. 🙂
My thrill every spring is hearing the first territorial call of my returning pileated pair. Every year at this place since 2002.
I have to post this because ya ‘all are the only ones that understand my excitement: so I make the above post yesterday, ….. re pileated Paul and this morning I go out to check my water fountain I created at my cabin just back of the house. I bring the card from the camera back and plug it in and bingo – pileated Paul is drinking the fountain about dry. He comes and goes 3 times this week. I haven’t heard him for about a month now, thought they took the kids and left. Doesn’t take much to excite me nowadays.
DIFFERENT TOPIC: So Zinke responded to an appeal from the mule deer club to hold back drill leases in the migration corridor in WY. Seems his Teddy Roosevelt wannabe will stop drilling if it’s something to hunt and kill. But not so much for pygmy rabbits, California condors or beautiful historical monuments.
🙂 That is something to get excited about! Sometimes I think some wildlife has gone, but then when I see them again it is thrilling.
As Henry Beston said, “In a world older and more complete than ours, they move finished and complete, gifted with the extension of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear. They are not brethren, they are not underlings: they are other nations,…”.
I’m just happy to get a glimpse of them from time to time.
Drilling in a migration corridor? I just don’t know what to say. This is one time I am grateful to hunters.
Having a debate where the subject of wolves is mentioned unfavorably at the National Guard Joint Forces Readiness Center just isn’t a good image in my mind. 🙁
But who is voting for the legislators? Like Tammy Baldwin (D) who has co-authored legislation in the past to delist wolves without judicial review? I don’t think people are making the connection that once an animal is delisted – hunting is automatic afterwards.
That’s what keeps nagging me about ‘support for the ESA is still strong by the public’. How in the world did Donald Trump become president then, when Republicans have been anti-ESA and environmental laws for decades? There’s a disconnect there.
More info about the circumstances of this grizzly encounter that was discussed on this forum:
Excerpt: “…a field assistant working in a remote section of the Cabinet Mountains was caught off guard in mid-May in a surprise grizzly bear attack south of Libby while working on a U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service grizzly bear project.”
http://www.kpax.com/story/38750131/fwp-hosts-animal-attack-investigation-training-class-in-kalispell
Fascinating. I’m glad they make the distinction of surprise encounters for the wildlife. 🙂
“MINNEAPOLIS MAYOR SIGNS PLANT-BASED PROCLAMATION”
Excerpt: “Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey signed a proclamation last week urging citizens to eat plant-based foods. The withdrawal of the United States from the Paris Agreement… prompted the mayor to issue the document in an effort to promote environmentally friendly eating habits. ‘If each American affirmatively chose to eat plant-based food at just one meal per week,” the proclamation stated, “the carbon dioxide savings would be the same as taking more than half a million cars off US roads.’”
https://vegnews.com/2018/7/minneapolis-mayor-signs-plant-based-proclamation
Blueberries from Peru in Jan are plant based. Maybe changing law would be more effective than personal virtue. Don’t get me wrong: most of the molecules of my body right now came from things out of my garden, but that’s partly because I’m privileged, with time to garden and cook and compost, skills, land.
Let’s talk carbon taxes. Affects cows, affects those blueberries, affects gas.
Choices……
“This brings us to 4 vehicle deaths on this 13-mile stretch of Hwy 93 in 2018 and brings the NCDE mortality numbers to 26, 12 of which are vehicle collisions”
https://nbcmontana.com/news/local/family-of-bears-killed-in-car-collision-south-of-ronan
I think I have not yet reported my annual findings on how deer are going in Michigan’s upper peninsula (UP, it’s not really a peninsula). Wolves have been steady at about 650 since 2011. Human howls of them annihilating the deer are much older, and became more shrill after deadly winters in 2014, and 2015. 2016 saw only around 20000 bucks tagged (legally killed and recovered). Sane people said it was the weather rather than the wolves.
2017: About 30000 bucks were tagged in the UP.
Reactions, retractions, or comment by UP deer hunters: zero.
Other tidbit:
Statewide 41% of deer tagged were antlerless – a horribly low number in my opinion. In our CWD zone, where I want instant reduction of deer densities via greater deer deaths and especially more doe deaths, 41% of deer tagged were antlerless. I hope I don’t need to apply additional sarcasm for either the UP or CWD stories.
https://www.michigan.gov/documents/dnr/2017_deer_harvest_survey_report_628089_7.pdf
One more bit of sarcasm: I was not emailed and I think there was no press release when the report went out. Almost no press coverage.
MN DNR report. Echos the bad winters of 12/13 and 13/14.
https://files.dnr.state.mn.us/wildlife/deer/reports/harvest/deerharvest_2017.pdf
“Nearly 50% of deer hunters indicated that deer numbers and harvest has decreased during the last five years…”
If I’m reading Fig. 12 correctly, deer harvest actually increased during the past 5 years; so [surprise!] the perception of deer hunters does not match reality. Hmm…now why does this story sound familiar?
I sarcastically commented on that at Michigansportsman too.
In my area (Southern lower MI) only about 5% of folks thought there were more deer in 2017 than 5 years earlier. 2012 was exactly the year half of the deer where I hunt died of EHD before Oct. It didn’t happen that way everywhere, but our local area wasn’t the only place. Densities were lower for 2 or 3 years, but it seems right back where it used to be now. There are obviously more deer near me. There are too many deer in NE lower (Presque Isle) too. I found it hard to find the 2012 report though.
Smaller point: Everyone bemoans hunter numbers decline (-2% for last year), but effort went up 5% last year. Numbers of bow hunters is down since the 90’s but I’d say number of serious bow hunters (that have chances) is obviously up. The rest bought bows but then realized it’s not so easy, and quit showing up. We called them “the gun hunters with bows”.
SLP bucks 2013: 103416.
SLP bucks 2017: 110876.
When Elk375 used to post here regularly, we used to have the same argument concerning elk numbers (where he hunted in MT). Here in Ohio, I had a half-hour argument with a guy at the deer stakeholder summit this spring about why hunter numbers are declining. He insisted it was because the deer population was down, and so I showed him 35 years of data that show a steady decrease in per-capita license sales. I also showed him that during that time, deer harvest had actually gone up considerably (in fact, deer harvest and hunter license sales were correlated at -0.92). Didn’t bother him one bit. He went right on insisting that hunter numbers are down because of the recent decline in deer.
Apparently in the Trump era, if an argument feels right, it’s right. To Hell with the data.
Rork, The complaint by hunters is that public lands hunting is suffering under wolf mis-management. I know that they give the statistics private vs public (at least they did in 2015) how much of your 20,000 / 30000 is private vs public. And what is the historic trends….? In the past roughly only 25% of the harvest was on public lands But, public lands way outnumbers the private land by far! ….looking at the numbers for just public lands was very telling!
Wisconsin is now collecting public vs private harvest numbers.
You don’t get to say what the complaint is. I’ve heard many. But I did do some of your homework.
In 2012, 9106 public land bucks, 29109 private, 23.8% public.
In 2017 it was 8464 and 22050 for 27.7% public.
I can’t see effort split for private vs public though. People know the deer are just now rebounding from bad winters, but effort went up just 3.7% compared to 2016. Antler regs changed too somewhere in there.
I can’t tell if this is telling or not cause I am not sure what you are trying to say.
Deer densities may be much higher on private lands. Private owners try not to overshoot their deer, plant things for deer, farm and have fields. It’s the better land to begin with, like every other state. There might be more effort there too. Hunting big tracts of the nothing up there in November takes huge effort and gear. It is often like winter already. One of the bad years people could not get their cars to their hunting spots cause there was 4 feet of snow.
Correction: in 2013 it was 9106 and 19798, 31.5% public.
Update: It’s now day 6 that the grieving mother orca has refused to abandon the body of her dead calf. How heartbreaking is this…The Southern Resident orcas are in a dire situation thanks to human impacts:
Excerpt: “The whales are suffering from at least three challenges: vessel noise, which interrupts their foraging; toxins, which are released into their bloodstream and calves’ milk especially when the whales are hungry: and lack of food, especially chinook salmon.”
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/environment/orca-mother-carries-dead-calf-for-fifth-day-her-entire-family-is-also-staying-close-by/
If so moved, call WA Gov. Inslee and tell him “breach the lower Snake River dams now!” (360)902-4111
Dam Sense on FB: https://www.facebook.com/damsense.org/
Website: https://damsense.org/
It’s just so stomach-turningly sad to see the other rightful inhabitants of this planet suffer under the indifference of humanity. Many of the dams need to go.
Yeah, I know there’s a handful of people who care, but it’s not enough.
The Question of Animal Awareness by Donald R. Griffin. We have to stop thinking we are the only ones that have feelings.
It was bound to come to this:
“Urban coyote bloodbaths are the future liberals want”
*sigh*
http://www.citypages.com/news/soucheray-sez-urban-coyote-bloodbaths-are-the-future-liberals-want/489528741
“After third offense, Durango man fined $1,000 for feeding bears: Resident had been ticketed in 2010 and 2012”
“A Durango man has been ticketed for intentionally feeding bears – for the third time in eight years – resulting in a $1,000 fine and a likelihood the bears will have to be euthanized.” (NOTE: Euthanized is the wrong word; the correct word is executed.)
https://durangoherald.com/articles/234395-durango-man-fined-1000-for-feeding-bears-third-offense
Well, so much for education. Again, the bears should be relocated because it was a case of baiting.
“Here’s How America Uses Its Land”
A fascinating series of maps. Excerpt: “There’s a single, major occupant on all this land: cows. Between pastures and cropland used to produce feed, 41 percent of U.S. land in the contiguous states revolves around livestock.”
https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-us-land-use/?utm_content=business&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&cmpid=socialflow-twitter-business
FYI
“As the world economy develops and many countries industrialize, people seek different uses of livestock. Today, non-food functions are generally in decline and are replaced by cheaper and more convenient substitutes. The following trends may be depicted:
• The asset, petty cash and insurance function that livestock provide is being replaced by financial institutions as even remote rural areas enter the monetary economy;
• With the notable exception of sub-Saharan Africa and some areas in Asia animal draught is on the decline as more farmers mechanize.
• Manure continues to be important for nutrient management in mixed farming but its role in overall nutrient supply is declining because of the competitive price and ease of management of inorganic fertilizer.
• Although the demand for natural fibres is still high, and in some places even increasing, there are increasingly more synthetic substitutes for wool and leather
http://www.fao.org/wairdocs/lead/x6130e/x6130e02.htm
This is from February, so apologies if already posted, but it appears the Yellowstone elk population is rebounding very well.
https://trib.com/lifestyles/recreation/famous-yellowstone-elk-herd-rebounds-two-decades-after-wolf-reintroduction/article_0f7eefd9-484b-5060-a68d-2ebfbed2b054.html
Two items: “Yellowstone National Park responds to video of a man teasing a bison”
Watch the video–absolutely appalling.
http://www.krtv.com/story/38801578/yellowstone-national-park-responds-to-video-of-a-man-teasing-a-bison
And “Birds learn another ‘language’ by eavesdropping on neighbors, scientists say”
Excerpt: “To put it in human terms, it’s as though a person who only speaks English had learned that “Achtung” means ‘attention’ or ‘danger’ in German simply by listening to people yell phrases with similar meanings in multiple languages at once. ‘Until this study, we had limited knowledge about how an animal learns what calls from other species actually mean.’”
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/science/ct-birds-language-eavesdropping-20180802-story.html?platform=hootsuite
Update on the bison teaser: He was arrested in Glacier National Park today and has been transported back to the Yellowstone National Park Jail in Mammoth. The article is in the Missoulian. He was in trouble in Grand Teton National Park, Yellowstone National Park and Glacier National Park. Some people.
wtf
https://www.ktvb.com/article/news/rescue-response-delayed-for-woman-treed-by-wolves-in-washington/277-580035863
This is what happens when you have three agencies, two of which don’t seem to know what is going on. And you can see the wolf haters are champing on the bit for a delisting, like rabid creatures. Can’t wait for things to happen in their due course, have to whip up controversy and make threats about having their cronies in DC change the laws to suit them, and circumvent any challenge.
This person was employed by the Forest Service, wasn’t she? They should not have sent her in alone. Did they communicate with the WDFW?
I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the other one of the two, the Bureau of Land (Mis)management.
I knew you’d have the bison story. The guy is making the park circuit, drunk and disorderly, and harassing the wildlife. Karma police, arrest this man! (and they have.) I hope he gets a fine, and more than a slap on the wrist.
hmm
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/nra-financial-trouble-706371/
US wildlife refuges end ban on neonics and GM crops
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-45068650
It was taken to court, and then the USF&W voluntarily ended the questionable practice in a wildlife refuge to avoid the suit. I guess it’s back to court! PEER initiated the lawsuit, I think? This is just one think I could think of with the information:
https://www.centerforfoodsafety.org/press-releases/3342/fish-and-wildlife-service-agrees-to-phase-out-genetically-engineered-crops-and-ban-bee-killing-pesticides-on-national-refuges
Sorry, link. There was a settlement agreement that link says, so I don’t know what the terms of the agreement were. We’ll see, I guess.
“IS SOUTHERN RESIDENT KILLER WHALE J35 REALLY MOURNING?”
Kudos to this scientist for stating this so unequivocally!
Excerpt: “For years scientists vigorously avoided using emotional terms like happy, sad, playful or angry when describing animal behavior. But as Carl Safina reminds us in his treatise on animal emotions, Beyond Words: What animals think and feel, if animals have the same brain, same hormones, and same neurotransmitters as we do, why wouldn’t we expect them to have the same emotions? Are we, after all, so arrogant to think we have the market cornered on emotions even though other highly social animals have the same hard wiring?
“So, can we scientifically call J35’s behavior mourning? Yes! Not only do I think we can call it mourning, I think we must call it mourning.”
https://www.seadocsociety.org/blog/is-southern-resident-killer-whale-j35-really-mourning
Its not rocket science Rork. Those that love to make excuses for the wolf always try to expand away from the root of the problem. You know as well as I do that the overwhelming majority of wolves reside on the public lands in the Upper Peninsula. This is where they are negatively affecting the once heathy deer population. Sure a few wolves live on and tramps on private lands. But we both know the problem is those public lands.
Your “howls” of the sane people look at the trends for where wolves are saturated. If you are really interested in seeing what the wolves do, map out the historic trends for those public lands in the UP.
From 2011 to 2017 the UP public land harvest went from 13225 to 8464! DOWN 36%
IN contrast the NORTHERN LP public land harvest went from 23,876 29,828 UP 24%
TELLING!…… Gotta question for ya Rork…..are the deer in the Northern Lower Peninsula on public lands healthy?
Winter severity has always been the primary variable in deer survival in the UP. Comparing population dynamics in the UP and NLP without considering the severity index difference between the two areas is disingenuous.
From DNR Harvest Reports:
Public land harvests UP/NLP
2010 – 12,983 / 18,900
2011 – 13,225 / 23,876
2012 – 14,677 / 28,470
2013 – 11,697 / 28,065
2014 – 5,882 / 23,282
2015 – 5,037 / 24,987
2016 – 6,103 / 24,987
2017 – 9110 / 29,828
As you can see the hard winters of 2013-2015 took their toll on deer numbers…. much more so in the UP. Numbers are beginning to rise again due to milder winters of late (though this Spring was a tough one).
Good summary of the history of deer numbers in UP here:
http://www.woods-n-waternews.com/Articles-In-This-Issue-i-2016-12-01-224615.112113-WHITETAILS-OF-THE-UP.html
Thanks for the backup info to Dr Mech’s quote
“During two decades of wolf research, conducting studies in northern Minnesota and on Isle Royale in Michigan, I have learned that, far from always being ‘balanced,’ ratios of wolves and prey animals can fluctuate wildly – and sometimes catastrophically. Wolves may actually starve after killing off almost all the moose and deer in an area. This explains why wolf-control programs may sometimes ensure greater and more stable numbers of both wolves and the animals they hunt.”—L. David Mech
2011 is cherry picked – that was max deer in the UP. BTW it was also max wolf.
Winter is not the same in the UP as in the northern lower.
Antler point restrictions were applied in the UP during the time you are using data for, reducing the kill.
After harsh winters, we kill no female deer or young in the UP. In contrast the DNR has been trying to get us to shoot more anterless deer in the northern lower to reduce densities (helps with TB for one). I can shoot an extra 5 antlerless deer in the NE lower for the past few years, and the tags cost less.
So those are 5 problems with your data.
As for health in the northern lower, my observations from Presque Isle county are that their condition is not good, and the land is being harmed by too many deer, despite the encouragements of the DNR to knock them down. What the deer weigh is my data, and whether white cedar can establish.
Maybe you could try and say what your point is once in awhile. If it is that wolves kill deer, and slow rebound after harsh winters, I agree. I also agree that lows are lower. My suggestion is that we learn to live with it. The forestry people agree. Maybe we can regenerate our wintering sites thanks to some lower density deer years.
My original point was that the public land data is the best picture of the wolf issue …. you posted your “sane people” comment based on data from ALL of the UP when you knew full well that the public land data doesn’t water down the issue. Your whole harvest numbers you tried to throw in the face of those advocating for better management is only a ruse when you have better data and you choose not to use it.
“This is where they are negatively affecting the once heathy deer population.”
“negatively affecting” = reducing densities of
“once healthy” = overpopulated
—-
Let’s put things in perspective: Everywhere there are wolves there is continued deer and elk harvest. Is it as much as the folks who want a deer (or elk) behind every tree would like — nope, not in a lot of cases. Then again, in my experience those folks are never satisfied.
Ohh Come on JB, It’s those that continue to promote wolves that are “never satisfied” Secondary prey like the moose in the GYA are an example of your folly! Heck, wolves could kill off EVERY endangered caribou on the Slate and Michipicoten island in lake Superior and there are still those that don’t want any kind of management.
Rork knows full well that most units of the UP have always matched up well with specific units in the northern half of the LP. Its the units right on the boarder with Superior that get the lake snow WHICH also occurs to a lesser extent in the LP. Severity indexes in certain WI MI and MN all tend to reflect each other year after year…! Rork embarrasses himself to portray all the the UP as having no resemblance in climate to the northern half of the LP. Moose’s data needs to go back to the late 1990’s to get the clear picture as units matched up well with units in the LP….. before wolves!
“It’s those that continue to promote wolves that are ‘never satisfied’.”
— Without passing judgment on either statement… both can be simultaneously true. However, the desire for less (no) lethal management is not ecologically equivalent to the desire to have an overabundant deer herd. Wolves and their prey persisted without human management for thousands of years; wild ungulate herds protected from predation are a much more recent phenomena.
“Secondary prey like the moose in the GYA are an example of your folly!”
??? Moose are in trouble because of climate change. Predation (whether by humans, or native carnivores) can certainly aggravate the problem, but we made the coffin for moose, not wolves.
“Rork knows full well that most units of the UP have always matched up well with specific units in the northern half of the LP.”
Sorry Matt, I’m not buying this argument at all (I’m actually from the northern lower peninsula, and vacation there every year). There are PARTS of the NLP that receive similar snowfall to the UP, but the two are not equivalent. For example, the counties of the NLP most resemble the counties of the southern part of the UP in terms of snowfall; however, these areas have different soil types. The northern UP — which has similar soils to the NLP — actually gets waaay more snow: http://geo.msu.edu/extra/geogmich/where&why.html
More to the point, a recent study found wolves were not the primary predator of deer neonates — it was coyotes (then black bears). https://www.mlive.com/outdoors/index.ssf/2012/04/experts_surprised_by_which_pre.html
JB I often wonder if you actually believe the narratives you try to push on others?
http://aspenpublicradio.org/post/moose-population-healthier-ever-colorado#stream/0
http://www.denverpost.com/2016/08/13/wickstrom-moose-populations-are-thriving-in-colorado/
“Wolves and their prey persisted without human management for thousands of years” Your revision of history is quite unprofessional! A thinking person knows that 10 to 50 million Native Americans living in North America did not give a full out pass to all predators….THAT is the “more recent phenomena” especially in the GYA! Your blaming of “climate change” only adds to my leaning less towards your perceived truth about climate change.
Someone hit a bear on I-90 about ten miles east of Livingston Sunday morning. I saw it in the median as I was traveling by. I haven’t heard any news about it, I did call to report it but it had already been reported. Looked like it could have been a black bear but all I could see was the fur on its back.
FYI Shouldn’t surprise anyone given the push to do away with wilderness study areas.
The current administration has lined out a number of pricks (Zinke included) who can’t wait to end protections for wilderness areas.
https://nbcmontana.com/news/local/group-says-us-energy-panel-stacked-with-industry-supporters
Registration is still open for Wildlife for All: Re-envisioning State Wildlife Governance. This meeting is being organized by the Southwest Environmental Center and Western Wildlife Conservancy, and will be held in Albuquerque on August 14-15.
The purpose is to convene wildlife advocates from around the country to answer the question: how do we create the policies and institutions we need to protect all of our wildlife, for everybody, in every state, forever?
Topics include: Report from the States, Public Trust Doctrine, Alliances for Change, Finding Alternative Funding, and Building a Movement. Speakers include: Adrian Treves, Martin Nie, Mike Phillips, Jill Fritz, Camilla Fox, Ruth Musgrave, and many others. More info at wildmesquite.org.
NE Washington wolves treed a female USFS employee a couple weeks back. Dispatch dialog just became available on the incident. WDFW wolf management is not getting good marks for its response to the incident, and who should be involved in s time sensitive “rescue” of the treed person. Also some blaming from WDFW, and lack of communication with Okanogan authorities. One more bad mark for the Loup Loup pack and WDFW, with wolves doing what they do. Worth watching this short TV segment:
https://www.ktvb.com/article/news/rescue-response-delayed-for-woman-treed-by-wolves-in-washington/277-580035863
A matter of lack of communication/cooperation that allowed a simple incident balloon into unnecessary controversy.
Blast from the past for any Dana Carvey fans out there – 2:22 minutes in
https://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/tom-brokaw-pre-tapes/n10894
Again, how many hikers have enjoyed the backcountry of Yellowstone National Park (since wolf reintroduction in 1995) and NO ONE yet has been run down, treed or been eaten by wolves?
Did this, what appears to be an inexperienced? seasonal? “grad student/researcher”, stumble upon a pack of wolves, who were just trying to warn her away from their family/ den site?
And how many of us, that are fortunate enough to actually live around wildlife, say birds? have been “dive bombed” warning us to stay away for their nest/ babies?
“For over an hour” according to this news report, this student spend in a tree, before being dramatically rescued (after who should be doing the rescuing, was finally sorted out)
That comment had me flashing back to an incident with a local rancher, a couple of decades ago, who spent an hour or more, in a tree, when the “biggest Gawd damn black bear I’d ever seen” came barreling at him, mad, while he was repairing fence line.
It was spring time. Could of been an old boar (male bear) enjoying a fresh caught elk or deer calf, could of been a female bear with cubs, warning him away from her family. But fact was, it was on the cusp of where public lands meet private lands.
I saw that rancher the same day of the incident and he held out his hands and said “I’m still shaking”
But, back then I was sympathetic, “hey how cute a cattle drive” and had no idea at the time the lengths many ranchers go to retain the “good stewards of the land” title, till I lived here for a few decades and started witnessing, firsthand, the destruction, annually, to public lands and native wildlife, by continued government sanctioned, invasive livestock.
Course that thought isn’t going to make an immediate impression on most folks, who don’t live in wild lands, until they can no longer find enough wild lands left to visit while on vacation….
Always the drama with wolves. “Surrounded by a pack of wolves.” She spent an hour in a tree.
I have reservations about the authenticity of this story. How many times over the last 200 years has anyone been actually been attacked by a pack of wolves?
1. How many wolves were there when she got treed?
2. How far away were the wolves when she first noticed them?
3. Did they actually tree her or did she see them in the distance and panicked since she was alone?
4. Did any of the wolves charge her? Chase her?
5. Did the ‘pack of wolves’ that ‘surrounded’ her circle the tree? How did they behave?
5. Any witnesses? She managed to call for help. Did she have a phone where she could video this pack of wolves that treed her? Everything is caught on video in this technological era. Why is there never any evidence the “chased by, treed by, surrounded by” “pack of wolves” stories? Not once. Ever.
So much drama. Centuries of it. Same old stories and never any witnesses. “Victim” is always alone.
Many different story renditions.
1. She had a satellite phone, thus no pictures.
2. I believe there were two wolves, with barking and howling.
3. She discharged bear spray, to no avail.
4. She called her supervisor, who suggested she climb a tree.
From there the mess begins…
Of course. I just did a quick search. Check out the hysterical comments and bad grammar in the comments on this site. Plus, one comment states she was a ‘seasoned researcher’ rather than, ‘seasonal researcher’. Big difference since seasonal workers are usually grad. students or recent graduates.
Taught staff how to perform a stream habitat assessment and did two assessments on two different creek sites. 07/18 and 07/19.
OMG! Mat-ters. Did you really think this guy was in danger?
Wolf; tail wagging, romping around, almost at this guy’s feet?
Big guy and on cue, thrashing sticks, screaming at the wolf…. Wolf wondering what WTF and finally wandering off?
One of those videos that gets dragged out of storage (its what 3-4 years old?) every time wolf opponents need to drive home a point about how dangerous wolves are?
The animal is so far off (and friendly, even trained) it could even be a dog. I can’t imagine a wolf behaving that way. The guy sounds like Bigfoot.
To be honest, watching this, I was more frightened of Bigfoot than the canine!
What were the other ‘bad marks’ for the Loup Loup pack? I must have missed them?
I think people have to be realistic about how quickly someone can be rescued in remote areas. Again, she shouldn’t have been sent out alone. The FS ought to be responsible for its own employees?
The Wisconsin carnage continues.
https://dnr.wi.gov/topic/wildlifehabitat/wolf/dogdeps.html
Why is it that people rarely get worked as up when they are in mountain lion territory as they do in wolf territory?
If a mountain lion attacks they usually pounce before the human victim ever notices the cat. They quietly stalk, pounce and kill. Much more dangerous and deadly than wolves.
I am a cat person. Love all of them from the smallest felines to the biggest. However, if I were out and had a choice of encounters, I’d take my chances of survival to be more likely with wolves than it would a cougar.
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/eastside/1-dead-1-injured-in-cougar-attack-on-eastside/
That’s from May. Last death in WA was 94 years ago.
I find that hiking in cougar/griz country makes me more aware of things in the green world. It is an enhanced experience. Even this past week in Shenandoah Nat Park, I was more appreciative of details like the overturned rocks or shredded stumps, and I was able to see black bears several times thanks to paying more attention. I also thank my fellow humans for leaving the chanterelles alone, even those right next to the trails.
She would seem to be a very good climber, of just the right tree, also.
You can’t blame the Loup Loup pack, but the people involved. Three agencies and they don’t seem to be able to communicate. I’m willing to cut the WDWF some slack. As I said before, are budgets so tight that only one person can go out into the field? No matter how you look at it, it is the agency (FS) at fault here.
With WA and OR, and the Great Lakes, champing at the bit for delisting, you’ve got to take some of it with a grain of salt, IMO.
There’s an account from MN of a guy out hunting grouse whose dog was chase by wolves. Apparently, he had his 3 year old son and 5 year old nephew with him. What do people think, really? Sanitize the landscape of wildlife so that they can do whatever they want?
https://www.twincities.com/2017/09/27/northern-minnesota-hunter-has-harrowing-encounter-with-pack-of-wolves/
Insisting upon taking dogs out to train for bear hunting in wolf country is just asking for trouble as well. People are the ones who are supposed to be the smart ones, not competing with wolves.
Step back and let Bailey’s “first person” account,sink in Ida:
“Bailey and the boys continued to hunt during the afternoon in an area about 10 miles from where they had encountered the wolves. Bailey shot one grouse. The boys seemed to find the wolf encounter fascinating, he said.
They thought it was the coolest experience in the north woods,” he said. “They were seeing all kinds of wolves all day long.”
The encounter has made Bailey rethink hunting grouse with Henry.
It makes me not want to bring my dog in the woods anymore,” he said. “It makes you think twice.”
IMHO, a person that has now given some serious thought (from firsthand experience) to what wilderness areas are all about, predators, etc. need to be recognized, so few are not…..
You would hope so, but I’m skeptical. I wonder what wasn’t said and published. I’m not naïve enough to think anyone could have a magical conversion. What’s been done for decades, even centuries, especially that we’re hovering on the brink of it again, to wolves has sunk in enough for me, thank you very much.
I can’t imagine a 3-year old would be that aware of a wolf, especially when by the account ‘everything happened so fast’. Maybe the 5-year old would be. Thinking twice about taking a dog out, and hopefully thinking twice about taking toddlers out too. The ka-blams! might be a little too loud for their little ears?
It would not be very cool for the wolves to have to be destroyed because of the idea of the dog being killed, or the man of his children injured.
I don’t know what ‘makes him rethink’ hunting really means. Is it just another disguised argument to have a culling done so that it is safe for hunters and their family bonding and to be able to go out into the woods and not be encumbered? Calls for safety are already being written about in the media, after the treed FS employee. Ridiculous hope just allows more wildlife to be killed.
I was reading that people today ‘don’t know’ about the government-sponsored elimination programs for wolves and other wildlife, a comment made in response to the book American Wolf.
Again Ida, take a step back?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAaHUg0wSzo
You actually came to mind, while watching this documentary, when someone yelled ” Call the Coast Guard” 🙂
I so appreciate knowing both these species are still managing to hang in there.
Grey whales have made a come back after being endangered from decades of abuse by the whaling industry but killer whales are becoming endangered now, due to the decades of dams (their natural prey are salmon, who need to spawn in rivers, that were dammed decades ago) and over fishing of salmon in the oceans, before they even get to their rivers of origin, to reproduce.
Had to have been a depressing boat ride for those just hoping to see marine wildlife but fact is, nothing escapes “our” attention anymore due to the wonders of technology and its too bad we (humans) aren’t paying more attention to the effects we might now be having, that might be causing changes in behavioral patterns in the wildlife around us?
That’s true. There isn’t much left out there. I think our own bad behavior escapes our attention for the most part because people don’t want to believe or face it.
That’s true. It’s been very upsetting to read about that poor mother Orca and her dead baby, the pod starving and not having had a successful birth in 3 years, while humans are just running rampant with gluttony and reproducing.
Our answer to the salmon damming problem is to kill sea lions who are eating the hatchlings.
Even if that guy in MN had the best of intentions, it won’t take much for those of the old mindset to seize upon it and demand a delisting and a hunt for ‘safety’. I just thought it was very irresponsible on his part, and obviously in all his years on the planet, he hasn’t had to consider anything other than himself.
Even if this man had the best of intentions, it won’t take much for someone of the old mindset to seize upon this and call for hunting, culling, or safety cages at the bus stops.
sorry for the duplicate lines, my screen went blank and I thought I lost what I had typed! 🙂
“I just thought it was very irresponsible on his part, and obviously in all his years on the planet, he hasn’t had to consider anything other than himself”
And I am STILL, really puzzled at what you found “irresponsible” on his part, Ida.
“Bailey said he never thought about shooting at any of the wolves” even with the drama unfolding, right in front of him.
Recognize the situation for what it was, Ida – being in the wrong place, at the wrong time (when it comes to nature)
I didn’t get the impression that Bailey was hysterical or went running to the press after this encounter, other than to maybe give others a heads up about close encounters they might have, in areas wolves might frequent.
You do realize the local press/news titled this a “harrowing encounter”
I didn’t get that impression when I read the article. And got to say also, kudos to Bailey’s dog Henry (a pup really) who had the good sense to bail INTO the truck, before the wolf gave him a sound thrashing 🙂 for intruding on what that wolf, no doubt thought, was his territory.
I didn’t feel the man was hysterical either – just not very aware for a supposed outdoorsperson. But then I suppose most people feel entitled to go out into known wolf areas and wilderness with very young children and a dog, and are surprised if they encounter wildlife? Wolves are not the only danger in this situation, so it was very ill-advised IMO, and hardly a surprise.
It really isn’t wrong place, wrong time in that respect – it was going out into the woods, and people should be aware of these things. Does he not read the news or check with his local DNR or R&W? I think the dog running away would be a natural response, and the dog owner is very lucky nothing happened.
Yes, of course I realize it said ‘harrowing encounter’ – it makes for a good story, which is all the media is after a lot of the time. I just rolled my eyes because these kinds of ‘harrowing’ encounters are avoidable. It’s not like people don’t know there are wolves in MN.
And the media whips up trouble like this for a good story, which is also irresponsible, and many times they are not knowledgeable either.
When people have every advantage and dominate the landscape, I cannot have sympathy if they are out touring their ’empire’ and get a rude awakening. I don’t need to step back either.
https://www.cnn.com/videos/us/2018/08/08/great-white-shark-greg-skomal-intv-newday-vpx.cnn
I bet thhi shark is still laughing
this
and the guy is changing his shorts
Rethinking bugs, birds and forest composition.
http://www.anthropocenemagazine.org/2018/08/the-incredible-value-of-insect-eating-birds/
Father and son (sportsmen) illegally kill black bear sow and cubs. Evidently, it’s all on film.
http://time.com/5361963/police-alaska-bear-cubs-shooting/
Wild life, watch out, especially for motorcycles
https://www.google.com/amp/s/minnesota.cbslocal.com/2018/08/05/motorcyclist-hits-moose/amp/
https://www.google.com/amp/s/bringmethenews.com/.amp/minnesota-news/motorcycle-deer-crashes-piling-up-in-minnesota-wisconsin
I agree, we have a notorious flat straight secluded smooth spot near us that the motorcyclist like to wined up their bike and test out their speedometer… when they do it at dusk I shake my head at their elevated stupidity.
http://www.news8000.com/news/UPDATE-Man-hits-wolf-dies-in-Jackson-Co-motorcycle-accident/112964
http://wivb.com/2016/10/02/man-dies-after-sports-bike-hits-turkey-vulture-in-town-of-evans/
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/2-killed-in-freak-crash-with-bear-1.1061614.
I hope we are done now discussing this. To be perfectly honest, I thought it was one of the dumbest things I have ever read, and I found it difficult to believe that anyone could be that clueless. The children were practically babies, and there was a gun involved as well. Wild animals are wild and unpredictable. It reminds me of the old ‘wolves snatching babies’ myth told in a new way.
People have been responsible for more and more destruction of wildlife and wild lands over the decades and centuries, and I can’t cut them anymore slack. I can’t support the idea of some environmentalists and wildlife advocates who unwittingly contribute to more loss by continually making excuses for people’s behavior and dumb mistakes.
As rork wrote, you need to learn how to use the reply function.
Yeah, we are done discussing this, Ida. But I’d suggest you do a little research into the use of the word “clueless” 🙂
Will leave you with this thought –
“The Universe is under no obligation to make sense to you” Neil Grasse Tyson
and for another viewpoint
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7W33HRc1A6c
but I agree with you Nancy, one should not drink Boons farm in the morning….
Love Carlin!!!
And I’ll raise you one:
https://www.facebook.com/pluggedinwithgreta/videos/406325566553755/?from=watch_www_rhc&video_id=406325566553755&upstream_player_source=rhc&autoplay_expanded=1
Some of us want to encounter wildlife with kids. I was just in a place where you see black bears 3 times a day, and people were roaming the woods *gasp* with kids. I’m grateful I got to go to the Nipegon country, boundary waters, and yellowstone/glacier since I could walk. Most kids today are impoverished by comparison.
https://newrepublic.com/article/150637/trump-godsend-trophy-hunters
Interesting new data on these wolves
https://www.hcn.org/articles/wolves-mixed-ancestry-wolves-are-recolonizing-the-pacific-northwest
Well I can tell you I am not satisfied. I’d like to see wolves back in the Northeast on the border of Canada, the Northeast Kingdom of VT, and Maine, so there’s still lots of good habitat and the job isn’t done yet, IMO. The barest minimum of recovery (look at the before and after maps) really ain’t that great, IMO. I don’t think it is fair for the minority of those who have financial interests in not having them to deprive the rest of us.
^^and the Adirondacks, I should add.
Folks need to make up their minds in regard to woodland caribou. Either you try to save them, or not. Culling wolves does absolutely nothing other than kill wolves, as more move into vacated territories, ultimately resulting in absolutely no benefit for the long term existence of the woodland caribou. If, destruction of old growth forests continues, as well as seismic testing lines, snowmobile paths, etc, the woodland caribou is good as gone.
https://www.news1130.com/2018/08/11/clear-cut-logging-discovered-within-area-deemed-critical-threatened-caribou/
Wow. What can you say about something like this? Very disappointing.
If it’s like wild salmon, we can have “mitigation”. We’d raise a bunch in high fence enclosures and release some on occasion. Those trees are worth money, and we’d still have some caribou to see. /s
I don’t see this posted yet. Surprised it isn’t.
Bad news. Four wolf pups found dead.
“The Jackson Hole News&Guide received a tip that the dead wolf pups were found near the Mill Iron Ranch, which is at the end of Horse Creek Road, and that they possibly died of parvovirus, a contagious disease found in dogs.”
All four pups dies from parvovirus right at the same time? I’m calling bullshit.
And apparently, anything wolf has a gag order in Wyoming.
https://www.jhnewsandguide.com/jackson_hole_daily/local/article_cfd5aa36-f37c-580e-8c8a-993e39d6701a.html
No comment either. You’d think they would want to proclaim their innocence. I wonder what the lab reports will come up with.
I really wish they would deduct these deaths from the hunting quotas, or from the rancher restitution funds.
I wanted to say that you had posted an interesting article, Yvette, about the Pacific Northwest seaside wolves.
That was super cool, wasn’t it?
Ralph or someone, would you please remove my last name on this post? Thanks
https://www.idahostatesman.com/news/local/environment/article216276755.html
And a gag order? And the amount of wolves killed legally can only be reported ‘in aggregate’. I hope it all goes into consideration for the hunting quotas.
I do hope that someone keeps on top of this and keeps us informed so that the public knows whether or not they were shot, had parvo, or were poisoned. The public has a right to know what happens on the public lands and to our valued wildlife.
Togo wolf pack in NE Washington, now in cross-hairs for multiple attacks on cattle in Ferry County. Three of six events in the last 30 days.
“[E]vidence shows non-lethal measures have not been successful.
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/environment/washington-state-approves-killing-of-wolves-that-preyed-on-cattle-in-ferry-county/
Here’s a much more thorough article. We know that Idaho has a lot more experience in these things than WA:
http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2018/aug/20/following-cattle-depredations-wdfw-orders-lethal-r/
“The pack is estimated to include two adult wolves and unknown number of pups, according to the release. Lethal removal efforts are scheduled to start 8 business hours following the authorization of lethal removal.”
A pack that is only two wolves and an unknown number of pups, I’m not sure that ‘incremental removal’ doesn’t mean the entire pack in this case?
But ever optimistic, officials and bar-stool experts guesstimate and assure us that ‘more are out there’. I just hope they don’t call in the Gatling guns again, because not only is it the most appalling image, but extremely expensive for the taxpayers, year after year, $10,000 a whack.
Uh, oh … this just in:
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/environment/washington-state-approves-killing-of-wolves-that-preyed-on-cattle-in-ferry-county/
This will be a test of the WA wolf management plan – and its contemplated administrative processes – possibly predicated on careless writing, now becoming the subject of litigation. I doubt the Commission would have approved the plan if interpreted the way plaintiffs now want in court. The Commission thought it would give the Division administrative discretion to diffuse tensions with livestock owners. So, now a coastal Superior Court judge may say otherwise.
More facts here:
https://wdfw.wa.gov/conservation/gray_wolf/updates.php
The legal complaint here, with an experienced heavy duty commercial litigator from Lane Powell (a big name Seattle/Regional firm).
https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/campaigns/wolves_on_the_west_coast/pdfs/003-2018-08-20-Petition-and-Ex–A.pdf
Who would have thought differently?
https://www.idahostatesman.com/latest-news/article217151810.html
I can’t believe it. I’m no expert, but doesn’t anything that is especially dangerous to the public fall under strict liability and held to a higher standard?
http://www.tpr.org/post/texas-deer-industry-bring-concerns-over-chronic-wasting-disease-legislature
That’s NPR from texas covering a deer “industry” convention.
A guy complains that he can’t move deer if other deer on the ranch have CWD. In Michigan, we’d kill every deer on the property.
Only excuse Rork, is it’s Texas. I think the canned hunting is big in TX and most Texans want zero regulations on anything.
I agree. Deer husbandry generates so much money there that it influences management decisions. I’ve had battles on other blogs about this. I want to drive a wedge between normal hunters and the industry. Some have opined that private management of enclosed deer is efficient, and so should be our future. That includes a former deer czar in WI, owner of a Texas deer ranch, and spokesman for that industry.
We have CWD in Ohio precisely because they are moving these deer. Grrr…
https://www.ktvb.com/article/news/crime/oregon-man-gets-jail-time-for-harassing-yellowstone-bison/277-586975389
Wisconsin trapper charged with illegal wolf kill.
http://www.wqow.com/story/38958095/2018/08/Friday/western-wisconsin-man-charged-with-killing-a-wolf
The DNR told News 18 that trappers are required to release animals they are not licensed to take, or contact the DNR for assistance releasing the animal.
In my opinion, you cannot take away protections for an animal as long as people behave like this. Certain animals are more susceptible to this kind of treatment than others.
“U.S. District Court Judge Dana Christensen has warned the attorneys he might rule from the bench after he finishes questioning them about removing Endangered Species Act protections from grizzlies in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.”
https://missoulian.com/news/local/as-hunting-season-looms-case-on-grizzly-protections-could-see/article_ced4ffa5-a3b2-5473-be53-e7373a4cd48c.html
Got to love The Onion and how it captures the “moment” in politics these days:
https://politics.theonion.com/white-house-flag-now-moving-minute-to-minute-to-indicat-1828656803
Let’s hear it for the opossum.
https://blog.nwf.org/2017/06/opossums-unsung-heroes-in-the-fight-against-ticks-and-lyme-disease/?s_email_id=20180825_MEM_ENG_WLO_Aug_Edition%7CSLPMem
I didn’t know they ate rats and mice.
I didn’t realize opossum would attack dogs or their leashed humans. Ran into one in of all places the play field around Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle. We escaped without contact. They are not very fast.
At first I thought it might have rabies. After the incident, I read up on them, and it looks like they do not get it easily. So much for the roll over and play dead routine. And, they do have very nasty teeth.
Had one dog with a propensity for finding possums. Only once did a possum not play possum. It go shook up pretty bad for its efforts, but did amble on afterwords, perhaps wiser for having not played dead.
Id rather have the chickens do it….. and keep the vermin at bay.
https://www.wideopenpets.com/tick-control-with-chickens-how-effective-is-your-fowl-flock-patrol/
Guinea hens, they say, are better at the tick thing than chickens.
Here’s a map of the grizzly bear’s range from Wikipedia, both historic and present. I wouldn’t blame anyone if they need a magnifying glass to see the extent of recovery in Idaho and Wyoming, around the National Parks:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grizzly_bear#/media/File:Ursus_arctos_horribilis_map.svg
Hunting any wildlife around the National Parks should be out of the question.
Damn:
https://www.ktvb.com/article/news/local/regional/judge-wont-rule-immediately-on-grizzly-hunts/277-589071358
https://www.greatfallstribune.com/story/news/2018/07/03/montana-grizzly-cubs-may-end-up-canadian-zoo-quebec-canada/756874002/
“FWP then sought a permanent home for the cubs. Unlike black bear cubs, the department does not rehabilitate and release grizzly bear cubs back into the wild”
The question is, why not?
Do they care more about these plans?
https://myfwp.mt.gov/fwpPub/planahunt
Which seem to be in direct conflict with what the department of FWP is trying to promote in this well done video. How many species can you spot in this video, that are now targets (or future targets) for some in the community?
He could still order that the hunt be stopped until a decision on relisting is made.
I honestly don’t know how another hunt could be scheduled for next year either. Is this a one-time thing?
Some news reports, in their creativity, are framing it as ‘fewer than 2 dozen bears will be killed’. But that is a lot for the population, according to experts.
And of course, others are printing ‘as many as 22 bears can be killed’, which is more accurate. And probably more.
Grizzly hunt blocked while judge decides:
https://www.sfchronicle.com/news/science/article/The-Latest-Judge-won-t-rule-immediately-on-13194067.php
I don’t know. It seems like they don’t have a more progressive view of wildlife. At least they won’t get their mitts on more orphaned cubs this year, I hope anyway.
Something to hide perhaps.
https://www.ktvb.com/article/news/local/idaho/us-rejects-request-for-information-on-idaho-wolf-attacks/277-589676376
I was reading that if the judge restores protections to the grizzlies as ‘threatened’, the states would like to keep their ‘management’ in state hands:
“Wyoming Gov. Matt Mead was willing to “make adjustments” to the hunting season, Petersen said, if the judge leaves Wyoming, Montana and Idaho in charge of managing the bears — even if he rules that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service needs to revise its rule declassifying grizzlies as threatened.”
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-grizzly-bear-hunts-20180830-story.html
It’s a crazy headline too, because it would have been the first option right from the beginning, to block the hunt.
Good management and concern for the species first should not include a hunt, especially a trophy hunt, the after barely the first year of recovery.
Someday hunting may or may not resume, but if I had a wish list, the bargain should be that in addition to returning the bears to Threatened status, I’d ask that no hunting of any kind be allowed at or around, near or close to National Parks. If the states would like to keep managing. Hunting has devastated the wolf population of Denali, which one would think is nearly impossible. Hovering around the national park boundaries is not hunting.
I don’t believe wildlife belongs to anyone, but as it stands, Wyoming and its hunting community have no greater claim than anyone else in the country to the management of wildlife. We all have the right and want to be involved.
oops, forgot the link to the response by Wyoming officials:
https://ktvq.com/news/montana-news/2018/08/31/wyoming-officials-blast-delay-of-grizzly-bear-hunt/
I often wonder and challenge Wildlife officials in any state to explain why, in there world, a wildlife “success” event is not a success unless we then get to kill some of the said animals especially if it is not for food but just so someone can kill something. Never understood that.
I often wonder and challenge animal lovers in any state to explain why, in there world, a wildlife “success” event is only a success if the animal can become a burden on the local rancher, pet owners and tax payers that have to clean up after them. Especially, for predators that have always been thinned around people(for around 12000 years here in North America). Never understood that.
Ranchers usually lack tolerance for any wild animal, not just predatory ones. If it is allowed, they will poison, trap or shoot coyotes, and then when the number of rodents expands as the result of no predation on them, the ranchers want to poison the rodents.
This is true of man’s domain everywhere…and for good reason! Ralph, do you swat the mosquito that flew into your tent on a camping trip…. how about the cricket that’s chirping somewhere just inside your back door…. or the rabbit that dug under the fence in your garden…. what about the robin that choose to nest above the light on the back porch…. or the bugs splattering on your windshield.
People everywhere are making choices ….do I swat the mosquitoes, burn the tick, shoot the rabbit, knock the nest down a third time… these are their choices not yours.
The argument of some of those on the wolf loving side is that coyote depredation on livestock way outnumbers the wolf!
If there were only a way to have the wolf lovers take responsibility for the damage predators do and pay for the added burden to the rancher we could have as many as a man-less mother nature could abnormally dish out! BUT, I would still feel for the other wildlife that would have to live in that unnatural misery!
How many bugs have we all killed, yet they keep on coming. Large mammals, on the other hand, need protection from us if they are to survive. Otherwise we’ll have a world of rats and cockroaches. By the way, they have a program to reimburse ranchers for proven wolf kills.
Hiker, The wolf is one of the most prolific and versatile animals on the planet aside from homo-sapiens, I can’t think of a creature more adaptable! Less than a century ago our forefathers tried their hardest to kill them all…. and couldn’t do it! Need our protection? Laughable! Another “laughable” statement is the “reimbursement” of proven wolf kills. Dr Mech puts it at around only one in seven true depredations are ever “proven”. You need to have your pay docked so that your only getting paid for one in seven of the hours you work, just so you get a handle on what that means!
I think many wolf lovers would gladly accept a little more responsibility, but that isn’t allowed either – because the reality is that ranchers and other do not want predators around at any cost.
I never kill anything if I can help it. All life IMO has the ‘spark of divinity’. I leave nests alone and am thrilled to see them. I love to hear crickets. Rabbits in the garden, deer, and woodchucks are welcome. I even put bugs outside when I can.
Why should the taxpayer be burdened with ranchers and their millions in subsidies and the huge cost of public lands grazing?
Do you really believe that the value of a BML lease to ranchers are same no matter the location?! I’m sorry timz, but a short term three or four week rotation of a limited number of livestock pairs by a local rancher into a local short term lease with limited watering does not have the value it does to all ranchers some here would suggest it does. It just don’t! Also, anyone that suggests that their are no ecological benefits of this monitored grazing (similar to a herd of migrating bison) have you hoodwinked.
despite all your blather the fact remains “In 2014, $143.6 million was directly appropriated to the grazing program (an amount that’s been consistent over the last 10 years). Some quick math reveals that, on average, public lands ranchers paid just $376 for what cost taxpayers $6,838 last year.”
“Also, anyone that suggests that their are no ecological benefits of this monitored grazing (similar to a herd of migrating bison) have you hoodwinked.”
I suspect some would argue that the question is not whether public lands should be grazed by animals, but rather, whether the grazing should be done by livestock (and the benefits concentrated in producers), or whether the grazing should be done by native wildlife (and benefits distributed throughout society)?
JB, “I suspect some would argue that the question is not whether public lands should be grazed by animals, but rather, whether the grazing should be done by livestock (and the benefits concentrated in producers), or whether the grazing should be done by native wildlife (and benefits distributed throughout society)?”
I see, from my lenses a great number of local people recognize the localized importance of these leases to the ranchers and local school districts and benefits to local economies. I suspect, that very fact is the driving force behind why some that have hate in their hearts for the rancher push so hard to upset the cart. These benefits as they play out all over the west foster social benefits throughout all of society! What a win for us all!
I’m surprised JB, that you didn’t touch the “ecological benefit” of monitored seasonal limited grazing! I saw firsthand how these grazing permits benefit wildlife back in 2012 while bow hunting elk/deer in MT near Sugarloaf Mountain. Elk/deer were flocking to a plush regenerated non-flammable meadow/plateau that was mowed down by cattle weeks/months earlier. I’m not sure how “native wildlife” creates this benefit to other native wildlife without MAN providing watering needs and herdsmanship.
“…from my lenses a great number of local people recognize the localized importance of these leases to the ranchers and local school districts and benefits to local economies.”
The standard by which to judge an activity’s impact on the economy is not ‘how much gross income does it generate?’, but rather, ‘how much NET income does it generate relative to other possible activities?’. Personally, I would argue that even this latter standard is less than ideal. If you really want to measure whether something is socially beneficial, I would look at its affect on human well-being.
“I suspect, that very fact is the driving force behind why some that have hate in their hearts for the rancher push so hard to upset the cart. These benefits as they play out all over the west foster social benefits throughout all of society! What a win for us all!”
I don’t see much evidence of ‘hatred in hearts’ for ranchers; rather, I see people questioning whether public lands could be put to a better use — one that generates greater benefits for society. The fact that those individuals answer the question affirmatively leads them to have animosity toward the activity (ranching).
“I’m surprised JB, that you didn’t touch the “ecological benefit” of monitored seasonal limited grazing! I saw firsthand how these grazing permits benefit wildlife back in 2012 while bow hunting elk/deer in MT near Sugarloaf Mountain. Elk/deer were flocking to a plush regenerated non-flammable meadow/plateau that was mowed down by cattle weeks/months earlier. I’m not sure how “native wildlife” creates this benefit to other native wildlife without MAN providing watering needs and herdsmanship.”
Interesting… what you describe is a benefit to YOURSELF (in the form of increased usage of an area by deer and elk), which presumably you were hunting. I didn’t touch ‘ecological benefit’ because the concept is as slippery as they come. But, seeing how you brought it up, if we were to fill the room full of ecologists, most would argue that an ecological benefit is one that increases either biological diversity or resiliency. Grazing on the whole does neither.
JB, I’ll leave this thread and exchange stand as is with only one more comment. WHY in god’s green earth is elk and deer flocking to a fresh green fire-resistant pasture only a benefit for me? Isn’t it a benefit to the very wildlife you claim to be a champion for and others that “love” wildlife? You can’t say that the biological benefit from the cattle isn’t similar to what bison do to benefit those elk and deer can you? I’m coming to think that there is no other stance for me to look at your view on livestock other than you have a view of contempt and not a view of “diversity”. Now, on top of that your “yourself” comment added contempt for sportsman and their role as what Natives once played in that diversity.
A symptom that type of contempt would be if someone would complain about the “disgusting the amount of cow shit you had to maneuver around on the trails” that would have to say the same thing about buffalo chips had it been them doing their biological thing…. wouldn’t it?
First, I never said it elk and deer were a benefit ONLY to you; rather I contested your claim that heightened presence of elk and deer is good for the ecology of a place (“ecological benefit”–your words). It is not beneficial–at least, not necessarily. Grazing often negatively impacts biodiversity, which makes a system less resilient (able to recover from perturbation) — these are the standards by which ecologists typically judge ecological health.
Second, I’ve said nothing about sportsmen, so I’m not sure where you see contempt? Rather, I noted that increased use of place by elk and deer is potentially beneficial to sportsmen. I suspect we can agree on at least that much? The issue is that, again, what is good for sportsmen isn’t necessarily good for the ecological health of a place (see paragraph #1, and witness Rork’s writings about the effects of deer). That isn’t contempt, it’s simply fact. I don’t have any more contempt for the sportsmen who takes advantage of high deer and elk densities than I do for the deer and elk who take advantage of a better food source (optimal foraging in both cases) — I just don’t think managing a place for greater ungulate density is necessary a good thing.
Make sense?
Hints:
Principle 1: Maximize utility for clientele.
Principle 2: Minimize harm to sentient life.
Now you both understand. 🙂
not talking about ranchers, or pet owners, and like everyone else I pay taxes and I don’t want my taxes subsidizing public lands ranching so there ya go.
but to the point, if you can stay on it, why should there immediately be a hunting season for the sole reason of just killing something?
@ Mat-ters
@ Jeff E, paying taxes for things we don’t like or believe in sounds like a conservative ideology…. good for you Jeff E! Simply put, there are a ton of things that the Federal Government has absolutely no business sticking their nose into…let alone spending millions on! The real point is that the grizzly should have been delisted years ago. As we have said on this site countless times… hunting removes grizzles from zones where they are more likely to become a burden to pet owners, livestock owners & the taxpayer. It also naturally thins those in areas other wildlife feel the burden of too many predators! Hunting has been part of healthy ecosystems here in North America for thousands of years…..those that clammier that the moose and wolf have “lived together for thousands of years” purposefully ignore the hard fact that humans have also been part of that very equation. Those claiming that unhealthy predator saturated areas non-human affected areas are the “only healthy” typically have an agenda based solely on negativity towards the ranchers and sportsman. It has no roots in conservation, morality or care for all wildlife!
“those that clammier that the moose and wolf have “lived together for thousands of years” purposefully ignore the hard fact that humans have also been part of that very equation”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PUwmA3Q0_OE
And try and be a little more accurate about your grazing schedules Mat-ters. Most allotments in this part of the west (on public lands) can be anywhere from 3-6 months or longer (or in Bundy’s allotment down in NV – 20 + years of free grazing)
Took a hike last week, on public lands, and it was disgusting the amount of cow shit you had to maneuver around on the trails.
so you are not able to stay on point….
ok
JEFF E
Agreed and similar thoughts here. Delist Just to shoot and hang on a wall makes little sense. First wolf season up here many folks were aghast at the depth and breadth of take, when all they want was ability to protect pets if need be done.
Immer, this isn’t a case of defending life or property, or damage to personnel belongings on private property. It is someone purposely traveling to a distance location for no other reason than to kill something. I am referring to the proposed Idaho grizzly proposed kill but other examples come to mind.
JEFF E,
No argument from me. I agree with you.
i know you did. i was just agreeing with your post…?
ahhh yes… Immer gives us more anecdotal evidence to the bogus history of the anishinaabe / chippewa living with dogs and in brotherly harmony with wolves! Thank you Immer!
This is one of many reasons I no longer even attempt discussion with you. I have said absolutely nothing about/in regard to Anishinabe/Chippewa.
My comment was in regard to your propensity for betting/conjecture on the wrong horse.
And as JEFF E has correctly pointed out, you have once again avoided the topic of a comment and applied your own spin. Time is too valuable to waste on you.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PVrEwCa8nSA
Immer, It appears that I’ve put to much on your plate. Please, take a better look at my responses. 1st did respond to your comment on “my” “propensity” by making the point that all those “bets” were protocols the government trapper was to follow… but then again you probably knew that!
THEN, totally aside of that time waster, I made the point that you…. and I quote “when all they want was ability to protect pets if need be done.” made an statement of admission that those living with pet / dogs have issue with wolves, anecdotal evidence of how the Anishinabe would have also viewed the wolf and the inevitability of habituation of their brother!
+1 I think people still have the vestige of hunter in them, even though the world has changed.
I don’t particularly care for hunting, but if people hunt for food that I can tolerate. But trophy hunting for animals that have uncertain futures, no.
I should add that I don’t think people need to be reminded how the “Wolf Stamp” idea went over. Not well. I think it was the hunting community who complained, and the idea was ‘tabled’. Shelved, it looks like. 🙁
Karma?
http://www.foxnews.com/science/2018/08/30/black-bear-hit-by-arrow-mauls-hunter-before-dying-reports-say.html?intcmp=ob_article_footer_text&intcmp=obnetwork
In case folks don’t recall, the natives where I live (the Anishinaabe) oppose wolf hunting. It is encoded in their religion. It would be like killing your brother.
That seems to show it was not a necessity to thin them out for the last 12000 years. European settlers managed to extirpate them though. Necessity is the plea, but the costing out of it is often shallow, and suspect. Our livestock losses to wolves are minuscule, despite wolves being at saturation in upper Michigan. Ecological service benefits are very difficult to estimate in dollars, but I could list several. I really don’t care if you let your dog get killed by wolves or bears. I’m not saying every place in the world is like here though.
Rork, I don’t know the historical context but the Colville Tribe, NE Washington, have come to realize that wolves represent a threat to their current way of life (livestock-sheep, cows, horses/pets), that they instituted a tribal hunting season on wolves a couple years back. The Colville Reservation is just a stone’s throw from wolf-central where all the lethal control has been done by WDFW over the last 3 years, including the recent thumping of a Goto pack member. I’ve not had reason to check on how many wolves the Colville tribe have taken “officially” or by tribal members illegally without disclosure, but I do believe there is not high reverence for wolves as might be the case in other Native American cultures. I also wonder what will happen when wolves in any significant numbers show on the Navajo or Hopi reservations in the Southwest. Their respective cultures center around sheep and goats, highly vulnerable to our canine friends. Navajo County, AZ, which includes the Navajo reservation (and leans pretty strongly R), I think has an ordinance outlawing wolves.
So, broad labeling of reverence for wolves by Native Americans geographically, I suspect, is worthy of considerable critical thought.
Yeah WM, attitudes do have a way of changing over generations, especially when its all about profit these days versus trying to find ways to co-exist with nature. Nature by the way, we humans continue to displace at an alarming rate, around the world.
I wonder I wonder bla bla bla
always eager to moan about few cattle lost to predators but will never ever mention billions of dollars owed by the government
few excerpts from Appendix to the Second paperback Edition of Norman G. Finkelstein’s „The Holocaust Industry: Reflections on the Exploitation of Jewish Suffering” Second edition 2003,
pages 264-273
„In June 1996 the Native American Rights Fund filed the largest class-action lawsuit in US history on behalf of Elouise Pepion Cobell of Montana’s Blackfeet tribe, and 300 000 – 500 000 other Native Americans.
… At issue were Native American monies held in trust by the US government. The genesis of these Individual Indian Money (IIM) trust accounts reached back to the late nineteenth century when, under the General Allotment Act (1887), 140 million acres of communally-owned tribal lands were broken up into private plots. „As the government concedes,” Judge Lamberth stated, „the purpose of the IIM trust was to deprive plaintiffs’ ancestors of their native lands and rid the nation of their tribal identity.” Fully 90 million acres were deemed „surplus” and quickly opened to non-Indian settlement, while another 40 million acres „have never been accounted for.” Revenue from leases for grazing, mining, drilling and lumbering rights on these lands – now reduced to 10 million acres – was supposed to go into the IIM trust accounts. The class-action suit called on the US government to finally audit – „abide by its duty to render an accurate accounting of” – these accounts. Designating their condition a „national disgrace,” a 1992 Congressional report found that IIM accounts „look as though they had been handled with a pitchfork,” and were the „equivalent of a bank that doesn’t know how much money it has.”
… „It would be difficult to find a more historically mismanaged federal program,” Judge Lamberth concluded. „The United States … cannot say how much money is or should be in the trust … It is fiscal and governmental irresponsibility in its purest form.” And again: „The Department of Interior’s administration of the Individual Indian Money trust has served as the gold standard for mismanagement by the federal government for more than a century … The federal government regularly issues payments to beneficiaries – of their own money – in erroneous amounts.”
… Noting that apparently „no sitting Secretary in modern times has been held in contempt of court,” Lamberth charged defendants with „actions that can be characterized as nothing short of contumacious,” a „behind-the-scenes cover-up,” „campaign of stonewalling,” and „shocking pattern of deception,” „numerous illegitimate misrepresentations,” „nothing short of travesty,” „reckless disregard for the orders of this court,” „misconduct that rises above the level of ‘reckless disregard’ ,” „wilfull dereliction … perilously close to criminal contempt of court” and so on. „I have never seen,” he concluded, „more egregious misconduct by the federal government.”
… In a December 1999 report the court-appointed Special Master disclosed the Treasury Department’s renewed destruction of documents „potentially responsive or potentially relevant to the Cobell litigation … at the exact time the Secretary of the Treasury was held in contempt for violation of his discovery obligations,” as well as its failure „to disclose the destruction … notwithstanding myriad opportunities to do so.” „This is a system,” the Special Master concluded,”clearly out of control.”
… Upholding Lamberth’s opinion, the US Court of Appeals subsequently ruled that the Treasury Department’s „destruction of potentially relevant IIM-related trust documents that may have been necessary for a complete accounting is clear evidence that the Department” breached its „fiduciary duty”; and that „given the history of destruction of documents and loss of information necessary to conduct an historical accounting, the failure of the government to act could place anything approaching an adequate accounting beyond plaintiffs’ reach.”
… „In my fifteen years on the bench I have never seen a litigant make such a concerted effort to subvert the truth seeking function of the judicial process. I am immensely disappointed that I see such a litigant today and that the litigant is a Department of the United States government. The Department of Interior is truly an embarrassment to the federal government in general and the executive branch in particular”; „The egregious nature of the Department’s conduct in this is exacerbated by the fact that attorneys in the Solicitor’s Office actively participated”; „It is almost unfathomable that a federal agency would engage in such a pervasive scheme aimed at defrauding the Court and preventing the plaintiffs from learning the truth about the administration of their trust accounts.”
The U.S. government’s handling of the actual audit has proven equally scandalous. With cost estimates ranging from $200 to $400 million, already in the early 1990s both Congress („it makes little sense to spend so much”) and the Department of Interior („a difficult task, perhaps costing over $200 million”) questioned the financial wisdom of auditing the accounts. In 1996 Interior requested only a modest sum for the audit and even this amount was slashed by the federal government. In the September 2002 contempt trial Judge Lamberth found that, despite a court order, for more than a year and a half Interior „had not even taken the preliminary steps” toward conducting the audit.
… Reviewing the entire court record, Judge Lamberth scathingly observed that the Department of Interior „handled this litigation the same way that it has managed the IIM trust – disgracefully”; that „the defendants’ contention that the Court should consider their ‘good-faith’ efforts would be laughable if it were not so sad and cynical”; that „the recalcitrance exhibited by the Department of Interior in complying with the orders of this Court is only surpassed by the incompetence that the agency has shown in administering the IIM trust”; and so on. „I may have life tenure,” he concluded, „but at the rate the Department of Interior is progressing that is not a long enough appointment.” In January 2003, Native American plaintiffs presented Judge Lamberth a „detailed court filing … based on private historical records asserting that the government had cheated them out of as much as $137.2 billion over the last 115 years.”
Some footnotes / references:
United States District Court for the District of Columbia, Elouise Pepion Cobell et al., Plaintiffs, v. Bruce Babbitt, Secretary of the Interior, Lawrence Summers, Secretary of the Treasury, and Kevin Gover, Assistant Secretary of the Interior (Civil Action No. 96-1285) (RCL), Memorandum Opinion: Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law (21 December 1999)
Jeffrey St. Clair, „Stolen Trust” in CounrePunch (5 September 2002)
Joel Brinkley, „American Indians Say Documents Show Government Has Cheated Them Out of Billions,” in New York Times (7 January 2003).
I see you have a case of keyboard relevancy diarrhea again, Mareks. You really should take something for that before you dehydrate.
I think most people do recognize differences in beliefs by different tribes, but many do have cultural ties, including the tribes you mention. So broad labeling, intentionally or not, does no one any good.
For the Colville, the decision to hunt was not unanimous. The official take is three, I believe, and there was an article mentioning lifting the quota, but I have not seen anything else about it it. I can’t speculate about illegal takes without proof, and it doesn’t seem to be as large percentage of those who get caught and that we read about.
I could not find anything about an ordinance ‘outlawing’ wolves in Navajo nation – how could they when they have been extirpated? The wolf is part of their creation myths also. It should be noted that for Native peoples, their ‘way of life’ was taken from them, and they were forced upon reservations with smaller area and less game to hunt.
But I did find something about a NNDFW policy for Mexican wolves on the Navajo lands:
https://www.nndfw.org/Summit%20Presentations%202015/Mexican%20Wolves%20on%20The%20Navajo%20Nation_CSmith.pdf
They are not participating in the program, and ask that dispersers be removed (not killed unless absolutely necessary) but do not seem particularly alarmed either.
No matter what current policies are, there was never a general policy to destroy them entirely, to extinction, like there was by the colonists and their descendants, an attitude that persists to this day. The photographs that exist of mountains of bison bones and wolf pelts tell of a disregard for life.
We do have to admit that there is, or was, a great difference in point of view of the natural world.
It was Apache County, AZ that passed the no wolf release ordinance, so my mistake:
https://www.wmicentral.com/news_premium/apache-county-passes-gray-wolf-ordinance-cites-th-amendment/article_919be0d8-c3ee-11e2-8247-0019bb2963f4.html
I will keep looking as I recalled Navajo County did something similar.
Ah yes, just a quick Google search produced this. And remember this is Navajo County, and the reservation is WITHIN the County: http://www.timberwolfinformation.org/az-county-site-considered-for-gray-wolf-reintroduction/
Cleary there is no desire for wolves as reflected in a duly elected government – the board of Commissioners.
“The update follows the county’s years-long battle to ban the wolves’ release locally, with the five eastern counties of Arizona expending much effort to restrict the wolves from the federal government’s endangered species listings as a matter of public safety.
In May 2008, the Board of Supervisors passed the Navajo County Predatory Animal Ordinance, which prohibited the release of wolves in the county, and specified criminal penalties and fines up to $300 and $1,000 for individual and enterprise violations, respectively.”
That complicates things a bit. Is it Navajo county who passed the ordinance, or the Navajo nation also? Who prevails in that case?
Yvette, if I understand the presentation you cite above, USFWS will remove any wolf north or south of I-40 on or near the reservation at Navajo Tribal request. So, seems to me there is a safety valve there, which no doubt came about as a result of concerns of potential impact to tribal interests. And, I bet a tribal member -regardless of tribe- would consider thumping a wolf if it interfered with a significant economic interest that they believe was threatened – ANYWHERE on any reservation or protected off-reservation hunting or grazing right. That certainly has to piss off the folks at CBD, headquartered in AZ.
WM, The Colville Tribe is one of your favorite to reference. My sister and brother in law lived on that rez for a couple of years and did not care for the way they ran their tribe. Did not like working for them. But you are right, they are pretty anti-wolf. I do know that one tribal member who worked for BIA and had who oversight on agriculture and ag management plans was closely tied to big ag industry. I also remember reading after the Colville’s implemented their first wolf season that a tribal member brought in a dog. He hunted and killed a dog thinking he had a wolf.
Comparing the Colvilles to the GL tribes is more like comparing the French to the Russians. One is neither better than the other but they are culturally different. As Rork stated, the wolf is in the Anishinaabe’s creation story. Ma’iigan (wolf) was their true brother in creation. Then they separated and went on different paths but remained brothers. You should go out there and visit with them because that reverence and their religion should really only be disseminated by them.
I suspect the Yakama’s won’t be to welcoming of wolves, either, but I have not seen anything one way or the other. They do raise quite a few cows on the reservation, the largest in WA. Their big issue would be the impact on elk on reservation or off reservation historic hunting grounds, preserved by treaty In that respect they are probably as pissed as non-Indian hunters.
Footnote: The large elk herd on the Yakama Reservation is considered an essential tribal subsistence resource. If and when wolves arrive, it will be interesting to see how the Yakama’s respond. Though asked to participate on the WA wolf management planning group, if I remember correctly, they were pretty silent.
LOL, I started to say the Colville’s and the Yakama’s are your favorite tribes to reference but went back and deleted before I posted.
Yes, not all tribes are the same. Not all Natives revere wolves, nature and the wild.
Yvette, I would tell you about a joke Vine DeLoria a Standing Rock Sioux told at a legal lecture years ago about another Northern Plains tribe, and its customs, but it would necessitate a lengthy description. On the other hand, first day of my Indian Law class taught by Charles Wilkinson, he told a kind of a sick joke about a Sioux gourmet meal being a six pack of beer and a puppy. Irreverent, indeed, by a white professor. But, in the coming months and years I learned why he told the pithy joke. He is among the greatest legal champions Native Americans have ever had (along with a bunch of other folks-David Getches, Richard Collins, John Echohawk- who were involved in starting and making the Native American Rights Foundation a loud voice in Indian Country).
WM, sounds like a good class. Recently, I’ve kind of regretted not having interest in pursuing a law degree when I was younger. Once I started reading legal papers for various research, I found environmental law, and environmental justice interesting. All I know is lawyers write long papers.
Just for reference in AZ. The Apache reservation (W/in the Lobo recovery zone) is broken into two segments divided by the Black River. North of the river is considered White Mountain Apache, who have been accommodating to wolf recovery on their land pretty much from the start. South of the river is considered San Carlos Apache. They have more of an issue with wolves on their land due to more livestock grazing and the management of their elk herd allowing for trophy hunting opportunities. Originally they did not want any wolves on their part of the reservation, however I believe that have become somewhat more accommodating over the years, though reluctantly.
The Anishinaabe / Ojibwe have passed on traditions and “beliefs” generation to generation without the written word… one would think that history in such cases tends to be rewritten in some form as the new generation puts on their spin. The written word and writings of the past 3000 years tend to make these subtle and catastrophic changes less likely. Not the case with the Anishinaabe. If memory serves me right, there (current) “language” was only put into writing about 40 years ago! I suspect, (with knowledge of general animal behavior 101) that some tribes /generations experience disaster with wolves for their only domestic animal was the dog. Dogs and wolves do not mix! (for sure for the Chippewa – a sub clan of the Anishinaabe). For that reason, I would most certainly bet the farm that their current beliefs on wolves has a different history…
Those here can not rewrite history … take a look at what happened during the great WW’s in northern Russia… here is a glimpse of what happens! Those on the side of the wolf can not outrun the inevitability of habituation including the Anishinaabe!
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/15/sports/ukraine-war-hunting.html
“For that reason, I would most certainly bet the farm that their current beliefs on wolves has a different history…
Those on the side of the wolf can not outrun the inevitability of habituation including the Anishinaabe!”
…….and the Catholic’s beliefs on the virgin Mary who gave birth to Jesus will be doubted as empirical evidence continues to show Christianity and other religions to be highly improbable.
improbable ….. the fact still remains that the bible, 2700 year old, is still as relevant today as day one. The timeline consistency of the message is unparalleled. The interpretation of King James version of the bible is still scrutinized today & only a testament to that consistency. In contrast, recordings of the Anishinaabe language prior to their documentation do not have the consistency to their documented / written word….look it up. I suspect the same of their verbal history.
Hey Mat-ters, Whitesplain that to me again.
+
No Problem Yvette, From my understanding Judaism, Christianity & Islam all originate from and acknowledge the history of a man called Jesus. Judaism and Islam both acknowledge him as a good man but differ in his role in monotheism. His message is clear and that clarity has been consistent for 1000’s of years…it’s a good message and for the most part has brought peace, civility and tranquility where it has been truly applied. I personally have found nothing better than the long lasting un-revised message of Jesus.
On the other hand, it is my understanding that the beliefs, language, and verbal history of the Anishinaabe have relied on the mouth to mouth interpretations for the last 1000’s of years. Maybe you can do some indiansplaining to give me a better understanding the following: How is the reliability and consistency of Anishinaabe history and beliefs kept intact? Do you think beliefs such as the wolf being equal and a brother changed when and during times where predators became habituated? Is it your belief that predators such has the wolf only become habituated to those other than the Anishinaabe?? Did the Anishinaabe live with dogs as pets?
Immer, your “+” of Yvette’s “whitesplaining” comment is interesting for neither of you know the color of my skin…. racism is a fickle foe …. and unchristian!
“Racism is a fickle foe…and unchristian.” Cough.
“For that reason, I would most certainly bet the farm that their current beliefs on wolves has a different history…”
Just like your willingness to bet that a boy and his dog were trespassing
“I’m willing to bet that this boy and his dog were trespassing. The article includes statements from the father and a balance article should have included a statement on this. I’m willing to bet that neighbors of this private property were notified of the devices via direct conversation AND OR signs posted. I’m willing to bet that the rancher has had AND is having serious issues with coyotes.”
With you, all bets are off.
What, and you didn’t take the bets??? The use of those products have protocol consistent with those bets …..don’t they Immer! I’m wondering if the boozo public servant that put them out “illegally” was fired?
https://nbcmontana.com/news/local/us-approves-sheep-grazing-research-in-grizzly-bear-area-09-06-2018
4 years ago:
“The US Sheep Experiment Station has long outlived its usefulness to the American taxpayers and continues to be the cause of conflict with many imperiled species from grizzly bears to grayling to bighorn sheep. These many conflicts, and the attempts by the Sheep Experiment Station to cover them up, leads me to believe the Station should be shuttered and its lands incorporated into the Red Rock Lakes National Wildlife Refuge to be repurposed to conserve wildlife.” Ken Cole NEPA Coordinator -‐ Western Watersheds Project
http://www.thewildlifenews.com/2014/02/03/conservationists-settle-lawsuit-against-experimental-sheep-station-after-grizzly-goes-missing/
https://www.npr.org/2018/09/06/645186055/migration-101-it-doesnt-come-naturally-for-moose-and-sheep
“disgusting the amount of cow shit you had to maneuver around on the trails” that would have to say the same thing about buffalo chips had it been them doing their biological thing…. wouldn’t it?
It would appear, as usual, that you are clueless, Mat-ters, to a lot of the terrain out here in the west.
The area I hiked was a long ravine, lush in browse (ideal for elk, deer, moose) but lacking in grasses. (Not a area herds of buffalo would of been found in due to the lack of grass)
Unfortunately too many of these areas are part of grazing allotments and are subjected to cattle, in search of grass.
Cow shit aside, the destruction is obvious, even to the untrained eye.
Nancy, I call BULL! My ties to and visits to MT / WY are extensive! One area that I know like the back of my hand is Slough Creek this drainage runs south from MT to Yellowstone. To the east of that drainage is the head of the Stillwater river which runs somewhat north (opposite Slough Creek)near Cooke city which runs around 22 miles (as the crow flies) to Nye MT. I know and understand this area its history and is wildlife and the well being of that wildlife. ONE being the increase in the number of bison in the slough creek drainage. To say that bison don’t defecate on the trails and eat their way in and out from a place called French’s Meadow to the Transfer in Yellowstone and the somewhat narrowing passes is preposterous! I encourage those interested in getting to know this area and can’t handle “roughing it” to book a stay at a dude ranch just out of the park called Silvertip Ranch which is on the south end of Frenches Meadow.
Bison also defecate in the creek and erode their banks just as the cattle do all along that trail! A new hunting unit have been set up for the increase of bison in the Slough Creek drainage to mimic the natural take of Natives and keep bison from eating themselves out of house and home as the no doubt do in parts of the park. I feel Nancy this is just another example of how your views are guided by contempt for others in two certain groups and not what is truly good for wildlife and people.
I KNOW that you’re the “clueless” one to argue that I know nothing of the terrain of the west….laughable!
Perhaps in your “infinite wisdom” of the west Mat-ters, you are confusing what landlocked, managed, native bison now look like, compared to migratory bison of the old days?
https://www.westernwatersheds.org/gw-cattle-v-bison/
Or perhaps the folks just coming to enjoy the area, hoping to catch a glimpse of a whole host of wildlife including wolves, bears, etc. tangled with your time there – getting in, shooting something and getting out. Caring little about how complex the ecosystem is, now that its being managed by humans….
https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g60999-d145498-Reviews-Slough_Creek-Yellowstone_National_Park_Wyoming.html
“. . . confusing what landlocked, managed, native bison now look like, compared to migratory bison of the old days?”
+1
Come on Ida…. Bison have been roaming the Lamar Valley and its fingers for ……FOREVER! Don’t follow Nancy down the path of such an embarrassing / contemptful post! There is no landlocking here! I suspect that maybe a few hundred bison could spend seven to eight month a year coming and going from this remote place “French’s Meadow” before being force to lower non-landlocked elevations making hardly a dent in the plentiful vegetation!
The Meadow is named after an old French homesteader that became grizzly bear food. An old horse drawn metal hay rake and some other remnants remain on the north west corner of the meadow. The old home layout / chimney stones can be seen if you know where to look just to the NE of the equipment remnants.
“Caring little about how complex the ecosystem is, now that its being managed by humans…” Her contemptful conjecture as to my “Caring” has no basis in what is good for all wildlife…. Those promoting ecosystems based on unprecedented predator protection certainly have no upper hand in the care department / diversity or animal kindness.
“unprecedented predator protection” ??????
Talk about contemptuous!
Nancy, your comment got me thinking, why is staring the truth in the eye so contemptuous for you?
I’d be surprised if those the likes of Jeremy B are foolish enough to say ANYTHING other than “unprecedented predator protection” in certain places is a reality of the true history of life here in North America. I would have heightened disrespect for any wildlife professional that had the historic realities of anthropological effects of a place like Yellowstone other than looking at today as “unprecedented” …..and that is on both the predators and prey side. The overabundance of prey in Yellowstone and damage done was a direct result of ignoring that historic anthropologic reality – that any time there was an overabundance of prey MAN would have quickly moved in to remedy the situation. Your way of thinking is more responsible for the “damage” in Yellowstone than any sportsman. That’s just reality, fact and looking at history in a logical moral manner. NO contempt here, just history you can’t run from!
+ 1
https://amp.theguardian.com/environment/2018/sep/08/scientists-get-ready-to-begin-great-pacific-garbage-patch-cleanup
https://youtu.be/KwIS7hOSz3U
A video that seems to captures the situation on this planet, in real time. Do what you will with it 🙂 but I’d suggest passing it on…….
Bad press for the WDFW:
https://www.seattletimes.com/opinion/washingtons-wrong-way-approach-to-managing-wolves/
When are the folks in “bear country” going to wake up to the fact that bears will look for readily available, unprotected, food sources?
https://nbcmontana.com/news/local/grizzly-bear-captured-killed-after-getting-into-turkey-feed
I’m not optimistic that they ever will. 🙁
But the numbers of ‘euthanized’ grizzlies just keeps piling up.
Both tribes that you mention WM have historical ties to wolves. As far as today, I think things have changed.
A spokesperson for the Colville has said that it was a difficult decision to come to because of their historical ties to the wolf.
Searching the internet, found something to ponder:
“In Navajo, another word for “wolf” is “mai-coh,” meaning witch. The Navajo fear of wolves derives not from the nature of the animal but rather from the potential for monstrous behavior from humans. Both the Navajo and the Hopi believe that human witches use or possibly abuse the wolf’s powers to influence other people. While Europeans warned of a wolf in sheep’s clothing, some Native American tribal beliefs cautioned against a human in wolf’s clothing. Literally, the Navajo wolf, or witch, can also be referred to as a skinwalker. Not all Navajo witches are skinwalkers, but all skinwalkers are witches.”
or I should say, cultural and historical ties.
Good to see you posting, Mareks!
WDFW is again going after wolves with a preference for cattle, finding that non-lethal efforts were not working. Offenders are a newly formed pack in the same range as the Profanity pack that was (mostly) eliminated in 2016. https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/washington-state-to-kill-more-wolves-in-ferry-county/?utm_source=marketingcloud&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Morning+Brief+9-13-18_9_13_2018&utm_term=
And, remember this is arguably all being done under the duly adopted wolf management plan, though CBD and other conservation groups are claiming to challenge the ambiguity in the plan – even in light of what I recall the then sitting WA Fish and Wildlife Commission declaring in its plan deliberation a need for flexibility. So, even if they win a recently filed suit and requested injunctions, the next WDFW step will at some point be to amend the plan so it is crystal clear that lethal control will be an integral part of the plan for reintroduction going forward, delegating to the staff the decision authority to micro-manage wolves. At least, that is my uninformed opinion.
WM, I understand the frustrated tone of your post. Once again, a blind man can see the crystal clear waste of tax dollars to “save” wolves. Do you feel this is more about wearing wolves on their sleeve as a fundraiser OR is it a true effort to “save” wolves? Either way, it weakens Endangered Species Laws!
“The wolf pack WDFW plans to target has tried to prey on cattle six times this month on federal grazing lands, killing one calf and injuring five others, according to WDFW.”
This is the exact same thing that they claimed the Togo pack had done, six cattle, and I thought the problem had been addressed when they killed the male wolf last week or the week before?
Now, is this an additional six cattle, a different ranch, six other cattle? Are there 12 cattle that have been attacked? It’s confusing.
https://www.sfgate.com/news/science/article/Judge-to-decide-on-grizzly-bear-hunts-in-Idaho-13225793.php
“In extending the delay, the judge said there remained “serious questions” regarding whether the government acted lawfully in lifting protections on an estimated 700 bears in the three-state Yellowstone region. He gave no further indication of his position in the case.”
I really do hope that F&W and the Interior Dept. isn’t acting in a retaliatory fashion with wolves because of this. It would seem to me they should have handled the problem rancher all at once?
Good reading from Louisa Wilcox:
https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/09/13/the-grizzlys-day-in-court/
The transfer of mountain goats from the Olympics to the Cascades has begun:
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/environment/mountain-goat-relocation-begins-in-olympic-national-park/
Good news!
Looks like a lottery one would rally care about winning if a mountain goat.
Absolutely. I had read that they would have been hunted, or just killed. This way, at least a majority will have a new home.
I will be in Olympic NP this coming week, back roughly 20 miles into the high country for 7 days. For my friends here who believe helicopters ARE NOT used in designated Wilderness, here is a prime example where, indeed, they are using helicopters. Over 95 percent of ONP is designated Wilderness. https://www.nps.gov/olym/planyourvisit/wilderness.htm
These goats are in the high peaks in the heart of Wilderness.
The National Park Service also uses helicopters in ONP and elsewhere to haul out shit bins and ranger tent platforms in the same manner this time of year, after the heavy summer use period is over. They just don’t put skids on the ground typically, or if they do it, I think it is on an artificial surface, like a 2×8 board.
So, answer me this, if helicopters can and are used legally for general “management” in a national park, as they have been for decades here and elsewhere, why can’t they be legally used for wolf removal in designated Wilderness in a National Recreation Area, under administration by USDA Forest Service (which typically has more lenient rules than the Park Service? This is not a trick question.
The National Park Service is very concerned that the goat removal (non-native introduced species) goes well, without mortality from netting and darting. They had a PR fiasco a number of years back when the mortality of goats being removed was very high. And, of course, folks like to see goats there because they are really cool animals.
These goats, by the way, relocated to the Cascades may be subject to hunting eventually. There is a limited draw lottery for goats in a number of areas, if they are not in the North Cascades National Park, but in designated Wilderness and elsewhere in the Cascades.
A better article, including historicl context, on the goat removal by the Kitsap Sun. The Seattle Times article is more PC for urbanites.
https://www.kitsapsun.com/story/news/local/2018/09/13/mountain-goats-airlifted-out-olympic-national-park/1293142002/
The ST article has links to previous in-depth articles on the issue..not sure where your PC gripe applies.
You’re right. I should have looked at the links. Evan Bush is usually pretty balanced. The ST, from my years of experience and candid input from relatives who work there, is generally not very balanced on some topics.
Yes, you definitely have a point with that last sentence.
http://siberiantimes.com/ecology/others/news/threat-of-extinction-over-as-kremlin-confirms-rarest-big-cats-in-world-pass-key-milestone/
I’m so glad to read this, and for the Siberian tiger recovery too. Working to save endangered wildlife from extinction is apolitical, and in the interest of the world.
Rare encounters, for humans.
https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/05/22/613374055/watch-when-noble-lynxes-square-off-the-call-of-the-wild-gets-a-bit-whiny
Hopefully the first big step toward banning M-44’s
https://www.idahostatesman.com/news/local/environment/article217956755.html
Larsen represents the Mansfields in their suit against the government. He’s also one of the Mansfields’ neighbors up Buckskin Road. After Canyon was injured, Larsen learned that cyanide devices had been placed near his property, too, with no notice to him or his immediate neighbors.
“That outraged me,” he says. “It’s not part of this litigation, but as an attorney it helps fuel my motivation to make sure the right thing is done for the Mansfields, because this could have happened to my grandkids, who roam those same hills and area doing the same thing Canyon did.”
Bannock County Sheriff Lorin Nielsen looks like the grandfather he is, with a quick smile and snowy white hair. He’s been in law enforcement for 40 years, and sheriff for nearly 22 of those. He’d never heard of M-44s, and when he asked his fellow Idaho sheriffs, just two of the other 43 knew anything about them. None had been briefed on their use, or techniques to respond to an accident, as federal regulations require.
“I’m the elected sheriff. I’m supposed to protect the public. You’re putting out cyanide gas … and you’re not letting me know what’s going on?” he said..
“What’s right is right and what’s wrong is wrong. Whether it be a dog or a child — how do you justify this?”
50thousand year old wolf pup and caribou calf found mummified in Yukon.
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2018/sep/14/spectacular-ice-age-wolf-pup-and-caribou-dug-up-in-canada
Fascinating. Wow! 🙂
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2018/09/17/wyoming-hunting-guide-fatally-mauled-by-grizzly-bears.html
“I can only imagine how horrific this was,” Sy Gilliland, a hunting guide and spokesman for grizzly hunters in the area, told the newspaper. “You’ve got a bear population that’s basically un-hunted, is an apex predator, and has no fear of humans.”
Yes this happened because they are not being hunted.
Huh. I thought there was no grizzly hunting yet – what were they hunting there, elk?
It says the two bears, mother and cub, were ‘euthanized’. This is the option that the state has, and has always had.
I do not believe grizzlies should be hunted in any of their GYE range, but it seems apparent that about 8-10 percent of the entire population gets in some kind of trouble with humans every year. I don’t know how many result in mortality of some sort, but as the population grows I bet the percentage as well as the total number of bears increases substantially, unless they get more range and fewer (not more) people and domestic stock with which they can have the bad encounters, including roadways where they are hit by cars (or even trains).
Those who believe the population can continue to grow without bad PR and significant conflict and management that eliminates conflicting bears in larger numbers are naive.
I don’t know that killing a certain number will stop accidents like this, they are unpredictable – unless the goal is to wipe them all out eventually? Or to keep a small artificial number for artificial hunting purposes?
WM, When someone asks “how does an animal such as the grizzly bear “learn” to fear people?” one has to wonder why such an easy question isn’t answered. It’s called, survival of the fittest. We both know that hunting via zoning would target those bears in the 8 to 10 % of bears that are getting into trouble wouldn’t it? Those bears that are teaching their youth poor habituation practices, aren’t they? Survival of bears (in this zoning scenario) that are more likely pass on good habits of fear…..when the offenders are far more likely to become a bear rug! That’s how it works isn’t it WM? Friends of ours near Red Lodge MT have had grizz issues the last few years. It started with a suspicious calf mortality that was to far gone to be ID’d , then came the bear poop under the apple trees near the house, then sow / cub tracks in the triangle, then a fence down and another calf kill & finally seeing them in the early morning day light in the apple orchard. Though, they didn’t have it as bad as the well documented neighbor still the sighting was their enough is enough moment!
It seems most on this thread don’t understand “learning” as it pertains to wildlife / predators. Did you rally say, or do you know anyone that says the shooting a loner grizzly teaches other bears or shooting any bear teaches anything? It’s a foolish premise and I suspect the faux pas has more to do with propaganda then someone actually suggesting so. Now, I don’t know of anyone that is trying to peddle the notion that bears are “learning” from a member of their species being shot. I have seen incomplete articles from writers such as Doug Peacock pushing the notion that there are those out their saying as such….BUT, I’m having a hard time finding the original sources! If you didn’t say that , you may suggest to those asking the question to come up with the many examples I’m sure they have to enlighten us as to just whom is saying this. I’ve seen it countless times from those (as was done here) saying this is the case ….. but never an original source. Even Elk375’s comment below doesn’t say bears “learn” from others being shot. It says “hunting makes them more afraid of people”. His confusion can be answered in with ease…. The survival of the fittest! Survival of those leerier of man! “Wind direction” ….. it’s for windbags!
Back to this again.
“You’ve got a bear population that’s basically un-hunted, is an apex predator, and has no fear of humans.”
Pray tell, in particular due to both their rather insular nature, and being the big kid on the block, I must once again ask the question, how does an animal such as the grizzly bear “learn” to fear people? Wind in your favor grizzly does not know you’re there. Can’t see you, doesn’t know you’re there. No other bear witnesses the incident, doesn’t know it happened. Nothing to learn.
Hyperphagia, bear behavior shifts
http://www.thewildlifenews.com/2015/09/20/its-hyperphagia-time-for-bears/
Maybe the answer is to stop hunting elk in Grand Teton national park. When a hunter goes into harm’s way – what can they expect, unless they want an artificial landscape with no risk whatsoever, sanitized of wolves and bears, and a guaranteed trophy. Artificial.
The answer is to not hunt the bears in and around the national parks, and to stop elk hunting in Grand Teton. But I’m sure that won’t go over well. Can’t give an inch in the name of ‘collaboration’. 🙁
The trains many times are due to grain spillage, which should be able to be corrected by companies or the transportation company itself. Without ‘undue hardship and expense’ for them.
Here is a link to the an article in the Jackson Hole paper.
http://www.jhnewsandguide.com
Ida, this incident did not happen in GTNP but on the adjoining national forest. If it would have happen in the GTNP the park service would have investigated not the Wyoming Game and Fish. Try shutting down elk hunting on the national forest.
Would hunting of bears make them more afraid of humans? That is an interesting question. Bears are not like a herd of elk or antelope if you shoot one out of the herd the herd runs and becomes spooky. If you hunt grizzly bears and kill one how are the other bears going to see what or understand what happen.
I have spent a number of years in Alaska have killed all of the Alaskan animals, most of them by myself, except the grizzly. I have never had a real desire to kill a grizzly, hunted them several times but never got one. In my observation grizzlies in Alaska will run from people. In Montana I have noticed that grizzlies will not leave as quickly as Alaskan Grizzlies and can linger.
A number of years ago my cousin and I were moose hunting East of Denali National Park on the Yanert Fork. My cousin lives in Alaska and took a few steps over a knoll, steps back and said there is a grizzly over the knoll. Well cousin had a grizzly tag and I said let shoot it. We got ready and step over the knoll and the grizzly was gone.
Twenty minutes later I shot a moose 15 minute from our camp. We skinned it, quartered it and hung the meat in the trees for three days until the horses could come and get the meat. That grizzly or any grizzly never bother the meat or the gut pile. So does the hunting of grizzlies make them afraid of people? I think it does but how it does I do not know.
Elk, I shot an elk below cut off mountain just north of Yellowstone in MT. We were on foot and packed out what the three of us could walk to camp. We quartered the ~ eight year old bull elk and put what we didn’t pack in the cool grass far from the ribs and guts. We figured the impressive bull was starting a decline and had moved out of the park because it couldn’t compete with the five and six year old.
The next morning my cousin and I returned with the horses / pack mules. As we approached the site with the horses they (the horses) started acting spooky. We then saw of flash of brown/black heading away from the rib area. My cousin checked the guts and they were almost ate completely and the rib cage was rolled a few times. We set a record semi-packing the remaining quarters and got the heck out of Dodge. After a short / long ride with constant rubber necking we repositioned the load and road back to camp. That wasn’t the only encounter with grizzlies?? we had that trip. That was back when this area actually had elk / moose diversity.
I still think that getting the elk hunters out of Grand Teton National Park is a good idea. It can only complicate things with grizzly and wolf hunting. If these people truly want to compromise (which they do not.) The only people doing all the compromising are environmentalists.
“the only people doing all the compromising are environmnetalists”
yup
“Authorities said Chubon was bow hunting and shot an elk Thursday, but he and Uptain could not find the animal until Friday. They were preparing to pack it out that day when they were charged by two bears”
Over the past few years, incidents like this are becoming more and more common. Maybe hunting hours need to change in an environment rich in predators?
Wounding or killing an elk (deer/moose) and then leaving it over night, is asking for trouble anymore. Can’t pack it out before nightfall or at least hang it high, then don’t take the shot….
Scary, close encounter with a good ending:
This is not meant as anti-hunting/anti-archery
https://www.ellsworthamerican.com/sports-outdoors-in-maine/losing-wounded-deer/
“McCollough’s column was well-researched and his statistics raise some thoughtful questions. As a deer hunter, what do you think? Is Maine’s index of a 15 percent wounded deer loss high or low? The national data seems to suggest that Maine hunters wound a higher percentage of deer than its current formula indicates. Noteworthy, too, is that bow hunters — if we are to believe the national averages — lose twice as many wounded deer as gun hunters.”
My best friend up here, and his sons are avid archery/gun hunters. Most of their meat is wild game. Broadhead arrows create devastating wounds if they hit the correct area, but do not have the shock value of a bullet. In the years I have been friends and hunted with him, I can’t recall a gunshot deer not being found. Archery season, I know of two not found. Snow cover on ground during gun season makes tracking much easier, Red on white pretty easy to see, even at night with good lights.
Though no grizzlies here, we have an ample supply of wolves, coyotes, and black bear that will help themselves to wounded deer if not found by hunter. By the time you see the birds in the morning, it’s usually too late.
if you look you find many reports of wounded animals with arrows in them. sorry its a sickening sport.
a predictably sickening ending.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2018/09/16/grizzlies-killed-wyoming-hunting-guide-fatally-mauled/1330037002/
Louise,
In a sense, that’s what I said. Statistically, more unfound wounded deer in archery season than rifle. On another track, one of the reasons in crimp off all barns on fishing hooks/lures other than jigs. Easy hook out and release. I think we’ve spoken about this before, but catch and release fishing is fun for the fisherman, but the fish might offer an alternative opinion.
Crimp off all barbs
agreed!
Opinion in the Missoulian:
“Bears are forced to rely on foods that put them in danger of conflict with humans, such as gut piles left in the field. And conflicts with humans all too often leads to dead bears.”
You just knew that this would be a problem, the reduction in food sources, when you read that they would turn to elk. Why the mainstream press is writing articles that claim the bears ‘didn’t appear to be interested in the elk carcass’. Of course they were, especially with the time of year!
https://missoulian.com/opinion/letters/ensure-long-term-health-of-grizzly-bears/article_8224a747-73ef-526f-a525-76b7c12e7489.html
Hunting in Grand Teton National Park is supposed to be a population reduction program. Elk are migratory. Elsewhere the carnivores (non-human) are threatening the elk population. Which is it?
There is a new article in the Jackson Hole News today about this bear attack.
https://www.jhnewsandguide.com/news/environmental/article_b4d14d59-e76a-5da6-9929-b9422416a744.html
I never want to Monday morning quarterback, but if I was the guide I would have had the horses with me when I started to break down the elk. When I was guiding in Alaska I would tie the riding horses and the pack horses around the dead animal.
Elk, We have road into the wilderness many times using good ranch horses. Many times, those horse are spooky around a fresh kill, especially if its the first time in that season. Keeping them at a distance is not unusual to me. Even the mules we were lent by our outfitter friend show some spookiness on their virgin trip of the year (as I recall). This may be a learning lesson / change in protocol for back country hunting in grizzly country could be in the works for me. Also, (as Nancy and I both know) there have been some thick un-level “terrain” in the west where these elk / deer/ moose / sheep end up that taking a horse in just isn’t the smart thing to do. I’ve tossed a few bagged quarters over snags / deadfalls and dropped them to trails to get them out. Getting out an 800 pound elk is hard work…. labor of love for the hard-working sportsman.
Things to ponder in regards to this article….
* Survival of the fittest, I discussed above.
* What would have been the reaction of an Indian tribe be if a brave came back to camp with the story like this.
Matters you keep referencing the statement “Survival of the fittest” and it’s apparent you have no clue what it really means.
timz, I’m thinking that Herbert Spencer would be proud of my usage of the phase to demonstrate Darwin’s Adaptation (behavioral)principle. The next step was to contrast predicted results from two trains of thought: ONE the removal of only offenders of poor habituation predators & the other those with the propensity to have poor habituation….taking into consideration Darwin’s “descent with modification” principle.
I didn’t expect anyone to agree with me & my thoughts on the strawman’s down wind argument but, having trouble with survival of the fittest didn’t occur to me…. my bad!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fatal_bear_attacks_in_North_America
It would appear from this list that black bears (who are hunted regularly) are responsible for more human deaths over the years then grizzlies/brown bears. Deaths by grizzlies, also seem to happen more frequently in areas where they are also hunted – Alaska & Canada – so the idea that hunting them will make wary of humans, doesn’t float.
Hikers and backpackers seem to take the brunt of grizzly bear attacks although hunters are gaining ground, now that grizzlies have made a comeback in wilderness areas. And researchers have already discovered that the sound of gunshots, wounded ungulates, dead ungulates left over night, gut piles, are a growing attraction to bears.
There are over 500 licensed outfitters in Montana (with over a 1,000 seasonal guides working for them) and take into account the thousands of hunters out on their own during hunting season.
Here’s probably just a partial list of outfitters in Wyoming:
https://www.wyoga.org/wyoga-results.php?all_members=1
Out of state hunters (with disposable incomes – a guided hunt can run anywhere from $5 to $10 grand) flock to the west for a chance at those trophy heads. (click on any website and that’s what it’s all about)
I’m surprised there aren’t more encounters, resulting in fatalities but its becoming clear that outfitters/hunters need to be better educated and more “bear aware” for their safety and their clients.
Gone (or should be) the days of shooting game at dusk or too late in the day to pack it out.
Would imagine Native Americans & even early settlers, didn’t just leave dead game till the following morning.
“Would imagine Native Americans & even early settlers, didn’t just leave dead game till the following morning.”
Would be interesting to see if this “leaving game in the field” is a recent phenomena, or if it has been going on ‘forever’… Native Americans and early settlers did not have lights, in particular the type of lights (LED) that we now have that can light up a trail like daylight. But then they also had predators/scavengers that would help themselves to what was left in the field.
Not until recent history have predators been knocked almost out of existence, so the competition for that meat has increased. After all, isn’t competition what being a sportsman is all about?
“Gone (or should be) the days of shooting game at dusk or too late in the day to pack it out.”
https://dnr.wi.gov/topic/hunt/documents/TribalNHFAQ.pdf
Natives didn’t have a quitting time and fight them to this day. In the days gone by, I’m thinking, Natives hunted whenever and wherever it gave them an advantage and rightfully so! I’m sure it was a hard life to begin with….let alone Nancy’s of the tribe setting quitting times! Quitting times were set by sportsman and were established to improve successful shot averages and more so for safety.
Nancy, I’m not sure how you square these two: “Hikers and backpackers seem to take the brunt of grizzly bear attacks” & “its becoming clear that outfitters/hunters need to be better educated and more “bear aware”” Why does a single surprise uncharacteristic grizzly attack make things clear to you? We have been hanging quarters out of camp, positioning horses / pets (dogs), doing bear hangs keeping cook areas clean and way from sleeping areas, bear spray….etc etc etc for DECADES!
“Quitting times were set by sportsman and were established to improve successful shot averages and more so for safety”
And I’m sure everyone follows the “established times”
https://nbcmontana.com/news/local/game-wardens-investigate-poaching-case-near-whitefish
And the safety aspect:
https://accident.laws.com/hunting-accidents
“We have been hanging quarters out of camp, positioning horses / pets (dogs), doing bear hangs keeping cook areas clean and way from sleeping areas, bear spray….etc etc etc for DECADES!”
This discussion isn’t about how tidy you keep your camp, Mat-ters. Do try and stay on subject.
Immer makes an interesting point:
“Would be interesting to see if this “leaving game in the field” is a recent phenomena, or if it has been going on ‘forever’ ”
My guess would be its a recent phenomena since a lot of the clients on these guided hunts, are in it for the head, the meat is an afterthought.
“Deaths by grizzlies, also seem to happen more frequently in areas where they are also hunted – Alaska & Canada – so the idea that hunting them will make wary of humans, doesn’t float.”
Nancy, I’m not sure which statistic your trying to twist to show your disdain for sportsman. BUT, if its black bears …they are hunted everywhere and deaths seam to be spread among the hunting community. Grizzlies…well their is where your underwater…. From 2010 to present (FROM your list plus the recent death) there has been 13 deaths, EIGHT of which were from the lower 48 where hunting is not allowed! Combine that with the fact that only a small percentage of the browns live in the lower 48 makes your statement embarrassingly laughable…. thanks for making a case for hunting! Try again!
Nancy has her agenda, but so do you, and you are both willing torture data for your purposes.
Can’t it simply be that there’s more mauling and death where there is more human contact with bears?
We have definite geography differences in Michigan, with much more bear troubles in upper MI that in the southern lower peninsula. It has nothing to do with whether they are hunted up there or not, but as it happens there’s more hunting up there – probably cause there’s more bears I figure. Call me crazy. Anyway, there are simply lots more bear x human contacts. If I increase bears or people or both, contacts increase. I’m not saying this proves hunting has no effects, but trying to probe it has an effect in one way or another while ignoring the most obvious cause of risk is disingenuous.
I’ll add: if a handful of people die per year due to bear contacts, it’s OK. They are not scarce. And they know or should know that there is risk. The recent dead guide certainly knew.
Can’t it simply be that there’s more mauling and death where there is more human contact with bears?
+++
http://ec.europa.eu/environment/nature/conservation/species/carnivores/pdf/209_Hovardas_fear%20and%20safety.pdf
page4
Recorded large carnivore attacks on humans in Europe in the 21 century involve exclusively brown bears (Penterianiet al., 2016)
A recent review (Naves et al., 2016) focused on the period 2000-2015 and concentrated on human-bear contact which resulted in either human injury or death: 20 fatalities from a total of 299 registered bear attacks on humans in Europe (Russian Federation excluded) in 19 out of 24 countries hosting the species (total population about 18000 individuals)
More than half of the fatalities (12 out of 20) were recorded for one bear population (Carpathian) in one country (Romania)
Romania is not your usual / normal grizz country
The Bear Slayer
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2003/07/the-bear-slayer/302768/
If the area contains bear habitat, as the best of the mountainous areas do, an important part of the gamekeeper’s job is to nurture the resident bears and familiarize himself with them as individuals. How does he nurture them? By putting out supplemental food—apples and pears and plums by the bushel, corncobs by the cartload, pellets of a specially blended bear chow, and occasionally the carcass of an old horse. Spring, summer, and fall, the gamekeeper and his helpers deliver vast quantities of such stuff for the delectation of their bears, serving it at feeding stations sited strategically throughout the forest. A typical station includes a feeding trough (just like one in a barnyard, except here bear scat lies among the old corncobs strewn around it) and a tall iron frame for hanging large pieces of meat.
During the twenty-five years of his reign, according to Crisan’s tally, Nicolae Ceausescu shot about 400 bears. In the earlier years he sometimes hosted shooting parties at which guests were welcome to kill game—deer, boar, even some of those precious bears. On a single day’s hunt in 1974 Ceausescu shot twenty-two bears, and his guests another eleven. In later years he jealously kept the bears for himself. From 1983 until his death, in 1989, according to Crisan, Ceausescu bagged 130. His most notable fit of excess occurred in the autumn of 1983, when, aided by four separate game drives toward his position, Ceausescu shot twenty-four bears in one day.
Estonia have 20 000km2 forest area and 700 grizz. And despite that 1.3m people are regularly in forests gathering wild berries, mushrooms etc there’s no human casualties.
Slovakia has the same story: 20 000 km2 forest area; ~ 1 000 grizz, 5.5m people
Action plan for conservation and management of large carnivores
(wolf Canis lupus, lynx Lynx lynx, brown bear Ursus arctos)
in Estonia in 2012–2021
http://www2.nina.no/lcie_new/pdf/635379340188248258_LC_action%20plan_Estonia_2012-2021.pdf
3.4 Attacks on humans
in Estonia there have been cases where people were injured in bear attacks.Most of such cases took palace in hunting situations and involved wounded animals.Although in the world and in Europe there have been lethal outcome to involved people.Such cases are not known from Estonia. In the last 10 years three episodes of bear attack and consequent injury have been registered. In one case wounded bear was involved and the attack would not have taken place, as far as the circumstances are known, without the shooting incident. Fear for bear attack plays a key role in bear conservation.There are eight known cases from Estonia when bears have been shot in self-defence from short distance while four of them were wintering females with cubs. In none of those cases bears had actually attacked people.
Rork, “Nancy has her agenda, but so do you, and you are both willing (to) torture data for your purposes.” Anytime you have an example of me “torturing” data …..let me know! Your comment on Aug 12 about me “cherry picking” / “2011 is cherry picked – that was max deer in the UP. BTW it was also max wolf” was a sham. 2012 was the max deer in the UP AND I could have exposed everyone to the 1990’s data ….even more telling!
“if a handful of people die per year due to bear contacts, it’s OK.” I’m with you on that point…. to a point. Allowing expansion of the population into poorer and poorer habitat will result and does result in conflict in that poor habitat. It is unequivocally unacceptable and immoral to expect those living in those areas to live in constant fear as some ranchers do around Red Lodge MT. A death to someone in these areas are on the heads of the likes of some here. Removing only bears that cause issues in the bad habitat is certainly not the answer for you guarantee an endless supply of failure and certain and righteous revolt!
Bad manners to put words in someone’s mouth, Mat-ters. I have no problem with hunting to put food on the table but like a lot of people here, I do have disdain for “head” hunters, you know those guys, right? The ones that would rather have animal heads (and hides) hanging on their walls versus say artwork. You can buy a lot of incredible artwork for the price of a 6 day, guided hunt.
The ones that are all for opening a season on grizzly bears again, in the lower 48. Even though human deaths occurred (in the neighborhood of 26) from the 1850’s on to the 1970’s when it was legal to hunt grizzlies, in the lower 48. 9 deaths directly related to hunting grizzlies, including this character:
“Old Ike”
One of the most successful bear hunters, he killed over 100 grizzlies during the 1800s. In June 1886, he wounded a grizzly bear near the headwaters of the Salmon River, but not enough to cripple the animal. After pursuing it into a dense stand of trees, he was attacked by the bear and mauled, with the bear biting into his chest—crushing his entire chest with one bite. The bear was driven off by his companions”
Yeah, 8 deaths by grizzles in the lower 48 since 2010 but I’d knock off 2 maybe 3 on technicalities – Treat, who literally ran into a grizzly, at a high speed, while on a bike (that would of pissed any bear off)
Erwin Frank, who stumbled on a grizzly that had just been trapped, drugged and then released (given how many grizzlies have been trapped and drugged over the years, I’m surprised there aren’t more incidents)
Take Old Scare Face, I read that this bear had been trapped 17 times for research.
https://trib.com/lifestyles/recreation/famous-yellowstone-grizzly-scarface-was-shot-at-close-range-by/article_b2e98362-6355-507c-9c03-a25a3505f0ed.html
Regardless, this bear managed to keep a good attitude about humans (photographed often) until that fateful night when an elk hunter, wandering around IN THE DARK, shot first and then couldn’t answer questions later as to what happened.
And Wallace, stupidity?
“According to a report released by Yellowstone rangers, park officials had attempted to give Wallace a lecture about bear safety, but he was not interested, calling himself a “grizzly bear expert”
Animals are capable of mourning the loss of a family member, wouldn’t be a stretch to think they may also be capable of resentment too.
So lets take black bears again, they are regularly hunted in most parts of the country. Baited, shot at, trapped and hounded. 23 human deaths in the last 18 years. Roughly 90% of the deaths didn’t involve hunters, just people out enjoying the wilderness. Resentment?
And lets also take a look at grizzly deaths over the past few years:
11 in 2018 just in “unknown cause of death, under investigation” (and those were just the bears found)
How many grizzlies/brown bears do you think may have been shot at (or harassed) over the years by hunters and then carry that memory until one day they stumble on a human, unaware in bear country?
We have no idea what their thought process is but (IMHO) killing them for sport is pretty pathetic.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rbE53XUtVw0
Source for grizzly bear mortality last 3 years in the greater Yellowstone ecosystem:
https://www.usgs.gov/centers/norock/data-tools
https://www.the-scientist.com/news-opinion/science-behind-hunting-quotas-unavailable-study-29986/amp
Thank you for this, Louise, it’s something I’ve always wondered about. I’m not surprised. 🙁
From the JHNews article:
“Her stomach was “full of elk meat,” one indication that told the Game and Fish folks that they had killed the right bear.”
So the elk was an issue. There’s no way anyone can know what was going on in the bear’s mind at the time, or what so-called ‘normal’ behavior is – I would be that she wanted that carcass. One of the comments said she was pretty underweight, which would stand to reason for the time of year?
Also, why hasn’t the sex of the cub been disclosed? It is unimportant? Was it another female? While this is a tragic event, it would appear to be preventable. Going up against a grizzly deliberately at the time of year when they are preparing for hibernation would appear to be foolish.
Trophy hunting isn’t worth it – I don’t know how the process goes in the field, but the article implied that the guide was getting the elk head first ‘for his client’.
For years I’ve posted here, often arguing that hunters and environmentalists should be on the same team concerning conservation issues. Recently I found a convincing (at least to me) demonstration as to why: specifically, a paper that estimates the earth’s biomass (weight in living things), which finds that 96% of the earth’s mammalian biomass is in livestock and people — only 4% is in wild mammals.
You can read the article yourself here: http://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/early/2018/05/15/1711842115.full.pdf
Biomass estimates are included in supplementary table 1.
I’ve read this but thank you for posting
Is there a better argument against trophy hunting? I know not the intent of your post but really just 4 percent are wild
You’d think the numbers we are seeing related to diminishing populations of wildlife and habitats would justify rethinking the archaic arguments used to justify management aka hunting
Wildlife populations have enough pressure on them
Can’t we get past at least trophy hunting
Trophies of wild animals are indefensible
Thanks JB!
“Over the relatively short span of human history, major innovations, such as the domestication of livestock, adoption of an agricultural lifestyle, and the
Industrial Revolution, have increased the human population dramatically and have had radical ecological effects.”
The wipe-out by colonists in less than 500 years (?) has always boggled my mind. Indigenous peoples hunted, but managed to coexist for a lot longer than that. Good grief! 🙁
Indigenous people are hardly saints. They can’t afford to be, because there’s an existential game being played, unless everyone on the continent agrees to play nice. In Europe they pretty much wiped-out bears, wolves, and what we call moose. On many islands (New Zealand and Madagascar are famous) large birds were made extinct, and Easter Island was denuded even of trees. In North America lots of the megafauna went extinct. The only brakes were the lack of technology or density, or societal collapse (several examples in the Americas). At least until recently.
Another take on the Grizzly incident.
https://mountainjournal.org/reflections-on-fatal-bear-attack-in-wyoming
In autumn, grizzlies are in the physiological condition known as hyperphagia when they are trying to consume as many calories as possible prior to denning. Thus, for humans, there is a need not only for heightened awareness among all those who go into the mountains but it is critical that people consciously contemplate what could possibly happen and know how they would react.
An honest effort here not to victim blame, for the Bears also died, but the “conscious contemplation/how they would react” scenario was obviously not observed. Surprise of suddenness of attack and clients inability to fire gun.
And we can also look at the bear spray/gun debate. Actually neither worked as the bear spray was not utilized in time, and the gun could not be fired, at least from accounts provided. We weren’t there, so the chaos that was experienced by men and bears likely something none of us will ever experience.
My reflection is 1) two bears is worse than one, and 2) it’s bad if the other people don’t help you. The guide could have had a better client. That there’s strength in numbers is key.
I’m glad it’s my brother next to me when I’m in griz country. We joke about only needing to be faster than the other guy, but it’s only a joke, about inconceivable behavior.
Inconceivable behavior, but the guards were down when the attack occurred. I’ll put something forward in regard to learned behavior, though it’s just a hunch, which also ties into the joke of who is faster, you or your brother.
In particular with hyperphagia affecting bear foraging, the bears, Specifically the female, along with her cub, quite well may have been adept at stealing elk from wolves. No bluster, no bluff, charge in, wolves disperse, claim the kill. Wolves are fast enough, and more aware of what is going on around them due to sense of smell and hearing, to avoid the charge. Not so the case of the guide and his client.
Also, what is usual when hunting? Some here have mentioned leaving the elk for the next day. Isn’t that unsanitary?
It would appear to me that the client was only interested in the trophy, not the meat, because certainly the carcass would have attracted the carnivores, the scavengers, and insects within that time? Not to mention weather.
Not wise – but then people do not have to be responsible for their behavior, only the animals pay for interfering with human activities. The world belongs to humans, and we are not benevolent dictators.
“Also, what is usual when hunting? Some here have mentioned leaving the elk for the next day. Isn’t that unsanitary?”
No.
Cooler nights, esp mountains, like a refrigerator.
Only problem that might occur is if GI tract contents mt into body cavity, can ruin meat, or at least make it unpalatable. Proper shot/arrow placement preclude above from happening.
Here’s a similar story:
“Dennehy said the U.S. Department of Fish and Wildlife forensics lab in Ashland was unable to recover any of the cougar’s DNA left on the hiker’s body during the attack.
“When the evidence was recovered, it was believed to be several days after the attack occurred. Heavy rain fell during that time,” she said.”
https://www.opb.org/news/article/mount-hood-cougar-diana-bober-hiker-death/
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/snowy-owl-disappearing-180970314/?utm_source=smithsoniandaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20180918-daily-responsive&spMailingID=36149735&spUserID=NzY3NDE2MDM1MzAS1&spJobID=1361793526&spReportId=MTM2MTc5MzUyNgS2
one can take a look at those maps and compare them with large carnivore (>40 000 grizz, wolves, Eurasian lynx, wolverine)distribution maps:
1)Population density of US with European equivalents
https://i.redd.it/2b7uoxjoprqz.jpg
2)Population density of Europe with US equivalents
https://i.redd.it/zmelimmbkgqz.jpg
3) Distribution of large carnivores in Europe in 2011
https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Recovery-of-large-carnivores-in-Europe%E2%80%99s-modern-Chapron-Kaczensky/7a61113bf165f65486040bbd943c889faf976383/figure/0
bottom line:
core populations of grizz and Eurasian lynx live in countries with Virginia, Arkansas and Maine densities
core populations of wolf live in countries with Illinois,Virginia, and Delaware densities
http://www.miningjournal.net/news/front-page-news/2018/09/officials-prep-to-relocate-wolves/
Wonderful news! 🙂
https://missoulian.com/news/state-and-regional/montana/quick-thinking-good-fortune-saves-man-mauled-by-grizzlies-in/article_84e7e5ef-c4f5-56de-83d4-f8943cdf57ac.html
Currently the this forum has a fixation of the incident outside of Jackson Hole, Wyoming. This bear attack happen several weeks ago in the Beartooth Mtns near Granite Lake on the Montana/Wyoming Border.
What interest me about this incident is that 51 years ago, four 15/16 year old’s with newly minted drivers licenses took a backpacking/ fishing trip in this exact area. I was the driver, driving a 1961 ford sedan with three on the tree. When we returned and got home mothers were in a panic because while we were gone in Glacier National Park two women had been killed by two different bears, “The Night of the Gizzlies”.
An excellent documentary of the accounts that took place that night (Night of the Grizzlies)
Thanks Nancy
Not sure I’d call it a fixation, Elk, as much as a discussion/interest in finding out what took place and how tragic incidents like this, could of been avoided?
Back in the 60’s, around parks, bears were considered nothing more than entertainment (around trash dumps) and expected to be frightened away by humans, wandering around in THEIR habitat. But then bear numbers (grizzlies) were in the low 200’s?
The numbers of bears has increased over the decades but so have the numbers of hunters & hikers (not to mention livestock) into what’s left of THEIR habitat – roads carved into areas and the human toys like ATV’s, mountain and dirt bikes, that come along with that invasion.
So maybe it’s time to re think (as they did in the late 60’s) re: the impact humans are having on not just bears but wildlife in gerneal, in what’s left of their habitat?
I did not know about this attack – but any time an animal has to be killed because of an encounter with humans, it is cause for concern, and to examine what went wrong.
I recall staying pretty alert in that county, especially when I had cutthroat trout on me, but we saw no griz. We saw goats several times who were bold, hoping to eat our cloths.
https://nbcmontana.com/news/local/judge-restores-protections-for-grizzly-bears-blocking-hunts-09-24-2018-234632609
I welcome this ruling, but as per WM on the 17th:
“I do not believe grizzlies should be hunted in any of their GYE range, but it seems apparent that about 8-10 percent of the entire population gets in some kind of trouble with humans every year. I don’t know how many result in mortality of some sort, but as the population grows I bet the percentage as well as the total number of bears increases substantially, unless they get more range and fewer (not more) people and domestic stock with which they can have the bad encounters, including roadways where they are hit by cars (or even trains).
Those who believe the population can continue to grow without bad PR and significant conflict and management that eliminates conflicting bears in larger numbers are naive.“
Delisting for the purpose of random killing does little to ease these conflicts. It just makes sense that management of the bears is better served by the surgical removal of problem bears. Perhaps a Conservation/management license in a lottery system for this purpose. Just throwing it out there for sake of discussion.
Like with wolves, I might like giving permits to landowners, where the permit is for their land not for them as an individual. You can give permits to several landowners. State can revoke permissions at any time. Landowners can say if a professional from the state can do the killing in the case of “problem” bears, but I’m not sure about merely “trespassing” ones. Problem bear on public land would be pros only. People from outside the area are excluded is one of my goals, the other being no elective hunting on public land. It’s what I want for wolves in MI. For trespassers in villages I’m uncertain – maybe local authorities could be permitted to act. That hasn’t happened with wolves here yet, but with black bear it does, but usually hazing suffices, and some places have designated hazers with lots of tools and skills, who make life miserable for the bear. I’m not sure we actually have a permitting process for that or not, or what the laws are. I’m pretty ignorant about what to do about griz, but hazing might be hazardous. I’m willing to learn, and change my views – also just throwing it out there.
That came out bad – people from outside could do the killing, but it would be at owner’s invitation. Might get “ugly” cause people might pay for the privilege. Haven’t thought enough or seen examples.
“I’m pretty ignorant about what to do about griz, but hazing might be hazardous. I’m willing to learn, and change my views – also just throwing it out there”
So look at the site I posted previously Rork and you can learn exactly where grizzlies are being “eliminated” in large numbers, in just the past 3 years, because of “human conflicts”
https://www.usgs.gov/centers/norock/data-tools
Not hard to see the pendulum that continues to swing in the direction of human occupation.
Early on, claiming choice spots for livestock or now, occupying more and more of wilderness areas, by building right up against what’s left of those, use to be, wildlife habitats.
I’ve witnessed it firsthand, where I’ve lived for the past 26 years. And everyone coming in, taking advantage of the land that’s now opened up by ranchers (a few acres here and there tossed out on the real estate market) take their clues from old time ranchers, who pretty much hated anything that might interfere with their lifestyle – like ground squirrels, badgers, hawks, eagles, coyotes, wolves, bears and even ungulates, till they figured out how to make a few bucks re: private land hunting.
Agenda? I got no stinking agenda 🙂 unless some of my words make an impression on those that don’t take the time to venture out here or question what local and federal government is doing to public lands and the wildlife on those lands, in the name of private enterprise/profit.
“It would appear from this list that black bears (who are hunted regularly) are responsible for more human deaths over the years then grizzlies/brown bears. Deaths by grizzlies, also seem to happen more frequently in areas where they are also hunted – Alaska & Canada – so the idea that hunting them will make wary of humans, doesn’t float.”
Nancy, that is the tortured data analysis I was talking about. It reeks. I am sorry if there’s human overwhelm near you. There are thousands of new homes in formally mostly empty spaces near me too.
Rork, your comments, Immers below, and the comments on grizzlies are all connected. The general theme is to:
Protecting predators until they become a burden on those living with them.
Continue to allow abuse federal laws and wasted tax dollars regarding truly non-endangered animals.
Cram them down the throats of the local people to the point they rebel.
Act as if you have “natural” is on your side, knowing full well that the dynamic here in (where these predators and laws are abused) North America IS and has been predator/prey/man NOT only predator/prey.
Have no regard or compassion for the primary prey and secondary prey animals.
Act as if managed game herds densities (outside of places like National parks) were non-sustainable or “unhealthy” even closely resembling inside the parks where again man was not part of the dynamic. (do not include private lands in this dynamic).
BUT, the bottom line is that in the end we always yes ALWAYS, end up with the conundrum of what to do too kill the inevitable access that bleeds into places they cause trouble as you have noted here. Rork, Do you think groups like HSUS, Defenders of Wildlife actually continue to push the compassionless abuse of our Environmental laws in order to drive local people to the point resentment, to a point where a extreme minority of them do what’s in Immer post below……because it’s good for business and donate now buttons and promote hate for the local people?
I do not support HSUS or defenders. Can you even write a comment without putting words in other people’s mouths or is it your only ability? Did you entirely miss the part where I was talking about the details of how to go about killing bears and wolves? That’s not exactly protection. I think not hunting in many National parks is bad for the land. I will hopefully be killing deer starting Monday.
I’m not averse to having local resentment though – times change, land use changes, sometimes for the better.
I can’t even tell what you are pointing out about Immer’s “comments below”, and a few other sentences are also unintelligible to me.
I put no words in your mouth or anyone else! I first stated the facts as “most” local people see them. THEN, asked you a simple question. You had acknowledged the fact of the inevitability and I acknowledged that “as you have noted here” … I didn’t ask you if you support them and you didn’t answer my question. “You” in some instances of my comment clearly pertains to “the General theme” …. and not Rork!
Immer comment is the one where the local people killed the wolf…. his “not bothering anyone” made my morning coffee come up when I read from the article HE POSTED “On December 1, 2017, a few days before the killing, a person who remained unnamed in the complaint reported seeing a Mexican wolf “crouched down” behind a log near his family’s hunt camp near Dipping Vat Springs. It was 20 or 30 yards from his two young daughters, the person told a wildlife manager at the Arizona Game and Fish Department. He wanted to know at what point the wolf could be shot.” this particular wolf (in my opinion) was set up for failure at which groups like DOW and HSUS actually want…. for its good for business!
“I put no words in your mouth or anyone else! I first stated the facts as “most” local people see them”
And where exactly do you live again, Mat-ters? Pertaining to facts as most “local people” see them?” Out here.
I live in ground zero, where I’m thinking you just visit on occasion? Or maybe just spend time hunting and commensurate via emails, and often? “with those locals” who feel frustrated or hampered by the attempts of some to re-establish relationships, with wilderness and wildlife, after what? a century of ranching, logging and hunting abuse?
Come on Mat-ters, give me just a little clue as to what you and your “bros” are so fricken angry about?
Please go and look at how many deaths or attack’s by wolves
Mexican or otherwise
Your firey fear mongering sadly works in some circles but hopefully that’s changing
2 fatal attacks in more than a hundred years in all of North America
Seems absurd to spend so much time hating an animal whose dna gave life to our beloved domesticated canines
There is a common thread of twisted perverse that seems to infect those who hate predators
Wonder what a psychological profile would look like?
Louise Kane, Any wolf that is crouching down behind a log eyeing up some children is not exhibiting normal wolf behavior and is currently and rightfully an automatic target for removal. Even wolf hugging biologist like Carter Niemeyer and Adrian Wydeven would admit that much. It is not normal wolf behavior because for the last 12000 years MAN has been smart enough to automatically kill the habituated vermin leaving behind a more farouche wolf. We can thank those smart enough to do that for the reason that we only have 2 KNOWN fatal attacks in all of modern North America!
Demanding that those in affected areas tolerate that behavior and calling them haters is a great way to eventually kill the program. One must wonder about the psychological profile of a person that is that demanding and can’t empathize with that situation. Do they think wolves are more related to the Pit Bull or their Havanese? Does the hate they have for certain groups of their fellow man override their caring for the welfare of all wildlife? Are they willing to set the supposed animals they love up for failure just to stick it to those they hate?
In general, one must wonder about groups that have that “demanding” mentality and their true motivations, their hate and if they really care about the long term success of the programs they interject themselves into.
In the end wolves, cougars and grizzlies will still need to be killed…..just a fact some haters can’t come to grips with.
Wow
Really
The primary burden on ecosystems seems to be our gross mismanagement of all species
Your description of how to manage and manipulate Predators and how you perceive the need to repress some species for the benefit of others is s big part of the problem
Managing predators is a history rife with gross callous actions that are indefensible ignorant and intolerable
On another note
http://montanauntamed.com/get-outside/article_a804b88e-3ec6-5a02-9bb6-0b942c43efba.html
Wondering if the thugs are emboldened by all of the nasty actions coming from
The new hunting club aka Dept of interior
I love my dog but I don’t think dogs should be in Yellowstone
Shouldn’t there be some places just for wildlife?
“U.S. District Judge Dana Christensen ruled grizzlies weren’t sufficiently recovered to sustain hunting, pointing out an estimated 50,000 bears once roamed the contiguous states.”
Of course they aren’t. This article examines WY and ID’s ‘options’, such as leaning on Congress, and ignoring the ESA! So much for cooperation for the good of the species. 🙁
https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/judge-restores-protections-grizzly-bears-blocking-hunts-58054405
Minnesota Wolf Population Stable and Healthy
https://www.mprnews.org/story/2018/09/24/wolf-population-stable-and-healthy
Good. Unless they are causing problems, just leave them alone.
https://www.mprnews.org/story/2017/10/24/minn-ranchers-welcome-more-federal-cash-to-stop-wolves
Anyone know why the 2017 wolf removal numbers still have not been posted on the MN DNR site?
Yes Inmee exactly
Shot taken from 200 yards, not bothering anybody, ID’d as a wolf. No reason for this other than hate. 50K to the program and at least 1/2 year in jail for ignorance. This is why wolves are listed as endangered or threatened. Got no problem with protecting livestock, pets, yourself, etc. this is just pure unadulterated hate.
https://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/news/phoenix-area-men-charged-with-killing-mexican-gray-wolf-10870323
First two wolves released on Isle Royale
https://www.nationalparkstraveler.org/2018/09/two-wolves-set-loose-isle-royale-national-park
https://www.nationalparkstraveler.org/2018/09/wolf-captured-relocation-isle-royale-national-park-dies
Not much for details.
Sad. But I do also agree the the program is valuable not only for science, but for the protection of wolves.
Stress or tranquilization reaction? They said their ‘procedures’ are going to be altered.
According to my math ….. these wolf biologists have abused more females than Brett Kavanaugh.
‘A wolf that died before transport to Isle Royale National Park (IRNP) is believed to have overheated after being taken to a holding facility’ … The park is still awaiting a diagnosis from an necropsy of the dead wolf
http://www.mininggazette.com/news/2018/10/trapped-wolf-dies-in-holding/
“The animal actually appeared to be coming out of any difficulty in the anesthesia,” Green said. “It quickly reversed its situation. Our vets did CPR, they provided oxygen for it, but they couldn’t save that individual.”
Ten or more wolves have been captured so far, Green said. Most have been released back into the wild due to health, age or gender balance reasons.
The park is ahead of the anticipated pace of one animal per week,
https://nbcmontana.com/news/offbeat/ohio-pd-makes-wily-request-about-coyotes
Criminal Complaint in regard to Mexican Wolf Shot by Kunkel.
https://images.phoenixnewtimes.com/media/pdf/wolf_shot_info.pdf
Another example of, “I shot it because I could”. None of the normal self-aggrandizing reasoning nor even applying the contorted application of “sport” to the slaughtering of wildlife. The court should but won’t take away his 2nd amendment rights. Such willful and knowing crimes should have lifetime consequences.
RE: https://phys.org/news/2018-10-grazing-access-western-good-ranching.html UC Santa Barbara’s National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS). This is another prime example of Leopold’s, “Burning the furniture to keep warm”. Pretty short sighted to propose that continuing to do that which is bad is the best option. Bundy types would agree since they support slavery as “At least they could grow a garden and work as a family”. And while I’m at it, we could not find anyone with less respect for nature than Kavanaugh.
“And while I’m at it, we could not find anyone with less respect for nature than Kavanaugh.” Who is “we” Larry…..?
. . . doesn’t deserve a responsive explanation to you as the subject is much to serious to us.
Chalk one up for the bear, well, almost.
https://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2018/10/01/bear-attack-wisconsin-hunting-trip/
Hunters can’t legally shoot grizzlies for sport, but they don’t seem to have a problem killing them.
https://nbcmontana.com/news/local/grizzly-bear-shot-by-hunting-guide-in-northern-wyoming
Continuing to prove the point that a hunting season is not necessary.
Modern day grizzly habitat
https://nbcmontana.com/news/slideshows/gallery/slideshow-grizzly-bear-in-creston-residents-yards#/
Big beautiful bear! Living right outside Glacier National Park. What kills more people in our country? bears or alcohol? Bears or motor vehicles? bears or people with guns? When I was a park ranger in Yellowstone I told people I preferred bears as neighbors because they never pointed a gun at me, like people have in Los Angeles. Don’t like to live with bears? MOVE!!! Did you know the wild animal that kills the most people in the USA is the deer? By your logic we should get rid of all the deer!
And the mask come off! MOVE? I’m glad self-centered, self-absorbed, self-obsessed, self-seeking, self-interested, self-serving comments like MOVE have no place in wildlife management. Groups like DU and RMEF that protect habitat amid and with respect the rights and lives of those living in the habitat are the shinning star in the environmental movement. Any group run by “selfies” and “MOVERS” need to do reassess their goals and reputations! Any state or federal employee with a selfy and move attitude needs to be canned!
just saying it’s not hard to live with bears. probably easier than having YOU as a neighbor. I’ve lived in wildlife habitat for over 30 years and enjoyed it, never had a problem. Also, when you resort to name calling it doesn’t help. It looks like you’re not rational. Just calm down and realize we differ. I’m ok with you having a different opinion. In fact your posts always make me laugh.
Hiker, “calm down”? No need for someone calm to calm down…. any feelings of upset, angry, or excited are in your interpretation of my words. It might be easier for you to interpret my words correctly by making believe their coming from the mouth of Christine Ford. The
“…..”cadence.
oops Dr Ford
It’s just the way you write I guess. All the accusations and name calling. I feel I’m reading a transcript from one of Trump’s speeches. Why all the put downs? Are you that insecure? BTW many of your points I find valid. I just have to read your post four or five times to find those nuggets I agree with. For example I agree that humans are part of the ecosystem. Even places that are protected like National Parks or Wilderness Areas have lots of people. Also, hunting is part of our history, like you said. I have great respect for anyone who eats what they hunt. I just have a hard time with your “it’s my way or the highway” “black and white” writing. Maybe you are just trying to make a point, it just seems like your rhetoric is inflammatory. That doesn’t seem like a solid way to convince people that you are right. If anything I think it alienates them. Also, you have an annoying habit of picking one item from a post to attack while ignoring what I feel might be valid points. It almost seems like you just like to attack people. If that’s the case then I’m asking you, one human to another, to be nicer.
+ 1 Hiker and follow up to your comments:
Repetitive photos of what amounts to the same couple of bears do not make Creston a “modern day grizzly habitat”
Drag the map around in any direction and its not hard to see why a bear will show up around town on occasion.
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Creston,+MT+59901/@48.3026239,-114.1359114,4495m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x53664e89857d9a5d:0xccf190882f0f9fbd!8m2!3d48.1894036!4d-114.1373429
Pro-active ways to live with wildlife:
http://blackfootchallenge.org/?cat=12
The Caribou Guardians
https://thenarwhal.ca/the-caribou-guardians/
Hunting Moose in Canada to Save Caribou from Wolves
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/30/science/moose-wolves-caribou.html
LOL
https://docs.wixstatic.com/ugd/d2beb3_116a15f46ec748cfbf121bea66dd1743.pdf
The Court finds for the Plaintiffs on both grounds. By delisting the Greater Yellowstone grizzly without analyzing how delisting would affect the remaining
members of the lower-48 grizzly designation, the Service failed to consider how reduced protections in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem would impact the other
grizzly populations. Thus, the Service “entirely failed to consider an important aspect of the problem
LOL
https://docs.wixstatic.com/ugd/d2beb3_116a15f46ec748cfbf121bea66dd1743.pdf
Further, the Service’s application of the ESA threats analysis is arbitrary and capricious for at least two reasons. First, by dropping a key commitment-the
commitment to ensure that any population estimator adopted in the future is calibrated to the estimator used to justify delisting – the Service illegally
negotiated away its obligation to apply the best available science in order to reach an accommodation with the states of Wyoming, Idaho, and Montana. Second, the Service relied on two studies to support its determination that the Greater Yellowstone grizzly can remain independent and genetically self-sufficient.
However, the Service’s reliance is illogical, as both studies conclude that the long-term health of the Greater Yellowstone grizzly depends on the introduction of new genetic material.
Another sad example of man’s negative impact on nature:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-10-06/satin-bowerbirds-falling-victim-to-plastic-waste/10215078
Almost impossible to escape microplastics. Proponents of sea salts might be surprised at how much plastic they ingest due to the plastic floating around in the ocean.
The Impact of Wolf Predation on Western
Canada Boreal Woodland Caribou Populations:
A Critical Review of the Evidence
http://cwbm.name/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/4-Proulx-Point-to-Ponder-Vol-6-Issue-2.pdf
Well. So much (permanent) destruction of wolves based on what might be wrong assumptions about them. Or not facing up to what is the real cause of caribou decline – continual encroachment into habitat for human activities. Not surprising tho. 🙁
Read above prior two wolf/caribou postings,
There are many more
Two more wolves released to Isle Royale
https://www.twincities.com/2018/10/06/two-more-minnesota-wolves-moved-to-lake-superiors-isle-royale/
https://www.npr.org/2018/10/10/655937903/alaska-national-park-declares-fattest-bear-winner
and to think even at that weight they can move incredibly fast
http://www.speedofanimals.com/animals/brown_bear
brown bear / grizzly bear: top speed 21.7 – 34.8mph
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Footspeed
The record was 44.72 km/h (27.8 mph), measured between meter 60 and meter 80 of the 100 meters sprint of the World Championships in Berlin on 16 August 2009 by Usain Bolt.[4][5] (Bolt’s average speed over the course of this race was 37.58 km/h or 23.35 mph.)[6] Maximum human sprint speed is strikingly slower than that of many animals. Compared to other land animals, humans are exceptionally capable of endurance, but incapable of great speed.[7
https://www.healthline.com/health/mens-health/average-weight-for-men
The average American man over age 20 weighs 195.7 pounds
By comparison, the average American woman weighs 168.5 pounds
Who’s faster, a bear or a human with a bicycle?
https://www.quora.com/Whos-faster-a-bear-or-a-human-with-a-bicycle
+
some other variations on a sideline question list
Wonder how the wildlife is doing. If this is how they treat pets and rodents…..
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5449023/Venezuelans-eat-rats-dogs-economy-nosedives.html
“Zoos are forced to slaughter animals to feed others in Venezuela”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fauna_of_Venezuela
Overall, around 8,000 species (the world’s 5th highest total) are endemic to the country. Venezuela,being a very tropical country,has a very large supply of fossil fuels, gasoline,and minerals.
Venezuela hosts a total of 1,417 bird species, more than 351 mammals, 341 reptiles, 315 amphibians and more than 2000 freshwater and marine fishes.[1] Invertebrates groups have not been inventoried exhaustively, but among the well known groups there are around 900 species of marine molluscs, 1600 butterfly, over 120 dung beetles species and 39 species of blowflies.[2][3][4][5][6]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fauna_of_the_United_States
An estimated 432 species of mammals characterize the fauna of the continental U.S.[2] There are more than 800 species of bird[3] and more than 100,000 known species of insects.[4] There are 311 known reptiles, 295 amphibians and 1154 known fish species in the U.S.[5
Why Venezuela Reporting Is So Bad
Review of Alan MacLeod’s Bad News From Venezuela
https://fair.org/home/why-venezuela-reporting-is-so-bad/
For almost 20 years, the US government has been trying to overthrow Venezuela’s government, and establishment media outlets (state, corporate and some nonprofit) throughout the Americas and Europe have been bending over backwards to help the US do it.
…. In the US and UK establishment media, you are way more likely to see a defense of Saudi Arabia’s dictatorship than of Venezuela’s democratically elected government. Any defense of Venezuela’s government will provoke vilification and ridicule, so both Alan MacLeod and his publisher (Routledge) deserve very high praise for producing the book Bad News From Venezuela: Twenty Years of Fake News and Misreporting. It took real political courage.
…. MacLeod’s approach was to assess 501 articles (news reports and opinion pieces) about Venezuela that appeared in the US and UK newspapers during key periods since Hugo Chávez was first elected Venezuelan president in 1998.
WSJ’s Epic Distortion of Colombian and Venezuelan Refugees
https://fair.org/home/wsjs-epic-distortion-of-colombian-and-venezuelan-refugees/
The Politics of Food in Venezuela
https://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/13855
A nuanced understanding of contemporary Venezuela requires going back not to Chávez’s election in 1999, but centuries earlier, to the period of colonization and the inception of interrelated patterns of extraction and social differentiation that continue today.
Related:
https://consortiumnews.com/2018/10/09/future-of-western-democracy-being-played-out-in-brazil/
Five Common Wolf Myths Dispelled
http://bemidjipioneer.com/news/science-and-nature/4511382-expert-dispels-5-common-wolf-myths-ahead-international-wolf
“That book is still being sold. I tried to get that off the shelf, but it’s selling too well.”
+++
just take a look at amazon’s one-star reviews
https://www.amazon.com/Wolf-Ecology-Behavior-Endangered-Species/product-reviews/0816610266/ref=cm_cr_dp_d_hist_1?ie=UTF8&filterByStar=one_star&reviewerType=all_reviews#reviews-filter-bar
PLEASE RESPECT THE AUTHOR, DON’T BUY THIS BOOK
Don’t buy! The author has asked for the book to stop being published.
Dont get this book the author has asked the publisher …
The author has debunked his own theories.
Much of the information is sorely out of date, for example the whole idea of “Alpha” wolves and pack hierarchy has since been debunked
As I sit here during another unfortunately gray northern MN morning, we skipped October and went directly to November… I have a copy of said Mech book in my lap. Hard cover, obtained sometime in mid 70’s, signed by the author at the 1995 International Wolf Symposium. I remember him commenting at the time of the books information as “old”.
Interesting example of how the ability to gather information evolves, in particular in regard for animals where so little was known, save for the equally limited information known by those who lived among wolves.
Back in the lates 60’s and early 70’s, there wasn’t much literature available about wolves. There was Murie, Lois Crisler’s Arctic Wild from 1956, Rutter and Pimlott’s The World of the Wolf, also in my possession and not a whole lot more for those interested in the wolf. Currently, we have an animal that has been comparativley been studied to death.
Information continues to pour in, the good, the bad, and the ugly. Living in wolf country as I do, the wolf is fairly easy animal with which to share the land. Young dogs like to investigate and unfortunately chase, whereas the older dogs either know better, or find the effort not worth their while. Musing over my experiences with wolves, all interactions have been positive,with wolves either showing idle curiosity, continuing on in the direction they were heading, or rapidly disappearing with indignation, yet, in particular with dogs, situations can change quickly.
Back to Mech. I’ve always liked this quote. “Wolves are neither saints nor sinners save for those who would make them so.”
I am always interested in someone’s bookshelf – that’s why I love photo’s from N.Chomsky’s office, Keith Richards’s library or D.Mech’s office for that matter. Love that worn dust jacket of Wolves
https://brightestyoungthings.com/articles/the-secret-of-noam-a-chomsky-interview
http://colleencollinsbooks.com/blog/2015/4/15/keith-richards-rocker-librarian
and of course those who rewarded Mech’s book with one star are Mat-ters /Rockholm /Gillett /Nugent-types who are determined to spare the public of another misinformation source
https://www.idahostatesman.com/outdoors/hunting/article219758365.html
disgusting
When this guy was born, there must have been two choices for brains remaining that day. And both included a box of rocks.
For some reason this song popped into my head when I read the article and saw the photos of “lets kill something for the fun of it” Blake Fischer’s African hunting trip
No surprise that this guy is an Idaho Game Commissioner
Just awful. How could anyone do such a thing. Beyond selfish and greedy. 🙁
Good grief. A public apology that means nothing will not suffice. He needs to resign. Young were killed.
The baby baboon looks to be in agony. What an insensitive lout to do such a thing, and hide behind ‘legal and ethical. But it is immoral. He needs to resign or be made to. It does show the agency in a bad light, that belongs in another era, along with the handlebar mustache. 🙁
Immoral? What is immoral is those that know of the inevitability of management for animals “we don’t eat”, YET, continue the “outrage” with that inevitability in tow! Those (groups and individuals) that absolutely know of the inevitability and use the uninformed to garner the clicking of their “donate now” buttons are where immorality lies! NOT with those that understand it & provide the resources to keep true balance and habitat protection of those very animals.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/05/opinion/in-zimbabwe-we-dont-cry-for-lions.html
Predators like Wayne Pacelle love this stuff! And people like him know of the inevitability of having to manage an animal like he baboon! Think of the immorality of those that promote and stand with the “killing” of viable babies in the womb and no answers for an expanding and habitat taxing baboon population – typically they are the same ones that have love for Cecil! Sad!
That’s a discussion for a different day (and blog).
The question I have is how can people justify, and rationalize away, the causing pain and suffering and misery, to another sentient being – and then pose for photos with a big, crap-eating grin on their face!
Do they not think anyone else feels pain but humans? That’s a long-outdated notion, and is being challenged by current research into the sentience of animals. Do they not care? And they need to balance their own habitat.
“A week later, my mother gathered me with nine of my siblings…”
Perhaps part of the problem
“to explain that her uncle had been attacked but escaped with nothing more than an injured leg. The lion sucked the life out of the village: No one socialized by fires at night; no one dared stroll over to a neighbor’s homestead.”
Compelling argument, however, Cecil the lion was lured out of a preserve not endangering a village. It was slaughtered for fun.
And here on full display is how some have disdain and contempt for the proliferation of man in one breath and promote the unfettered proliferation of the grizz, wolf, lion and baboon in the next.
Immorality is obscured in the light coming from ones false idols like the wolf, lion, grizzly & baboon. It gets a little clear in the light coming from the reflection off the box of rocks!
Morality…immorality…how about just some honesty…he enjoys killing “things”.
Namibia’s trophy hunting is controlled by the Ministry of Environment and Tourism, which issues special permits for hunting big game such as zebras, giraffes, wildebeest, impalas and other animals. But, Fischer told the Statesman, “baboons are free.”
Fischer probably spent his weekends as a kid, shooting coyotes, badgers and ground squirrels. Cuz ya know, out here in the west, they are “free” too…
https://www.npr.org/2018/10/15/657485097/idaho-game-commissioner-criticized-for-killing-family-of-baboons-in-africa
Nancy, you have a real grudge for the “trophy hunter” don’t you??? It sounds like baboons are a real nuisance for the good people of Africa. I applaud the locals that recognize their(the baboons)plight and are proactive in keeping them from becoming vermin…. You know what vermin are don’t you Nancy?
The grizzly bear is coming close to being on the list of vermin, as was said here on TWN 8 to 10 percent of the populations is causing issues in poorer habitat they are now moving into. I honestly think groups like HSUS are tickled pink to have them failing at such rates and to have a law that they can abuse to no end in order to wear the grizz on their sleeve. It’s good for business. Long term damage to the ESA has been done thanks to groups like them and those with a grudge. In the meantime their welfare lawyers lap up EAJA dollars left and right!
Mat-ters, you really do need to get a life 🙂
There are many good examples & studies out there by qualified researchers (researchers not paid by governments, hoping to sideline concerns) as to why other species, who we humans share the planet with, are now labeled as pests or vermin.
http://theconversation.com/why-southern-africas-iconic-baboon-is-on-the-decline-55042
And a link below to a good read and who knows Mat-ters, YOU might find some answers as to why you feel this innate need to discount; every other living species around you, that doesn’t fall right into that neat, comfortable, little pattern of life, set up by your ancestors before you?
https://www.npr.org/2011/03/29/134956180/criminals-see-their-victims-as-less-than-human
There you go again, going out on your ledge and putting words in the mouths of others. The only mega organisms on the earth with unfettered population growth are humans.
Immorality and False idols? Your propensity for application of your own dogma upon others is not complimentary to you in anyway. Suffice it to o say I’m as comfortable in my own skin as I guess you are with your sky god.
It gets a little more clear, that when one looks around at the footprint of humans on the earth, their rapaciousness for resources, and waste production compared to the creatures with whom we share this orb, that comments like yours provide great clarity to the likelihood that you and Fischer were in a race for one box of rocks or the other.
I suppose you are (comfortable)… The general narrative here is unequivocally consistent with my statement “And here on full display is how some have disdain and contempt for the proliferation of man in one breath and promote the unfettered proliferation of the grizz, wolf, lion and baboon in the next.” I put no words in anyone’s mouth! JUST a sound observation! My morality wants nothing to do with that observation and those adding to the narrative can do so all they want…..
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=sh8YtxdTkE4
No wildlife will ever have unfettered proliferation of their populations ever again. There’s actually a squirrel census going on in Central Park (and you know what that might mean.)
There are certain rhinos that are nearly extinct, whose horns are used to make false idols. Meanwhile, the human population is 7.6 billion as of May 2018.
ugghhh Mat-ters you’ve got so little appreciation for anything but your own dogged take on human superiority. attitudes like yours are why we are in a sixth extinction with some populations of large mammals counted in the hundreds and imminent extinctions as common as the stars in the sky. sad man
Another Grizzly encounter. Bear Spray worked, sort of.
Via Mountain Journal and Todd Wilkinson
Greg Gibson and Bob Legasa: glad you guys are okay and thanks for sharing details….insights and lessons to be learned for all….
This post from Bob Legasa
16 hrs
“Before rumors spread and things get blown severely out of proportion this morning I was mauled by a Grizzly Bear bow hunting in Montana.
Due to the closeness (12 yards) I did not have time to react besides getting into a defensive mode/stance,
My hunting partner Greg Gibson and I surprised a Sow grizzly and her cub as we were moving in on some Elk. We walked up to with in 12 yards when we all saw each other And before I could even reach for my bear spray she was at full charge. I was able to get my arm up to someone at protect my face when she knocked me over, Greg was only a few steps behind me and he was able to get his bear spray out and give one shot to the bear which stopped her and she reared up and came towards him, he was able to give her one more blast where she and her cub retreated.
Readying myself for another attack I was able to get my bear spray out of the holster and unfortunately during all the chaos sprayed my self.
My arm is broken in two spots where she grabbed on with her mouth and I have a nice couple of scratches on my face where she got me with her claws.
We were able to make it to Livingston to the ER room. Because of the bear bite and fractured bones they were afraid of infection so they put me in an ambulance and sent me to Bozeman where they needed to do surgery to clean out the wound.
I will be here until Monday as they want the wound to drain lessening the cause of any sort of infection.
Just received an updated tetanus shot and started a series of rabies shots.
Huge shout out for my hunting partner Greg has his quick response was able to minimize the damage and severity of this attack.
All in all I am in good shape.My arm is screwed up a little and sore and the vision is good, I will be fine.
Huge shout out to the Livingston ER room and the Bozeman hospital and surgeons, nurses, etc.
In a few days I’ll give you a little bit more of a update.”
It is important to start relating to and understanding our relationships with wildlife, in what’s left of wildlife habitat:
https://www.jscimedcentral.com/Behavior/behavior-2-1009.php
Big salute to Greg Gibson and Bob Legasa in spite of the obvious fact that the event could have turned on a dime and ended in tragedy their report of the encounter has a strong tone of respect for the bears. Soooo glad such a bad incident turned out no worse for all four.
Put that in your trophy case
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/15/us/idaho-fish-game-hunting-africa.html?rref=collection%2Ftimestopic%2FAnimals&action=click&contentCollection=science®ion=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=1&pgtype=collection
https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/2018/10/15/hyperalarming-study-shows-massive-insect-loss/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.369f97e1ba01
One’s first impulse is to say good. There seems to be no lack of biting insects up here, mosquitoes, deer flies, blackflies, the occasional horse fly, the ankle-biters, the hordes of stinging insects…the tree killers such as spruce budworm, emerald ash borer gettin nearer, etc. not to mention the plethora of arachnids including spiders of all varieties and tine ubiquitous ticks, but then one realizes the interwoven nature of nature.the only real insect eaters we have up here are the warblers and woodpeckers. When the warblers arrive in May, the air is festive with their song. I believe that outside of the tropics, there exists a greater variety of warbler species here, than anywhere else in the world. It’s always a challenge to remember their song, and to observe them in the trees before the leaves fully develop. They do a great job on spruce budworm except in pure stands of balsam fir and white spruce.
Woodpeckers, save the seasonal flickers, sapsuckers and redbellied, include the Hairy, Downy, the jackhammer of woodpeckers the Pileated, and the rarer three toed woodpeckers including the northern and blackbacked. The latter two appear to rummage through fallen balsam, with their tell tale calling card of chipped bark littering the ground along the fallen trees.
Other than the insects, and arachnids hitching rides on the dogs upon entering the cabin, and those fishing spiders that seem to appear from nowhere, they are seasonal, not missed when gone, but appreciated to have vanished, as with winter’s passing into Spring, and another bug season, yet part of Winter’s joy is coming inside to feel warmth surround one’s body.
Ahh bug season, kind of like the long winter, part of what makes the Northwoods unique
I’m wondering the effect bird-watching has on this issue….. bug eaters like Chickadees, Nuthatches, Nighthawks, Swallows, Sparrows, Yellow Warblers, and Woodpeckers have only recently been given a pass by a disnified public. Grandma once told me there were less birds in her youth. Bird-watchers have poured billions into feeding a clientele that in turn “unnaturally” kills bugs….. now, don’t get me wrong! I’m all for the Emma Marris model of wildlife management and urbanite’s right to attract in that trophy nighthawk. Again, I’m wondering the effect bird-watching has on this issue….. they best be on watch for the “hyperalarmed” climate expert taking aim at their past-time….maybe not??
Sigh…
Bye-bye and good riddance:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2018/10/15/i-shot-a-whole-family-of-baboons-idaho-fish-and-game-official-faces-fury-after-africa-trophy-hunting-boasts/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.4468c8794b22
Yes, but his replacement will likely not be a whole lot better.
I have gray foxes now (in SE lower MI). That is new. I was amazed. Red fox has obviously declined – they used to be abundant. I did not know, but the two are not that related, they just happen to be 2 canines of about the same size. I have mined trapper blogs and it looks like this is a trend. Up north gray is almost the only fox, and perhaps was most places in eastern N America before European-American agriculture and the war against their enemy, the trees. New things near me are 1) more forest, much more than 80 years ago, and 2) coyotes, which were never here before. I think coyotes are most of the cause, but am merely a beginner. Red fox is more vulnerable to them. Gray can climb trees, and sticks to forest more. Both are magnificent to observe hunting. I’ve not seen rearing of young for gray’s, yet, but my place has some good spots, and 50 chipmunks per acre (its a big white oak year).
I see the red from time to time (the one with socks), and they are so beautiful. Now I’m confused – coyotes, coywolves, gray fox and red fox.
coyotes are the more dominant predator but maybe the trappers are the cause of decline….
Interesting coat color analysis on wolves.
http://www.explorebigsky.com/research-links-wolf-color-to-survival-and-reproduction
The black allele is dominant, yet…
I don’t know if this explains why there are fewer black wolves in comparison to gray. As an observer in regard to black vs sable (wolf color) of which there are lighter and darker variations GS, the black color all but disappears in the woods, even when snow is deep as they just disappear into shadows and trees.
Fascinating. 🙂
in “Decade of the Wolf” page 18-19 Doug W Smith talks about black vs gray female genetics:
“… the average life span of a gray female wolf in Yellowstone is roughly four years, while the average age of a black female is roughly eight. In other words, there seem to be some big advantages to being black, as opposed to being gray.
…we’re speculating that the gene for being black could be linked to another gene that actually enhances a wolf’s immune system
… gray wolves shine when it comes to pups, enjoying a slightly higher survival rate than black ones;this advantage seems to disappear once the animals get through their first summer.
https://books.google.co.uk/books?redir_esc=y&hl=lv&id=U4a51XDu26IC&q=black+wolf+pup+survival#v=snippet&q=black%20wolf%20pup%20survival&f=false
wow that is fascinating
BLACK COAT COLOR: caused by K-locus gene thought to have originated from historic hybridization with domestic dogs 500-14,000 years ago
https://www.nps.gov/yell/learn/ys-24-1-yellowstone-wolf-facts.htm
The latest DNA research techniques have narrowed down the hybridization to ~7000 YA in the area of the Northwest Territories.
Good to see you posting!
There are fewer black wolves because the homozygous black wolves are significantly less fit than homozygous grays or heterozygous blacks, for reasons that are not currently understood. Annual survival rate for homozygous blacks is only on the order of .50, while heterozygous blacks and homozygous grays survive at around .80, and recruitment is around .30 for the hardier grays and blacks, but less than .10 for the homozygous blacks.
Homozygous blacks lag in other measures of fitness as well – breeding life and reproductive success. So even though the black coloration is a dominant trait, it’s likely that grays will always outnumber blacks.
For dog people, https://www.nationalcanineresearchcouncil.com/browse/research_library/?rows=20&f%5B0%5D=bundle:research_library&
https://www.msn.com/en-us/video/animals/humpback-whale-takes-swipe-at-over-eager-diver/vi-BBOBgJL
I wonder how this conflict will be resolved. No easy answer.
https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/article219339280.html?fbclid=IwAR0LY_rucg9cBCymBJ4FZfPvUbQVNgo8G6eJWFqTUKZi3tnTyrxgO7_7ZS4
https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/10/19/the-plight-of-the-pyrenees-the-abandoned-guard-dogs-of-the-west/
more ugly underbelly of the livestock industry
dogs in hunting and in livestock seem to suffer tremendous abuse….along with the land and predators.
Sad. Harming a dog in any way is just shameful. Some of these people just don’t want to put in any extra effort to take care of their animals, it seems. Just send the government the bill for any livestock losses.
I’ve always wondered – can investigators tell which was a predation and which was a cow or calf that died from other causes and found by a carnivore?
I’ve always wondered – can investigators tell which was a predation and which was a cow or calf that died from other causes and found by a carnivore?
Not difficult in most cases – dead animals don’t struggle or bleed out. If we’re still unsure based on the scene, we skin the carcass and look for bite marks.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2018-10-18/pando-aspen-clone-utah-collapse/10383562
Op-Ed: Will Trophy Hunting Grizzlies Make The Wilds Safer?
https://mountainjournal.org/does-trophy-hunting-animals-make-wild-places-safer
“But research conducted in Canada and Alaska shows that the hunting of grizzlies does not decrease these sorts of tragic events. Even if the hunting seasons had gone forth, it would have been illegal to kill sows with cubs. Sow grizzlies are naturally and sometimes aggressively defensive of their cubs, and grizzlies can be aggressively defensive of their food caches. It’s their nature. Dead grizzlies don’t learn to avoid humans. “
Snow leopard vs Himalayan Blue Sheep. Amazing!
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ulF9R7r4Jok
Yikes, carnivores have to work hard for their dinner! That illustrates how cats always land on their feet for certain. 🙂
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PSxihhBzCjk
Who would have not figured this would happen.
Researchers Have Found Microplastics in Human Waste for the First Time – TIME
Researchers Have Found Microplastics in Human Waste for the First Time
Tests conducted by the the Environment Agency Austria show microplastics may be widespread in the human gut
Casey Quackenbush
A new study found microplastic particles in human waste for the first time, a worrying sign of the prevalence of plastic in the food chain, the Guardian reports.
In the small study of participants from Europe, Russia and Japan, all eight were found to have microplastic particles in their stool samples. Out of 10 varieties tested for, nine different plastics were identified in the human waste, with polypropylene and polyethylene terephthalate the most common.
Based on their findings, the study researchers expect that tiny bits of plastics may be widespread in the human digestive system.
“This is the first study of its kind and confirms what we have long suspected, that plastics ultimately reach the human gut. Of particular concern is what this means to us, and especially patients with gastrointestinal diseases,” said Philipp Schwabl, the study’s lead and a researcher at the Medical University of Vienna.
THE BRIEF
The 12 top stories you need to know right now, chosen by TIME’s editors
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The study, conducted by the Environment Agency Austria, hypothesizes that “more than 50% of the world population might have microplastics in their stools,” according to the Guardian. However, the authors underscored the need for more research on a larger sample size before drawing conclusions.
Microplastics are tiny pieces of plastic smaller than 5 millimeters, either found in products like exfoliants or disintegrated from larger pieces of plastic such as those that often end up in the ocean.
One study earlier this year found that fish in Hong Kong were ingesting plastic which could end up in humans. Another found that microplastic contamination in bottled water was nearly universal.
Researchers say microplastics circulating in the human body could endanger health, affecting the immune system or facilitating the exchange of toxins, according to the Guardian.
By the World Economic Forum’s estimation, the world’s oceans will be filled with more plastic than fish by weight by 2050. Every year, 8 million metric tons of plastic end up in the oceans—a that figure could increase by ten-fold over the next decade if actions are not taken, according to another 2015 study.
Visit TIME.com
The “Russian Model” ….. Trump must be behind this……
https://www.theyeshivaworld.com/news/general/1609233/watch-mark-levin-on-the-truth-about-global-warming.html
Ah yes, Fox News…best taken with a pinch of salt and 2 aspirin 🙂
“Perhaps the most misleading – and certainly the highest profile – was a June 21st op-ed in the Wall Street Journal written by Pat Michaels and Ryan Maue. Michaels is director of the Center for the Study of Science at the Cato Institute, a think tank financially linked to the fossil fuel industry”
http://blogs.edf.org/climate411/2018/07/18/hansen-was-right-marking-an-anniversary-by-misleading-the-public/
Discussions 5 years earlier:
https://skepticalscience.com/patrick-michaels-history-getting-climate-wrong.html
From your article “Four decades of climate model projections have fared well”
hahhaaahhhaaaaa
Nancy, If you believe that then you are not paying attection!
Attection? No, you aren’t paying attention, Matt-ters. If Fox News is your go to source for up to date information regarding the affairs of this country and the world….. my heart aches for you.
You’re embarrassing yourself, Nancy! I hope ya got a big heart.
.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/markjoyella/2018/10/08/6-million-watch-kavanaugh-coverage-saturday-fox-news-dominates-ratings/#709f841d3ad5
https://www.businessinsider.com/study-watching-fox-news-makes-you-less-informed-than-watching-no-news-at-all-2012-5
Huh. Also from Forbes:
“Fox News is like an all-you-can-eat buffet, serving up red meat. A more balanced diet might be healthier in the long run
https://www.forbes.com/sites/quora/2016/07/21/a-rigorous-scientific-look-into-the-fox-news-effect/#41a4e77512ab
For the record….. I don’t watch FOX at home ….. I don’t have cable. I do enjoy watching ABC NBC and CBS make fools of themselves and their reporting when I know both sides of the story. The Kavanaugh coverage made things quite clear. They had no interest in giving background info of the accusers. When information came out on what fords x-boyfriend had to say about her, NOT A PEEP in the headlines…. when it came out about HER true experiences with Polygraphs NOT A PEEP in the headlines. When it came out about HIS overwhelming support of former highschool classmates…. I could go on and on and on….
I know what the Democrat/Leftist news has to say and know both sides…. and know how things are reported. If you don’t watch both YOU’RE A FOOL!
BACK TO WILDLIFE! The mainstream media are sheep herders!
“They had no interest in giving background info of the accusers”
Nor did the GOP want to explore fully, other real concerns about Kavanaugh’s credibility.
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/kavanaugh-dogged-credibility-concerns-ahead-senate-hearing
But yes, lets get BACK TO WILDLIFE or is it vermin? I guess it depends on how it effects your orderly, little world.
30 years after Hansen’s testimony
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2018/06/30-years-after-hansens-testimony/
Patrick J. Michaels
https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Patrick_J._Michaels
In 2004: Michaels-McKitrick Climate paper basic error
Michaels “co-operated with Ross McKitrick on another paper that managed to “prove” that global warming wasn’t happening by mixing up degrees with radians.”[28]
LOL
Patrick J. Michaels – funding
https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Patrick_J._Michaels_-_funding
https://nbcmontana.com/news/local/oil-and-gas-lease-sales-in-sage-grouse-habitat-delayed
What happened to the ‘unprecedented collaborative efforts’ touted by the last administration to protect sage grouse habitat? It sounds more like unprecedented efforts to try to continue exploiting and developing:
https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/10/18/the-ten-big-lies-of-traditional-western-politics/
Here’s another story that has been bothering me all day. If progressive news outlets print this stuff with the same tired reasoning, it’s hopeless (but I hope not):
https://www.salon.com/2018/10/21/restocking-wolves-on-isle-royale-raises-questions-about-which-species-get-rescued_partner/
1. “Restocking wolves on Isle Royale is the first time that the National Park Service has intervened in a designated wilderness area to manipulate a predator-prey relationship.”
Restocking? Really? That word sounds like game fish and animals, or livestock. And it is true that it is the first time the NPS has done such a thing?
2. “Supporters call this plan a “genetic rescue,” but skeptics say nature should be allowed to take its course.”
Why start now? People have interfered with nature’s course for centuries, so much so that we have made drastic and dramatic changes that need to be corrected.
3. “How will it choose which species to save?”
Trophic cascades anyone? Restoring the top carnivores to an ecosystem benefits all.
Restocking wolves on Isle Royale is the first time that the National Park Service has intervened in a designated wilderness area to manipulate a predator-prey relationship.
I guess they don’t count the sickening helicopter assisted slaughter of wolves in the Lolo as a manipulation…..
Yes! It’s done ‘in reverse’ by F&W routinely.
I was surprised they didn’t include the reintroduction to Yellowstone.
And who are ‘the skeptics’? It doesn’t say…..
I was sorry to hear about the death of one of the wolves, but I think the program is a good one, to protect some of them – especially with the nefarious legislation floating around Congress constantly threatening the Great Lakes population.
I would love to visit Isle Royale.
More Democrats joining forces with Republicans to destroy America’s wildlife. I just do not get it! It must be that wildlife is the easiest, most throwaway concession to make without having any voter repercussions:
https://www.jhnewsandguide.com/news/election/wyoming_statewide_races/article_d0ced3d5-5b22-5187-97c2-c709b2b23b2c.html
https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/10/22/basket-of-deplorables-revisited-grizzly-bears-at-the-mercy-of-wyoming/
I just cannot believe that the states of ID and WY can still claim that they can manage wildlife after just how poor and inadequate the plans were exposed to be in what should have been a humiliating court case for F&W and the states.
Having unused hunting tags is not a good enough reason for a governor’s candidate to make for hunting!
Unfortunately, it’s that time of the year up here again. Good to know how to release this trap, because it’s a cul de sac for your dog if caught in one. I’d also caution anyone who practices with a conibear to watch your thumbs and fingers because if it closes on your digits, you need help quick.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=uVTyT3_nIcM
Trapping could go the way of whale oil and no one would miss it.
“Trapping could go the way of whale oil and no one would miss it.”
Au contraire, how would you and your ilk clean up the vermin that you’ve set up for failure…. like the thousands of cougars trapped and killed in CA ….. or more recently the 8 to 10 percent of the grizzlies causing issues in the GYA …. or the HUNDREDS Minnesota wolves that are killed on the skirts of marginal wolf habitat.
As you are not a mind reader, or for that matter (again, pun intended) a discerning individual, please allow me to insert the word recreational in front of trapping. Furs are no longer necessary in our world and incidental take is much too high.
http://www.citypages.com/news/how-minnesota-refuses-to-save-dogs-being-killed-by-trappers/389964231
Ahh yes, a typical lefty trick where your proven wrong then name call and accuse to the exact thing you have just done….. It WAS not very discerning to leave out the word “recreational”, then have the audacity to name call me with not “discerning”. It made me laugh when the lefty hero Hillary kicked off her run for the presidency with “women need to be believed”. Immer, you learned from the best, thanks for the morning chuckle!
Sorry, but you’ve proven nothing. Conibears aren’t used for wolves, cougars and grizzly, but largely for smaller mammals and water sets, to which my original post with video for disarming a conibears was directed. Those traps are in great demand among recreational trappers because they don’t have to be checked every day, and yes, they kill quickly, all the more reason for the video provided.
Then you switch topic again, and through in your typical banter, that does nothing for conversation/discussion. Doesn’t matter (there it is again) if I’m left or right, but the sooner traps of this sort, as well as snares, and legholds are removed from our lands, the better. I doubt you will find many discerning individuals who post on this site who will disagree.
Name calling? I wrote what you aren’t, not what you are, and the latter would takes pages. Let’s Say JB had you pegged with his zipper analogy.
Duplicate. Moderators please delete.
Gotta love it, Immer…..proven is quite clear here.
Back in the day, I took hunters safety! To my surprise we had a woman instructor…. to this day I remember my older brother arguing with her that his answer to the question…. something like (What type of of weapon fires automatically with every pull of the trigger?) He said “rifle” ….she said it was wrong and “semi-automatic rifle” was a right answer.
Immer, is that how you run your classes now a days?? Do ya give up a participation metal for “rifle”…. Makes me wonder if back in the day little Immey pouted and sat in the corner drawing coyotes… because Sister Mary didn’t see eye to eye with the “trapping” answer…..Makes me wonder…
You’ve proven nothing other than Your ego is the anesthesia that deadens the pain of your ignorance.
Sorry, but you’ve proven nothing. Conibears aren’t used for wolves, cougars and grizzly, but largely for smaller mammals and water sets like beaver and otter, to which my original post with video for disarming a conibears was directed. Those traps are in great demand among recreational trappers because they don’t have to be checked every day, and yes, they are deadly efficient, all the more reason for the video provided.
Then you switch topic again, and throw in your typical banter, that does nothing for conversation/discussion. Doesn’t matter (there it is again) if I’m left or right, but the sooner traps of this sort, as well as snares, and legholds are removed from our lands, the better. I doubt you will find many discerning individuals who post on this site who will disagree. It is, after all, a wildlife site, not a grin for the photo by what you just shot, or in this case trapped and hang its head on a wall site.
Name calling? I wrote what you aren’t, not what you are, and the latter would fill pages. Let’s Say JB had you pegged with his zipper analogy.
I’m thinking #3 & #4, might apply to your way of “expressing” yourself on this site and perhaps other sites too, Mat-ters?
Because there is little doubt, IMHO (and perhaps a few others on this site…from your comments) you “swing” hard and far to the right, in your posts regarding the issues surrounding wildlife, in what’s left of wildlife habitat.
25 years in the same location in Montana and the only vermin, invasive species I’ve had to deal with, continuously, over those years, is domesticated livestock in an areas that can’t and never did, support their introduction…
Ah yes typical right-wing trick accusing opponents of trickery! I think YOU have learned from the best, our winniest president ever.
Ya know …. I didn’t vote for him…. but absolutely love the way he treats the mainstream lefty media and their 24×7 non-stop hate… they deserve no respect, NONE! Call it “winniest” if you want! It isn’t new, Bush cowered to their bull! Trump is showing us all how it to treat them!
So lying about everything is what we can learn from watching the news? You’re right, don’t trust the media. But don’t trust the politician as well. Also, don’t trust those who use the tactics of hate. The media for sure but our president is the master. It seems that you strive to be a top student!
H, I didn’t vote for Trump because of concerns for what his foreign policy would bring. As of now I have totally flipped on the issues and feel his foreign policy should “so far” be the blueprint for the future. If you watch only the leftist media you don’t understand how his unrelenting pressure on China is one of the reasons NK has come to the table and stop their provocative rhetoric. I almost voted for him only on the Supreme Court nominations. Some say 15 to 20 percent of his voters say that is the ONLY reason they voted for him.
If you read is book “Art of the deal” you would understand some of his “lies” and compound that with a media that is 24×7 Trump hate….you believe the “lie” lie. Calling him a racist or “white supremacist” is laughable….. a better case can be made that the media and Obama are race baiters!
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/arts/photos-meet-the-wolves-and-humans-who-inspired-american-wolf
thanks Nancy!
FYI
https://www.peer.org/news/press-releases/refuges-slash-already-shrinking-law-enforcement.html
The only one you won’t meet is her vile killer. Now ordinary hunters I can meet halfway, but wolf killers are a special bad breed, and I won’t have one scintilla of sympathy for them.
I won’t spend one dime on a book that asks for sympathy for them, or understanding. That’s what turned me off so much when I read a comment about 0-Six’s pelt on Amazon!
Mat-ters, if there’s one thing the country, all political leanings, can agree on is what a vile mess politics has become.
I think both sides’ volatile rhetoric is responsible for the latest horrors.
I watched the Kavanaugh confirmation in disbelief as well. The concept of jurisprudence is being thrown out the window in current times. How they tried to destroy that man’s life was shocking to me. Something that may have occurred when he was an immature minor himself, and ordinary juveniles’ records are sealed for the very reason that they will mature and should not have their lives destroyed.
If he had done something in his 12 spotless years as a judge, I might have been more inclined to think he should not be confirmed, especially since I remember well the Clarence Thomas confirmation. Susan Collins was a wonder – thorough and concise.
The porn lawyer and his client’s claims have been virtually dismissed.
Ida, thank you for some level headedness….. If I had to wager on who is telling the truth my money would go with Kavanaugh. The more I get to know about Ford the less believable she is…
Thanks! I try to call ’em like I see ’em, and do not fall in line with a party if I do not agree.
Ida, Kavanaugh wasn’t on trial. He was interviewing for a job that is a lifetime appointment. His raunchy behavior from his high school and college days is quite prudent to what kind of human he is today. And personally, whether or not he is an angry alcoholic placed in a position that changes peoples’ lives for generations matters.
Just wait until he votes on ESA and your precious wolves lose what minuscule protections they currently have. Let’s Ida Lupine reacts when this privileged, sniveling little frat rat wounds the wolves and endangers the ESA.
I will remember this post so if you come on here crying for your wolves when Kavanaugh and the other conservative SC justices wound wildlife protections and drill, dredge and destroy public lands, I will throw it back to you.
“I think both sides’ volatile rhetoric is responsible for the latest horrors.”
I think you should explain why you believe that. Which horrors? What level of responsibility? Applied to what? When?
I don’t think that can ever be proven for certain. I also think that just about every schoolboy of frat boy has something to be ashamed of in their past. It isn’t realistic to think that someone out there is going to be absolutely perfect, in my view. Most every woman on earth has had some kind of inappropriate behavior directed towards them.
I can’t believe you don’t think that people can grow and change from their adolescent and teenage years into an adult.
I won’t come crying. My crying days were under the Obama administration when Tester joined forces against wolves.
I just think that both sides should refrain from ‘lack of civility’ instruction because you just don’t know who it might incite.
By latest horrors, I meant the mail bomb and shooting in the synagogue. I thought that would be obvious, but shooting are a daily occurrence now anyway – and the lamenting after the fact is all we do.
As far as predictions on what the Supreme Court will do – I always think of the Warren Court. What happened was character assassination by Roe v. Wade zealots was my first thought about the entire matter, (im)pure and simple.
Neither side can be relied upon to protect the environment and wildlife. I’m sick to death of the whole lot of them.
Ida, I’ve bookmarked your post for reference. There will come a day when Kavanaugh votes on conservation issues, including the ESA. Let’s see how that works out for you.
I don’t care about Bill Clinton. Clinton isn’t being interviewed for a lifetime job making legal decisions that will effect me, my daughter and grandchild, and maybe, even a generation after that. Clinton isn’t running for office. The rightwingers only use the Bill Clinton to conjure the ghost of the Blue Gap dress from 25 years ago.
I do care about current events like the grabber in chief. Look what they did to Bear’s Ears. That matters. Look what the Republicans did in North Dakota to disenfranchise all ND Native American votes. Kavanaugh is on of the ones who voted to uphold the lower courts on requiring street addresses for all residents, even houses on reservations far removed from towns and cities. That matters. That is current.
As a man I resent your statement about schoolboys. I can state for the record that I never did anything like what that man was accused of. Nor did I know anyone who did, or had that happen. Maybe I live in a bubble, but I think that is what we should strive for, not excuses. My attitude and behavior towards women has not changed from high school. Has Kavanaugh’s?
Yes he apologized, but the exchange that preceded the apology should have been, by itself, a disqualifying moment for A now Supreme Court Justice.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/politics/kavanaugh-throws-blackout-question-back-to-klobuchar-then-apologizes/2018/09/27/211387c8-c2b0-11e8-9451-e878f96be19b_video.html?utm_term=.0dfca145833c
Well, good for you. You’re one. Sure we should strive for it, but it isn’t realistic. I challenge anyone to examine Congress for their drinking habits in college, the clumsy behavior of young men around girls. Bill “I never inhaled” Clinton and his bad behavior over a long period of time come to mind, and he was President (and not a bad one overall).
I actually do not know what really happened. There’s too many things not remembered (to avoid perjury?) to keep a very qualified candidate from the Supreme Court. There comes a time when a woman has to put these things behind her if she can.
I also think Diane Feinstein ought to have some kind of review of her behavior in this. Susan Collins certainly outclassed Frank Murkowski’s daughter, and in Mass. we’ve got Warren the kook, I’d wish for someone like Susan Collins.
More excuses. For that job only the highest standards should be used. Why do you bring up other people’s errors as if that excuses someone else? So, Bill Clinton and others are vile. Does that mean we should accept vile behavior in others? If you are going to be in the highest court office FOR LIFE, then you should be as perfect as possible. There should be no doubt. Can’t you see that this example of behavior sets a tone for the nation? Horrible. And I think it is realistic if we try.
Hiker, most young men are not like the way Kavanaugh is described. But then again, I wasn’t running around with prep school privileged kids. Working class kids and most were decent and honorable kids.
Yes, most boys I grew up with were decent to the girls. That was how we were raised.
Yvette, All one has to do is look at your post and they can tell exactly what kind of person you are. “raunchy”, “angry alcoholic”, “privileged, sniveling little frat rat” tells me you have no interest in seeing the real Bret Kavanaugh just what the 24×7 hate media had to say! So be it! Rush Limbaugh is dead on describing the likes of you!
Any decent Mother would be extremely proud to have a son like Justice Kavanaugh, his superlative academic record, his outstanding judicial record, his community service his family successes and his faith! NOT Yvette though! She more worried about getting someone on the court for activism and not constitutionalism! There isn’t even a hint of activism for any of the candidates Trump had on his list for judges! Yvette, you and your family have most certainly earned some leftist karma by your petty vindictive post to Ida!
Pay attention Mat-ters. Your alt-right mentality is becoming more obvious in your responses (attacks) on other posters here.
“Due to the controversial nature of the issues discussed, experience tells that a completely open forum would be a string of insults. We don’t want this to be a forum for free floating emotion. There are quite a few strangers who show up and post a troll. ***They are usually removed unless posting them would seem to bring the embarrassment they deserve”
http://www.thewildlifenews.com/blog-comment-rules/
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Graham's_Hierarchy_of_Disagreement.svg
I’m sorry you feel the way you do that I pointed out Yvette’s true attack on Ida… Yvette should only take my post as a taste of her own medicine….as some would say….made her look in the mirror.
Alt-right; If you want to label my views as “alt-right”,then so be it. Labels/name calling are a tool of demonization. I know of a collective genus that recently showed us all how to masterfully do it…. the members of the Senate judiciary committee minority. What goes around comes around.
Matters you could teach a master’s class in name calling! What a joke. Almost all your posts include some name that you heard somewhere else. Try some new ones, lets see how creative you can be.
Its how you pointed it out Mat-ters, in your too often rude and condescending way, when addressing anyone that doesn’t agree with you here, that bothers me.
Do me a favor and please read this article (and while I’m sure you will find the article biased) please also read the article (link also provided by the one commenter below the article) and then tell me again, how the minority members of the Senate judiciary committee differ from Judge Kavanaugh’s attempt, a few years ago, to get at the “truth” regarding our then, sitting president Bill Clinton, at that time in history who yes, he had an affair with, who by the way, was a consenting adult, in the White House and how that didn’t turn into a political sideshow/circus, with both parties involved, hoping to damn the other side?
And be warned, Kavanaugh, gets rather graphic in his “pursuit” or perhaps even obsessive need? (as the commenter suggested) for answers, to his questions when HE was in the position and granted the power, to ask the questions….
http://davidfarmer.bangordailynews.com/2018/09/26/republicans/the-truth-about-kavanaugh-will-come-out-can-the-senate-handle-it/
https://int.nyt.com/data/documenthelper/178-kavanaugh-clinton-monica-lewin/9b9a46ab055ee2458fd5/optimized/full.pdf#page=1
And let’s not forget, that during this time period, one of the republicans leading the charge against Clinton was Henry Hyde, who broke up a family due to his affair, all the while being married. Ahhh, the party of family values.
https://www.salon.com/1998/09/17/cov_16newsb/
My how things have changed in the world of higher education. Why it seems like just 50 years ago, oh wait, it was just about 50 years ago, that women were even allowed into some of the more prestigious “halls” of higher education.
“Gentlemen — let’s face it — charming as women are — they get to be a drag if you are forced to associate with them each and every day,” a Yale graduate wrote to the school’s alumni magazine. “Think of the poor student who has a steady date — he wants to concentrate on the basic principles of thermodynamics, but she keeps trying to gossip about the idiotic trivia all women try to impose on men.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/book-party/wp/2016/10/14/how-harvard-princeton-and-yale-discovered-women/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.f53f73db91a1
And the attitudes 50 years later:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/sep/29/yale-students-protest-brett-kavanaugh
Now you and I could go on and on about this Mat-ters but it serves no purpose on this blog since you have your opinion and I have mine, regarding the events & coverage, surrounding Kavanaugh’s nomination.
So back to wildlife issues 🙂
The very fact that you choose only Bill’s oval office discretion is an indictment of the media and their failure to do a Kavanaugh on Billy!
https://www.businessinsider.com/these-are-the-sexual-assault-allegations-against-bill-clinton-2017-11
or not have their lives destroyed over a mistake, I should add.
Matters, seems you’ve been fooled like the rest. Do you still believe that North Korea or China are doing anything different because of Trump? NK still has missiles and our trade deficit with China is worse than ever. His tax cuts only help the super rich and while China makes progress with renewables trump says coal is king. What a joke. If you only believe a tenth of what you hear about him it’s a disaster. This, without bringing up my original point, which you leave out, his hate is hateful. It influences others to hate as well. Or are you one of those who believe that the bombs are a hoax and democrats are funding the migrant caravan. This is a president who jokes about his hair after people are murdered worshipping. His style seems to piss off everyone who doesn’t agree with him. Then he calls for unity after dividing everyone into those for and against him.
Hiker, seems you have been fooled like the rest of the lefty media lovers. NK has missiles because leaders like Clinton, Bush and Obama let it happen. “NK and China not doing anything different because of Trump?” What are you smoken that your senses have been numbed?
It is absolutely abhorrent that the only divisive rhetoric YOU hear is the one shouted from the roof tops at CNN ABC CBS MNNBC etc… When in reality a better case can be made in reverse! JUST THINK how the media would have acted if someone shot up the Democrat baseball team!
https://www.redstate.com/tladuke/2018/10/26/media-democrats-hateful-rhetoric-make-cesar-altieri-sayoc-snap/
BTW this is the second article saying Cesar Altieri WAS once A REGISTERED DEMOCRAT! hahddahhahahahh! YOU WON’T SEE that on CNN & Georgy won’t mention it on his round table.
I agree that past administrations have blown it with NK. I agree you CAN’T trust the media (didn’t you read that in my previous post?). But you gotta admit that Trump has said and done those things I mentioned earlier. Hard to call “fake news” when they show him saying those things. What have you to say about his statements just during the last week? Never mind all the terrible things he said before. Don’t bring up previous presidents in your arguments! I agree they were all horrible. However, Trump is worse by far. His greatest achievement is to divide us! I bet you and I have a lot more in common than you think. You obviously care about public lands a great deal. As do I! We may disagree about how they should be managed but we can agree that they SHOULD be managed. I may not like wolves being hunted but I agree that they need to be managed somehow. There are simply too many people in the world to think we shouldn’t try to manage our wildlands the best we can.
as usual – when it comes to foreign policy / military aggression – mainstream Americans have no clue about the crimes of their own government
leading American historian on Korea is Bruce Cumings
https://www.lrb.co.uk/v39/n10/bruce-cumings/a-murderous-history-of-korea
regarding NK nuclear weapons issue:
How the Media Wove a Narrative of North Korean Nuclear Deception
https://www.38north.org/2018/07/gporter072618/
I am fully aware of the horrors our government has committed(and continues in Yemen). I know we destroyed NK during that war. We also fought Chinese soldiers and lost. By saying past administration have blown it with NK I am not condoning our policy towards them. But their policy of preventing NK from having nukes HAS failed. Mostly because China props up that state. NK is a useful puppet for China.
The problem with ‘management’ of wildlife is people don’t seem to know the difference between management and overmanagement, or obsessive meddling.
Wolf killers, to me, are all part of that anti-government, anti-public lands, and even racist contingent. We all remember that photo with a group of men (or boys) with sheets over their faces, with guns, cowboy hats, and holding up an American flag and a dead wolf.
No sympathy or understanding for that. 🙁
Ida, I agree that all too often the managers make mistakes. I worked for the National Park Service and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for over 25 years. I saw firsthand countless errors. However, I also witnessed some of the most dedicated individuals in my life. Mostly they were frontline employees who believed in the mission of that agency. Do you think we should stop managing things because people make mistakes? Where would that leave us? It’s better to have faulty management than none at all.
Yes. I really don’t want to get into such heated exchanges and want to try to be civil with people who have been posting here for years and are passionate about the subjects.
That’s what happens when you post something offensive like “boys will be boys”. You offended me for making excuses for someone accused of doing something horrible to women. It’s a new era when that is no longer acceptable. Many things are no longer acceptable. Like owning another person, or making someone use a different restroom because of their race, or unwanted sexual advances. Let’s look forward to a new time when we are all treated equally, instead of looking back to when we weren’t.
I never said ‘boys will be boys’. I said the if it happened, they were not literally not mature individuals themselves at 15 or 17, I keep hearing conflicting reports about the ages. It did not mean the behavior is acceptable, but that there’s not enough to go on, 36 years later. It offends my intelligence to think that these continual ‘j’accuse!’ is enough to destroy someone. Complete with yearbooks!
The timing and the scripts of these repeated accusations are ‘compelling’ to me.
You implied “boys will be boys” when you said “I also think that just about every schoolboy or frat boy has something to be ashamed of in their past”. Making excuses. Remember, this is the Supreme Court we’re talking about. Don’t you want someone with a clean past sitting there for the rest of their lives? I mean, come on, if I was to run for city council somewhere I would expect people to dig up dirt on me. I would prepare to answer calmly and civilly to at least give the appearance that I deserve to be there. Not at all what I saw happen. He yelled at them like a scolded schoolboy screaming it’s not fair. Sorry, if you’re going to sit in that chair IT IS FAIR.
Well there’s no implication now because I stated what I meant exactly. I’m sure his patience was worn a little thin by that time. Amy Klobachar was trying to ‘imply’ that he had a drinking problem, and blackouts, in order to try to make the case for Ford. There’s just no proof of that.
I wouldn’t expect to have someone’s mistakes from their high school years brought forward. Just imagine if the justice candidate was a woman and something from her high school days was brought up? Or her grade school report card? Imagine the outcries of unfairness.
That’s why we have laws to protect young people whose minds haven’t matured – they will mature (hopefully) at some point into adults. It’s unreasonable to treat a 15 or 17 year-old like a mature adult.
I knew the case for the alleged assault which is now misconduct was failing when they made the abrupt switch to implications of alcoholism to fill in the gaps of the story.
If I’m not mistaken it’s against the law for minors to have sex. Just saying, you keep on bringing up these young ages as if that is an excuse, when if you are caught having sex at that age you can be classified as a sex offender the rest of your life!
Yes, we also know it is a new era, and for the Democrats to keep regressing to pre-feminism and pre-Civil Rights Act is offensive to me. Times have changed greatly. It’s a distraction from the issues I think should be taking center stage right now. I’m tired of just receiving the leftover crumbs for the things I care about, and Democrats capitulating.
But that said, there’s no accounting for how men, or women, will behave. The only one who can control what happens to me is me, and I have and do.
There is accounting for how we behave. It’s called the law. If a woman says no I stop. If she even hesitates I stop. It’s called consent and even in Junior High I knew about it. Others do control what happens to you. You could die tomorrow in some horrible accident. Maybe someone tries to rob you or attack you. It doesn’t feel good when that happens, but it IS outside your control.
On a wildlife note, Washington state F&G has authorized the killing of the two remaining wolves of the Profanity pack in NE Washington. 16 depredations attributed to the pack, all on one ranchers cattle as far as I can glean from local coverage. Not easy to decide on which way to come down on this. On the one hand they have taken out more than one pack in the region, (at the behest of the same rancher) so it seems likely another pack will probably form in the area in short order. The coverage I’ve read indicates that the rancher has tried to use deterrents to no effective affect. I am realistic enough to to understand that as wolf populations grow/expand there are going to be conflicts that are going to be addressed by humans (probably in a heavy-handed manner). however, it may be time to re-evaluate these grazing leases in light of geography and timing. Thank You
I should add that as far as wolves coming off the endangered species list in the future ‘because of Kavanaugh’ – the precedent was set (we know that Justice Kavanaugh believes in following precedent) when John Tester (D) and Mike Simpson (R) conspired to delist them without the remedy of judicial review. All just this side of illegal, according to the judge in the case.
It is going to take a huge effort now to keep wolves, and any other wildlife, protected because of them. It is a constant threat. And other Democrats and Republicans are co-authorizing legislation detrimental to wolves and other wildlife, and wild lands. But the nail was first hammered by Tester and the Obama administration.
Worth the watch if you missed it:
I should say that I had a 80-ft pine tree come down during a bad but short windstorm in the area – the tree didn’t come down on the house, but a few branches knocked out the power lines and the power surge fried my computer. What a fright! I thought there was going to be a fire. That was during most of the early part of the Kavanaugh hearings.
After getting things repaired and replaced, the latter part I was able to follow.
For me, these are battles that have been fought and won decades ago. Will they be perfect? No, but huge changes have been made.
It’s time to move on to anthropocentric climate change and environmental issues that effect all of us, and the innocent beings who (try) to survive alongside our multitudes.
I have said all I am going to about this topic, but carry on. Have a pleasant evening!
You too, Ida and no hard feelings on my part.
🙂 Me neither. Thanks!
For all, here’s an interesting read:
https://www.houstonchronicle.com/opinion/outlook/article/Opposing-Trump-s-border-wall-with-the-fed-s-13362133.php
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-46020176
I’ve lost faith in that most in our species will do anything to conserve our planet and its inhabitants. We must change the paradigm in many areas but we refuse. And the reason we refuse is largely based on greed. With wildlife and conservation, it appears that we are functioning with a 19th and early 20th century mindset.
Two article on Zinke. Notice that this guy Chancellor is also a coal baron. Shut them down. Again, 19th and early 20th century paradigms.
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/steven-chancellor-lion-trophy-import-permits-ryan-zinke-advisory-council_us_5bd78157e4b017e5bfd4dfaf
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/ryan-zinke-robert-e-lee-martin-luther-king-jr_us_5bd8d090e4b01abe6a190bb4
Good read:
“We call for more research to evaluate quantitatively the conditions that influence trophy hunting motivation. If the signalling hypothesis explains this behaviour, then policies designed to limit the perceived cost of the activity, dampen signal efficacy or both should reduce trophy hunting”
http://rsbl.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/13/3/20160909
I’m glad that this is being analyzed. It seems to be a holdover from our hunter/gatherer days IMO – but now that we do not need to hunt for food in modern times, we seem to be left with the killer instinct – all dressed up with nowhere to go, apparently.
But increasingly, women are trophy hunting too.
Not good
https://www.foxnews.com/us/judge-rules-in-favor-of-trump-administration-vs-california-blocks-bill-giving-state-right-to-regulate-sale-of-federal-land
Test
Test, test
Here’s a sad turn of events. I first read this over at the Exposing the Big Game site. The last six caribou in the lower 48 are being relocated to Canada, where hopefully they will have a better chance against extinction than they do in the good ol’ US of A.
Everyone has a turn of this phrase, here’s mine – MAWEA (Make America’s Wildlife Extirpated Again):
http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2018/nov/03/gone-from-the-lower-48-last-6-wild-caribou-in-on-t/
https://nbcmontana.com/news/local/rare-caribou-sightings-reported-in-nw-montana
https://nbcmontana.com/news/local/judge-rules-wildlife-agency-must-do-more-to-protect-lynx
This is a test
I can reply to your post, but I get the 404 if I try to post
Sorry, I must have posted this under the wrong thread:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/2018/11/05/federal-judge-blasts-fish-wildlife-service-says-endangered-wolves-cannot-be-shot/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.f35ae858751b
karma
https://allthatsinteresting.com/lion-killer-hunt?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=smoblionkiller
Having experienced tiny examples of karma over my life time Timz, situations that snap you back to what really matters in the big picture, this, definitely falls (pun intended) under an example of karma, at work 🙂
Test
http://montanauntamed.com/get-outside/article_70e1c649-f173-5a2e-954e-b09b0479ff95.html
Reflecting on 40 years of change in Yellowstone following wolf reintroduction
Honest look at predictions, what happened, and explanations.
Hunters vs Wolves
Boyce also discovered that wolves and human hunters influenced elk populations in very different ways.
“Another shortcoming was failure to recognize the strong age selectivity by wolves and hunters,” Boyce wrote. “Hunters preferentially kill bulls, but when they kill cow elk they primarily kill prime-age females of high reproductive value; cows learn to avoid hunters to the extent that individuals older than about 9-10 are essentially ‘bullet proof.’”
“In contrast, wolves killed primarily young and old (elk), and as a consequence the per-capita influence of hunters on elk populations was much greater than for those killed by wolves.”
Trying to splice these two comments together
Jim Yuskavitch, in his book In Wolf Country explains that wolves kill mostly calves and cow elk. Yes, wolves do kill elk. However, a study by IDFG wolf biologist Jason Husseman from 1999 until 2001 (supporting a Yellowstone study by Dan McNulty that claimed wolves target calves but don’t really begin to target adults until they are 10-11 years old) shows that “although wolves mostly killed elk calves, the cow elk they killed averaged 12.6 years old, compared to cows killed by hunters that averaged 7.3 years”.
This corroborates with an Isle Royale study of 307 wolf-killed moose from 1958-1974 where 9.8% of wolf killed moose were < 1-2 years of age. The percentages of wolf-killed moose then drops off precipitously until moose are in the 6-7 year range and accelerates to 10.1% by time moose are 10-11 years of age. An interesting aside is that the older moose make up a much smaller percentage of the total population, yet make up a much greater percentage of moose killed by wolves.
Yes, wolves will kill elk and moose of all ages, but the wolf economy thrives on calves and older individuals.
Nature’s way!
Scott walker may be going down
Hopefully some good news for Wisconsin wildlife!!!
Perhaps also some good news for Wisconsin people.
Klobochar and Baldwin I hope stay away from Jon Tester’s precedent. As I say, it’s the only time you’ll see bi-partisanship, delisting wolves, because it’s not on the top of the priority list for voters.
They had been co-authors of similar legislation for the Great Lakes wolves. I don’t know where this stands.
Lest we forget:
“Great Lakes democratic Senators Klobuchar and Baldwin, both facing 2018 elections, joined republican Senators Barrasso and Enzi from Wyoming as cosponsors on the Senate’s bill to kick wolves off of the endangered species list. If it and its companion bill in the House pass, Wyoming, Minnesota, Michigan, and Wisconsin wolves will lose Endangered Species Act protections and these states will decide how to manage wolves. That will mean a swift start of trophy hunting and trapping in some states and even unsportsmanlike baiting and hounding of wolves in Wisconsin.”
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/leda-huta/why-the-latest-war-on-wol_b_14370670.html
One would hope, that even if wolves are delisted, their “management” would mean more than open hunting/trapping seasons. There is nothing wrong with being able to protect what is yours. Common sense also needs be put into place.
In an area such as mine, deer food plots and supplemental deer feeding abound. If you have more deer, there are going to be more wolves. Keep a closer eye on your dogs…
More important, in a state like MN, hunting/trapping wolves in the BWCA, where nobody lives, where there is no livestock, does absolutely nothing to assist the farmer/rancher losing stock to wolves along the diagonal forest farmland interphase.
Past statistics showed about 50/50 split in wolf gender take in MN, with, if memory serves me correct, about 50% of wolves taken as <1 to <2 years of age. Wolves cannot be managed like deer as even the seasoned hunter can’t tell the difference between a male and female wolf (easy to do with deer), also easier to differentiate between bucks due to antler size. The point being, deer numbers can be “managed” based on what zones allow to be taken, in order to keep deer numbers up. This can’t be done with wolves, for no other reason then the differentiation between males and females is near impossible.
Well that’s the thing – it usually follows that hunting and trapping and ‘unsportsmanlike’ hounding follows as management tools.
I hope the politicians will listen to comments like yours.
I was also encouraged to see Mitt Romney win for Utah. Hopefully he will be a moderating influence. He was good when he was governor of Massachusetts; an architect of our insurance reform laws, and pretty good on the environment. He helped to write tighter legislation to protect our waterways from oil spills with a group I had volunteered with, but of course, the Federal government nixed it and sued our state.
“Republicans lost the house last night. Today there are no riots, no protests, no videos of large groups of voters sobbing uncontrollably, no grief counselors were sent to schools, no celebrities threatening to move to Canada, no property was destroyed, no cars overturned and nothing set on fire.
No outrage. No drama. Life goes on even if you didn’t get what you wanted. Let’s hope that others can learn from this example.”
If Ruth Bader kicks the bucket….. look for more of the same hogwash! Had an opportunity to watch the “View” this morning, nothing but Trump hate being whipped up by overpaid network privileged hypocrites! I’m glad I watched … now I know what others are talking about.
Hey, Mat-ters, PLEASE get a fricken life, okay?….
Immigrants “invasion” coming up from the south? Let’s not forget this “bigly” migration just a few short decades ago:
And some excellent thoughts when it comes to the divide in this country right now:
https://mtstandard.com/lifestyles/recreation/rare-woodland-caribou-sighted-in-northwest-montana/article_6d655579-467d-5b89-8893-884f2a3636f5.html#tracking-source=home-trending
The Gloves Come Off
http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2018/nov/08/robert-wielgus-the-wolf-wars-in-washington-can-eas/
Good! Thanks for posting.
It does seem the ‘management’ of this year after year crisis can be simply remedied by just these suggestions.
Why won’t someone do anything? It is just obstinate non-acceptance of wolf recolonization in the state, which the public at least says they want?
Not exactly Wildlife, but judge blocks Keystone.
https://www.npr.org/2018/11/09/665994751/judge-puts-keystone-xl-pipeline-on-hold-pending-further-environmental-study
https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/01/europe/whale-audit-satellite-photography-scli-intl/
http://mynorthwest.com/1179155/washington-wolf-war-wolves/
“McIrvin says those salt blocks have been there for over 60 years, and moving the salt blocks wouldn’t have made a lick of difference because wolves are smart and they follow the food source. He says this isn’t about wolves.”
Well try. It should be up to WDFW to move the salt blocks then. Otherwise, it is not doing all one can non-lethally.
Other years, the cattle would have been moved by this time?
You know, where this is public land, it should be a simple matter for WDFW to get a court order to have this uncooperative rancher move or remove the salt blocks, or move his cattle?
I do not understand why the coddling. It will cost more and tax money to constantly kill wolves, which the public should have an overriding interest in restoring to their natural habitat.
My precious wolves? Damn right. It should be our precious wolves, and other wildlife!
http://www.startribune.com/wolf-taken-to-isle-royale-national-park-this-fall-dies/500391671/
Hmmm. :\ This is the second one who has died.
I’m sure it is a stressful adjustment, and what about the social dynamics. Are they all from the same pack, I would think?
I worry about human meddling of course, but you wonder what the alternative is, especially in modern times.
https://www.denverpost.com/2018/11/07/woman-false-bear-attack-golden-gate-canyon-state-park/
Here we go again! Always the first order of business:
“Republicans have only a few weeks left until they cede control of the House to Democrats, but the first big post-election GOP vote won’t address taxes or border wall funding.
It involves wolves.
Republicans are furiously pushing legislation that would remove gray wolves in the 48 contiguous U.S. states from the list of threatened and endangered animals protected under the Endangered Species Act, which safeguards those animals’ habitats. The House of Representatives is expected to vote on the bill Friday.”
Read more here: https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/congress/article221647280.html#storylink=cpy
““To avoid the suppression of science through the court system, (the bill) should also be exempted from judicial review,” the livestock groups wrote.”
COUGH
^^Just eyerolling, isn’t it. 🙁
Here’s some more info. I’ve actually read some (familiar) comments complaining about bringing wolves to Isle Royale, which has no impact on ranching at all and not their concern. I’d still like to see them reintroduced into New England.
We’ll see if they can stay out of reach of the Long Arm of the
Law industry lobby.http://www.southernminn.com/faribault_daily_news/news/state/article_6eab30ae-3291-5a53-b343-cc62c099407e.html
A talented man. RIP Roy.
https://nbcmontana.com/news/local/house-passes-bill-to-drop-legal-protections-for-gray-wolves-11-16-2018
This decision shouldn’t surprise anyone who lives or spends any time around the “delicate” balance of what’s left of wild areas/wildlife habitat and the greed, surrounding those areas.
One only has to look at the disgusting WS (Wildlife Services) history, not to mention taxpayer expense, over the past few decades, in their attempts to “control” the coyote population (for the benefit of a tiny majority of livestock raisers) to realize that its a joke and an expensive joke at that, on wildlife and taxpayers.
And it doesn’t end there. Many species are and have been deemed “predators/pests/vermin” with little regard to what amounts to a very tiny percentage of what’s actually raised, re: livestock, for human consumption, out here in the west.
Take some time and do some research if you care…….
No, any fool could see this coming for miles, I think I read where it is the 19th attempt?
Anyway, voting record, if anyone is interested:
https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/115-2018/h420
read this:Wisconsin wolf advocate and friend Paul Collin’s take on today’s House vote.
https://www.facebook.com/Idaho-Wild-Boulder-White-Clouds-Council-201618698553/?__tn__=kC-R&eid=ARC6TGLLPf-RakikUOT94ZYkjlMGTZm1D9grJq-Rk99Mdgzkw3_Arji4KozbsQXShs25ILB3etajorFw&hc_ref=ARTdbu3i5zJXKCW-URWK6pG2GUqI5RLuLM-QB_GxTAwvZ7mb5DX4H3qhCWs-tqPHbUY&__xts__%5B0%5D=68.ARCri8_S0yub9lke3X-wfO-lVJ-fbp5tc8Vfitl8CdrXqPMA2oC5cCdEiyFoxkpbJnw2plklRZzqu5DIf1zqXGkWJeIwNqUkMvf–1gvkadw07fEPyxeBr_Lfdxrwknj0FQ9_Rjw4IlmYHbVgrNvJQN68UgWThh_tq3oWsSZsuqsEIftjtQgr29RYTPtBGk8s1G0H9_2x4YL96bXakoJBxn72V0sHlTvWR-bKoD9z2cejFQj52YYOFYP0SlT2QiTDcR788m_DUzwIA5jvbCVABPdfcyDp_bQiNrcjuWblyMoiDaeY73khhxUZ9pkf7XFV1lmEDTm8pym-tupkUGJqpyJy1wgOsab0boy-ESMjaWOSUFl0MvaiaUpbD_sjJJBXBck4L8OGyGHAqzDQuH-qKI4i2s7AVK6tgbm3aiVVooWAWjvQhwfT5__fU2imXIkPzPDXshY_NeYk7e9lln149NMYBp2DgMkfjqJumhKL5ZjL9RYEQS-HoTp-IEjUDIngzNwrIQM
Thanks!
Good news or bad news:
http://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-zinke-bernhardt-20181116-story.html
Fascinating stuff:
“Looking Back”
Persecution, hunting, warfare, and perhaps rabies led to the extinction of wolves in Japan. The Ezo wolf (Canis lupus hattai), which inhabited Hokkaido until 1889, was a descendant of North American grey wolves. A separate species, the Honshu wolf (Canis lupus hodophilax), survived until 1905. A recent DNA study published in Science found that it was more closely related to an ancient species that lived in Siberia until about 20,000 years ago than to modern grey wolves.”
https://news.mongabay.com/2018/11/restore-wolves-or-slaughter-deer-to-save-japanese-forests/
I wish them much success!
Lots of things to be “thankful” for tomorrow and here’s just a tiny example:
https://www.diyphotography.net/these-are-the-finalists-of-2018-comedy-wildlife-photography-awards-and-theyre-hilarious/?fbclid=IwAR0CF0tas62WFFornmtSJNKuQbKMdJiWgKMsk-zQ-n4WkPe6YDV6PfCTYto
🙂 They’re all so adorable.
https://nbcmontana.com/news/local/conservation-groups-buy-grizzly-bear-habitat
https://nbcmontana.com/news/local/grizzly-kills-calf-in-rare-appearance-near-montana-town?utm_source=taboola&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=internal
In other news, thousands of cattle die on public land each year due to exposure. In other news, thousands of cattle overgraze our public lands leaving less forage for deer, antelope, elk, and bison, (also the taxpayer foots the bill for these cattle). In other news, isolated remnant populations of bears become more inbred and less fit every year. In other news, millions of people from all over the world pay thousands of dollars each into local economies just for the chance to see a wild bear in it’s natural habitat. In other news, far sighted Americans protected habitat and populations of their most threatened animals(on public lands), with overwhelming support from the majority of citizens. In other news, most people who live near bear habitat benefit from the clean air and water that habitat provides (from public lands). What a gift these bears provide!
🙂
https://sciencing.com/the-grizzly-reclaims-the-great-plains-13400310.html
https://www.arctictoday.com/new-dna-study-reveals-previously-unidentified-north-american-polar-wolf/
https://theconversation.com/we-found-grizzly-black-and-polar-bears-together-for-the-first-time-106216