Wolves
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Textual Manipulations in Anti-wolf Rhetoric Less than three months from now Colorado will decide whether to support Initiative 107, otherwise known as the Gray Wolf Reintroduction Initiative. Polling done as recently as August of 2019 by Colorado State University found that 84% of Coloradans support reintroduction and suggests that the initiative will almost certainly pass. …
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Mexican gray wolves are blamed for all kinds of livestock deaths in Catron County, and so we wanted to see for ourselves, by reviewing depredation reports, how USDA Wildlife Services is investigating dead livestock and arriving at determinations that Mexican wolves are to blame. Spoiler alert: It’s not particularly convincing. (I’ve written about this before,…
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Paradise Valley, Montana. Photo by George Wuerthner Paradise Valley, Montana, is aptly named. The Yellowstone River flows north to Livingston, Montana, framed by the Absaroka Mountains on the east and the Gallatin Range on the West. It’s one of the most stunning landscapes in the entire West. Due to its location immediately adjacent to…
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Cattle grazing Mojave National Preserve, CA. Photo by George Wuerthner The 1964 Wilderness Act requires federal agencies to protect and manage designated wilderness areas “to preserve its natural conditions.” Given that all domestic livestock are exotic alien animals and hardly contribute to “natural conditions,” one might assume that livestock production would be prohibited in designated…
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On March 9, a colleague from Endangered Species Coalition and I published this op-ed in the Albuquerque Journal, identifying Arizona and New Mexico as major stumbling blocks to wolf recovery, “[B]ecause both are allowing the Fish and Wildlife Service only to conduct cross-fostering in their states.” We called out the urgency with which the New…
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Recently the Idaho Fish and Game changed its rules to allow any hunter or trapper to kill up to 30 wolves per year. And the state is considering a proposal to open much of the state to year-round wolf killing. In Montana, the MDFWP is discussing increases from 5 to 10 wolf tags for some…
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In December 2017, an Arizona hunter knowingly shot and killed a young lobo, took pictures of his “trophy,” and left her body to rot in a field. Someone else saw the photos and reported the killing to the anonymous tip line. Law enforcement officers investigated and, last year, the perpetrator lost his access to national…
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The livestock industry and its apologists are trying out a new spin to justify their unwillingness to coexist with native wildlife, arguing that it is necessary to kill large predators from time to time to appease the locals and create “social tolerance.” This is a false and self-serving narrative, and is causing a public backlash…
