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While Wolves Continue to Face Opposition in the West, I Think About Aldo Leopold

2010-03-05T23:08:47Z

Gray wolves continue to grace many headlines in the West these days. And, unfortunately, the news is more often than not bad for the wolves.

Here are some recent wolf news stories:

In February, a joint resolution drafted by the Idaho Legislature, HCR043, claims that Idaho’s current wolf population constitutes an emergency and calls for a drastic reduction of Idaho’s wolf population (i.e., killing several hundred wolves).
Also in February, the Utah Senate passed a bill making wolves an enemy of the state. (No, I’m not kidding). “The proposed legislation would make it state policy to ‘manage’ wolves to prevent any packs from forming in areas where wolves are no longer listed as an endangered species. In areas where wolves are still protected, the bill would require state officials to request that federal agencies remove wolves from the state.”
An anomalously uplifting article in High Country News relates how Colorado might just have its first wolf pack in decades. (And then a couple of weeks later came the requisite polarizing, over-the-top, run-for-your-lives article on the potential return of wolves to Colorado.)
Northern Rockies wolves are the subject of a NOW on PBS episode that recently aired, and they’re also on the cover of the current issue of National Geographic.
In a Yellowstone National Park press release issued a few weeks ago came news that Yellowstone’s wolf population declined for the second year in row.
A man pleaded guilty this week to illegally killing a wolf in Montana in 2008. He said he killed the wolf because it was approaching him while he was hunting deer, but a forensics investigation later determined that the wolf was shot in its back left side.
Finally, an article in yesterday’s Billings Gazette delivered the sad news that Yellowstone’s legendary, historic, beloved Druid wolf pack will likely be gone soon.

Reading about state governments drafting “let’s kill wolves” legislation and a coward illegally shooting a wolf in the back and then lying about it makes me think about the great environmental writer and thinker Aldo Leopold.

Leopold has been dead for more than sixty years, but his eloquent wisdom about ecology and conservation still rings true today. His A Sand County Almanac is one of my all-time favorite books, and I reread it regularly. (My more-than-a-little-crazy black lab is also named Aldo.)

But the thing about Leopold is that he once advocated for the killing of wolves to benefit game populations. He later regretted it, and in “Thinking Like a Mountain” he powerfully and poetically described the evolution of his perspective on wolves.

Since trying to follow Leopold with a pen is pointless, I’ll close with his words from “Thinking Like a Mountain”:

A deep chesty bawl echoes from rimrock to rimrock, rolls down the mountain, and fades into the far blackness of the night. It is an outburst of wild defiant sorrow, and of contempt for all the adversities of the world.

Every living thing (and perhaps many a dead one as well) pays heed to that call. To the deer it is a reminder of the way of all flesh, to the pine a forecast of midnight scuffles and of blood upon the snow, to the coyote a promise of gleanings to come, to the cowman a threat of red ink at the bank, to the hunter a challenge of fang against bullet. Yet behind these obvious and immediate hopes and fears there lies a deeper meaning, known only to the mountain itself. Only the mountain has lived long enough to listen objectively to the howl of a wolf.

Those unable to decipher the hidden meaning know nevertheless that it is there, for it is felt in all wolf country, and distinguishes that country from all other land. It tingles in the spine of all who hear wolves by night, or who scan their tracks by day. Even without sight or sound of wolf, it is implicit in a hundred small events: the midnight whinny of a pack horse, the rattle of rolling rocks, the bound of a fleeing deer, the way shadows lie under the spruces. Only the ineducable tyro can fail to sense the presence or absence of wolves, or the fact that mountains have a secret opinion about them.

My own conviction on this score dates from the day I saw a wolf die. We were eating lunch on a high rimrock, at the foot of which a turbulent river elbowed its way. We saw what we thought was a doe fording the torrent, her breast awash in white water. When she climbed the bank toward us and shook out her tail, we realized our error: it was a wolf. A half-dozen others, evidently grown pups, sprang from the willows and all joined in a welcoming melee of wagging tails and playful maulings. What was literally a pile of wolves writhed and tumbled in the center of an open flat at the foot of our rimrock.

In those days we had never heard of passing up a chance to kill a wolf. In a second we were pumping lead into the pack, but with more excitement than accuracy: how to aim a steep downhill shot is always confusing. When our rifles were empty, the old wolf was down, and a pup was dragging a leg into impassable slide-rocks.

We reached the old wolf in time to watch a fierce green fire dying in her eyes. I realized then, and have known ever since, that there was something new to me in those eyes - something known only to her and to the mountain. I was young then, and full of trigger-itch; I thought that because fewer wolves meant more deer, that no wolves would mean hunters' paradise. But after seeing the green fire die, I sensed that neither the wolf nor the mountain agreed with such a view.

Since then I have lived to see state after state extirpate its wolves. I have watched the face of many a newly wolfless mountain, and seen the south-facing slopes wrinkle with a maze of new deer trails. I have seen every edible bush and seedling browsed, first to anaemic desuetude, and then to death. I have seen every edible tree defoliated to the height of a saddlehorn. Such a mountain looks as if someone had given God a new pruning shears, and forbidden Him all other exercise. In the end the starved bones of the hoped-for deer herd, dead of its own too-much, bleach with the bones of the dead sage, or molder under the high-lined junipers.

I now suspect that just as a deer herd lives in mortal fear of its wolves, so does a mountain live in mortal fear of its deer. And perhaps with better cause, for while a buck pulled down by wolves can be replaced in two or three years, a range pulled down by too many deer may fail of replacement in as many decades.

So also with cows. The cowman who cleans his range of wolves does not realize that he is taking over the wolf's job of trimming the herd to fit the range. He has not learned to think like a mountain. Hence we have dustbowls, and rivers washing the future into the sea.

We all strive for safety, prosperity, comfort, long life, and dullness. The deer strives with his supple legs, the cowman with trap and poison, the statesman with pen, the most of us with machines, votes, and dollars, but it all comes to the same thing: peace in our time. A measure of success in this is all well enough, and perhaps is a requisite to objective thinking, but too much safety seems to yield only danger in the long run. Perhaps this is behind Thoreau's dictum: In wildness is the salvation of the world. Perhaps this is the hidden meaning in the howl of the wolf, long known among mountains, but seldom perceived among men.

(Wolf tracks photo by m d d on Flickr)

(And here is a great op-ed by James William Gibson in the Los Angeles Times on Leopold and wolf-hunting from last December.)

The Feds Drag Their Feet, and Whitebark Pine Continues To Go Bye-Bye

2010-02-26T18:44:55Z

NRDC Senior Wildlife Advocate Louisa Willcox and leading Canadian author Andrew Nikiforuk hiking above dying and dead whitebark pines in the Gallatin Mountains in Montana last summer.

Whitebark pine trees anchor the high country of the Northern Rockies. They are beautiful, funky, wild trees that eke out a living in a harsh environment (think Montana, 9,000 feet, January). And they’re critically important to the ecological health of the Northern Rockies, particularly the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, where Yellowstone grizzlies fatten up before their winter slumber on the whitebark pine’s big, high-calorie, nutritious seeds.

Enter climate change.

With warmer winter temperatures, mountain pine beetles are surviving at higher elevations because the requisite prolonged cold snaps needed to kill the beetles are not occurring. And the beetles are feasting on – and decimating – whitebark pine trees.

A non-native fungus, white pine blister rust, is also having its way with whitebark.

The loss of whitebark pine seeds as a food source for Yellowstone grizzlies will be catastrophic for the iconic bears. Without whitebark pine seeds, the bears won’t be prowling the high country to gorge on whitebark pine seeds in the late summer and fall. They’ll be forced to search for replacement foods at lower elevations, where they’ll be more likely to bump into two-legged critters – and thus more likely to get killed.

Because whitebark pines are dying at a mind-blowingly fast rate, we submitted a petition in December 2008 to list the whitebark pine as an endangered species under the Endangered Species Act.

Over a year has passed since we filed our petition, yet, in contravention of the law, we’ve heard nothing from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. As such, we filed a lawsuit on Wednesday against the Service for failing to make a ninety-day finding on our petition.

Time is running out, and the stakes are too high for whitebark pine and the Yellowstone grizz.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service must protect whitebark pine under the Endangered Species Act.

Tomorrow.

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(To see my photo essay on whitebark country, click here. To see more of my photos and learn more about whitebark pine and grizzlies, click here, here, and here. And to see blog posts by my NRDC colleagues on whitebark pine, click here.)

“Wolf Wars” -- Cover Story of the March 2010 National Geographic Magazine

2010-02-24T00:21:31Z

Douglas Chadwick, a prominent Montana author, penned a though-provoking article on the never-ending controversy of gray wolves in the Northern Rockies for the March 2010 edition of National Geographic.

In “Wolf Wars,” Chadwick touches on many of the issues associated with the return of Canis lupus to the wild environs of Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming (e.g., history, livestock ranching, false information, endangered species listing, litigation, impact on hunting opportunities, economic effect, etc.).

But what struck me most about Chadwick’s piece was how well he captured the ecological importance of the wolf’s return. Simply put, wolves have greatly improved the health of the Northern Rockies ecosystems they now inhabit.

For example, without wolves:

[B]y most measures the [Yellowstone elk] population had swelled too high, and their range was deteriorating. Shortly after killing the last Yellowstone wolves in 1926, park officials were culling elk by the thousands. The elk kept rebounding and overgrazing key habitats, creating a perpetually unnatural situation for a park intended to preserve nature.

With wolves back in the picture, however:

[P]ack-hunted elk turn into less vulnerable quarry. They become more vigilant and keep on the move more. In the wolfless era, herds practically camped at favorite winter dining spots, foraging on young aspen, willow, and cottonwood until the stems grew clubbed and stunted like bonsai plants. Released from such grazing pressure, saplings now shoot up to form lush young groves. More songbirds find nesting habitat within their leafy shade. Along waterways, vigorous willow and cottonwood growth helps stabilize stream banks. More insects fall from overhanging stems to feed fish and amphibians. Beavers find enough nutritious twigs and branches to support new colonies.

Chadwick goes on to explain that Doug Smith, head of the Yellowstone Wolf Project, found only one beaver colony in Yellowstone’s northern range in 1996, the lowest total in many years. By 2009, however, with wolves on the landscape for just over a decade, Smith located twelve colonies.

Chadwick then describes the impact of more beavers and the effect of wolves on other critters:

Along Crystal Creek I find another recent beaver dam storing water, releasing a more constant flow for riparian species downstream through the dry months. Ponds and marshes that form behind the dams create habitat for moose, muskrat, mink, waterfowl, wading birds, and an array of other wildlife. After wolves moved in, cougars that had begun hunting the valleys retreated to the steep, rocky terrain they normally inhabit. The big canines killed nearly half the coyote population. They may have rebounded a bit, but the coyotes now live in groups with shrunk territories or as vagabond “floaters.” With less competition from elk for grasses, bison may be doing better than ever.

Ecologically speaking, Chadwick explains that “[f]rom a single new predatory force on the landscape, a rebalancing effect ripples all the way to microbes in the soil. Biologists define the series of top-down changes as a trophic cascade. In a nod to the behavioral factors at play, others speak of the ‘ecology of fear.’”

And what about the gripe that wolves are eating all the elk in the Northern Rockies? Chadwick, like so many others, puts that fabulously false rumor to bed (though surely it will matter not to the devoted propagators of the myth):

[B]oth elk and deer are doing well across the West. As game manager Jim Williams puts it, “With wolves back in the picture along with cougars and bears, we'll have places where elk and deer may never be as abundant again as people remember, and we'll have other places where they'll do fine. There are bigger drivers than wolves in these systems.” Studies have shown that winter weather and the quality of wintering habitat are really what control deer and elk populations over time. That and human hunting.

Chadwick relates how a Montana state government biologist said that, until recently, “most gripes about wildlife concerned elk raiding haystacks and deer damaging crops and gardens and being a danger on highways.” And while the Bitterroot Valley in western Montana has “10 to 12 wolf packs for a minimum of 45 to 60 wolves, we also have 14,000 hunters coming through the Bitterroot check station in a given year.”

In fact, the elk total today in the Bitterroot Valley is above 6,000 animals, whereas in the 1970s less than 3,000 elk inhabited the Bitterroot because hunters were allowed to kill so many females (which makes one question how good “the good old days” really were).

Wolves balance elk and deer populations in the Northern Rockies, but hunter harvest, winter range quality and availability, winter severity, and development collectively play a much, much bigger role in deer and elk numbers. And without wolves, the whole landscape would suffer.

Ultimately, human tolerance will dictate the wolf’s future in the Northern Rockies. We eradicated them from these parts once, and we could easily do it again.

And thus the question Chadwick poses to close his article is the most critical question facing wolves today:

"When we say we want to conserve wildlife communities in America, does that mean including the wolf, or not?"

(Wolf photo by SigmaEye on Flickr)

A Huge National Park Planned For Labrador, Canada (With Photos)

2010-02-10T21:26:21Z

An early Valentine’s Day gift to the continent, the Canadian government recently announced it will create North America’s newest national park in an isolated corner of southeast Labrador.

Mealy Mountains National Park will include spongy tundra, gorgeous mountains, soggy bogs, wild lakes and rivers, and some of the world’s oldest slow-growing boreal forest. The area is also home to a variety of wildlife, including wolves, black bears, moose, and a threatened population of woodland caribou.

And it’s going to be a whopper.

The park will protect 11,000 square kilometers of rugged wilderness, an area bigger than Yellowstone and Yosemite combined.

The provincial government of Newfoundland and Labrador announced that a provincial park would also be created. Adjacent to the Mealy Mountains, that park will protect the Eagle River watershed, where wild Atlantic salmon are still abundant.

I was especially thrilled to hear the announcement of the establishment of Mealy Mountains National Park and Eagle River Provincial Park, as I spent several days last summer in that spectacularly wild corner of Labrador.

Thanks to a kind invitation from my dear friend Jeremy Charles, a renowned, award-winning chef in Newfoundland, I traveled to the Eagle River last July to fly-fish for wild Atlantic salmon. (Salmo salar -- The Leaper, The King -- once swam the rivers of New England in great numbers, but it's now, thanks to dams, overfishing, and habitat destruction, an endangered species in the United States.)

Getting to the Eagle River from Montana was not easy. I flew from Bozeman to Denver to Boston, spent the night with my younger brother, Dan, then flew from Boston to Halifax to Goose Bay, and then took an incredible helicopter ride to the Eagle.

Arduous the journey was, but, oh, man, was it worth it.

The wildness, remoteness, and raw beauty of Labrador blew me away. Our travel was restricted to foot, boat, plane, or helicopter. We saw moose and caribou, and we caught (and released) several finned beauties fresh from the sea on the Eagle and other nearby rivers.

While we were there, we talked a lot about how special the Eagle watershed and surrounding area are -- and the unfortunate reality that such places are slowly disappearing from the planet or simply becoming less wild.

So when I heard the news yesterday that the Mealy Mountains and Eagle River watershed have been granted permanent protection, a big smile graced my face and chills ran up my spine.

It’s a place the earth just can’t afford to lose.

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The Eagle River

Southeast Labrador

Atlantic Salmon (Salmo Salar)

Awesome Lake and Mealy Mountains

Running Rapids on the Eagle River

Southeast Labrador

Jeremy Charles on the Eagle River

Woodland Caribou Bull (Rangifer tarandus caribou)

Paradise River

Admiring Salmo Salar

Southeast Labrador

Top Predators Create Healthy Ecosystems

2010-02-03T17:31:12Z

In an excellent article published yesterday, Jeremy Hance examines three recent studies that underscore how critically important top predators are to healthy ecosystems.

The first study considers the negative effects that occur when "mesopredators” (e.g., coyotes, raccoons, skunks, baboons, etc.) fill the void left by the disappearance of top or “apex” predators (e.g., wolves, cougars, lions, sharks, etc.). The second study discusses how the presence of top predators can improve the health of plant communities (e.g., the reintroduction of wolves to Yellowstone led to increased willow and aspen growth). The third study, the most surprising of the three, looks at how hunting by top predators can “create nutrient hotspots that keep ecosystems rich and varied” (e.g., researchers used a 50-year record of moose kills by wolves on Isle Royale National Park to find that moose corpses create hotspots of forest fertility by enriching the soil with biochemicals).

Hance’s analysis of the three studies leads him to correctly conclude that “it appears that top predators are indispensable to a working ecosystem.”

The ecological importance of predators is an important component of our wildlife work at NRDC, and it’s an issue we’ve previously blogged about it. (See other posts by Andrew Wetzler, Dr. Sylvia Fallon, and me.)

Hance’s article and the studies about which he writes are both timely and alarming, as top predators are fast disappearing from the earth.

The Northern Rockies Wolf Population Has Stopped Growing

2010-01-29T23:02:11Z

An Associated Press article reports that, according to court documents filed by Montana wildlife officials yesterday in the federal lawsuit over the removal of Endangered Species Act protections from wolves in Idaho and Montana (to which NRDC is a party), the preliminary estimate for the current size of the Northern Rockies wolf population is approximately 1,650 wolves.

If the preliminary estimate turns out to be correct, 2009 will mark the first year since wolves were reintroduced in the mid-1990s that the population has not grown, as the official 2008 population size estimate was also approximately 1,650 wolves.

And that’s a big problem.

For a sustainably recovered population of wolves in the Northern Rockies, the latest science points to the need for a population of at least 2,000 wolves.

We’re close to full recovery, but we’re not quite there yet. And, unfortunately, it looks like last year’s premature wolf hunts and aggressive government control actions, which contributed to a record of more than 500 wolves killed, have further delayed full recovery. (And the numbers do not include illegal kills, which were likely significant.)

The Northern Rockies wolf population has been steadily growing at a rate of about 20% per year since reintroduction. Such impressive growth can be attributed to the success of the reintroduction and the compatibility of wolves with their native landscape (i.e., wolves belong here, and the landscape needs them).

Without the hunts (and without a significant increase in control actions), the population would have been expected to grow another 20% or so last year, putting it within spitting distance of 2,000 wolves. Instead, the population has been stopped in its tracks. (And Montana is already exploring more aggressive kill quotas for its 2010 hunt, and we expect Idaho to do the same.)

Of course, state wildlife officials will cite this preliminary estimate as proof that the inaugural wolf hunts were successful, even though such claims are specious.

Besides halting population growth and further delaying recovery, the premature hunts were harmful in other ways.

Many backcountry wolves were needlessly killed, as neither the hunt in Montana nor the hunt in Idaho was the least bit designed to target front-country wolves or wolves that reside in high-depredation areas. While the state agencies claimed the wolf hunts would be a panacea for livestock conflicts, there is absolutely no evidence that this was an actual strategy or that it worked (e.g., Montana’s quota system was based on only three hunting areas -- not exactly targeted). Quite to the contrary, Montana had to scramble in October and shut down the wolf hunt north of Yellowstone National Park after several wilderness wolves and multiple Yellowstone wolves had already been killed, including radio-collared wolves from the Yellowstone Wolf Project.

We also have no idea what effect the hunts will have on livestock depredations. Notwithstanding assurances from state wildlife officials that the hunts will help reduce conflicts, the reality is that the hunts could easily exacerbate conflicts by disrupting pack structures (i.e., more juvenile wolves now looking for an easy meal without hunting guidance from experienced wolves) or killing the wrong wolves (i.e., wolves that avoided livestock ranches (and taught their young to avoid them) might have been killed, thus removing “good” wolves from the population).

We want to see wolves fully recovered in the Northern Rockies. When that happens, we will not oppose a sustainable wolf hunt.

Sadly, we are not there yet. And, no matter how you spin them, last year’s wolf hunts were premature and poorly planned, which is why we challenged them in federal court.

Now, with the Montana hunt over and Idaho’s ending on March 31st, the lawsuit brought by NRDC and other conservation groups, represented by Earthjustice, seeking to restore Endangered Species Act protections for wolves in Idaho and Montana will take center stage in the world of Northern Rockies wolves.

Oh, how I wish a fully recovered Northern Rockies wolf population was center stage.

(Wolf photo by SigmaEye on Flickr)

Ted Turner and Yellowstone Bison?

2010-01-16T17:11:46Z

Montana’s proposal to send some or all of the brucellosis-free Yellowstone bison currently quarantined just north of Yellowstone National Park to Ted Turner’s Green Ranch west of Bozeman, Montana, and allow Turner Enterprises to keep up to 90% of the bison’s offspring has caused quite a stir recently. Some support the proposal, but many more, it seems to me, oppose the plan because it allows for the privatization of public Yellowstone wildlife.

What is NRDC’s take on the issue?

We want the quarantine feasibility study to be completed as originally planned, and we want the brucellosis-free Yellowstone bison that “graduate” from the study -- both the original entrants and all offspring -- to be placed on public or tribal lands in the West to reestablish wild herds of genetically pure bison. Needlessly slaughtering any of these bison, which have been the subject of years of scientific research and financial investment, should not be an option.

While we would prefer to see the bison that need to be moved out of the quarantine facility transferred immediately to public or tribal land, we would support moving the bison to Turner’s ranch for the duration of the study -- so long as none of the originally quarantined bison or their offspring are privatized or commercialized in any way.

Thus, because the two alternatives that give bison to Turner Enterprises (one gives it all 88 bison and the other sends 14 bison to a state park in Wyoming and the rest go to Turner) allow for the privatization and/or commercialization of bison offspring, we oppose both alternatives as currently written. We also oppose the other two alternatives because both involve the needless slaughter of Yellowstone bison.

Allowing public wildlife -- wildlife from America’s first national park -- to be privatized and commercialized sets a dangerous precedent. Forever removing public wildlife from the public domain violates the public trust. Yellowstone’s wildlife belongs to all Americans, and proposing to give away such wildlife as a form of payment is abhorrent. Yellowstone’s public wildlife is not a form of currency. Turner Enterprises should be compensated if it allows the feasibility study to be completed at its Green Ranch, but it should be paid with money (or some equivalent), not Yellowstone wildlife.

All of the invaluable brucellosis-free genetically pure Yellowstone bison that emerge from the quarantine study should be transferred to public or tribal lands to establish new herds within the bison’s vast historic range. Under no circumstances should a private entity be allowed to keep 90% of the offspring of 74 bison or 75% of the offspring of 88 bison, as two of the four proposed alternatives allow. Such privatization would limit the opportunities to establish new herds, which would be especially problematic for Montana, where wild bison are almost literally nonexistent.

Sadly, as the Draft Environmental Assessment points out, “[i]n Montana, wild bison only exist within the designated bison-tolerant zones near Yellowstone National Park.” (Page 27.) It is amazing -- and almost inconceivable -- that in Montana, an enormous state with significant public land and a rich history of public wildlife and wildlife restoration, wild bison are found nowhere in the state except for a few tiny “designated tolerance zones” near Yellowstone National Park. Montana is The Last Best Place, and it is well past time for the same to be true for wild bison.

The upside to Montana’s current dearth of wild bison is that enormous potential exists for the state in the near future. With the reestablishment of wild bison herds on public lands in Montana will come significant values: ecological, economic, cultural, spiritual, historical. Restoring wild bison herds around Montana will help restore communities struggling in a changing economy. Tourism, fair-chase hunting, eco-tours and wildlife-watching, new museums; the opportunities are innumerable.

It is also vital that new herds of genetically pure bison be established from the Yellowstone herd in places outside the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. Creation of such new herds will protect the precious genetic value of the Yellowstone population, which is critical for the long-term conservation of the species.

Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks should analyze which of Montana’s abundant public lands are suitable for reestablishing herds of wild bison (e.g., Wildlife Management Areas). And the ongoing development of a statewide bison management plan, which is long overdue, should not prevent transferring quarantined bison to suitable state lands prior to completion of the state management plan.

Transferring quarantined bison to tribal lands should also be a top priority. The Draft Environmental Assessment states that the Fort Belknap proposal for quarantined bison “could meet many of the quarantine monitoring requirements,” but Fort Belknap could not accept the first cohort of bison in the necessary timeframe. (Page 17.) Because reestablishing a genetically pure bison population on the Fort Belknap Indian Reservation in Montana with the quarantined bison would be a desirable outcome for many stakeholders, FWP should do all it can to achieve a Fort Belknap translocation with these bison.

Allowing for the privatization and/or commercialization of brucellosis-free Yellowstone bison when such bison could be used to reestablish wild bison herds on public and/or tribal lands cannot occur. Montana must creatively work to find alternatives to the false choice of “either slaughter or privatization/commercialization of public wildlife.”

Other options we would support include, but are not limited to: (1) temporarily sending the bison to the Green Ranch until Fort Belknap, a Wildlife Management Area, or some other public or tribal land is ready to receive the bison (and paying Turner Enterprises for the costs it incurs, if needed); (2) temporarily moving the bison to other suitable private property until Fort Belknap, a Wildlife Management Area, or some other public or tribal land is ready (and paying the private entity for the costs it incurs, if needed); (3) temporarily moving the bison to suitable state property until Fort Belknap, a Wildlife Management Area, or some other public or tribal land is ready; (4) leaving the bison in quarantine until Fort Belknap, a Wildlife Management Area, or some other public or tribal land is ready (assuming such readiness is imminent – e.g., Fort Belknap, as mentioned in the Draft Environmental Assessment); or (5) transferring the bison to the Green Ranch for the duration of the feasibility study and instead of compensating Turner Enterprises with Yellowstone wildlife, pay Turner Enterprises for the costs it incurs in being a steward for public wildlife and allowing the feasibility study to be completed on its property.

Montana cannot set the dangerous precedent of allowing for the privatization and/or commercialization of public Yellowstone wildlife. Significant time, money, research, and resources have been invested in the quarantined bison. These bison are too valuable, and too much potential for reestablishing wild bison herds on public and tribal lands exists for the state to squander this priceless opportunity. Montana cannot let brucellosis-free genetically pure Yellowstone bison disappear from the public realm.

(Photo courtesy of Sarah Skoglund)

2009: The Year in Wolves

2009-12-30T19:25:46Z

2009 was a dismal, tragic year for Northern Rockies wolves. They lost all protections under the Endangered Species Act (ESA), were hunted for the first time in Montana and Idaho (and continue to be hunted in Idaho), and were killed by various causes in record numbers. In all, almost one third -- one third! -- of the Northern Rockies wolf population was killed in 2009.

The good news is that NRDC and other conservation groups have not relented one iota in our fight on behalf on Northern Rockies wolves, and our lawsuit to restore their ESA protections should be ruled upon in 2010.

Here is a recap of 2009 for Canis lupus in the Northern Rockies:

January 14, 2009: Dubya the Decider, wishing to go out with a bang, announced that wolves in Montana and Idaho were being removed from the endangered species list, but wolves in Wyoming would remain listed.

January 20, 2009: Freshly inaugurated President Obama put on hold the wolf delisting rule -- and all other last-minute rules and regulations issued by the Bush administration -- for further review. Hope was restored, as many assumed the Obama Administration, with its pledged commitment to science, would scrap the premature, scientifically baseless, politically motivated Bush rule on wolves.

March 6, 2009: Hope was crushed, as Department of Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced he was rubber-stamping the Bush rule on wolves and removing ESA protections for wolves in Montana and Idaho, but not Wyoming. (Six months later, a federal judge found that this decision was politically crafted and thus likely illegal.)

May 4, 2009: The delisting rule went into effect, and wolves in Montana and Idaho lost all federal protections under the Endangered Species Act.

June 2, 2009: NRDC and twelve other conservation organizations, represented by Earthjustice, filed a lawsuit to restore ESA protections for wolves in Montana and Idaho.

July 8, 2009: The State of Montana approved the state’s first-ever fair-chase public wolf hunt with a kill quota of 75 wolves -- or about 15% of its population.

August 17, 2009: Montana’s neighbor to the west, Idaho, authorized its first-ever fair-chase public wolf hunt with a kill quota of 255 wolves -- or about 30% of its population. (And neither Montana’s nor Idaho’s quota included any of the wolves killed by government “control” actions, natural mortality, or illegal poaching.)

August 20, 2009: NRDC and the other conservation groups in the delisting lawsuit filed a motion for a preliminary injunction to stop the planned wolf hunts in Montana and Idaho from proceeding.

September 1, 2009: Idaho’s premature wolf hunt opened.

September 8, 2009: U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy denied our motion to stop the wolf hunts in Montana and Idaho, but, on a very bright note, he found that we are likely to win our delisting lawsuit. Specifically, he concluded, “The [U.S. Fish and Wildlife] Service has distinguished a natural population of wolves based on a political line, not the best available science. That, by definition, seems arbitrary and capricious.”

September 15, 2009: Montana’s poorly planned wolf hunt opened only in the backcountry, with the rest of the state scheduled to open on October 25th. The result? Multiple wilderness wolves and wolves from Yellowstone National Park were quickly killed, which the state must have seen coming with the way it structured the hunt.

October 13, 2009: With too many wolves from Yellowstone killed just outside the Park’s boundary (because Montana failed to implement a buffer zone around the Park to protect its famous and important wolves), Montana shut down the wolf hunt north of Yellowstone.

November 16, 2009: Montana’s wolf hunt ends, with 72 wolves killed in the hunt.

December 2009: Two ominous reports about wolves in the Northern Rockies surfaced. The first described how Yellowstone’s wolf population is shrinking and the annual census of the Park's population is expected to be the lowest in 10 years. The second broke the worrying news that a record number of Northern Rockies wolves -- more than 500 -- have been killed in 2009 by hunters, government agents, ranchers, poachers, and natural causes. This astronomical level of mortality amounts to almost one third of the last official population estimate.

December 24, 2009: Lynne Stone, a fearless wolf advocate in Idaho, received a scary, threatening e-mail from a wolf hater there. The e-mail simply said, “Merry Cristmas” (spelled without the “h”), and it included a morbid photo:

Heading into 2010, this disturbing photo and sinister e-mail (sent the night of Christmas Eve) remind us of what wolves are up against in the West -- and why NRDC’s work on behalf of Northern Rockies wolves is more important than ever.

On January 28, 2010, the last brief in our wolf lawsuit will be filed. Following a hearing in federal court, Judge Molloy will decide whether the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service violated the Endangered Species Act when it removed ESA protections from wolves in Montana and Idaho earlier this year. Hopefully he concludes that the ESA was violated and restores ESA protections for those states’ wolves.

After a deadly 2009, let’s hope 2010 is a better year for wolves in the Northern Rockies -- with less killing, less spinning of the facts by government bureaucrats, and less politically driven decision-making. Let’s hope wolves . . . can be wolves.

Happy New Year. Howl.

Montana’s Governor Brags About His Bison-Killing Ways

2009-12-17T23:11:14Z

If you’ve ever searched for an answer to the insanity that is bison management in Montana, you need look no further than a recent comment made by Montana’s Governor, Brian Schweitzer.

During a speech last week at the annual convention of the Montana Stockgrowers Association, a conservative livestock group, Schweitzer assured the Stockgrowers members “that he has pushed an agenda favorable to their industry.”

With the way bison have been hazed and slaughtered in Montana on his watch, his catering to the livestock industry was never in doubt. But the following bunker buster he tossed to the Stockgrowers certainly raised a few eyebrows:

"No governor in Montana history has sent more bison to slaughter than this governor."

Proudly boasting of your legacy as a bison killer? Seriously, Governor?

This is from the same guy that became a "star" last summer after giving a rousing speech at the Democratic National Convention in Denver. I wonder if he bragged about his proud bison-killing legacy to the national Democrats in attendance. The tragic irony is that while the Democrats were in Denver sneering at Sarah Palin’s fondness for shooting wolves from airplanes in Alaska, the Democrats’ star speaker had just presided over the slaughter of over 1,600 Yellowstone bison earlier in 2008.

It’s a shame Governor Schweitzer doesn’t recognize his good fortune.

The only continuously wild buffalo population that exists in the country resides in Yellowstone National Park. Some of those iconic, invaluable animals want to migrate into Montana in the winter and spring and bring their wildlife values -- ecological, cultural, economic, spiritual -- with them.

Instead of celebrating these bison and working to find ways for them to become a boon for Montana -- something he unequivocally has the power to do -- Governor Schweitzer brags about sending them to slaughter.

It is insane.

The largest land mammal in North America, ubiquitous symbol of the American West, the only continuously wild buffalo left in America, and the Governor of Montana brags about killing them.

If you’re outraged by his comments, please contact Governor Schweitzer and let him know:

Governor Brian D. Schweitzer, Office of the Governor, Montana State Capitol Building, P.O. Box 200801, Helena, MT 59620, (406) 444-3111

Click here to submit an electronic comment.

(Bison photo courtesy of Dana Leonard)

Spinning Wolves in Montana

2009-12-11T23:40:57Z

A recent Associated Press article makes the case that Montana is on the right track with its management of wolves. The article opens by stating, “An examination of Montana’s first public gray-wolf hunt showed at least nine of the animals were killed in an area prone to livestock attacks — a finding that could blunt criticism that the hunt was ineffective.”

The article also notes that “[c]onfident state wildlife officials said they could increase the quota on the predators next year.” Montana’s wolf coordinator is then quoted as saying, “We’re on the right track.”

Really? A total of 72 wolves were killed in the hunt, and Montana justified its wolf “hunt, in part, as a way to remove the predators from the front country where they’re more likely to interact with or kill livestock.” It looks like Montana went 9 for 72 on that score.

If a ballplayer on the Cubs went 9 for 72, he’d find himself playing for the Peoria Chiefs in short order. (Well, on second thought, the Cubs might not be the best example here. A 9 for 72 hitter for the Cubs would, in all likelihood, probably find himself batting cleanup, on the cover of the club’s annual program, and the recipient of a long-term contract extension worth tens of millions of dollars. I digress.)

Say you went 9 for 72 in your job, would your boss say you’re effective and on the right track? (If you play for the Cubs and are reading this, please don’t answer.)

Furthermore, multiple Yellowstone National Park wolves were tragically killed because Montana failed to implement a buffer zone around the Park and it structured its wolf-hunting season so that only wilderness wolves (the “good” guys the state wants to keep around) could be killed for the first month and a half of the hunting season.

Need more? Three illegally poached wolves were not added to the total kill quota, and Montana slapped the wrist of the offender of two of the poached wolves with a chickadee’s feather for a punishment. Eight radio-collared wolves were also killed; their contributions to science perishing with them.

The wolf hunt in Montana was premature (same with Idaho’s) and should not have taken place at all. But it did, and, to be fair, plenty of uncertainty existed heading into the hunt, Montana’s first-ever fair-chase public wolf hunt.

But many big mistakes were made -- both in the planning of the hunt and in its management once it was underway. And it’s discouraging to see the state so aggressively spinning the results.

It’s also concerning.

Approximately 40% of Montana’s wolf population has already been killed this year. While 72 wolves were killed in the hunt, another 127 wolves have been killed by “wildlife control” agents, ranchers, and other causes. With the last official estimate putting Montana’s wolf population at 497 wolves, the loss of 199 wolves amounts to a 40% hit to the population. (And that does not include the wolves that have been killed via the “shoot, shovel, and shut up” method.)

The Northern Rockies wolf population has yet to fully recover, and not a lot of room for error exists.

Montana’s poorly planned hunt, its subsequent spinning of the results, and this year’s heavy death toll are three damn good reasons, among many, why NRDC and other conservation groups, represented by Earthjustice, are suing the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to restore Endangered Species Act protections for wolves in Montana and Idaho.

Spinning wolves into trouble cannot be tolerated.

A Gift To Yellowstone’s Bison From The Gallatin National Forest

2009-12-02T23:23:20Z

Two weeks ago, Yellowstone's wild bison received an early Winter Solstice gift from the Gallatin National Forest: permanent closure of the Horse Butte public grazing allotment.

This is huge, wonderful news.

Horse Butte is a large, cattle-free peninsula that juts into Hebgen Lake on the west side of Yellowstone National Park in Montana. The butte has broad, exposed, south-facing slopes that green up earlier in the spring than much of the surrounding area. As such, many bison leave snow-covered Yellowstone and migrate to Horse Butte in the spring to graze and give birth.

But current bison-management regulations under the Interagency Bison Management Plan (IBMP) prevent bison from occupying Horse Butte after May 15th. Instead, bison are needlessly and cruelly hazed from Horse Butte back into Yellowstone National Park with helicopters, horses, ATVs, and snowmobiles. And a lot of time, resources, and taxpayer dollars are unnecessarily wasted along the way.

The permanent closure of the U.S. Forest Service's Horse Butte grazing allotment should be the final straw for the May 15th hazing deadline on Horse Butte.

While the grazing allotment has been vacant for eight years and Horse Butte has been cattle-free for multiple years, the Horse Butte allotment was still technically open and hanging out there.

Now it's closed. Forever.

With its permanent closure, Horse Butte is now totally devoid of cattle and grazing allotments. Furthermore, none of the private residents run cattle on Horse Butte (quite to the contrary, the majority of them want to see wild bison free to migrate to Horse Butte year-round).

No longer can anyone try to justify an arbitrary hazing deadline on Horse Butte without his or her face blushing redder than the hair of a newborn bison calf.

The "Suitability Analysis for Horse Butte Vacant Livestock Grazing Allotment" prepared by Lauren Turner, the District Ranger for the Hebgen Lake Ranger District of the Gallatin National Forest, states:

Horse Butte is used by bison. Consequently, cattle grazing in this area may contribute to the controversy associated with bison management and could be perceived as a barrier to year-round bison use of Horse Butte peninsula. Some believe that if cattle are not on Horse Butte, then bison would be allowed to use the area all season long. Removing cattle from Horse Butte would allow the opportunity for this discussion to proceed and focus on resolving any safety, private property or other concerns that exist on the butte relative to bison.

Yes, proceed, proceed.

District Ranger Turner ultimately concluded that:

This allotment has high value for rare plants and wildlife, including grizzly bears, bald eagles and bison, and there is no demand for domestic livestock grazing. Therefore, the recommendation is to close it permanently.

Amen. Great call.

On November 17th, Mary Erickson, the Gallatin National Forest Supervisor, agreed with District Ranger Turner's recommendation and permanently closed the allotment. In her closure letter, Supervisor Erickson noted "the inherently high wildlife values in this area" and directly stated that "[t]his decision will help reduce potential conflicts with wildlife and sensitive plants on Horse Butte."

Another amen. Another great call.

Thank you, Supervisor Erickson, District Ranger Turner, and the Gallatin National Forest.

The path for Horse Butte to become year-round bison habitat is now crystal clear.

It's time for the IBMP agencies to act.

(Photo taken by NRDC Wildlife Intern Whitney Leonard on the Slough Creek Trail in Yellowstone National Park)

A Deadly Thanksgiving Weekend Planned For Wolves And Other Predators In Idaho

2009-11-25T19:10:57Z

Grab your distressed prey call and serve yourself an extra helping of manliness at your Thanksgiving feast, it's Idaho Predatory Derby time, baby!

Yeah, that's right, the 5th Annual Sportsmen for Fish and Wildlife Idaho Predator Derby is set to kick off in two days.

So forget about football, leftovers, and full-contact shopping, it's time to slaughter some wolves, coyotes, foxes, and bobcats.

This event so greatly exceeds the bounds of ridiculousness, it's tough to write about it with a straight face (my face, which you can't see, is filled with both fury and hilarity).

I love to hunt, and I can't wait to spend my Thanksgiving morning on an island in Montana's Madison River hunting ducks. But as a hunter, this Predator Derby is unrecognizable to me.

The Predator Derby is about organized competitive killing, not hunting. And the sponsors, organizers and participants will do a great job of trashing the name of hunting along the way.

The rules are quite simple: each team tries to kill as many predators as possible in one day. Points are awarded as follows: 2 points for each coyote, 2 points for each fox, 2 points for each bobcat, and 3 points for each evil, Satan-loving wolf. The team with the most points wins (with heaviest weight breaking any ties).

The entire impetus for the Derby stems from a hatred of predators (even though, ironically, predators such as wolves greatly benefit the ecosystems they inhabit).

And, speaking of the Predator Derby's sponsors, please check them out here.

Are you as shocked as I am to learn that Cabela's is a sponsor? Cabela's is the "largest mail-order, retail and Internet outdoor outfitter in the world." It should know better than to sponsor a wretched event like the Predator Derby. On the Conservation Partners section of its website, Cabela's states:

Like Cabela's, these organizations are dedicated to conserving the fish, game and wild places that are our heritage.

Really? Does a dedication to conserving fish, game and wild places translate to sponsoring a full-fledged predator slaughter?

As a national leader in outdoor sports, Cabela's should be ashamed of itself, and it should revoke its sponsorship.

An event like the Idaho Predator Derby is a jarring reminder of why NRDC's work on behalf of Northern Rockies wolves is so vitally important.

Tomorrow, somewhere between my morning duck hunt and my third slice of pumpkin pie, I'll give thanks for the return of wolves to the Northern Rockies in the past fifteen years.

And then, thinking about the Predator Derby, I'll give thanks for America's legal system and our lawsuit that seeks to restore Endangered Species Act protections for Northern Rockies wolves.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving, enjoy the cranberry sauce, and let loose a little howl for Northern Rockies wolves tomorrow.

Come to Montana and Poach a Wolf!

2009-11-19T21:19:25Z

You could pay an outfitter in the Northern Rockies $3,600 or $2,900 for a guided hunt to kill one wolf, or you could come to Montana and illegally poach two wolves for $1,135. And you don't need to worry about losing your hunting privileges for the poaching.

$1,135 and no revocation of hunting privileges; that was the punishment imposed upon a wolf hunter in northwest Montana that illegally killed two wolves near Glacier National Park last month.

The State of Montana also failed to include those two wolves and another illegally poached wolf in its hunt harvest quota of 75 wolves.

With such a ridiculously light wrist slap, what kind of message is Montana sending about the value of wolves in the state?

For comparison, two men from Bozeman, Montana, poached one bull elk in Yellowstone National Park a few years ago. Their punishment? One of the hunters received 30 days in jail, a year of supervised probation and three years of unsupervised probation (he also pled guilty to a marijuana possession charge). The other was sentenced to five days in jail already served and three years unsupervised probation. Each was ordered to pay more than $8,000 in restitution, fines and other costs, and both were banned from hunting for four years and prohibited from visiting Yellowstone for four years. They were also ordered to forfeit the guns and ammunition they used during their illegal hunt.

And while that was a federal case, Montana has historically not been shy about dishing out some hefty punishments for poaching cases in big sky country.

But with a very public case of two illegally poached wolves during the state's inaugural wolf hunt, Montana let this wildlife thief off easy and missed a great opportunity to set a strong precedent that illegally killing wolves in Montana will not be tolerated.

What a shame.

When an animal is poached, that animal dies a needless death, and, more broadly, everyone is robbed.

Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks Warden Sergeant John Obst nailed it when he said:

[E]very animal poached represents one less opportunity for real hunters, and for everyone, really, who values Montana's wildlife.

It's too bad Montana didn't heed Sergeant Obst's words and drop the hammer with a real punishment for this wolf poacher.

When Will Wild Bison Be Considered Wildlife In Montana?

2009-11-10T23:35:24Z

Wild wolves? Wildlife. Wild elk? Wildlife. Wild grizzly bears? Wildlife. Wild bison? Livestock.

What the . . . ?

Yes, you read that correctly. Wild bison are considered livestock in the State of Montana, and thus the Montana Department of Livestock is the lead agency for bison management.

(Such an absurd system reminds me of an exercise I did in grammar school: the teacher would list a group of objects together, and the student's job was to pick out the object on the list that didn't fit. So, for a throwback to the days of recess and naptime, pick out the object that doesn't fit here: (a) domesticated sheep, (b) domesticated chicken, (c) domesticated pig, (d) wild bison, (e) domesticated turkey. Time's up. The correct answer is (d) wild bison.)

I got to thinking about this paradox after reading Ralph Maughan's comment on his Wildlife News website: "For all those in Montana [Fish, Wildlife and Parks] who say they want the wolf treated like other animals, why can't they say the same about bison?"

That's a damned good point.

Throughout the significant media coverage of the Montana wolf hunt, you continually read Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks (FWP) personnel claiming that the time has come for wolves to be managed like all other wildlife in Montana:

Tom Palmer, FWP spokesman: "It really gives us a chance to show Montana can manage wolves smartly and carefully, like it manages all other wildlife in the state."

Carolyn Sime, FWP's wolf program coordinator: "I think this hunting season is very important from a symbolic viewpoint. It's an important benchmark in the timeline of wolves on the Montana landscape. Here's our first opportunity to manage wolves like other wildlife."

Such comments beg the question, "What about wild bison?"

To be fair to FWP, this asinine system was established by Montana statute. As such, classifying wild bison as wildlife and transferring management to FWP from the Department of Livestock would have to happen legislatively (e.g., "The Restoration of Sanity to Wildlife Classifications in Montana Act of 2011").

In fact, such a bill was introduced this past legislative session in Montana. NRDC supported the bill, which was developed and championed by the Gallatin Wildlife Association and formally sponsored by Rep. Mike Phillips. Unfortunately, however, scare tactics carried the day, and the bill failed to get out of committee.

The stated justification for wild bison being nonsensically considered livestock is brucellosis -- a disease that causes pregnant animals to abort -- and fear that wild bison may transmit the disease to domestic cattle in Montana. Yet no documented case of brucellosis transmission from bison to cattle has occurred in the wild.

And elk, which can also have brucellosis, are (properly) considered wildlife and managed by FWP. As Rep. Phillips said, "If you argue for the continuation of the status quo, you can't argue against the notion the (livestock) department should have authority over elk." And that's something nobody wants.

The preposterous management scheme surrounding wild bison in Montana makes no sense and needs to change. Hopefully it will during the next Montana legislative session, which begins in January 2011.

In the meantime, the next time you read a quote from a FWP official celebrating the management of wolves like "all other wildlife in Montana," remember to translate that to:

"All wildlife but wild bison."

(Bison photo by Seamus Murray on Flickr)

Wolves Increase Biodiversity And Greatly Benefit The Ecosystems They Inhabit

2009-10-26T23:56:34Z

Wolves matter.

They lead to more songbirds. Better trout habitat. More game birds. Less insects. Better soil. Fewer coyotes. Wilder elk. More aspen trees.

Wolves, in essence, are key to a healthy landscape.

So says biologist Christina Eisenberg in a fascinating Missoulian article on the effect of wolves -- and their absence -- on an ecosystem.

Eisenberg has been studying the top-to-bottom effect of wolves -- called a "trophic cascade" -- in Glacier National Park for years. She's also been researching ecosystems near St. Mary's, Montana, and in Waterton Lakes National Park in Alberta, Canada.

"Each study site is about the same size, and each has a similarly large elk population, native to an aspen-based winter range, and each has the same general density of cougars and bears." The difference between the sites is the number of resident wolves: St. Mary's has none, Waterton some, and Glacier many.

Her findings on the much heated debate over wolves and elk mirror what others have found: there are plenty of elk in the Northern Rockies, but the return of wolves has made the elk behave again like wild elk:

The North Fork, Eisenberg said, is "full of wolves," and has been for 20 years now. It's also full of elk - as many as 14 elk per square kilometer in this meadow, where the wolf den site is located. Elk scat litters the ground not 20 yards from the den.

Clearly, the wolves aren't eating all the elk. But aside from the tracks and the scat and the bones and the antlers, there are no elk to be seen.

"They've totally changed their behavior," Eisenberg said. "For 60 years we've become used to complacent elk. These elk aren't complacent. They're on high alert."

From a browse standpoint, that means elk eat a bit and move on, eat a bit and move on, never standing in one place long enough to eat a tree down to its roots. And from a human standpoint, it means hunters see far fewer elk even as state wildlife officials insist Montana has more deer and elk than it's had for years.

...

Hunters, of course, prefer elk that aren't quite so wily, but trophic cascades work both ways in wildlife management. Remove the wolves, and elk are easier to find. But then coyote populations explode, eating their way through the local game-bird population. Enhance one hunting opportunity, and you affect another.

And from a bigger viewpoint than just elk, Eisenberg has found that wolves increase biodiversity and greatly benefit the overall health of the areas they inhabit:

Remove the wolves, she said, and you lose the birds.

Remove the wolves, she said, and the coyotes fill the niche. The coyotes eat the ground squirrels, and so the meadows don't get "plowed," and soil productivity declines.

Remove the wolves, she said, and the deer eat the river-bottom willows, and the bull trout lose both their shade and their food, as insects no longer fall from overhanging brush.

Remove the wolves, she said, "and everything changes."

Why is this so noteworthy?

[B]ecause the places with greatest biodiversity are the places most resilient, most able to adapt to, say, changing climate.

And Eisenberg wisely thinks her -- and others' -- findings should guide wolf management.

Wolf populations aren't recovered with 12 breeding pairs, or 15, or 20, Eisenberg said. They're recovered when there are enough wolves and other top-end predators to maximize biodiversity.

Her findings are important, and they're timely, as wolves are being gunned down all over Idaho and Montana right now.

In her research and in this article, Eisenberg simply and unequivocally points out a critical fact that's been lost in the recent debate over the wolf hunts:

Wolves matter.