National Graphics special on wolves played several nights ago

[the hunter]

I'm basing my experience off twenty plus years hunting the same general elk herd. Not YouTube. I'm not saying don't hunt wolves, by all means hunt away. I'm just saying advocating shooting them out of helos paints a bad picture.

Advocating for roach killer spray is bad because it paints a bad picture. Dead roaches.

 

[CoachChris]

I live 130mi south of Yellowstone and can't figure out what problems the wolves pose?

 

[Barrelnut]

Just head on the radio that wolves have killed 7 cattle since October in Jackson county. This is the county that bumps right up the east border of Crater Lake NP. Had a photo in the paper last week of a wolf on that side of the park that a park employee took from the roadside. They are in this area in pretty good numbers. This used to be good elk country 10~15 years ago. It has been going downhill for the last 10 years. The Jackson Country does nothing about the wolves and pays $1000.00 per piece of livestock lost. Wonder where that money comes from?
https://kval.com/outdoors/oregon-wolf-or-7s-rogue-pack-kills-a-7th-cow

I saw wolf tracks around a backcountry lake in the area 10 years ago, never forget it. They have been there longer than the government claims. I believe the government put them in the NP without really saying anything. Wolves have also hurt elk numbers north of the park too. Used to bow hunt there, don't even bother anymore. The wolves have been there a little longer than they claim with the famous OR-7
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OR-7

 

[MtPockets]

What I'd like to know is why MT FWP dropped the quota in 313 (the area around Gardiner) to 2 this year?!
In my opinion, their previous quota of 3 was ridiculous, but now they dropped it even MORE?
How many wolves are born in that area every year? I won't even hazard a guess except to say it's way more than 2. That leads me to believe that the FWP thinks they need MORE wolves in that area?

WOW.

It is EXTREMELY hard for me to support FWP when they are doing things that obviously go against what the hunting public wants when (I believe) we pay for most of their budget.

Does anyone have any idea what percentage of the FWP budget comes directly from hunters?

 

[rooster740]

Plenty of wolves where I am greeny. It's funny though. I still manage to punch a bull tag pretty much every year. As far as rooster, he posts a lot of "Facts". I want to see proof of his "Facts". Don't be posting facts that you can't back up. mtmuley

What facts do you want? I learned my lesson on posting dead wolf pictures here. We do not care if you boast about killing an elk, what serious hunter does not every year? I can say that I look at the same groups of elk and sheep and count the declining calf and lamb ratio almost every day, and keep track thru the year. Do you want their names or do you want the published mfwp data? I can tell you that last year north of Yellowstone we were up 3000 elk and Jackson hole was down 3000 elk, from early heavy snow which was noted in the elk count report, but most just saw the increase in northern Yellowstone elk numbers. The published data is just that and it is posted for the public to look at on the Montana fish wildlife and parks website! Look it up! We went from 20,000 plus elk pre wolf to 3,500 plus or minus 500 now. I have nothing to prove here, other then lots of good hard earned education. Everything I have posted here can be proved. But I do not value your nit picky attitude that is so unrespectful to others info. I would be happy to show you in person. I will introduce you to the man that recently shot "Spitfire" and you can get his take on the 60 minutes program and harassment. I will introduce you to several people who shot Yellowstone wolves and what they went thru, I will introduce you to people that are here barely maintaining what was once a bountiful economy. I will not put their names and facts about them on this forum on my life or theirs, sorry if that angers you.

Thank you BigandGreen, you are also respected and I appreciate all of your knowledge. You are genuine and that is important in this fight we hunters fight.

 

[Bill Van Horn]

What facts do you want? I learned my lesson on posting dead wolf pictures here. We do not care if you boast about killing an elk, what serious hunter does not every year? I can say that I look at the same groups of elk and sheep and count the declining calf and lamb ratio almost every day, and keep track thru the year. Do you want their names or do you want the published mfwp data? I can tell you that last year north of Yellowstone we were up 3000 elk and Jackson hole was down 3000 elk, from early heavy snow which was noted in the elk count report, but most just saw the increase in northern Yellowstone elk numbers. The published data is just that and it is posted for the public to look at on the Montana fish wildlife and parks website! Look it up! We went from 20,000 plus elk pre wolf to 3,500 plus or minus 500 now. I have nothing to prove here, other then lots of good hard earned education. Everything I have posted here can be proved. But I do not value your nit picky attitude that is so unrespectful to others info. I would be happy to show you in person. I will introduce you to the man that recently shot "Spitfire" and you can get his take on the 60 minutes program and harassment. I will introduce you to several people who shot Yellowstone wolves and what they went thru, I will introduce you to people that are here barely maintaining what was once a bountiful economy. I will not put their names and facts about them on this forum on my life or theirs, sorry if that angers you.

Thank you BigandGreen, you are also respected and I appreciate all of your knowledge. You are genuine and that is important in this fight we hunters fight.

 

[Bill Van Horn]

I have had experience with wolves in both AK and ID. When they are introduced into areas with abundant game they have large litters and survival rates for pups are high resulting in above average population expansion. They will kill animals that are not eaten. Especially by young and adolescent pack members that occasionally go into a killing frenzy if abundant prey is present and escape is limited due to snow or other causes. Population numbers will not naturally reduce until there is an extreme shortage of food and reduction is usually achieved by members migrating to new territory. This is happening now on a a widespread basis. It takes many years and usually some reduction other than hunting for the food species to recover to healthy numbers

 

[bigngreen]

This isn't about if we kill a bull, I suspect there are some of you who would get a bull if it was the last one and still act like theres no problem, we went from being able to hunt enough numbers of elk over a broad area that each individual herd wasn't cleaned out. This is the third year I haven't seen a large scale migration from Idaho which is the elk that are here on winter range when fwp flies to set quota, we have two kinds of elk we hunt in SW MT, migration elk and local elk, the local elk and deer have been absalutely pumbled with little to no migration elk. Last year I had one opportunity to kill an elk, the ONLY elk I found and I didn'thave the heart to kill her since she had a calf and it's only chance was if she stayed alive, that cost my family a lot in meat and other families I can usually spare meat for. This unit we all used to take two elk and we could hunt them acting like normal elk, now the hunting you see out there it's hard to tell who's worse the wolves or the pumpkins. I haven't watched elk feed out in a normal area in long time, even going way back in some dark holes have proven to be empty now.

We're going to see an end to subsistence hunting in MT, fwp is ran by political pressure more than biology and that's straight from the fwp director, if we roll back and just let nature take it's course because we're afraid of anti hunters then we're all screwed and our kids will never know the hunting we had in a few western states. The trappers associations in a few Western States are the ONLY thing keeping trapping legal, they have not rolled over and played dead, hunters have, either you guys grow a spine and put political pressure on FWP or it'll be a pay to play game just like so many other states!!

 

[bigngreen]

If you see elk start counting calves, calf recruitment tells us all we need to know about the future of hunting, I saw one calf this year in a unit that we used to spend good time just trying to pick out a cow to shoot that didn't have a calf.
I personally think it's split between the wolves, the grizzlies and hunters, I saw cows in a second cycle this year and not a bull within 10 miles so breeding back in some areas may be an issue.

 

[HARPERC]

......The trappers associations in a few Western States are the ONLY thing keeping trapping legal, they have not rolled over and played dead, hunters have, either you guys grow a spine and put political pressure on FWP or it'll be a pay to play game just like so many other states!!

Too many groups more concerned with receiving Governor's tags for resale than applying pressure to "Wildlife" departments.

 

[the hunter]

Wolves- and the same for grizzlies -had their place on this continent at one time. Do they now? I think that needs to be the question in relation to what the real goal of reestablishment is, and what is the goal of reestablishment? We replaced the two former apex predators of the region. So do they have a place? Do they have the space?

It's very arrogant of man for us to think we can manage this planet. Regardless of your ideology we are but a blip on the radar. It's estimated 95+% of the species that have ever existed on this planet are gone forever. So how do we know how things should really be, or if we are even doing things correctly? That applies to all modes and mediums of environmental management.

Native Americans managed their herds for a thousand years.
White men are bad because we shot some buffalo, but the Native Americans drove herds off of cliffs.

 

[Ndfarmer]

I don't live in wolf country but feel for those of you who do. When you are fighting for your livelihood every thing else seams less important. I deal with the FWS every year and you won't find a agency that is more brainwashed and/or unintelligent. They throw common sense out the window and enforce old policies that don't work. I lose good farmland to these fools every year. The worst part is that the only way they got control over the land is by lying to elderly people to get them to sign perpetual contracts. I won't even get started on our state game and fish department.

 

[the hunter]

Just head on the radio that wolves have killed 7 cattle since October in Jackson county. This is the county that bumps right up the east border of Crater Lake NP. Had a photo in the paper last week of a wolf on that side of the park that a park employee took from the roadside. They are in this area in pretty good numbers. This used to be good elk country 10~15 years ago. It has been going downhill for the last 10 years. The Jackson Country does nothing about the wolves and pays $1000.00 per piece of livestock lost. Wonder where that money comes from?
https://kval.com/outdoors/oregon-wolf-or-7s-rogue-pack-kills-a-7th-cow

I saw wolf tracks around a backcountry lake in the area 10 years ago, never forget it. They have been there longer than the government claims. I believe the government put them in the NP without really saying anything. Wolves have also hurt elk numbers north of the park too. Used to bow hunt there, don't even bother anymore. The wolves have been there a little longer than they claim with the famous OR-7
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OR-7

For all of the people who did not know what I was talking about.
The pack that did this needs to be hunted and killed, and other packs that do the same thing.

 

[RockyMtnMT]

Absalutely they share the info, when I was running a meat processing plant I got the list of every hunter who had a late cow tag and sent them a sale flyer.

So I can get a list of special draw hunters from fwp so I can solicit them for custom ammo for their once in a lifetime hunt? Did you have to pay for the list?