Killing wolves to protect livestock doesn’t work in long run

[idahohuntr]

Interesting...

http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2014/dec/03/killing-wolves-protect-livestock-doesnt-work-study/

Rob Wielgus noticed something interesting when he studied reports of wolf attacks on sheep and cattle in the Northern Rockies.

When wolves were killed to reduce livestock predation, the number of dead sheep and cows rose the following year.

“It’s counterintuitive,” Wielgus, director of Washington State University’s Large Carnivore Conservation Lab, said of the study’s results. “People think, let’s kill the wolves and get rid of the problem. But it doesn’t work that way with carnivores. Sometimes, the punitive solution is causing the problem.”

Shooting or trapping problem wolves, particularly the pack’s leaders, disrupts the pack’s social structure. “If you kill the alpha male and female, the pack fractures,” he said. “Instead of one breeding pair, you may have two or three.”

More pups are born the next spring and the potential for livestock attacks increases, Wielgus said.

His research, published today in the journal PLOS ONE, questions the accepted practice of killing wolves that prey on livestock. It analyzed 25 years of data from Idaho, Montana and Wyoming.

More dead wolves correlated with more dead livestock, until more than 25 percent of a state’s wolf population was removed, Wielgus (pictured, right) and data analyst Kaylie Peebles found. Then, both the number of wolves and the number of livestock attacks dropped the following year.
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more on the link

[billythekidrock]

Why is it interesting? This is not new news.

[idahohuntr]

Why is it interesting? This is not new news.

Really? It was published today.

[billythekidrock]

This is not the first publication to state that killing alpha's can lead to increased populations.

[JimmyHoffa]

It seemed to work for nearly a century

[KFhunter]

Why is it interesting? This is not new news.

Good affirmation to not go around half-assed killing wolves - gotta do it right.

WDFW half assed killed the wolves on the sheep conflict in Stevens CO, they wacked the alpha female then quit the job before they got even 25% of them making the situation worse rather than better.  They need to go in and get at least 25% of them according to this article, 50% would be a marked improvement.  100% would be best.

 

[Birdguy]

Interesting...

http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2014/dec/03/killing-wolves-protect-livestock-doesnt-work-study/

More dead wolves correlated with more dead livestock, until more than 25 percent of a state’s wolf population was removed, Wielgus (pictured, right) and data analyst Kaylie Peebles found. Then, both the number of wolves and the number of livestock attacks dropped the following year.
___________________________________________________________________
more on the link

  Sounds pretty simple to me if we kill better than 25% of the wolves it helps the issue and would protect livestock in the long run. Thus killing between 98 and 100% of the population every year would mean less wolves and more livestock. Almost like it was before wolves were brought back. Almost too easy  .

To the casual observer it seems our fore fathers were wise beyond their years 

[KFhunter]

 

I like that kind of math

[idahohuntr]

Why is it interesting? This is not new news.

Good affirmation to not go around half-assed killing wolves - gotta do it right.

WDFW half assed killed the wolves on the sheep conflict in Stevens CO, they wacked the alpha female then quit the job before they got even 25% of them making the situation worse rather than better.  They need to go in and get at least 25% of them according to this article, 50% would be a marked improvement.  100% would be best.

25% of the statewide population...not 25% of a pack. 

The increase in depredation with less than 25% harvest is what I found new and interesting btkr...had not seen an estimate provided like that for wolves before.

[mountainman]

100 % worked for many years, reduced wolf/ livestock predation by, say, around 100%?

[HUNTINCOUPLE]

The wolf needs to be eradicated from the face of the earth.... No 25%, 50%, 90%.  100% gone! Unbelievable what these bios come up with. They will do studies just to watch it all go to you know where and then study again how to bring it back. These people have no common sense. History is being allowed to repeat itself after all these years of great heards of animals rebuilding themselves. We should divide up amogest ourselves and start killing each other as they did when this great country was founded.

[bobcat]

We should divide up amongst ourselves and start killing each other as they did when this great country was founded.

 

[Alchase]

Anyone else question the "25% of the total" before killing decreased? If the problem is caused mostly by one or two packs, why would it take a total decrease to 25% to make a depridation decrease?

And the "oh the alphas mate" myth has been disproved for decades. Like the wolf special on NatGeo about the "Rise of the black wolf" they stated all females come into estrus, no way a male will let that happen without responding, as soon as the Alpha male is distracted, some other male does the dead.

[Bean Counter]

I knew one dummy who said that wearing a seatbelt was more likely to get you killed than not wearing one. Heard someone say that about motorcycle helmets as well. To each his own. I view this as a self limiting problem.

[KFhunter]

We should divide up amongst ourselves and start killing each other as they did when this great country was founded.

 

Pretty sure that's happening as we speak.