Idaho wolf survey reveals thriving breeding numbers

[bearpaw]

Idaho wolf survey reveals thriving breeding numbers

Jim Hayden, Idaho Fish and Game’s head wolf biologist, said teams have surveyed 30 of the state’s 107 known wolf packs, and 22 breeding pairs were found within them.

The minimum requirement for breeding pairs set by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is 15 for the entire state. “At this point, there are 77 more packs that we have not examined,” he told The Spokesman-Review on Thursday.

In a briefing to the Fish and Game Commission in Boise last week, Hayden estimated Idaho holds roughly 1,000 wolves and probably many more breeding pairs than have been confirmed so far.

read more:  http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2015/jan/23/idaho-wolf-survey-reveals-thriving-breeding/

[huntnphool]

 Perfect, sounds like our new director did a bang up job over there, looking forward to his insightful plan for Washington.

[3nails]

 You got to read some of the comments to the article.  I can't stop laughing. Someone actually said that the DNR is sending "hundreds of new apprentice wannabe trappers with traps into the woods. Most leave the traps there never to return". 
 Oh my goodness!    The stupidity is so funny it hurts! 

[DOUBLELUNG]

The number of wolves in Idaho increased steadily since their reintroduction in 1995 and peaked in 2009 just before hunting and trapping began. It has declined each year since.

A final estimate for the total number of wolves currently in Idaho won’t be made until April. But Hayden said that through mid-January it appears the wolf population has declined slightly from the estimate of 1,036 wolves as of Jan. 1, 2014.

[jasnt]

I wonder how many transients there are moving west?

[CAMPMEAT]

Isn't this Unworth's baby, you know, the one that Washington hunters have started to praise for his great work in Idaho ?

[wolfbait]

Idaho wolf survey reveals thriving breeding numbers

Jim Hayden, Idaho Fish and Game’s head wolf biologist, said teams have surveyed 30 of the state’s 107 known wolf packs, and 22 breeding pairs were found within them.

The minimum requirement for breeding pairs set by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is 15 for the entire state. “At this point, there are 77 more packs that we have not examined,” he told The Spokesman-Review on Thursday.

In a briefing to the Fish and Game Commission in Boise last week, Hayden estimated Idaho holds roughly 1,000 wolves and probably many more breeding pairs than have been confirmed so far.

read more:  http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2015/jan/23/idaho-wolf-survey-reveals-thriving-breeding/

"In a briefing to the Fish and Game Commission in Boise last week, Hayden estimated Idaho holds roughly 1,000 wolves and probably many more breeding pairs"

Idaho's wolf population never seems to grow, I wonder where all the offspring end up?



Human Harvest Does Not Halt Wolf Increases

On page 8 of the Jan-March 2008 article, I reported the Alaska study in Denali National Park where biologists found they had been underestimating total wolf numbers by 50% by documenting primarily packs of wolves instead of also documenting dispersing and transient wolves. Yet Idaho biologists continue to ignore the Alaska research and pretend that pups, yearlings and older wolves that emigrate from packs suddenly disappear from the face of the earth just because they are not wearing a radio-tracking collar.

A six-year study of the impact of hunting and trapping on wolf populations in Alaska’s Central Brooks Range by Layne Adams and four other scientists concluded that liberal harvest by hunters and trappers of 29% or less of a wolf population has no impact (yes I said NO impact) on wolf population increases. If you doubt that, I suggest you read more about this study, published in the May 2008 issue of Wildlife Monographs, later in this article.

As part of the FWS May 9, 2008 Response to Plaintiffs’ Motion for a Preliminary Injunction (to halt wolf management by the three states) Mech wrote the following in his 22-page “Declaration under penalty of perjury:”

“Every year, most wolf populations almost double in the spring through the birth of pups [Mech 1970]. For example in May 2008, there will not be 1,500 wolves, but 3,000! (Wolf population estimates are usually made in winter when animals are at their nadir*. This approach serves to provide conservative estimates and further insure that management remains conservative).”

(*lowest point)

“70% Kill Needed to Reduce Wolf Population”

Mech continued, “As indicated above, 28-50% of a wolf population must be killed by humans per year (on top of natural mortality) to even hold a wolf population stationery. Indeed, the agencies outside the NRM which are seeking to reduce wolf populations try to kill 70% per year (Fuller et al. 2003).” (emphasis added)

“Such extreme taking of the kind necessary to effectively reduce wolf populations is done via concerted and expensive government agency (Alaska, Y ukon Territories for example) programs using helicopters and fixed wing aircraft. Normal regulated public harvest such as is contemplated in the NRM is usually unable to reduce wolf populations (Mech 2001).” (emphasis added)

In his Declaration, Mech also refuted the 1,500 NRM (three-state) minimum wolf estimate as follows: Read more @ http://idahoforwildlife.com/files/pdf/georgeDovel/The%20Outdoorsman%20No.28%20May%202008%20FWS%20Biologist%20Says%20Wolf%20Numbers%20Underestimated%20Mech%20Says%203,000%20Wolves%20Exist%20in%20ID,%20MT%20&%20WY.pdf

[HntnFsh]

Pretty sobering stuff Wolfbait!

[jasnt]

Idaho's wolf population never seems to grow, I wonder where all the offspring end up?

This what I been saying for few years. Hmmmm Washington has little compation  and no wolf hunting. Pretty safe if your a wolf

[idahohuntr]

Isn't this Unworth's baby, you know, the one that Washington hunters have started to praise for his great work in Idaho ?

Yes, I'm glad you recognize the good work Unsworth has been a part of in Idaho.  Navigating the state to a position where they can manage wolves, not be hampered by federal restrictions, no longer ESA listed, send trappers and helicopters to kill wolves in areas where predation is significant on big game...the list goes on and on.  In all of the states with wolves I would have a hard time finding one that has done it better than Idaho. 

[wolfbait]

Isn't this Unworth's baby, you know, the one that Washington hunters have started to praise for his great work in Idaho ?

Yes, I'm glad you recognize the good work Unsworth has been a part of in Idaho.  Navigating the state to a position where they can manage wolves, not be hampered by federal restrictions, no longer ESA listed, send trappers and helicopters to kill wolves in areas where predation is significant on big game...the list goes on and on.  In all of the states with wolves I would have a hard time finding one that has done it better than Idaho.

Reading the info below, it seems to me that Unsworth protected wolves, and ignored the impact of wolves on the game herds, blaming habitat as the reason for the decline instead of wolves. WDFW are on the same track, it's all about more habitat instead of predator control.

Killing 14 Wolves Insured Continued Elk Decline

During the Feb. 3, 2012 winter feeding hearing by the Senate Resource Committee, Senator Siddoway kept asking Wildlife Bureau Chief Jeff Gould if F&G planned to have Wildlife Services kill any wolves. When Sen. Siddoway emphasized his question by tone and demeanor, Gould finally said they would kill “some” wolves in the Lolo Zone.

Later when I asked the Wildlife Services Director in Idaho why they stopped with killing just 14 wolves in the Lolo Zone, he referred me to IDFG Deputy Director Jim Unsworth who he said was running the operation. In a Feb. 22 news release, Unsworth said the reason they shut down the control at just 14 wolves was that their minimum resident Lolo Zone wolf estimate was 76 wolves and they decided with 22 killed by hunters and trappers and six killed nearly a year earlier, removing a total of 42 wolves was appropriate.

The six wolves taken by WS nearly one year earlier did not affect the Dec. 16 2011 minimum estimate of 76-100 wolves in the Lolo Zone – which did not include the border packs roaming back and forth between Idaho and Montana. Killing only 36 total wolves assured wolves will continue to increase and destroy Lolo elk.
Montana has refused to allow trapping in its 2012- 2013 wolf “control” effort and, despite the frank admission by MTFWP that wolves have already caused some elk herds to become extinct, it obviously has no intention of reducing wolf numbers. Read the shocking supplement to this article in the July 2012 Outdoorsman.
http://idahoforwildlife.com/files/pdf/georgeDovel/The%20Outdoorsman%20No%20%2048%20April%202012-Native%20wolves.pdf

F&G Fails to Monitor Elk Populations

The Idaho Legislature did not allow IDFG to manage wolves for eight years after it violated Idaho law by secretly approving the FWS plan and issuing FWS a permit allowing them to transplant wolves into Idaho. But even after the Legislature rewrote and then approved the 17th IDFG draft of its wolf plan in 2002, F&G failed to follow even the provisions it had written into that plan,

For example Page 23 of the 2002 State Wolf Plan requires IDFG to conduct a census every year of selected prey populations, including at least population size and sex and age ratio, with additional information required when concerns are raised about wolf predation (emphasis added). Instead, biologists conducted these mandatory counts only once every 3-5 years and did nothing to assess the impact of wolf predation for several years.

F&G Denied Winter Losses, Increased Cow Permits

Despite peer reviewers‘ concurrence with counting total deer and elk and then comparing the numbers with pre-wolf counts to determine the impact of wolves, biologists also ignored that input. They also ignored the 19 years of research in the Clearwater and all of the research elsewhere implicating predators, and denied any adverse impact from the 1992-93 winter and the 1996-97 winter.

For a year after the severe 1996-97 winter they continued to claim cow elk losses were less than normal in Lewiston Tribune articles and increased the number of antlerless permits in the 1997 elk season! They continued to insist that declining calf survival since 1992 resulted from aging brush fields that were being replaced by forest. Zager Spent 20 years Trying to Prove the Habitat Myth

That is the same excuse other biologists used 40 years earlier with the same results. The famous Clearwater elk herds have continued to decline for the second time, but instead of seeking the truth as happened in 1964, research biologist Pete Zager and his helpers have wasted nearly two decades and countless dollars unsuccessfully trying to find some evidence to support their habitat excuse as they allowed the elk herd to be decimated.

The UN – Nature Conservancy – IDFG philosophy of reintroducing wolves into ecosystems to create a ―natural balance‖ prohibited biologists from killing wolves and from admitting the truth – that uncontrolled wolves ultimately destroy healthy elk herds and leave them in a predator pit from which they cannot recover without help.

IDFG 2005 Wolf Control Proposal Violated 10J

When former Idaho Gov. Kempthorne signed the Agreement with the Secretary of Interior on January 5, 2006 to manage wolves, Idaho biologists‘ proposal to kill 43-50 wolves in the Lolo Zone was written so it could not be approved by FWS (see ―10J Wolf Control Plan Sabotaged” on Page 10 of Outdoorsman Bulletin No.38 at: http://www.idahoforwildlife.com/Outdoorsman.html ). The Proposal falsely claimed (without offering any proof) that ―Forest Maturation‖ was the sole primary cause of elk declines, with bear and lion predation causing calf declines and wolf predation likely contributing to low cow survival.

Rather than rewrite their Proposal to include facts instead of the habitat myth, Idaho biologists insisted that habitat is always the primary cause of wild ungulate declines. FWS Wolf Leader Ed Bangs suggested IDFG hold the proposal and took two years to re-write and get final approval of another 10J version which allowed control if wolves were just a contributor to elk declines.

But that same 10J version by Bangs included the lie that predation is never the primary cause of prey declines despite the results of uncontested long-term scientific studies that prove just the opposite is true.

Meanwhile in 2007, Idaho biologists wrote their own version of an Idaho wolf plan, upping the minimum requirement for each state to leave at least 20 breeding pairs intact before any control of wolves impacting big game can be approved. Bangs included that in the final 10J 0proposal published on Jan. 28, 2008 even before it was finally approved by the Idaho F&G Commission in March,

Habitat Had Little or No Impact on Elk Decline
Read more @ http://idahoforwildlife.com/files/pdf/georgeDovel/The%20Outdoorsman%20No%20%2040%20-%20The%20Whole%20Truth%20about%20the%20Radical%20Declines%20in%20Idaho%20Big%20Game%20Harvests.pdf

F&G Ignores Warnings from Experts

Also in 2002, the most experienced researcher of the impact of wolves on wild ungulates in North America, Tom Bergerud, told the Idaho Fish and Game Commission wolves would cause a major decline in Idaho elk herds.  He described watching herd after herd of caribou become extinct across Canada and said wolves will concentrate on one prey species until it is depressed, then move on to another that is available.

Bergerud insisted that wolves must be reduced over a wide area and for a long period of time, but Panhandle biologist Jim Hayden suggested this and other similar advice “must be taken with a grain of salt.”  He provided the Commission with a computer model he designed alleging that it would not be necessary to manage wolves if bear, lion and human take is regulated.

He did this despite the fact that his computer solution was already proven a 100% failure in the adjacent Clearwater Region in the Lolo Zone.  It is that attitude, ignoring 40 years of painstaking wolf research by legitimate scientists in Canada and Alaska, which characterizes those who are destroying our wildlife and our way of life.

Unable to defend or even debate their so-called “restoration of native ecosystems,” they protect large carnivores in a network of man-made wilderness areas connected by a system of man-made predator corridors.  And our Western Governors not only endorse but are facilitating the projects while no one (except a few top wildlife scientists in North America) is willing to discuss what happens once the carnivores decimate their prey.

#38 Idaho F&G Director Warns F&G Commission Not to Show Controversial Wolf Documents to Public
http://www.idahoforwildlife.com/Outdoorsman-38.html

[idahohuntr]

I doubt any director would make you happy wolfbait.  The articles you frequently reference and quote are  not based in fact, they are written by someone who is jealous or has some complex with specific IDFG staff and just likes to make personal attacks against.   

I think Unsworth has done a fine job with working to harvest wolves in key areas, particularly where they are a limiting factor.  Unlike you, Unsworth has actually spent time in the Lolo.  The fact that he, like everyone else that knows anything about that area, can tell you habitat is a real problem in that zone is not surprising.  That he has worked to address both predation and habitat issues in the Lolo should be encouraging to all hunters.  I don't get your fascination with a zone in Idaho you have no understanding of...I seriously do not know a single person who has ever been to or hunted the Lolo zone who would disagree that habitat is also a significant factor affecting elk numbers.  Even the most anti-wolf zealots I know who actually have hunting experience in that zone will NOT dismiss the habitat component.

[mountainman]

I doubt any director would make you happy wolfbait.  The articles you frequently reference and quote are  not based in fact, they are written by someone who is jealous or has some complex with specific IDFG staff and just likes to make personal attacks against.   

I think Unsworth has done a fine job with working to harvest wolves in key areas, particularly where they are a limiting factor.  Unlike you, Unsworth has actually spent time in the Lolo.  The fact that he, like everyone else that knows anything about that area, can tell you habitat is a real problem in that zone is not surprising.  That he has worked to address both predation and habitat issues in the Lolo should be encouraging to all hunters.  I don't get your fascination with a zone in Idaho you have no understanding of...I seriously do not know a single person who has ever been to or hunted the Lolo zone who would disagree that habitat is also a significant factor affecting elk numbers.  Even the most anti-wolf zealots I know who actually have hunting experience in that zone will NOT dismiss the habitat component.

and you have years of experience (a lifetime I might add) hunting the west Okanagon  (Twisp/Carlton)  area?? Just curious...

[idahohuntr]

No.  But I dont see the relevance of your comment.  Perhaps you could clarify.

[mountainman]

No.  But I dont see the relevance of your comment.  Perhaps you could clarify.

Unlike you, Unsworth has actually spent time in the Lolo. 

Unlike you, Wolfbait and others have spent a lifetime in the Methow. .either those in the field have credibility or they don't..