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Author Topic: Taxpayers Fund Mass Killing of Wolves in British Columbia  (Read 10647 times)

Offline huntnphool

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Re: Taxpayers Fund Mass Killing of Wolves in British Columbia
« Reply #30 on: February 15, 2015, 07:29:50 PM »
Yellowstone doesn't have the habitat to support more than 5000 elk, everyone knows that  :bdid:

Wait your telling me there were once 17000-25000 elk, well winter kill is the reason 70-90% of the population died   :bdid:

So many ways to spin it except admitting wolves are the root cause, along with a small small percentage of other factors   :bash:


LOL your kidding right? if the habitat didn't support more than 5000 elk than how did the population continue to grow past 20000 over the years? I miss the yellowwstone that had elk, moose, and all animals everywhere you went in the greater yellow stone area, went back there for the 3rd time and it made me so sick to see so little life there now

 No sh@t! :mor:
The things that come to those who wait, may be the things left by those who got there first!

Offline mfswallace

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Re: Taxpayers Fund Mass Killing of Wolves in British Columbia
« Reply #31 on: February 18, 2015, 09:54:16 AM »
Yellowstone doesn't have the habitat to support more than 5000 elk, everyone knows that  :bdid:

Wait your telling me there were once 17000-25000 elk, well winter kill is the reason 70-90% of the population died   :bdid:

So many ways to spin it except admitting wolves are the root cause, along with a small small percentage of other factors   :bash:


LOL your kidding right? if the habitat didn't support more than 5000 elk than how did the population continue to grow past 20000 over the years? I miss the yellowwstone that had elk, moose, and all animals everywhere you went in the greater yellow stone area, went back there for the 3rd time and it made me so sick to see so little life there now

 No sh@t! :mor:

Sorry thought my last paragraph would explain it,

Yes being facetious!!!

Offline Sitka_Blacktail

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Re: Taxpayers Fund Mass Killing of Wolves in British Columbia
« Reply #32 on: February 23, 2015, 11:08:26 AM »
Here's the other side of the wolf kill coin from someone who has actually studied the situation.

http://www.vancouversun.com/opinion/op-ed/Opinion+Ecologists+oppose+wolf+kill/10827496/story.html

Some comments.......

This first is from the official BC Wolf Management Policy

“Attempts to control wolves to reduce predation risks on caribou has been a provincial priority since 2001. Wolf densities have been reduced; however, at this time, a correlation between reduced wolf densities and caribou recovery cannot be substantiated.”

From John and Mary Theberge who wrote this piece....

"Another possibility is that no rise in caribou numbers is possible because of habitat destruction, regardless of the presence of wolves"

"Realistically, caribou days in the southern part of their range are numbered. It is biologically futile to kill wolves to return to the former situation."

"We would place our bets, however, on a third reasons that wolf killing has not lead to caribou recovery. Over much of B.C., what is known as an ecological phase shift has happened."

"Across much of B.C., massive forest cutting has resulted in gross habitat alteration and fragmentation. The cost? A phase shift. Moose, benefiting from early successional forests after logging and other land uses have greatly extended their range in B.C. Numbers of elk and deer have adjusted, too. However, caribou, especially the southern mountain ecotype, have declined due to a loss of critical older-growth, lichen-clad forests. They have been victims, too, of habitat fragmentation preventing herd-to-herd “metapopulation” flow that once reduced risks of local, herd extinctions."

"New species crowd out the potential for recovery of old ones. Recovery is generally beyond the scope of management intervention."
(In this case, deer and elk)

"Every practicing wildlife biologist knows two landmark scientific publications show a straight line graph linking wolf population size to prey biomass (the live weight of prey in that region). It is simple. More prey, more wolves."

" With fewer wolves, will moose and elk populations increase? Will their browsing inhibit forest regeneration? Should they be killed, too? (In B.C.’s 2010 plan for an aerial wolf kill, moose reduction was a management prescription, too)"



Again, habitat is more the issue than predators. But it is more convenient to go after predators, even if it doesn't work, because habitat changes take decades in many cases and people want to see changes NOW. The thinking is "At least it looks like we are doing something, even if it changes nothing.".

I now some of you hate the habitat argument, and argue that the habitat is already there. The problem is, habitat isn't just empty space. Each species has it's own needs and they are not the same for each species. So where you see forest and think...."there is habitat", it may not have what individual species need. For instance, locally Deer and Elk do great inf well managed tree farms where there is a succession of different age classes of trees. The newer clearcuts offer great food sources (unless they are sprayed with herbicides) and the older areas provide plenty of cover or protection from hunters. But if an area is logged all at once, it may be good for several years, but once it reaches the cover stage, it's a dead zone because 12 to 20 year old reprod Douglas fir plantation has virtually no food to offer. The only thing on the ground is fir needles. As the forest grows up, and trees are thinned, eventually there is some forage that grows sparsely but it will still be marginal hunting at best. In the 80s and into the 90s there was an area north of Hoquiam, basically the Copalis unit, that was heavily logged and my gang had superb deer hunting there. It was blacktail paradise. The large group of us that hunted together pretty much tagged out every year there.  In 2013 a total of 60 deer were taken in the whole unit. That is next to nothing. Our group alone would take a dozen deer in a year there in the late 80s and early 90s. There is still habitat there, but it doesn't support the deer numbers it once did. They are starting to log parts of it again, so it may get better for a time. Then a couple other local areas, unit 638 Quinault Ridge and unit 618 Matheney ....... Lots of habitat there, but it isn't deer habitat to speak of. 20 deer and 4 deer were taken in those two units respectively in 2013. 

Land and forest does not necessarily translate to habitat.





A man who fears suffering is already suffering from what he fears. ~ Michel de Montaigne

Offline WAcoyotehunter

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Re: Taxpayers Fund Mass Killing of Wolves in British Columbia
« Reply #33 on: February 23, 2015, 03:14:49 PM »
It's true that the habitat needs help to encourage serious population growth.  Wolves also need to be removed from the area to allow the population to persist while the habitat develops and the other issues are dealt with.

The leading caribou biologist in the region has determined wolf predation to be the number one cause of mortality, and at this point wolves are the limiting factor for caribou recovery.  Killing the wolves is not going to hurt the wolf population, losing any caribou has serious impacts on that population.  This is a triage operation....

Offline Sitka_Blacktail

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Re: Taxpayers Fund Mass Killing of Wolves in British Columbia
« Reply #34 on: February 23, 2015, 08:55:00 PM »
Killing the wolves is not going to hurt the wolf population, losing any caribou has serious impacts on that population.  This is a triage operation....

I agree with that to a point. The point was made in the article I linked.


"Realistically, caribou days in the southern part of their range are numbered. It is biologically futile to kill wolves to return to the former situation."

What this biologist who has conducted "the longest, most intensive, telemetry-based wolf research program in Canada" is saying is that it is pointless to try to save a few animals of the fringe of their range by predator control, when other factors that are much more serious to survival are working against those few animals they are trying to save. Regime change in the local environment made the area in question favorable to moose, elk and deer, but lessened it for Mt Caribou. It's not that the habitat is not supporting any ungulates, it's that it's not supporting Mt Caribou. 

It's just like water temperature changes brought on by the El Nino effect bring about regime changes in the ocean. Some fish and shellfish favor cold water, and some favor warm water. El Nino goes north and you will see tuna boats fishing off of Sitka Alaska. (this has happened in the past) But you can't always expect those waters to be prime tuna grounds. When El Nino goes away, so do the tuna.
A man who fears suffering is already suffering from what he fears. ~ Michel de Montaigne

 


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