Free: Contests & Raffles.
Suspicious about how the species got here as well as their true numbers, the quartet of Eastside lawmakers are going through an estimated 7,200 pages of biologist emails, plans and other things wolfish they received through a public disclosure act request of the Department of Fish & Wildlife this past summer.At the same time, they’re questioning WDFW’s effort to provide new corridors for “rare, wide-ranging carnivores” through Okanogan County. A plan shows the agency hopes to “secure” 125 square miles of ranchland in the heart of some of the state’s best mule deer country through a mix of acquisitions and conservation easements over the next decade.
Republican staffers in Olympia are also scouring Internet forums such as Hunting Washington for reports from hunters which state biologists may have poo-poohed.One thing in the documents that has caught Taylor’s eye is Conservation Northwest’s involvement with WDFW. He brands the Bellingham organization an “environmental” group and says there is a lot of email traffic between them and state biologists.
ONE PARTICULAR WDFW document adds fuel to that fire.A grant proposal submitted to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service in 2009 makes it appear as if the agency has a Yellowstone to Yukon-like master plan for North-central and Northeast Washington.It asks the Feds for $4 million in matching funds for “the second phase of an anticipated 5-10 year public/private effort to secure approximately 80,000 acres of critical wildlife habitat and vital wildlife corridors in the Okanogan-Similkameen watershed.”
Protecting the land through conservation easements and fee-title purchases would help “maintain migration corridors for deer, moose and bighorn sheep (rare carnivore prey).”It’s the phrasing – relegating game species to burger for footloose wolves and bears – that partly gets Rep. Joel Kretz.“It really frosts me that sportsmen are the biggest contributors to the department and the reason for [the acquisitions] is to feed predators,” he says.
DAVE BRITTEL IS WDFW’S assistant wildlife program manager. He admits that if he were looking for “mischief” in the agency’s dealings on wolves, the carnivore-centric phrasing in the Okanogan-Similkameen grant proposal might be it.“That makes it awkward, you’re right,” he says.But the verbiage appears to be a function of what it takes to shake loose money from USFWS. Plug in words like “Canada lynx,” “bull trout” and other endangered or threatened wildlife, add that there’s connectivity to nearby public lands, and the coffers seemingly swing open – especially for WDFW.“The intent of these grants is to acquire habitat for listed species,” says Joan Jewett, a USFWS spokeswoman in Portland.Since 2001, her agency has awarded at least $28.74 million for land buys in Okanogan County. WDFW then matches that with grants from the state Recreation and Conservation Office, itself funded by state gas tax and bond sales, and the federal government.
AS TAYLOR AND KRETZ’S staffers dig into sites like Hunting Washington, they will find nearly as many reports of wolves there as they can find in WDFW’s own records. Together, the draft plan and a 1998 paper list over 800 different howls heard, tracks seen and critters spotted across the state the past 35 years.Over 250 sightings between 1975 and 1995 are considered confirmed wolves or highly likely to be, but wolf-dog hybrids – released by owners who can’t handle their pets, find another home for them or have them euthanized – lead to false sightings, giving biologists fits.For example, in 1992 WDFW’s Scott Fitkin captured, collared and released an animal near Mt. Baker. Big news at the time, but a month later it was determined to be a hybrid, so it was recaptured and taken to Wolf Haven International near Tenino where it was nicknamed Nooksack and died in 2005.
However, a real female wolf that was turned loose in southern British Columbia led to a flurry of sightings of adults and pups on upper Ross Lake in the early 1990s. The woman who raised then released the animal vehemently denied state biologists had any part in it when we spoke in early fall. But Seattle Times articles from that period – including one with a dubious passing reference to a whopping six packs in the state’s Cascades – are sometimes dredged up to discredit WDFW’s claim that the Lookout wolves were the state’s first confirmed breeding pair in 70 years.
SOME OF THE FIRST images of that pack and its six pups came off of Conservation Northwest’s trail cameras. The group is headed up by Mitch Friedman, one of Earth First’s original tree sitters. Now he’s hugging loggers.And the gun.I met him in mid-September as CNW campaigned in Seattle for new wilderness, more sawlogs and continued cattle grazing in the Colville National Forest (see page 14 of the November issue of Northwest Sportsman). He surprised me when he said he hunts Okanogan County, as do I.Suspicious he was just orangewashing himself, though, I checked with state sources and found he’s actually bought a deer tag every year since 2001. Over that time he reported killing three bucks and one doe with a rifle. He sent me pictures of himself posing with two, a spike whitetail and nice muley.Friedman later blogged that he’s a “nature lover” and “sportsman” at the same time. He explained of CNW, “Part of our role is to bridge the gap between various pro-nature ethics, urban/rural, and hunter/nonhunter, because this is what helps wildlife best.”
"After trying for 10 days, biologists Jon Almack and Scott Fitkin succeeded in luring the animal into a fenced swimming-pool area, using a fish carcass as bait."Ah yes, the old "swimming pool cage trap".... not generally regarded as the best trapping method for wolves...or any wild animal for that matter.It was a hybrid dog.page 313, The Company of Wolves, by Peter Stienhart
Quote from: WAcoyotehunter on March 10, 2015, 12:31:36 PM"After trying for 10 days, biologists Jon Almack and Scott Fitkin succeeded in luring the animal into a fenced swimming-pool area, using a fish carcass as bait."Ah yes, the old "swimming pool cage trap".... not generally regarded as the best trapping method for wolves...or any wild animal for that matter.It was a hybrid dog.page 313, The Company of Wolves, by Peter StienhartYup, that was confirmed to me. So all these stories from 1990 ( or 91 or 92.....) are just rumors without standing.
Thanks bear paw for posting that
Quote from: Knocker of rocks on March 10, 2015, 03:15:49 PMQuote from: WAcoyotehunter on March 10, 2015, 12:31:36 PM"After trying for 10 days, biologists Jon Almack and Scott Fitkin succeeded in luring the animal into a fenced swimming-pool area, using a fish carcass as bait."Ah yes, the old "swimming pool cage trap".... not generally regarded as the best trapping method for wolves...or any wild animal for that matter.It was a hybrid dog.page 313, The Company of Wolves, by Peter StienhartYup, that was confirmed to me. So all these stories from 1990 ( or 91 or 92.....) are just rumors without standing.I'm going to go with the Seattle Times articles, cover stories after the fact are pretty easy to spin as we are now seeing.Knocker-Maybe you could explain why WDFW shut coyotes hunting down in the Pasaten Wilderness in 1991-92? Was it because of wolves or was that just another story from the 90's that no one should believe?
Quote from: wolfbait on March 10, 2015, 05:56:44 PMQuote from: Knocker of rocks on March 10, 2015, 03:15:49 PMQuote from: WAcoyotehunter on March 10, 2015, 12:31:36 PM"After trying for 10 days, biologists Jon Almack and Scott Fitkin succeeded in luring the animal into a fenced swimming-pool area, using a fish carcass as bait."Ah yes, the old "swimming pool cage trap".... not generally regarded as the best trapping method for wolves...or any wild animal for that matter.It was a hybrid dog.page 313, The Company of Wolves, by Peter StienhartYup, that was confirmed to me. So all these stories from 1990 ( or 91 or 92.....) are just rumors without standing.I'm going to go with the Seattle Times articles, cover stories after the fact are pretty easy to spin as we are now seeing.Knocker-Maybe you could explain why WDFW shut coyotes hunting down in the Pasaten Wilderness in 1991-92? Was it because of wolves or was that just another story from the 90's that no one should believe?why are you going to stick with them? Bearpaws syory reconfirms that the collared animal captured in a swimming pool enclosure was a hybrid, and was placed in wolf Haven. Why is that story unbelievable to you?
