Free: Contests & Raffles.
The ranch foreman in charge of the cow herd near Eagle, who reported a dead cow to Wildlife Services, was gracious enough to let me, my wife, Jenny, and Suzanne Stone (Defenders of Wildlife) take a look at the cow carcass.
A point I need to make here is that in all my years of investigating wolf damage to livestock I have verified only two incidents where wolves have killed adult cows. I have never seen a situation where a bull, mule or horse have been killed. I’ve had more opportunity than most people to investigate wolf damage to livestock, so I am telling you, without equivocation, that it would be an extremely rare incident to see wolves kill large livestock. Wolves do not expend a lot of energy killing large prey unless they are hungry, regardless of the stories being told in the media and on blogs. When they do kill large prey, an individual wolf can consume 10-20 pounds of meat in a single feeding. Very little meat was eaten from the cow carcass except from visits by coyotes and an eagle.
I am no longer employed by any agency, and my opinion doesn’t change the outcome of this event. The government has authorized some wolves to die and I don’t expect that my conclusions will change that outcome either. I just wanted to express my opinion and remind the public that livestock depredation incidents need to be investigated professionally, and with transparency and oversight, because I think wolves have been, and continue to be, taking a bad rap for problems they do not create.
