RMEF responds to wolf groups

SANDPOINT — Wolves kill elk, many wolves kill many elk and the more wolves in Idaho, the more its elk herds will suffer.

The math according to the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation is being disputed by the environmental groups in media campaigns, which the foundation has targeted as false.

“The theory that wolves haven’t had a significant adverse impact on some elk populations is not accurate,” David Allen, Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation president and CEO said in a press release.

Campaigns by groups including Defenders of Wildlife target wolf hunting as a misguided step to managing wolves and have used bad science in their quest to overturn an earlier federal decision to take wolves off the endangered list, according to the foundation.

“Every wildlife conservation agency, both state and federal, working at ground zero of wolf restoration — Idaho, Montana and Wyoming — has abundant data to demonstrate how undermanaged wolf populations can compromise local elk herds and local livestock production,” Allen said. “There’s just no dispute, and emotion-over-science is not the way to professionally manage wildlife.”

The elk foundation supports state-regulated wolf management that includes hunting, while Defenders of Wildlife and 12 other groups want to see wolf management returned to the federal government.

The groups argue that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service violated federal law when it delisted wolves in the northern Rockies last year, paving the way for state management.

In Idaho, the state set a hunt quota of 220 wolves and hunters have until March 31 to fill their tags. So far, 165 wolves have been taken, according to Idaho Fish and Game.

The quota could stymie wolf restoration, according to Defenders of Wildlife.

“Idaho hosts the core of the region’s wolf population with approximately 1,000 wolves,” Suzanne Stone, Defenders of Wildlife’s northern Rockies representative said in Defenders Magazine. “By wiping out 220 wolves, the state is taking the first step toward crippling the regional wolf population.”

Killing that many wolves could isolate packs and put wolves at risk of inbreeding and disease, she said, further reducing wolf numbers and the role they play in the wild.

The government’s recovery goals for wolves in the Rockies was 30 breeding pairs and at least 300 wolves for three consecutive years. The goal was attained in 2002 when efforts began to remove the species from the endangered list.

The small population doesn’t support removing wolves from the endangered list, Stone said.

“No other endangered species has ever been delisted at such a low population level and then immediately hunted to even lower unsustainable levels,” she said. “This clearly is not responsible wolf management.”

Former Fish and Game commissioner Nancy Hadley of Sandpoint said the elk foundation’s stance was realistic, as it called for continued wolf management at a state level.

“It’s a huge debate,” Hadley, who spent eight years as a state game commissioner, said. “Managing wildlife is essential in today’s world where we are dealing with wildlife, people and limited habitat and they all have to be balanced.”