homers brother

What's a tree stand?

Somehow, I'm not making the connection between you, the "uber hunter" and wolf management.

Nor do I get the impression here that most of these guys here swill beer in camp, road hunt, and complain about wolves. Many of them (I suspect) hunt the country around Yellowstone. I don't anymore. I hate horses, and the last elk I shot there took four days (and almost 100 miles, 12 mile one-way and 3000 feet of altitude difference x four quarters, packing one quarter - 90 lbs - at a time).

If we want to debate wolf/hunting management, we first must come to grips and accept that the Yellowstone reintroduction was artificial - not only in its success, but now in its failures. Wolves thrived at first, coming into a land where the elk lived their long lives free from any harassment other than the people on the roads. While at the same time, the elk outside the park were hunted every fall.

So now, the pack I watched thriving in Lamar Valley in the 90s (the "Druids") is down to its last member? Intra-pack killing, disease, migration outside the park, ... Yes, some were killed by man. Interestingly though, the original alpha female was killed by three rivals in her own pack? And then disease. Mother Nature has done more to "manage" this pack than has man. And we see the result.

And what most wolf proponents lack is a fundamental understanding of wolves in the first place. Most wolf advocates I come into contact with hate human hunting more than they understand the wolf. In a sick kind of way, I hope wolves ARE introduced to Rocky Mountain National Park. They WILL, at a point early on, find their way into town and kill the city park elk. No doubt, they'll chase cats and dogs, maybe even some of the runners and skiers who enjoy their idyllic mountain lifestyle once they get hungry enough or see them as an opportunity?

And through that, maybe we'll finally realize that wolves are innately wild, and need to be kept wild - not accustomed to man like the coyote. Not in conflict with man as are mountain lions and bears.


Out here, our government unwittingly solves that problem by banning the roads. Maybe you should relocate?