Originally Posted by
tangozulu
An interesting perspective for sure but here is another. Maybe stop viewing the return of the wolf as a wildlife 9-11 and instead look at the situation as an opportunity to return hunting and wildlife management back to a simpler time.
Yes the elk will need to reach back into their collective memories in order to co-exist with wolves, but like riding a bike I believe they are capable of it. As intelligent and extremely well equiped humams we should be at least willing to try the same.
Is winter feeding of thousands of elk in Wyoming really doing hunters or elk any good? Do you really belive Spider Bull is a real elk? Is it just a coinsidence that in a the last century mother nature managed to create only 2 or 3 elk that could score better than 400 B and C points and now 400-450 bulls are behind every other tree? Because Spider never faced a 4 legged predater and only very controlled 2 legged ones we think he is somehow the "best" elk ever? Spider is and was just a coddled cow and if he lived in the real elk world would have never lived to become the frankenelk he was. Do we really want to continue with high fenceing and feed supplements in our wildlife "management" tool box. I don't.
Just maybe we can look at what our sport has become and turn a page back. Maybe we can look at elk as more than just another commodoty sold to the highest bidder and just maybe we can get another generation interested in the tradition of hunting. It has become little more than another game that needs to be made more "extreme" to be popular. Biggest horns or longest range killing being examples.
My last elk hunt I managed to let my 4 year old daughter hear her first wolves howling outside the tent. Of course all the elk we were watching left for the next mountain but I'm sure she didn't care and I didn't mind either. They would be back.
For all the reasons it is getting harder and harder to hunt, wolves are not one of them. Doesn't even come close to what the outfitting lobby is doing both in tieing up access to land and tags. But that is another issue.
You're still trying to make this "just" a wildlife issue. To me anyway it's more than a wildlife issue. Let's set aside the "destruction" that the wolf has on other wildlife for a second. We could argue that all day.
You live in a "free democtratic" country so try and wrap your arms around this for second. Imagine one day you come home from work one day and your neighborhood has been leveled. There is nothing left but a few trucks pulling out with bulldozers. There is a sign at the entrance to your street where the state has left a sign saying something like "In an effort to bring this area back to a more natural state your house has been leveled and we are re-introducing the natural vegetation. Please build your house somewhere else." To make is worse you found out some well funded hippee environmental group got this push through legislation because they saw a picture of what it used to look like before your neighborhood was there and they live hundreds of miles away and most have never even visited your state.
I know that's a bit extreme because it has personal implications but the point is it was just done. There was no governmet agent there to discuss this with you or at least offer some sort of compensation to you. (Say like negotiating wolf and no wolf areas so we could feel better about them) I assume you have to understand the politcal battle in it's entirety to understand how we feel about having the wolf here. The wolf was literly crammed down our throats and some anti-hunting organizations have been very open about the fact that they believe it is a vital step in eliminating hunting.
They aren't trying to flat out ban hunting (At least on the surface). They are taking baby steps. First ban bear hunting in New Jersey. Then ban dove hunting in Michigan. Then re-introduce wolves. Then they want to make the minimum age to hunt much older. (I'm assuming so that less people will take up the sport) Then ban firearms and so on. They don't come out and always say they want to ban hunting because it's immoral to them. They bring up stats about how many gun accidents happen a year and how much vandilism is done by hunters in the field and wayard bullets. They bring up how many kids are injured killed by hunters guns that aren't properly locked up. They blame hunters and guns makers for all the gun crimes. They talk about how many hunters poach and how we have such a "negative" environmental impact because we make new roads and rut up existing ones. That's why it's so important for us to be responsible now days.
Believe me when I say in this country we are completely embattled right now and as a sportsman I spend hundreds if not thousands when I can afford it to support organizations that fight for us.