feddoc

I hunt near my home in southern Colorado, unit 68, as I have since 1969. I began seeing wolf tracks sometime in the 80's.....can't remember exactly when. After I contacted a DOW officer about my first sighting, he said I had to be mistaken. Two years later I shot the biggest coyote I have ever seen and dropped it on his doorstep.

Ranchers around here are only too sadly aware of the reintroduction of wolves. SSS shoot shovel shutup

rather_be_huntin

Anyone game for some intellegence or do you all want to run around with your hands in the air crying wolf.

First I am no wolf lover. I don't care about wolves anymore than I care about other wildlife. Wolves are a part of nature and I am a nature fan. Now I am an elk lover.

Second. Based on your rational because I don't live in wolf country you're saying I shouldn't have anything to say about it and I'm only spouting BS. Give me a break. I'm trying to have an intellegent converstaion about it.

Now lets get down to business if there is any intellegence left out there. I have read everything I can get my hands on. Think about this rationally. To kill twelve full grown cow elk in one sitting you would have to have a super pack. Elk are still strong and it takes 2 or 3 wolves to bring one down and a few minutes to kill it by suffocation.

Ok so here goes our little scenario. So a pack of 9 see an elk herd. They break up in groups of 3. Each group attaks the herd and takes down a cow. Thats 3 elk on the ground while. After 2 or 3 minutes and strangling the elk the pack gets back up then after using all that energy they take off after the elk herd that has been running for 3 minutes, they catch up, take down another 3 cows and repeat until they get 12 cows. OK then after all that work they what, drag all the carcasses back to only central area to laugh and take pictures. After which they rip open the stomach of the cow only to feed on the fetus. Yeah that happens all the time I'm sure in wolf packs or maybe these wolves killed a couple of hunters down the road and took thier high powered rifles and just started plucking all the elk off. Its just not possible from a standpoint of rationale, thats info that is not accurate in one way or another. At the very least at the very extreme of the spectrum. I'm sure you guys are all experts in your own right however the real experts say wolves in fact do not kill for fun. They kill to survive and they do in fact consume what they eat. Oh and they target the weak, a necessary balance in nature.

By the way a Tom moutain lion will kill about an average of one deer a week.

Yes wolves roam in packs. But again lets use a little rationality here. If there are only 50 wolves in an area they are not going to kill thousands of animals. I completely agree they should not be protected. They should be hunted, exterminated if causing problems and managed. They should be kept at acceptable levels, they should not be allowed to roam unmanaged. If they start killing too many elk, up the wolf tags until that effect is very minimal. But anyone who thinks they are any different than any other predator has got some studying to do because the experts, you know the people who get paid to do this, say you are wrong.

jjt

would this be the politicians or the earth first bunny huggin biologists

i have talked to many biologists here in wyoming about the wolves you can get just as many different responces as you do on this forum

those who have the reintroduction agenda are pro wolf and tell you they eat everything they kill blah blah blah

those who feed the elk on the feed grounds (i presume that it your 12 elk story) will tell you just the opposite
i beleive the story you are trying to falseify was on the piney feed grounds last year where infact they(8-10 wolves) killed and left several elk to rot the picture that is surfing the internet with them all piled up was done by biologists in an attemp to get them to quit chasing the heard and essently feed the pack and stop them from killing more elk

for every wolf kill it is presumed that 4-6 animals are wounded( i have found data saying as high as 10 and as low as 0-1)most wounded ungulates end up dying from injuries due to infection

it is hard to get factual info on the above statement as i beleive 90% of the info on wolves is skewed one way or the other

rather_be_huntin

I knew someone would reply with that. I seriously doubt that PHD trained professionals from all over North America got together and conspired to make the evil wolf look like an angel. And I mean poeple who have actually researched them, not just any old biologist.

I suppose some wolves maybe do go off the wall and do strange things. But I do think stories about them mass murdering is either exaggerated or simply in the extreme, definitely not the norm. But then again I've heard some pretty wild grizzly stories too. I even buy that in some areas wolves are out of contol, population too high and consuming too many animals. One thing I do not agree with is protecting them. I think a lot of this wolf "hysteria" comes from the feds giving false info about the effect wolves are having in some areas. I do think the Feds are shoving wolves down peoples throat and thats not right either. And I think the Feds are doing this because of the damn bunny-humpers influence.

But I still think with a management plan to keep populations in check, hunting seasons and people given the right to exterminate problem wolves they are just another predator that belongs in nature.

Cougar Mag

First of all.....elk and deer are here for all to enjoy..not just for "sport hunters" as some of you refer too.

Arguments about keeping nature in balance by only humans hunting them is not viable. Either us humans under hunt or over hunt. Wolf populations will not destroy all of your elk, but ignorance will. Perhaps the government needs to allow hunting in over populated elk areas, just as I agree California has made a mistake with bans on cougar hunts. And if wolves overpopulate, then limited hunting of wolves could be utilized. If wildlife biologists were allowed to do their job, instead of politicians and the unknowing public using thir emotions, we would all be better off.

This coming from a diehard hunter, but a fan of all wildlife. Read the true hisory about wolves killing humans................very very few wolves have ever taken a human life. I think what it boils down to is a few do not want to share the earth. It smells of greed.

jjt

first of for someone to spend the time and money to get into this field (wildlife biology) you have to have an agenda or be an extreme animal lover

the only people that make any money in this profession is the government workers because there is a lack of money in the field

so that right there gives you a very skewed set of results in the field

they dont have to get together and conspire thay are all of or near the same mind set

jjt

cougar
here in Wyoming sportsman foot the bill for wildlife thru license fees and the sporting equiptment they buy there is no public tax, no state funds, etc. there fore sportsman and landowners have the biggest say in what, where, when, how, and why they enjoy them.

your correct there are very few human wolf conflicts

however there are plenty of wolf pet conflicts and way to many wolf livestock conflicts

Wolf killer

You need to get up from your computer, drive you car out of the city & watch a wolf kill a elk for yourself.
I watched twelve cow elk on the winter range north of Yellowstone national park get hamstrug by a pack of 17-wolves. The elk could not run away fast enough. The elk were breaking through the crust on the snow. The wolves were not breaking through, they were running on top of it.
The wolves did not take the elk down and sufficate them. They grab ahold of the hamstrings (flank) on the rear leg of the cows and ripped at them with there teeth. Every elk they did this to stopped running. They chased & cripped these elk until they had twelve crippled out of a herd of 250-300 elk. They went back to the elk that were still alive and ripped there stomchs open. The only thing they ate was the fetus. After they ate the fetuses the wolf pack moved on in the direction the herd of elk was headed. I did not follow them to see what happend next. I did walk up to the twelve elk to look at them. I was trying to figure out why they did this? I have been told they will do this type of killing when the snow conditions are right. They said the adult wolves do this to teach there young how to kill.

rather_be_huntin

I'm not saying the story did or didn't happen. I'm just saying its a freak thing, not a real world analogy of all wolves everywhere. I don't need to get up from my computer and drive anywhere. I can go out in my backyard and watch the neighborhood cat also teach its young how to kill in the same manner. I can watch the discovery channel and watch it. Predators do that.

If I don't respond to any more posts I'm just simply spent on the subject. No sense in arguing with anybody. I will say this though, like I've said a 100 times already. I'm not a wolf lover. I think there ought to be hunting seasons and management plans. Populations should be kept in check. If elk pops start hurting then wolf tag sales should go up. I do feel for anyone paying a tax of any kind for wolves, that would urk me too. The revenue should come from tags. If I saw one taking my cattle, I'd pop one. If one threatened wandered in my camp I probably pop. I just don't feel IMO they are different than any other predator.

Just thought I'd add this quote:
Aldo Leopold wrote,
"Those who understand the role of the predator understand the inner workings and drama of the land itself. You can not love game and hate the predator ... the land is one organism."

jjt

wanna bet!!