My opinion, the wolves were here long before any of us took a bow or rifle into the wilderness to hunt. Nature put these animals here for a reason and it would be highly ignorant of us to say that wolves are no longer needed. They are part of the ecological balance of the wild and us as man have tried to conquer nature for decades without success. Is it the wolfs fault that we need thousands of acres of range for cattle? Is it the wolf fault that we feel the need to encroach on their home and kill their food? I don't think so. Sure, I would love to have a plentiful supply of moose and elk and such to go afield and harvest every year too. But the fact of the matter is, we are taking their dinner from them. They are not taking it from us. It is much different today than it was hundreds of years ago when settlers and so forth had to kill elk and moose to survive. Today, we have grocery stores and restaurants. We are not hunting for survival. They wolves are.

My opinion, let the wolves be and open them up for hunting season. I know I would love the opportunity to take a wolf. Of course killing too many might cause a problem also. Wolves do hunt in packs. Their survival and ability to hunt depends a great deal on the size of the pack. Having smaller packs might make it difficult for them to effectively hunt their prey, especially larger animals. I'm not an expert, so I can't say for sure. Just my thoughts.

I hope I don't ruffle any feathers with this, but its my opinion. I hate hearing about how man in is own ignorance tries to control nature when in many cases we end up hindering it or destroying the delicate balance of things we so dearly love.

Wow. Gotta love the logic here vs fact. Sounds like some would give up hunting to allow the wolf, lion etc to return to maximum strength. I was hunting bear in Idaho with a bear/lion/elk guide. He rode mule with F&G to try to track a single male lion in winter that had killed eleven elk in three weeks. Just ate a chunk of hindquarter off each. It is true that predators will reduce in number when the food source is reduced. So what! That means when there is nothin left to hunt for us. I think we got by just fine controlling game pops with hunting. With modern populations and development how much predator help do we need? This whole bambi thing of romanticising the wolf or lion is a bunch of scat. Just another example of humans that have no desire to control their own consumption and growth trying to manipulate nature. Sometimes it works well like when reintroducing game animals but the goal there is for them to expand to provide hunting, watching and revenue opportunities. Predators will do the opposite. You won't see them, they will eliminate the very resource we spent so much on expanding and then they will eat yer cattle, dogs, cats and eventually a kid or two and generate zilch in revenues. They just don't make sense in populated states.

btpatriot02
I just talked to a biologist from Yellowstone. He told me there best estimate of the wolf population in the yellowstone ecosystem is 750. They think the yellowstone ecosystem has all of the wolves it can support? They think if they get more wolves than what they already have there will be conflicts between the packs, they will also kill too many elk, deer & moose for that ecosystem to reproduce & still support them. That would cause a inbalance in nature & several wolves would need to leave the area to survive.
The biologist are employed to observe & consult the park superintendent. They write reports, talk with the public & game departments. There job is NOT to play God. Yellowstones policy is to not let the wild remain wild. They do not interfer with wolves, elk, deer & moose.

muzzyman88
Ranchers need about 5-acres for every head of cattle they raise around here. If you want to keep buying beef at the grocery store? Then yes the ranchers do need all of the ground they own. I also feel that man is more of a problem than wolves are. We let are emotions get in the way of logical thinking sometimes. The wolves are just being wolves.
We need to have the right to shoot wolves on sight when they are in the wrong places.
The wolf issue will end up being a ballot box issue in the years to come and good sound science will loose again to emotions at the ballot box.[:'(]

Wolf Killer, I never thought of the head of cattle per acre. Do you oppose of the wolf or do you think we can find a balance with them? I for one think balance is what they should be shooting for. Although not as hard on their prey, we have a lot of coyote's here. Many, many people would much rather see them all shot off. I for one don't mind them, as long as they can be kept in check. They do kill fawns and turkeys every year, which in turn has the deer around every tree crowd fired up. We however can hunt them year round. The problem is, they are very difficult to hunt. If we can take enough of them each year to keep populations reasonable, then whats wrong with it?

Of course like I said, Coyotes, and Wolves are two entirely different breeds.

i have hunted the selway in idaho for a good many years. i quit last year i don't have horses.it's been going down hill for a long time in the areas i hunt.the last time i hunted there i spent 2 days tring to find the elk.when i found them guess what the wolves knew where they were to. i found a wallow in a big mud flat about three acres it was coverd with wolf tracks.a pack of wolves don't realy care about a little ol deer they want big game big family big game.they can kill any elk they come on not just calfs .they will hound it up to a week not let it eat or sleep they run it down then its feast time.here in wisconsin we just got a start on our elk herd guess what wolves killed a young 5 by 5 this animal was in perfect shape we have lots of deer here.but the elk is high on there list of food.like i said before more wolves less tags selway has a 365 or so out of state tag limit im sure that will be less as time goes on.as far as i see it wolves belong with the dinosoars a thing of the past they have no place in 2004.hunters control game pops very well they can be regulated unlike the wolves.

Well said selway, and wolf killer. Selway if you want info about anti wolf meetings, in idaho, email me.

Wolf killer, do you guys have any wolf management plan at all? if you do and its on a website could you give it to me so that i can have a better understanding on the wolf problems. If you would like to see ours you can go to www.dnr.state.mn.us and then write in wolves in the DNR search then click on the first link then you'll see what we are at with the wolf situation.

I see this as stirred up quite a few replies. very cool. I apologized for it being so long. next time i write up an article i wont space it so much lol, Keep the posts coming [:-]

btpatriot02
Montana & Wyoming do not have a final plan that has been approved. If they would just change the wolves statis to predator while it is on private land & endangered while it is on federal land? I think this would make most of us feel better about them?

That makes the most sense