USDA-APHIS Idaho Wildlife Services Wolf Activity Report Fiscal Year 2007
Full text [here]
Selected excerpts:
Introduction
This report summarizes Idaho Wildlife Services’ (WS) responses to reported gray wolf depredations and other wolf-related activities conducted during Fiscal Year (FY) 2007 pursuant to Permit No. TE-081376-12, issued by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) June 16, 2006. This permit allows WS to implement control actions for wolves suspected to be involved in livestock depredations and to capture non-depredating wolves for collaring and re-collaring with radio transmitters as part of ongoing wolf monitoring and management efforts.
Investigations Summary
WS conducted 133 depredation investigations related to wolf complaints in FY 2007 (as compared to 104 in 2006, an increase of almost 27%). Of those 133 investigations, 88 (~66%) involved confirmed depredations, 19 (~14%) involved probable depredations, 20 (~15%) were possible/unknown wolf depredations and 6 (~5%) of the complaints were due to causes other than wolves.
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May 6, 2008 | Comments Off | Topic: Wildlife Policy, Predators, Population Dynamics
Dovel, George. 2008. What They Didn’t Tell You About Wolf Recovery. The Outdoorsman, Bull. No. 26, Jan-Mar 2008.
Full text [here]
Also includes:
Geist, Val. 2008. Two Letters from Dr. Valerius Geist. The Outdoorsman, Bull. No. 26, Jan-Mar 2008.
Dovel, George. 2008. Attempt to End Airborne Predator Control–How Alaska’s Governor Responded. The Outdoorsman, Bull. No. 26, Jan-Mar 2008.
Collinge, Mark. 2008. Relative risks of predation on livestock posed by individual wolves, black bears, mountain lions and coyotes in Idaho. The Outdoorsman, Bull. No. 26, Jan-Mar 2008.
Dovel, George . 2008. Outdoorsmen Document Surplus Wolf Kills Hunters Comment on Declining Elk Harvests. The Outdoorsman, Bull. No. 26, Jan-Mar 2008.
The Outdoorsman is edited and published by George Dovel. For subscription info please contact:
The Outdoorsman
P.O. Box 155
Horseshoe Bend, ID 83629
Selected excerpts:
By 2006 many people in the West were aware that minimum estimated fall wolf numbers in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming already exceeded the criteria for delisting wolves by several hundred percent. But few seem aware that the FWS agenda to allow this to happen was exposed by wildlife ecologist Dr. Charles Kay way back in 1993 – before any Canadian wolves were transplanted into the three Northern Rocky Mountain states.
In an article entitled, “Wolves in the West – What the government does not want you to know about wolf recovery” in the August 1993 issue of Petersen’s Hunting, Dr. Kay asked the question, “If wolves are brought back how many are enough?” He pointed out that the federal government’s recovery plan announced that when 10 breeding pairs (approximately 100 wolves) existed in each of the three recovery areas for three consecutive years, wolves would be declared recovered and removed from the Endangered Species list.
Then Dr. Kay also pointed out that to prevent harmful inbreeding and protect against random environmental changes, most scientists believed that a minimum population of 1,500 wolves must be achieved. When he attempted to find out why such a low number was being sought for recovery FWS could not produce evidence of any scientific research to justify such a low recovery number. …
Six years after the 10 breeding pairs per area was established as the criterion for delisting, Wolf Project Leader Ed Bangs included Appendix 9 in the draft EIS stating that a questionnaire had been mailed to 43 wolf biologists in Nov.-Dec. 1992 asking whether they agreed with the minimum criteria of 10 pairs established in 1987. The names of the 25 biologists who reportedly responded and the specific answers they provided were not included.
Meanwhile Bangs initiated a letter-writing campaign to discredit Dr. Kay among his peers and elsewhere. Instead Kay’s scientific associates defended him and rebuked Bangs for his attempt to destroy Dr. Kay’s scientific reputation while also attempting to suppress legitimate scientific opinion. …
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April 6, 2008 | Comments Off | Topic: Wildlife Policy, Predators
Armstrong, J. Scott, Kesten C. Green, Willie Soon. 2008. Polar Bear Population Forecasts: A Public-Policy Forecasting Audit Working Paper Version 68: March 28, 2008
Full text [here]
Abstract: Calls to list polar bears as a threatened species under the U.S. Endangered Species Act are based on forecasts of substantial long-term declines in their population. Nine government reports were prepared to support the listing decision. We assessed these reports in light of evidence-based (scientific) forecasting principles. None referred to works on scientific forecasting methodology. Of the nine, Amstrup, Marcot and Douglas (2007) and Hunter et al. (2007) were the most relevant to the listing decision. Their forecasts were products of complex sets of assumptions. The first in both cases was the erroneous assumption that General Circulation Models provide valid forecasts of summer sea ice in the regions inhabited by polar bears. We nevertheless audited their conditional forecasts of what would happen to the polar bear population assuming, as the authors did, that the extent of summer sea ice would decrease substantially over the coming decades. We found that Amstrup et al. properly applied only 15% of relevant forecasting principles and Hunter et al. only 10%. We believe that their forecasts are unscientific and should therefore be of no consequence to decision makers. We recommend that all relevant principles be properly applied when important public policy decisions depend on accurate forecasts.
Key words: adaptation, bias, climate change, decision making, endangered species, expert opinion, extinction, evaluation, evidence-based principles, expert judgment, extinction, forecasting methods, global warming, habitat loss, mathematical models, scientific method, sea ice.
Dr. J. Scott Armstrong is professor of Marketing at The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. Professor Armstrong is internationally known for his pioneering work on forecasting methods. He is author of Long-Range Forecasting, the most frequently cited book on forecasting methods, and Principles of Forecasting, voted the “Favorite Book – First 25 Years” by researchers and practitioners associated with the International Institute of Forecasters. He is a co-founder of the Journal of Forecasting, the International Journal of Forecasting, the International Symposium on Forecasting, and forecastingprinciples.com [here]. He is a co-developer of new methods including rule-based forecasting, causal forces for extrapolation, simulated interaction, and structured analogies.
In 1989, a University of Maryland study ranked Professor Armstrong among the top 15 marketing professors in the U.S. In 1996, he was selected as one of the first six Honorary Fellows by the International Institute of Forecasters. He serves or has served on Editorial positions for the Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, the Journal of Business Research, Interfaces and the International Journal of Forecasting , and other journals. He was awarded the Society for Marketing Advances Distinguished Scholar Award for 2000. One of the most frequently cited marketing professors worldwide, his “first-author” citation rate currently averages over 200 per year.
Dr. Kesten C. Green is Senior Research Fellow, Business and Economic Forecasting Unit, Monash University, Australia. He is Co-director of the Forecasting Principles site, forecastingprinciples.com [here], and a member of the Editorial Board, Foresight: The International Journal of Applied Forecasting and the Editorial Board, Forecasting Letters. He is also Founder and former Director of Infometrics Limited, a leading New Zealand economic forecasting and consulting house. He is also Founder and former Director of Bettor Informed, a computerised horse-racing information magazine based on assessment of probabilities under different conditions.
Dr. Willie Soon is a physicist at the Solar, Stellar, and Planetary Sciences Division of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics and an astronomer at the Mount Wilson Observatory. Among his many published research studies is Reconstructing Climatic and Environmental Changes Of The Past 1000 Years: A Reappraisal with Sallie Baliunas, Craig Idso, Sherwood Idso, and David R. Legates. Energy & Environment, Vol. 14, Nos. 2 & 3, 2003.
March 31, 2008 | Comments Off | Topic: Wildlife Policy, Wildlife Habitat, Predators
Bergerud, Arthur T. The Need for the Management of Wolves–An Open Letter. 2007. Rangifer, Special Issue No. 17, 2007: The Eleventh North American Caribou Workshop, Jasper, Alberta, Canada, 24-27 April, 2006.
Note: A.T. Bergerud is former chief biologist of Newfoundland. He has been a population ecologist involved in research on caribou populations in North America since 1955. Along with Stuart N. Luttich and Lodewijk Camps, Bergerud authored the just released The Return of Caribou to Ungava [here].
Full text [here]
Selected excerpts:
Abstract: The Southern Mountain and Boreal Woodland Caribou are facing extinction from increased predation, predominantly wolves (Canis lupus) and coyotes (Canis latrans). These predators are increasing as moose (Alces alces) and deer (Odocoileus spp.) expand their range north with climate change. Mitigation endeavors will not be sufficient; there are too many predators. The critical habitat for caribou is the low predation risk habitat they select at calving: it is not old growth forests and climax lichens. The southern boundary of caribou in North America is not based on the presence of lichens but on reduced mammalian diversity. Caribou are just as adaptable as other cervids in their use of broadleaf seed plant as forage. Without predator management these woodland caribou will go extinct in our life time.
Introduction
A major ecological question that has been debated for 50 years is: are ecosystems structured from top-down (predator driven) or bottom-up (food limited) processes (Hairston et al., 1960; Hunter & Price, 1992)? Top-down systems can vary widely from sea mammals such as sea otters (Enhydra lutris) to ground nesting birds. The sea otter causes an elegantly documented trophic cascade through sea urchins (Strongylocentrotus spp.) down to kelp beds (Estes & Duggins, 1995). Ground nesting waterfowl and gallinaceous birds are not limited by food resources but are regulated by top-down nest predation caused by a suite of predators, mainly skunks (Mephitis mephitis), red foxes (Vulpes vulpes) and crows (Corvus brachyrhynchos) (Bergerud, 1988; 1990; Sargeant et al., 1993). Management decisions depend on understanding which structure is operational.
Discussions on top-down or bottom-up have been recently been rekindled with the introduction of wolves (Canis lupus) to Yellowstone National Park and Idaho in 1995 (Estes, 1995; Kay, 1995; 1998). The elk/wapiti (Cervus elaphus) population in Yellowstone prior to introduction were basically limited by a density-dependent shortage of food (Singer et al., 1997) but now is declining from wolf predation (Crête, 1999; White & Garrott, 2005). All three states, Wyoming, Idaho, and Montana, are litigating the federal government to get the wolf delisted so they can start wolf management to maintain their stocks of big-game.
We conducted a 30 year study (1974 to 2004) of two caribou (Rangifer tarandus) populations, one in Pukaskwa National Park (PNP) and the other on the Slate Islands in Ontario, relative to these two paradigms of top-down or bottom-up. (Bergerud et al., this conference). In Pukaskwa National Park, there was an intact predator-prey system including caribou, moose (Alces alces), wolves, bears (Ursus americanus), and lynx (Lynx canadensis). On the Slate Islands, our experimental area, there were no major predators of caribou. The PNP populated was regulated top-down by predation and existed at an extremely low density of 0.06 caribou per km2, whereas the population on the Slate Islands averaged 7-8 animals/km2 over the 30 years (100X greater than in PNP). In the absence of predators, these island caribou were regulated from the bottom-up by a shortage of summer foods and the flora was impacted, resulting in some floral extinctions. The extremely low density of only 0.06 caribou per km2 in PNP is normal for caribou populations coexisting with wolves (Bergerud, 1992a: Fig. 1, p. 1011). The top-down predator driven ecosystem of caribou in PNP also applies in Canada to moose, elk, and black-tailed deer (Odocoileus hemionus) that are in ecosystems with normal complements of wolves and bears (Bergerud, 1974; Bergerud et al., 1983; Bergerud et al., 1984; Messier & Crete, 1985; Farnell & McDonald, 1986; Seip, 1992; Messier 1994; Hatter & Janz 1994; Bergerud & Elliott, 1998; Hayes et al., 2003).
Of all the predator driven ecosystems of cervids, the threat of extinction is most eminent for the southern mountain and boreal woodland caribou ecotypes, both classified as threatened (COSEWIC 2002, Table 11). These herds are declining primarily from predation by wolves plus some mortality from bears. From west to east the equations for continued persistence are not encouraging — in British Columbia the total of the southern mountain ecotype is down from 2145 (1992-97) to 1540 caribou (2002-04) and four herds number only 3, 4, 6, and 14 individuals (Wittmer et al., 2005). In Alberta, the range has become fragmented and average recruitment recently was 17 calves/100 females, despite high pregnancy rates (McLoughlin et al., 2003). That low calf survival is less than the needed to maintain numbers - 12-15% calves or 22-25 calves per 100 females at 10-12 moths-of-age to replace the natural mortality of females (Bergerud, 1992a; Bergerud & Elliott 1998). In Saskatchewan, populations are going down, ?=0.95 (Rettie et al., 1998). The range is retreating in Ontario (Schaefer, 2003) as southern groups disappear; in Labrador the Red Wine herd is now less than 100 animals (Schmelzer et al., 2004); in southern Quebec, there may be only 3000 caribou left (Courtois et al., 2003), and in Newfoundland, herds are in rapid decline from coyotes (Canis latrans) and bear predation (G. Mercer and R. Otto, pers. comm.). In Gaspé, the problem for the endangered relic herd is also coyotes and bear predation (Crête & Desrosiers, 1995). In Gaspé, these predators have been reduced and there is a plan in place to continue adaptive management (Crête et al., 1994). Do we have to wait until the herds are listed as endangered to manage predators?
February 11, 2008 | Leave a Comment | Topic: Deer, Elk, Bison, Predators, Population Dynamics
Graves, Will N. Wolves in Russia: Anxiety Through the Ages. 2007. Detselig Enterprises LTD.
Selected excerpts and ordering info [here]
Review by Bear Bait
I finished it. Dryer than a popcorn fart. A sort of disjointed set of citations. Somehow the organization could have been better. Or so I think.
Wolves in Russia was PhD edited for facts and translations, but perhaps not for literary style. I have no doubt as to the veracity of the material, just some discomfort in how it was presented. I have neither the experience or talent to detail how it should have been done, however. My cop-out.
Wolves In Russia can be used as a reference, but you had better be an expert reader of Russian like the author. The book is edited by Dr. Valerius Geist, PhD, P.Biol., Prof. Emeritus U of Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Wolves in Russia has excellent scientific trappings, if not the order and style that would make it more digestible for me.
But after reading Will Graves’ gleanings from the historical record of the last 150 years, it becomes clear that Russians, and that means all those people under the rule of Mother Russia in the last 150 years, have every right to fear wolves.
There is an old Russian saying, “I kill the wolf not because he is grey. I kill the wolf because he kills my sheep.” Russians don’t hate wolves for being wolves. They hate them for what they do to their lives.
If you were rural and subsistence living in Russia during the last 150 years, you would have known political upheaval, government intervention and non-intervention, money for government services, and times without money for government services. You would have experienced long periods of gun control and being defenseless against violent people and predators. Hundreds of millions of Russians died in that 150 year period, and probably the majority at the hands of their own government by acts of omission as well as commission.
The apparent difference between the pioneer experience in the U.S. as opposed to Europe is the amount of liberty in the U.S. The freedom to own and bear arms was essential to a pioneering people who were able to succeed without undue influence of wolves in their lives. In the U.S. wolves were shot, on sight, by European immigrants because their life and cultural experiences were that wild predators consumed the means of human survival. “I shoot the wolf because he eats my sheep.” It is likely that pre-European North American residents felt the same way.
January 26, 2008 | Leave a Comment | Topic: Wildlife Habitat, Predators
Geist, Valerius, When do wolves become dangerous to humans?
Valerius Geist is Professor Emeritus of Environmental Science, The University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada.
Full text [here]
Review by Laura Schneberger of Wolf Crossing
This guide is for those who wish to understand the true nature of wolves in order to protect themselves and their families from harm or potential harm.
Please download it and pass it around to your neighbors particularly if you live in an area where wolf problems have become the norm. Not one human life is worth it.
Do not take a chance based on government or special interest literature that claims wolves will not attack humans. There is no real evidence supporting that claim and as most reasonable people understand, it is not in a special interest groups adgenda’s to protect anyone. Keep in mind that it is in the best interest of both government and special interest to maintain the status quo even at the cost of human life.
December 23, 2007 | Leave a Comment | Topic: Predators
