A recent Missoulian article stated:
“Wolf attacks account for only a small fraction of sheep and cattle losses in the Northern Rockies. Disease, weather and coyotes each take more”
You would think that would be the title of the article, instead it was:
“Gray wolves killed 1 stock animal per day in 2009, depleting compensation program”
“Gray wolves killed 1 stock animal per day in 2009, depleting compensation program”
So after admitting wolf kills were responsible for a tiny fraction of livestock deaths. the article went on to say,
“But wolves attract particular disdain because of their viciousness – many killed animals are left uneaten – and because of historic prohibitions against hunting the predators.”
“But wolves attract particular disdain because of their viciousness – many killed animals are left uneaten – and because of historic prohibitions against hunting the predators.”
First, I take strong issue with wolves being termed vicious, a predator’s job is to kill and survive. Look at the ugly pictures on FB and the Internet of grinning hunters with the bloodied, battered, beheaded bodies of wolves they’ve killed with high-powered rifles, to find out which predator enjoys killing!! They look like they’ve just won the lottery instead of taking the life of a beautiful animal for no reason other than blood lust.
Read Predatory Bureaucracy, The Extermination of Wolves and the Transformation of the West, by Michael Robinson, if you want to learn about the viciousness of man toward the wolf.
Secondly, was the reference to wolves leaving prey uneaten directed at the Dillon sheep incident? That story has been sensationalized and beaten into the ground. In my opinion, all the facts are not known and may never be known concerning Dillon but some of the answers may be explained here:
“Sheep and cattle, unlike their wild ungulate cousins, lack any kind of defense against wolf attacks. This mismatch can lead to the occasional slaughter, raising outcries from Western ranchers who demand greater measures to prevent wolf attacks. However, wolves only turn to livestock when their natural prey is unavailable, so these killings are infrequent. In 2008, wolves are known to have killed fewer than 200 cattle and sheep in Montana, and 100 wolves were hunted down in response.
Dogs are the only animal that definitely kills for sport, but that’s only because humans taught them to do so. When a farmer finds a few dead chickens killed during the daylight hours with no missing body parts, the neighbor’s dog is almost always the culprit.”
The Missoulian article goes on to say there is disdain for the wolf because of :
“historic prohibitions against hunting the predators”
“historic prohibitions against hunting the predators”
What? So people hate wolves because they weren’t allowed to legally kill them? Who is the one that enjoys killing again?
Wildlife Services blows wolves away every year for agribusiness.
The SSS crowd has been in full force. There may not have been a legal wolf hunt until now but there’s been plenty of wolf killing since their reintroduction. All we have to do is look to the past to see what the future could hold for wolves. They were exterminated in the West by the federal government working hand in hand with ranchers. The state of Montana introduced sarcoptic mange into the wolf population in the early 1900’s to get rid of wolves. The reason wolves made it back from the brink is because of the Endangered Species Act, passed in the 1970’s. The protection of ESA was the single most important factor in wolf recovery. It will be their downfall if their ESA protections are not reinstated. Wolves need help and they need good press, not constant reporting of minimal livestock depredations. Or to be fair let’s have media coverage of every cow that’s stolen or dies giving birth. Sound ridiculous? It is. Just as the wolf coverage has been ridiculous and unfair.
Since wolves kill so few livestock, why does the media continue to report wolf depredations like its big news? What’s behind this obsession? It only feeds into myths and stereotypes about wolves. Lets look at the facts:
“The governments own figures again show that mammalian carnivores kill very few livestock (0.18%) Of the 104.5 million cattle that were produced in 2005, 190,000 (or 0.18%) died as the result of predation from coyotes, domestic dogs, and other carnivores (USDA, 2006). In comparison, livestock producers lost 3.9 million head of cattle (3.69%) to all sorts of maladies, weather, or theft, respiratory problems, digestive problems, calving, unknown, other, disease, lameness, metabolic problems, poison (USDA, 2006)
Coyotes were the primary cattle predators — they killed 97,000 cattle in 2005, followed by domestic dogs — which killed 21,900 cattle. Wolves killed remarkably few cattle, 4,400 head, as did the felids (USDA, 2006)”
Yet the drumbeat of media coverage on wolf kills seems to have no end. Here’s a tiny sampling of headlines from different news outlets. From the headlines it looks as if wolves are on a livestock killing spree. That is simply not true, as the Missoulian article admits.
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