Feds Again Delay Release of Wolf Pack in Arizona

 

Center For Biological Diversity

For Immediate Release, October 8, 2010

Feds Again Delay Release of Wolf Pack in Arizona

SILVER CITY, N.M.— The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service today again delayed releasing a pack of eight wolves — badly needed to bolster the dwindling number of Mexican gray wolves in the Southwest — into the Arizona wild. The Engineer Springs pack would infuse new genetics into a wolf population suffering from inbreeding.

The decision is a capitulation to the Arizona Game and Fish Department, which has held up release of these wolves throughout 2010 and meanwhile has demanded resumption of federal trapping and shooting of wolves that prey on livestock.

“Continuing to postpone this wolf family’s release casts fresh doubts on the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s commitment to recovering this highly endangered and iconic animal of the Southwest,” said Michael Robinson of the Center for Biological Diversity. “The delay announced today demonstrates that the Arizona Game and Fish Department, working at the behest of the livestock industry, still wields veto power over the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and trumps the views of scientists.”

In December 2009, the Center and other conservation groups settled a lawsuit with Fish and Wildlife in which the federal agency acknowledged that a consortium of agencies led by Arizona Game and Fish had no authority over the federal reintroduction program.

“The Fish and Wildlife Service should honor its settlement agreement and make decisions based on what scientists think is best for this wolf population, not the political resistance of Arizona Game and Fish,” said Robinson.

The Mexican wolf population has declined or stayed stagnant for four years. Just 42 animals were counted in the wild in a survey in January, which was a 19-percent decline from the year before. A new count will be conducted in January 2011.

Only one Mexican wolf has been released into the wild from the captive-breeding program, without having previously been removed from the wild, over the past four years. That was in November 2008.

http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2010/mexican-gray-wolf-10-08-2010.html

  

Photo: Courtesy USFWS (F511 in Pre-release pen)

Posted in: Mexican gray wolf

Tags: The Engineer Springs Pack, Mexican gray wolves, inbreeding, Arizona Game and Fish, Michael Robinson

  

Karma…..Founder of SaveElk, the Anti-Wolf Website, Charged with Poaching

So wolves are killing all the elk huh? Hmmm, maybe Anthony Mayer, the founder of the anti-wolf website SaveElk, was talking about himself.

He’s charged with killing a trophy bull elk out of season, in other words, POACHING. If he’s guilty, don’t you find this person to be a complete hypocrite? He created a website to demonize wolves, yet he stands accused of taking down a beautiful bull elk, out of season and not in a nice way.

From the Idaho Mountain Express:

“The founder of a Twin Falls-based, anti-wolf Internet site has been charged with a felony for allegedly killing a trophy bull elk out of season last year in the Alturas Lake area of northern Blaine County.

Anthony J. Mayer, 59, is charged in a criminal complaint filed in Blaine County 5th District Court in September with “flagrant unlawful killing and possession of a trophy bull elk.” He is also charged with the misdemeanor crimes of hunting without an elk tag, hunting without an archery permit and unlawful possession of protected wildlife.”

According to the Mountain Express, Fish and Game Conservation Officer Merritt Horsmon states Mayer told him:

“he had first shot and wounded the elk using archery equipment on Sept. 30, 2009, and again shot and killed the elk using archery equipment on Oct. 1, 2009.”

That means it wasn’t a clean shot. The animal must have suffered terribly, after first being shot with a bow on Sept. 30 but was not killed until Oct 1. What kind of pain did he endure before dying?

Yet Mayer has the nerve to complain about wolves?  It’s not wolves we have to worry about, its human hunters that don’t know how to shoot. It’s human hunters that poach our wildlife and then brag about it. Apparently that’s what got him in trouble. He allegedly bragged on several hunting sites about killing the bull elk.

He’s facing some serious charges and I hope if he’s guilty they throw the book at him. How about losing his hunting license for life and even jail time? That’s the way to send a strong message.

But you know what gets me? Wolves are poached all the time and they’re a protected species. The little Oregon Wenaha pack wolf was found shot to death recently. Three highly endangered Mexican gray wolves were killed this summer and the alpha female of Washington’s Lookout Pack is missing. Or as one of my readers pointed out, thank you Rita, what happened to the little Mill Creek Pack female, 314f ? She made an epic journey of a thousand miles from Montana to Eagle County, Colorado. and there she died. Her bones were found on a lonely hillside called “No Name Ridge”. We’ve been waiting  for the results of her necropsy, yet it’s been 1 1/2 years and still no word that I know of?

When will a wolves’ life mean as much as a 6×6 trophy bull elk?

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Anti-wolf activist accused of poaching

SaveElk.com founder charged with felony in killing of trophy elk

http://www.mtexpress.com/index2.php?ID=2005133545

Photo: Wikimedia Commons

Posted in: Elk

Tags: poaching, anti-wolf website saveelk, Anthony Mayer, wolf hatred,  elk