ACTION ALERT: Wyoming Wolves In Grave Peril From “Old West Style” Politics…

Video by immywolf, who is a young, Australian teenager. Thank you immy for caring.

You may think we’re living in 2011 but it’s 1911 in the Northern Rockies. Wolves are under siege on all fronts from the Old West mentality, “the only good wolf, is a dead wolf“.

Ken Salazar and Wyoming’s Governor Matt Meade, struck a deal on wolves this summer that would allow unregulated killing of Wyoming wolves in most of the state. Wolves are still protected under the ESA in Wyoming but things are moving very quickly to delist them and push forward with the “wolf extermination plan”.

On November 8, 2011, Wyoming lawmakers made it even easier for the “plan” to move forward.

Panel of Wyoming lawmakers recommends approval of wolf plan that could lead to delisting

BEN NEARY  Associated Press

First Posted: November 08, 2011 – 12:50 pm

CHEYENNE, Wyo. — A panel of Wyoming lawmakers voted Tuesday to recommend approval of a plan that could remove federal protections from gray wolves in the state as soon as next year.

Members of the Joint Travel, Recreation, Wildlife and Cultural Resources Interim Committee voted unanimously in Thermopolis to approve a bill that would change the state’s existing wolf-management plan. The full Legislature will consider the issue when it meets in February. Revising the state plan is a key step in getting wolves in the state off the federal list of endangered species

Read more: http://www.therepublic.com/view/story/6ebeed86c9a44f51baf43b5d93535805/WY–Wolves-Wyoming/

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Meanwhile Rep. Cynthia Lummis (R-WY) has been busy pushing to delist wolves by applying the same tactics Congress used on wolves last spring.

“U.S. Rep. Cynthia Lummis, R-Wyo., successfully inserted a no-litigation rider into a 2012 congressional appropriations bill, as well as a clause that would immediately put Wyoming wolves under state control. It’s similar to a budget rider Congress passed in April preventing court action against the delisting of wolves in Montana, Idaho and parts of Washington, Oregon and Utah.”

Lummis clause preventing wolf lawsuits survives challenge

 By JEREMY PELZER Casper Star-Tribune The Billings Gazette

Read more:http://saovanews.blogspot.com/2011/07/lummis-clause-preventing-wolf-lawsuits.html

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On Tuesday, November 15, there will be a public hearing held by USFWS on this issue. Comments will be accepted. If you live in Wyoming or if you can travel out-of-state,  please make it your business to attend the hearing and speak out on the “wolf slaughter” proposal.

 If we allow wolves to be treated in this manner it will set a precedent that a wolves’ life means next to nothing and other states could follow suit. Their lives are already being devalued, as they suffer through Idaho and Montana hunts. On Tuesday, Idaho will allow trapping and snaring of wolves, something that hasn’t happened since the last Western wolf extermination. We can’t sit silently by.

“The public hearing is from 6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. Nov. 15, at Central Wyoming College (Riverton, Wyoming). There will be an informational meeting beforehand, from 4:30 p.m. to 6 p.m.”

Feds plan public meeting on Wyoming wolves

CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) — Some environmental groups say they intend to press the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to expand protections for wolves in Wyoming when the federal agency takes public comment next week on a wolf management plan.

The federal agency plans to hold a meeting Tuesday in Riverton to collect public comment on a plan that Gov. Matt Mead and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar reached this summer that could see an end to federal protections for Wyoming wolves as soon as next year.

Under the agreement, Wyoming would classify wolves as unprotected predators that could be shot on sight in most areas. Wolves would be protected as trophy game animals in a flexible zone outside Yellowstone National Park.

Daryle Murphy of Riverton, conservation chairman for the Wyoming chapter of the Sierra Club, said Friday he intends to hammer on the point that the deal Mead and Salazar struck is very similar to a plan to delisting plan the Fish and Wildlife Service rejected a few years ago.

“It’s not really a wolf-management plan,” Murphy said. “It’s more of a wolf-killing plan from our perspective. Our concern is that almost 90 percent of the state, wolves will have no protection whatsoever, and are susceptible to killing by anyone at any time without even requiring a license since they’ll be listed as predators for the most part.”

Read more: http://www.greatfallstribune.com/article/20111113/NEWS01/111130303/Feds-plan-public-meeting-Wyoming-wolves?odyssey=tab|topnews|text|Frontpage

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You can also comment on the plan until January 13, 2012 by using the link below.

Endangered and Threatened Wildlife and Plants: Removal of Gray Wolf in Wyoming from Federal List of Endangered and Threatened Wildlife, etc.

http://www.regulations.gov/#!documentDetail;D=FWS-R6-ES-2011-0039-0001

Please Act NOW. You can either attend the meeting in Riverton or use the above link to comment.

I’m not asking for your money,  just your time. Please act to help save Wyoming wolves from this terrible assault.

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Talking Points

•Wolves are vital to a thriving ecosystem. They keep elk healthy by culling the old, sick and weak. Having wolves on the landscape push elk and other ungulates to keep moving (ecology of fear), preventing over-browsing of young trees,  specifically ash and cottonwood along stream beds. This is called a trophic cascade.

•Wolves are accused of effecting rancher’s bottom line by preying heavily on cattle. In fact this couldn’t be further from the truth.  In 2010, Wyoming ranchers lost 37,100 cows to non-predation. Wolves were responsible for just 26 cows and 33 sheep losses, yet 40 wolves were killed in response.

•Wolves are blamed for decimating elk numbers in Wyoming. The truth is in 2010 there were 120,000 elk in the state up from 95,000 in 2009, plenty of elk by any standards. There are close to 400,000 (371, 000) elk in the tri-state area Montana, Idaho and Wyoming.

•Assigning “predator status” to wolves, in 90% of the state, is essentially a death sentence for Wyoming wolves.

•Wolves in Yellowstone and Grand Teton National park will be in grave danger from this “plan”

•Wolves are an economic bonanza for the Greater Yellowstone Area or GYA. They generate 35 million annually to the area. Tourists flock from all over the world to Yellowstone,  just to get a glimpse of a wild wolf. They are the rock stars of the park. Yet Wyoming is willing jeopardize  park wolves and all wolves in the state just to please a small, vocal group of hunting and ranching interests.

•”Predator status” means wolves can be killed at any time for any reason in 90% of the state. They can be run over by ATV’s and snowmobiles or chased by these vehicles until they drop dead. They can be tortured and nobody will be the wiser, because a license won’t be needed to kill a wolf. The only requirement is the wolf killer report the killing to the state.  Sort of like being on the buddy system with no incentive to report.

•This “plan” will destroy wolf families and leave wolves unprotected from the fierce hatred of anti-wolf factions. They could suffer unimaginable torment.

•The current plan is almost identical to the one USFWS rejected for years as insufficient.  What has changed?

•Let them know you will be boycotting Wyoming, specifically Yellowstone and Grand Teton NP,  until they stop the push to exterminate wolves in the state.

•Be polite but firm.

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It’s our job to convince Wyoming this would NOT be in the best interest of their state to enact the “wolf killing plan”.  Wyoming’s reputation and Yellowstone National Parks is at stake, as well as huge monetary losses, since wolves bring in millions of dollars annually to the GYA. Who will want to visit a state that advertises the wonder and iconic beauty of Yellowstone wolves, while  outside the park a giant death zone awaits canis lupus?

Video: Courtesy immywolf

Photo: Courtesy mythwallpaper.com

Posted in: Wyoming wolves, Wolf Wars

Tags: USFWS, public comments, meeting Riverton, Wyoming, Wyoming’s deadly wolf plan, Ken Salazar, Governor Matt Meade, Cynthia Lummis