Gray Wolf One True Wolf In North America…

                               Gray Wolf, Glacier National Park, NPS

The USFWS  thought it was being clever.  Several years ago they decided they wanted to delist gray wolves across the lower forty-eight but they had a problem.  Before wolves can be delisted they have to be recovered through most of their former habitat. Since gray wolves are basically confined to the Northern Rockies, Southwest, Great Lakes Region and Pacific Northwest, they couldn’t make that claim. So they used a 2012 study that stated there was another species of wolf, the Eastern wolf.

 “A few years ago, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) put forth a controversial proposal to remove gray wolves from the endangered species list. Technical distinctions about wolf species were at the heart of the plan. The FWS argued that gray wolves had been restored in enough of their original habitat. The agency relied on a 2012 study to designate a new species, the eastern wolf, as a separate species from the gray wolf; if that were true, it would mean gray wolves had never lived in the eastern United States, and thus the FWS claimed it wasn’t responsible for restoring gray wolves in that area.”

Their theory was just dealt a severe blow. It turns out the Eastern wolf is really a hybrid, a gray wolf with coyote DNA. There is no other species of wolf in North America but the gray wolf, which means this thwarts the USFWS plan to delist gray wolves across the Continental US. Gray wolves have not been recovered in most of their former habitat.  And almost every time they try to disperse to states like Kansas or Kentucky, they’re shot by a hunter using the mistaken identify excuse or “I thought it was a coyote”. And of course they almost always get away with it. What’s the point of having ESA protection for wolves if there are no consequences when they’re shot illegally? I’d love to hear the answer from USFWS!

The Eastern wolf has been proven to be a hybrid. I’m sure the USFWS is working overtime, using their “pretzel logic” to find a way around this conundrum. DNA is a wonderful thing!

Win one for the wolves!

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North America Has Only 1 True Species of Wolf, DNA Shows

                             Credit: Dan Stahler, courtesy of UCLA

By Megan Gannon, Live Science Contributor | July 29, 2016 07:04am ET

Research by UCLA biologists published today in the journal Science Advances presents strong evidence that the scientific reason advanced by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to remove the gray wolf from protection under the Endangered Species Act is incorrect.

A key justification for protection of the gray wolf under the act was that its geographic range included the Great Lakes region and 29 Eastern states, as well as much of North America. The Fish and Wildlife Service published a document in 2014 which asserted that a newly recognized species called the eastern wolf occupied the Great Lakes region and eastern states, not the gray wolf. Therefore, the original listing under the act was invalid, and the service recommended that the species (except for the Mexican gray wolf, which is the most endangered gray wolf in North America) should be removed from protection under the act.

A decision by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to remove the gray wolf from protection under the Endangered Species Act may be made as early as this fall.

In the new study, biologists analyzed the complete genomes of North American wolves — including the gray wolf, eastern wolf and red wolf — and coyotes. The researchers found that both the red wolf and eastern wolf are not distinct species, but instead are mixes of gray wolf and coyote.

“The recently defined eastern wolf is just a gray wolf and coyote mix, with about 75 percent of its genome assigned to the gray wolf,” said senior author Robert Wayne, a UCLA professor of ecology and evolutionary biology. “We found no evidence for an eastern wolf that has a separate evolutionary legacy. The gray wolf should keep its endangered species status and be preserved because the reason for removing it is incorrect. The gray wolf did live in the Great Lakes area and in the 29 eastern states.”

Once common throughout North America and among the world’s most widespread mammals, the gray wolf is now extinct in much of the United States, Mexico and Western Europe, and lives mostly in wilderness and remote areas. Gray wolves still lives in the Great lakes area, but not in the eastern states.

Apparently, the two species first mixed hundreds of years ago in the American South, resulting in a population that has become more coyote-like as gray wolves were slaughtered, Wayne said. The same process occurred more recently in the Great Lakes area, as wolves became rare and coyotes entered the region in the 1920s.

The researchers analyzed the genomes of 12 pure gray wolves (from areas where there are no coyotes), three coyotes (from areas where there are no gray wolves), six eastern wolves (which the researchers call Great Lakes wolves) and three red wolves.

There has been a substantial controversy over whether red wolves and eastern wolves are genetically distinct species. In their study, the researchers did not find a unique ancestry in either that could not be explained by inter-breeding between gray wolves and coyotes.

“If you did this same experiment with humans — human genomes from Eurasia — you would find that one to four percent of the human genome has what looks like strange genomic elements from another species: Neanderthals,” Wayne said. “In red wolves and eastern wolves, we thought it might be at least 10 to 20 percent of the genome that could not be explained by ancestry from gray wolves and coyotes. However, we found just three to four percent, on average — similar to that found in individuals from the same species when compared to our small reference set.”

Pure eastern wolves were thought to reside in Ontario’s Algonquin Provincial Park. The researchers studied two samples from Algonquin Provincial Park and found they were about 50 percent gray wolf, 50 percent coyote.

Biologists mistakenly classified the offspring of gray wolves and coyotes as red wolves or eastern wolves, but the new genomic data suggest they are hybrids. “These gray wolf-coyote hybrids look distinct and were mistaken as a distinct species,” Wayne said.

Eventually, after the extinction of gray wolves in the American south, the red wolves could mate only with one another and coyotes, and became increasingly coyote-like.

Red wolves turn out to be about 25 percent gray wolf and 75 percent coyote, while the eastern wolf’s ancestry is approximately 75 percent gray wolf and 25 percent coyote, Wayne said. (Wayne’s research team published findings in the journal Nature in 1991 suggesting red wolves were a mixture of gray wolves and coyotes.)

Although the red wolf, listed as an endangered species in 1973, is not a distinct species, Wayne believes it is worth conserving; it is the only repository of the gray wolf genes that existed in the American South, he said.

The researchers analyzed SNPs (single nucleotide polymorphisms) — tiny variations in a genetic sequence, and used sophisticated statistical approaches. In the more than two dozen genomes, they found 5.4 million differences in SNPs, a very large number.

Wayne said the Endangered Species Act has been extremely effective. He adds, however, that when it was formulated in the 1970s, biologists thought species tended not to inter-breed with other species, and that if there were hybrids, they were not as fit. The scientific view has changed substantially since then. Inter-breeding in the wild is common and may even be beneficial, he said. The researchers believe the Endangered Species Act should be applied with more flexibility to allow protection of hybrids in some cases (it currently does not), and scientists have made several suggestions about how this might be done without a change in the law, Wayne said.

Story Source:
The above post is reprinted from materials provided by University of California – Los Angeles. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.

Journal Reference:
Bridgett M. Vonholdt, James A. Cahill, Zhenxin Fan, Ilan Gronau, Jacqueline Robinson, John P. Pollinger, Beth Shapiro, Jeff Wall and Robert K. Wayne. Whole-genome sequence analysis shows that two endemic species of North American wolf are admixtures of the coyote and gray wolf. Science Advances, 2016 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.1501714

Cite This Page:
University of California – Los Angeles. “Should the gray wolf keep its endangered species protection? New genomic research provides the scientific answer.” ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 27 July 2016. .

http://www.livescience.com/55586-wolves-only-one-species.html

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The Gray Wolf Is The Only True King in The North

By Carli Velocci

http://gizmodo.com/the-gray-wolf-is-the-only-true-wolf-in-north-america-1784426738

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It turns out the United States has just one true species of wolf

                                     OR7 yearling pup – Courtesy ODFW

Rachel Feltman

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2016/07/29/it-turns-out-the-united-states-has-just-one-true-species-of-wolf/

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Gray Wolf The Only Species Distinct To North America, Study Says

Alpha female with her pup NPS Alaska

By Mary Pascaline On 07/28/16 AT 7:33 AM

http://www.ibtimes.com/gray-wolf-only-species-distinct-north-america-study-says-2395516

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Gray wolf is the only pure wolf species in North America

                                                    Echo – Courtesy NPS

Submitted by Diana Bretting on Fri, 07/29/2016 – 21:52

http://perfscience.com/content/2144509-gray-wolf-only-pure-wolf-species-north-america

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RED WOLVES

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Posted in: gray wolf, biodiversity

All photos in this post are credited

You Tube: wwwAAASorg

Tags: gray wolf, eastern wolf a hybrid, ESA, DNA study gray wolf, red wolf, USFWS, Echo, OR7

 

The Montana Trap-Free Public Lands Initiative, I-177, has qualified for the November 8, 2016 ballot!!

Exposing the Big Game

PRESS RELEASE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE….June 30, 2016

CONTACT

TIM PROVOW,tprovow@gmail.com;406-360-6332

CONNIE POTEN,406-274-4791,rattlefarm@gmail.com

 The Montana Trap-Free Public Lands Initiative, I-177, has qualified for the November 8, 2016 ballot.  Montana Trap-Free Public Lands is a ballot initiative committee based in Missoula and supported by volunteer coordinators statewide. Volunteer and hired signature gatherers gathered more than 24,175 qualified signatures required for the ballot.

Members of Footloose Montana, a non-profit corporation supporting trap-free public lands, formed the ballot initiative committee.

Montana Trap-Free Public Lands missed qualifying a similar initiative in 2010 by about 1,500 signatures.   I-177 will end commercial and recreational trapping on public lands.  People, pets and wildlife will be free of indiscriminate, hidden and baited traps.

Trapping to protect livestock and property, for health and safety will continue if non-lethal methods have tried and failed.   Trapping for wildlife management such as reintroduction and medical needs are…

View original post 102 more words

Happy Fourth of July

After Harambe’s Senseless Death It’s Time To Phase Out Zoos….

Baby Harambe (imgur)

The time for zoo’s has come and gone. They are prisons where animal captives live out sad lives. Zoo’s always use the excuse they are protecting endangered species but Harambe is the perfect example of the truth to that lie. Why are they breeding gorillas who will never be free or live in the wild?  If  we want to help the critically endangered lowland gorillas survive why not invest in protecting their habitat from human encroachment, from the bushmeat trade and from poachers, using armed rangers as many national preserves in Africa do.

 It”s not going to happen overnight but eventually zoo’s can be phased out and as Marc Bekoff says, turned into sanctuaries for the remaining captive animals.

 Zoo’s are relic’s of the past and I for one would not mind to see them gone.

For Harambe,

Nabeki

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Why Was Harambe the Gorilla in a Zoo in the First Place?

Amid the debate over who was at fault in the death of a beloved animal, we need to step back and ask a different question

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/why-was-harambe-the-gorilla-in-a-zoo-in-the-first-place/?version=meter+at+null&module=meter-Links&pgtype=Blogs&contentId=&mediaId=&referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F&priority=true&action=click&contentCollection=meter-links-click

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Posted in: Endangered Species, Biodiversity, Animals Rights

Photo: Courtesy imgur

Video: Courtesy YouTube

Tags: Harambe, senseless death, zoo’s should be phased out, Baby Harambe,  endangered species, lowland gorilla critically endangered,  mother of boy responsible, Marc Bekoff

ACTION ALERT: “House Republicans Unveil Another Anti-wolf, Anti-endangered Species Appropriations Bill”

Center For Biological Diversity

For Immediate Release, May 24, 2016

Contact: Jamie Pang, (858) 699-4153, Jpang@biologicaldiversity.org

Release, May 24, 2016

House Republicans Unveil Another Anti-wolf, Anti-endangered Species Appropriations Bill

114th Congress Has Now Launched Nearly 20 Legislative Attacks on Wolves

WASHINGTON— Republican members of the U.S. House of Representatives today introduced a bill to fund the U.S. Department of the Interior that includes a poison-pill rider to end federal protections for wolves in Wyoming and the western Great Lakes and to undermine other endangered species protections. The legislative rider would undo two court decisions affirming that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service wrongly removed Endangered Species Act protections for the wolf.

The bill is the 18th attack by the current Congress on gray wolves nationwide and the 12th attack targeting wolves in the Great Lakes and Wyoming populations.

“This is the most extreme, anti-wolf Congress our country has ever seen,” said Jamie Pang, an endangered species campaigner at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Rather than allowing for wolf recovery to follow a course prescribed by science, a small group of politicians has repeatedly tried to undermine species protections through unrelated policy riders tacked onto must-pass federal spending bills.”

The Fish and Wildlife Service removed protections for gray wolves in the Great Lakes region (Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota) in 2011, and in Wyoming in 2012. In both instances federal judges overturned agency decisions for prematurely removing protections, failing to follow the requirements of the Act and failing to follow the best available science. Republican lawmakers have responded by repeatedly attempting to remove protections from wolves and open the animals up to state-regulated hunting and trapping. Since the passage of the 2011 wolf rider that removed protections from wolves in the northern Rocky Mountains, there have been almost 30 legislative attacks on wolves in Congress. Already in 2016 there have been 10 legislative attacks, surpassing the number of anti-wolf bills for all of 2015.

In addition to this rider, the appropriations bill also contains language preventing the greater sage grouse from being protected under the Act, and would weaken protections for salmon and the Delta smelt in California’s Bay-Delta region.

“This shameful meddling is harmful to science, harmful to the rule of law, and harmful to our democratic processes,” said Pang. “Congressional lawmakers know that 90 percent of American voters support the Endangered Species Act, which precisely is why they have to resort to such back-door attempts at weakening the law.”

Despite overwhelming public support for the Endangered Species Act and the species it protects, there has been a greater than 600 percent increase in Republican-led legislative attacks on endangered species since the landmark ruling in Citizens United.

http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2016/wolf-05-24-2016.html

The Center for Biological Diversity is a national, nonprofit conservation organization with more than 1 million members and online activists dedicated to the protection of endangered species and wild places.

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Posted in: gray wolf, Wolf Wars

Photo: Courtesy ODFW

Tags: Center for Biological Diversity, Anti wolf, House Republicans war on wolves, poison-pill rider, Congress attack on the ESA, Wyoming wolves, Great Lakes wolves, Endangered Species Act, Take Action

Study Shows “Government-Sanctioned (Wolf) Culling Actually Results in More Illegal Killings”

 A new study finds that gray wolf culls may lead to more poaching.

 When the Government Kills Wolves, the Public May Follow Suit

A new study looking at two states in the U.S. could weaken the theory that culling some large carnivores can help conserve them.

By Jani Actman

PUBLISHED MAY 11, 2016

In 2005 Wisconsin wanted a permit to kill 43 endangered gray wolves. So the federal government granted it. The way it saw things, controlling wolves—which had earned a bad name by preying on livestock and pets—would increase human tolerance for the predators. By letting the state cull them, it would prevent even more wolves from getting shot by frustrated ranchers.

 Wildlife activists disagreed. In a federal lawsuit, they argued that killing the animals ran counter to the Endangered Species Act, a law meant to help conserve endangered and threatened species. The judge agreed, and the federal government was forced to revoke the permit.

Nonetheless, this argument—that legal killing helps stop illegal killing—continues to be made around the world. The United States still asserts it when it comes to grizzly bears. Both Sweden and Finland use it as a justification for controlled wolf hunting. “The philosophy that underpins wolf management is that hunting them makes them more socially acceptable to people,” says Doug Smith, senior wildlife biologist at Yellowstone National Park.

But now a new study examining wolf population growth rates in Michigan and Wisconsin shows that the opposite is true. Government-sanctioned culling actually results in more illegal killings, scientists report this week in the journal Proceedings Royal Society B.

They created this animated video to help break down the results:

 This animation was created by scientists who concluded in a new study that wolf culls result in more illegal killings of wolves.

“The idea that we need to kill to conserve large carnivores—in light of our study, it does not make sense,” says author Guillaume Chapron, an ecologist at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, who teamed up with Adrian Treves, a conservation biologist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, to research the topic.

Adding Fire to a Heated Debate

The research will likely inflame the hotly contested debate that has long pitted conservationists and biologists against agricultural and hunting interests. “I suspect there’s going to be a lot of folks weighing in on this from both sides,” says Jason Fisher, a wildlife scientist with Alberta Innovates, a research agency for the government of Alberta, Canada.

Gray wolves were viewed as so destructive to livestock that by the early 20th century they’d nearly been wiped out in most of the U.S. In 1978 the U.S. listed them as endangered in all states but Minnesota. Reintroduced to the American West in the mid-1990s, they’ve been the object of fierce controversy ever since.

In 2003 the U.S. declared that some populations had recovered to the point that wolves could be considered threatened rather than endangered. This meant states would be permitted to trap and shoot wolves when they threatened humans or livestock.

But with disagreements continuing about their recovery status, the issue has bounced in and out of court. Today the species is considered endangered in most states, but in Montana and Idaho wolves can be culled and hunted. And other states can cull them in certain cases.

Does Culling Conserve a Species?

Between 1995 and 2012, wolves in Michigan and Wisconsin experienced six periods of legal culls and six stages of protection, making these states ripe for testing whether cullings help conserve large carnivores.

To test the theory, researchers Chapron and Treves used a complex algorithm to measure population growth over time, taking into account the number of wolves culled. They found that during years when culling was allowed, there was an overwhelming probability that the wolf growth rate would drop.

The researchers concluded that poaching was the only plausible explanation for the decline. They ruled out other potential factors such as wolves migrating out of state and a slowdown in reproductive rates.

So why would people get poaching fever during years that the government OKs wolf culling? It could be that people didn’t think wolves had much value or they felt the government wouldn’t enforce the law during years culling was allowed, the researchers say. Their findings corroborate a 2013 study showing that legal culls don’t reduce the inclination to poach.

Chapron and Treves hope their study will show wildlife management agencies that they need to produce evidence before justifying “leniency in environmental protections,” as they put it. Fisher agrees. “The paper showed very clearly that wolf populations are experiencing added deaths” he says. “Governments all over need a lot more and a lot better information than they currently have about wildlife populations.”

Yellowstone’s Smith says the results are disappointing in that they throw into question long-held beliefs about wolf management. “But I’m not convinced,” he says.

Smith doesn’t think the results should apply to all wolf territories, as attitudes toward wolves might be different in areas where people have always lived alongside the animals, such as Alaska and Canada. Nor is he fully persuaded that poaching accounted for the population growth decline, though he doesn’t question the researchers’ data. Indeed, another study found that less government involvement resulted in decreased poaching.

But the current study could provide more grist for pro-wolf groups who have criticized wildlife management agencies for basing decisions on politics rather than science. Wildlife Services, a program of the U.S. Department of Agriculture that specializes in killing predators that put livestock at risk, in particular has faced criticism that its lethal control programs are not based on sound science.

And research from 2014 found that killing wolves to protect sheep and cattle actually caused the predators to kill even more livestock, contrary to a common justification for culling some large carnivores.

Chapron and Treves think their research should help guide management decisions for many large carnivores, such as grizzly bears, which could soon lose protections under U.S. law. In the meantime, the debate swirling around wolves will likely continue. “The study is going to be hugely controversial,” Fisher says.

This story was produced by National Geographic’s Special Investigations Unit, which focuses on wildlife crime and is made possible by grants from the BAND Foundation, and the Woodtiger Fund. Read more stories from the SIU on Wildlife Watch. Send tips, feedback, and story ideas to ngwildlife@ngs.org.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/05/160511-gray-wolf-poaching-wisconsin-michigan-endangered-species-culling/

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Posted in: gray wolves,  Wolf Wars, Wolf Poaching

Photo: Courtesy Tim Fitzharris, Minden Pictures/National Geographic

Tags: evils of wolf hunting, killing wolves, poaching, culling  National Geographic, blood does not buy goodwill

Happy Mothers Week!

❤ ❤ ❤ ❤

Mother’s day is every day for wolves!

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Posted in : gray wolf

Photo: Pinterest

Tags: Happy Mother’s Day, wolves love their babies, wolf puppy and mom

2009 – Obama Declares War on Wolves…

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Posted in: Wolf Wars, gray wolf

Photo: Why -I-Did-It-Blog

Tags: Obama Administration, Ken Salazar, Secretary of the Interior, Wolf Delisting 2009, Northern Rockies, First organized wolf hunt 2009, Northern Rockies wolves delisted 2009, Idaho, Montana

 

 

Think of The Wolves On Earth Day…

A Legend, OR4, Was Shot To Death!

A Eulogy for OR-4

Mar 31, 2016 | Rob Klavins

We met three times, but I imagine that I barely registered in his life.

To him I was no more than an occasional scent on his trail or the source of a tortured imitation of a howl.

But to me, no nonhuman animal ever has been or likely ever will be as important or consequential in my life as OR4.

He escaped kill orders and poachers. He endured at least 4 collarings and he beat the odds. There aren’t many ten year old wolves out there. Today there is one less.

OR4 was shot and killed today. And it hurts. Anyone celebrating his death, the killing of his likely pregnant partner, and two of his pups, must have a hardened heart indeed.

He became a symbol for those who revere wolves as well as for those who hate them and hate the wild. Even some of the most cynical wolf haters paid him begrudging respect.

He was imperfect. He challenged us. He was loud. But he was tough and he was tenacious. He was resilient, and he was a good father.

OR4 and his partners OR2 and a wolf known as “Limpy” leave behind an unparalleled legacy. His offspring include OR7, the first pups in California in nearly a century, OR3, and wolves both known and unknown quietly living their lives and retaking their rightful place on the Oregon landscape.

He never set paw in Salem or DC, but for better and worse, he had more impact on policy and politics than any animal I know of other than Cecil the Lion.

He also leaves behind questions. Lots of questions. Questions about our future – the future of his offspring…and ours.

Above all, as I heard the helicopter take off near my home this morning, I wondered if our society will leave room for the wild on the landscape…and in our hearts.

Despite his collars and dayglo ear tags, OR4 was wild.

OR4 is dead, and we killed him.

But we’ll keep fighting for his legacy as imperfectly and tenaciously as he did.

The story of Oregon’s biggest and baddest wolf didn’t end in “happily ever after”. But the story for wolves and those of us who value the wild is still not fully written. It’s a new chapter. I’m no starry-eyed optimist. So I’ll stubbornly cling to hope and tenacity.

The alternative is surrender. OR4 was no quitter. And we shouldn’t be either.

He was loud.

And he was annoying to those who hate the wild. We should be too.

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This is a post I did in September 2011, when OR4 had a kill order out on him over a few supposed cattle deaths. The purpose of the post was to point out the absolute lunacy and hysterics that play out over wolves. Oregon ranchers lost tens of thousands of cows that year to non predation yet they were screaming to the high heavens about a few livestock losses to wolves. It’s absolute madness. Wolves aren’t even the main predator of cattle, coyotes and dogs are. But because they despise wolves and want to portray them in the worst possible light, OR4 was slated to die and now, 5 years later they slaughter a 10 year old wolf and his family in the most cowardly of fashions. I hope Oregon is happy with itself because we all know that “wolf management” in Oregon is all about keeping the ranchers happy .

OR4 was OR7’s father. They were both legends,

I say this sincerely to all wolf advocates. Please consider cutting beef out of your diet. The single biggest reason wolves are dying is because of the ranching industry. They use Wildlife Services as their personal wolf killing service. Wolves are harangued and harassed their entire lives, they have to wear horrible tracking collars, they’re constantly tracked and bothered all because of cows.

I don’t like to preach but ranching  and cows are getting wolves killed.

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51,200 Dead Oregon Cows Not Killed By Wolves! Where’s The Media?

Slated to die. Imnaha Pack Alpha Male, OR4

September 28, 2011

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Ok, 51,200 cows died in Oregon in 2010 from non-predation causes. (NASS 2010) This should be front page news, right? When wolves are involved in miniscule livestock losses they make the front pages of local media. So what about those 51,200 cows that weren’t killed by wolves? Talk about making a mountain out of a mole-hill or big fish stories, this is the mother of all big fish stories. ODFW is planning on killing the alpha male (pictured above) and another wolf from the Imnaha Pack, for livestock losses so small, they barely register statistically. Yet incredibly large numbers of cows drop dead in Oregon every year and all we hear are “crickets”

READ MORE: 

https://howlingforjustice.wordpress.com/2011/09/28/51200-dead-oregon-cows-not-killed-by-wolves-wheres-the-media/

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Posted in: Oregon wolves, Wolf Wars

Photo: OdFW

Tags: OR4, wolf management/wolf slaughter, Oregon, a legend is killed, Rob Klavins, Oregon Wild