Wolves, Revisting The Dream….

February 3, 2013

This wonderful IMAX film was released in 1999 and documents the reintroduction of wolves into Central Idaho, while providing insight into wolf ecology and dynamics. These were good times,  hopeful times for the Nez Perce , wolf advocates and the wolves. That dream is now being dragged through the mud by the wolf states, who are bent on slaughtering them and profiting from their deaths.

Wolves – IMAX  enlightens us  regarding the true nature of  this iconic apex predator, traveling back to the heady days of wolf reintroduction in the Northern Rockies.  The Nez Perce tribe, like other wolf advocates, had high hopes for the wolves’ return, after their long absence.  How the worm has turned.

Looking back, I see how we were all duped into thinking wolf reintroduction would have a happy ending.  In reality, it’s clear there was never any real intent to maintain a viable, robust population of wolves outside the national parks.  It seems “the plan” all along was to slaughter wolves  in trophy hunts or kill them outright when they  ”recovered”.  Recovery is never defined, except in the outdated, original capitulation to ranching and hunting interests, of 100 wolves and ten breeding pairs per wolf state (Wyoming, Montana, Idaho) Those numbers are not based on science but politics and were never revised to reflect scientific findings or what constitutes a healthy wolf population in the Northern Rockies.  Wolf recovery is whatever the “wolf managers” deem it to be.  Ten wolves, a hundred, thousands?  That’s not a question the states seem interested in answering on their relentless march to decimate wolves .

The arrogance of  hunters and ranchers who think they have the right to dictate which animals will be allowed to exist on public lands,  is stunning.  These lands belong to us all. They’re  lucky Americans have been “asleep at the wheel”, allowing the anti-wolf crowd to dictate policy to Western politicians, ready and eager to do their bidding.

Wolf recovery, once a great success, has now descended into hell, with the deaths of thousands of wolves since their delisting by Ken Salazar and the Obama administration in 2009.

But all is not lost, we can still turn this around. Wolves must re-gain their Endangered Species Protections, for without them they will not be able to thrive as viable, healthy populations.  The wolf will be doomed to their current fate…. hounded, persecuted, tortured, maligned and DEAD. With their family structure and tight bonds decimated, their gene pool further diminished, they will exist as mere ghosts on the landscape, if even allowed to exist at all.

Please sign both petitions, if you haven’t already,  to demand wolves regain their federal protections before it’s too late.

Protect America’s Wolves

Click HERE to sign

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Relist Wolves

Click HERE to sign

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Photo: Wikimedia Commons

Posted in: gray wolf, biodiversity, Wolf Wars, Native Americans, Wolf Recovery

Tags: Nez Perce, wolf recovery, Central Idaho, persecution of Native Americans, IMAX films, wolf delisting, wolf states, 1999, killing the dream, Relist Wolves, Protect America’s Wolves