We recently saw NBC air an outdoors program showing a NRA lobbyist shooting an elephant in the face and then celebrating with champagne. Given the outcry over the show, he may want to check out Montana where hunters can make a real killing with a $19 license to kill up to five wolves. That is slightly above $3 a wolf. The problem is that the state has issued 6000 permits which would allow the killing of 30,000 wolves. The entire wolf population however is down to 625 in the entire state.
These seem to be pure thrill kills since no one is going to use the meat and you will be able to kill as many as five wolves.
To assist in what looks like a slaughter in the making, the state extended the period to hunt the wolves. If just roughly 2 percent of the hunters succeed, Montana will have wiped out the entire population of wolves. One can only conclude that that is the purpose of this overkill policy. In the meantime, people are clamoring to get in on the kill . . . and to be able to say that they helped wipe out a species in the state for less than the cost of two movie tickets.
The Center for Biological Diversity released the video below on the hunting program.
I say let the northwestern states take care of thier own and let the liberal piles of crap go back east and bitch about what they have no idea what they are talking about(randyjet!). I’ve lived and hunted Montana my whole life, and anyone who says the elk population hasn’t been dramaticlly affected since the wolves arrived to the area is a flat out liar. These arent even the kind of wolves we had to begin with. These are Canadian timber wolves not the small prarie wolves that were once native to this area. These wolves are much larger and much more aggressive, with evidence that they are killing for the joy of it and not just for feeding. So to all you bleeding heart liberal dicks, I say WELCOME TO MONTANA…NOW GET THE HELL OUT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I am a hunter i like to hunt and i think that the wolves need to be killed to manage the the deer population and i don’t care if it has a family i am no bunny hugger
you are dumb asses, sure they have 30000 possible tags, you don’t think they have a quota when they hit the number “WE” need thinned out. They clearly will not let us kill every wolf in Montana, though it wouldn’t bother me. between the 20 percent drop in elk populations, and the lack of a management to keep 15 breeding pairs it was the tree huggers like you that caused this over population. You probably think Montana is in Canada too ba haha. And just so you know only 400 were killed, and with the amount of breeding pairs, 200 more will be made this year. putting our population roughly 200 less than what it was.
If you think that the numbers of wolves are way off, then just what makes you think the number of elk are accurate? At least you are honest in admitting you want to kill off ALL the wolves. So it is the ignorant so called “hunters” like YOU that give us all a bad name. I have gone hunting a number of times and have come up with no game. That is part of hunting! It is not up to the state to artificially run up the numbers so that you can just get a shot after rolling out of bed with a bad hangover and not going too far to bag your limit.
You want more elk? Then breed them in captivity, release them in the wild. They will be used to humans then, and will not be so hard to hunt too. A win-win for all. It is not our job to subsidize your kind of “hunting” by killing off most of the wolves.
I am also damned tired of subsidizing ranchers who are too damn cheap to hire the best anti-predation measure that has worked for thousands of years. They are called SHEPHERDS. It is NOT our job to cater to your laziness and cheapskates.
Are you Daft?? Montana did not issue 6,000 tags to kill up to 30,000 wolves. It makes me scratch my head where you even get your information.
P.S. there are way more than 625 wolves in Montana too…..
Remarkable issues here. I am very happy to look your article.
Thanks a lot and I am looking ahead to touch you. Will
you kindly drop me a mail?
When the wolves live in “YOUR Backyard” then you can decide what happens to them.. As far as I’m concerned, I do not believe in extinction, but in some areas here in Montana, they are a problem, One Rancher out her lost 27 head of calves in one season to wolves, and was not compensated for it, this is a fact.
Mandy, I agree that wolves do like easier prey than wild game. Of course, there is a solution to this that has been used over the centuries. They are called shepherds. It is not the business of the government to subsidize ranchers costs by killing off all the predators. You go swimming in the ocean, you know that there are SHARKS in that water. It is not necessary for the government to kill off most of the sharks so that we can all be safe.
The FACT is that the state and Federal government DID make the wolves extinct, AND they were proud of it too. So to say you are not in favor of extinction rings VERY hollow to say the least. I have dogs and if I see a wolf attacking one, I will kill it. I have no problem with ranchers doing similar things to protect their livestock. This is NOT what is being done.
People, this is a lie. I have Montana’s wolf regulations and you can receive one tag at a time and can purchase up to five tags. Each tag is good for only one wolf and you must wait for 24 hours before purchasing a new tag after use of the first. Wolves are difficult to hunt and the likelihood of getting one, let alone 5, is extremely low. It’s about time Montana does something to control wolf population that’s killing off all the elk, moose, and deer.
Dan what you say is a lie. I never heard of there being no elk, moose or deer being extinct in Montana before white men arrived on the scene and made the WOLF extinct. So to say that having 600+ wolves killing off all those other species is patently absurd. Now I am sure that wolf predation has cut down on the numbers of those species, but that is called normal and makes them wary and harder to see and to hunt. Thus the lesser numbers for easy pickings by hunters. Sorry to hear that hunters in Montana will now have to do more than go out a short distance from their cabins and actually have to HUNT those game animals, instead of rolling out of bed and shooting them from close proximity to camp. Shoot, it makes them actually have to HUNT! How unfair!
@Brittius I hate to use this line, but nothing else is fitting. You’re one special kind of stupid, aren’t you? Spay and neuter an animal that SHOULD still be on the endangered species list? We don’t need to thin the wolf population, we need to thin our own so that wolves and other animals can actually live the way nature intended them to without humans feeling so inconvenienced by simple nature. Less than 1000 wolves vs. the millions of people in the state? Yeah, I don’t think we have to worry about the wolves actually being a problem. The human race needs to get the hell over itself already and learn to live WITH nature instead of destroying it at every turn.
STOP KILLING OUR WOLVES AND WILDLIFE, IF YOU CANT EAT IT LEAVE IT ALONE
It’s those damn saddle-horn injuries — gotta compensate somehow
The message is in the median (of the road) where the dead wolves are sometimes found. The great white hunters don’t parade the dead wolves around town on the hood of the car like they do the dead deer. The State of Montana wants wolves to be extinct. Period. It is a Pirate Territory. Fly over and flush.
“Examine each question in terms of what is ethically and aesthetically right, as well as what is economically expedient. A thing is right when it tends to perserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.”
*****
“The last word in ignorance is the man who says of an animal or plant, ‘What good is it?’ If the land mechanism as a whole is good, then every part is good, whether we understand it or not. If the biota, in the course of aeons, has built something we like but do not understand, then who but a fool would discard seemingly useless parts? To keep every cog and wheel is the first precaution of intelligent tinkering.”
*****
“We reached the old wolf in time to watch a fierce green fire dying in her eyes. I realized then, and have known ever since, that there was something new to me in those eyes — something known only to her and to the mountain. I was young then, and full of trigger-itch; I thought that because fewer wolves meant more deer, that no wolves would mean hunters’ paradise. But after seeing the green fire die, I sensed that neither the wolf nor the mountain agreed with such a view.
Since then I have lived to see state after state extirpate its wolves. I have watched the face of many a newly wolfless mountain, and seen the south-facing slopes wrinkle with a maze of new deer trails. I have seen every edible bush and seedling browsed, first to anemic desuetude, and then to death. I have seen every edible tree defoliated to the height of a saddlehorn. Such a mountain looks as if someone had given God a new pruning shears, and forbidden Him all other exercise. … I now suspect that just as a deer herd lives in mortal fear of its wolves, so does a mountain live in mortal fear of its deer.”
― Three quotes from the writings of Aldo Leopold
pete 1, October 3, 2013 at 9:25 pm
i’m gonna go up to montana and sell “not a wolf” signs to german shepards and siberian huskys.
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You could get more money by selling to Dick Cheney’s hunting buddies.
OS,
I know you’re interested in correcting the air pollution problem as am I.
After reviewing that US Forestry guy, Steve Brink’s comments on the above video, I noticed about half way through he mentions that just in California, on average, forest fires cause 2.5 to 3 times as much 2.5 PM pollution then all the cars/trucks there.
Prez Ike, I recall, subsidized local goat/sheep herders to graze on the under growth of the forest to prevent forest fires.
Now we spend billions on firemen, firetrucks/copters.
How much is wasted effort/capital, I’m not sure.
As Steve Brink is thinking I also have long thought that if the govt allowed Lumbermen to go in & clear cut fire breaks in those forest so that if a fire does start it’s soon stopped at the fire break.
Nick,
I started to get some Jack Rabbits last year for my mini farm, I get a kick out of the big floppy ears.
A friend mine told me if I let them roam free they’d attack my garden so I back out of the plan.
Maybe I build a large fenced area for some?
OS,
Even if one doesn’t have time or the place for a garden a great side benefit about thinking about how we organize our lives, where food comes from, etc., it means we can go out & meet local small farmers/gardeners & either trade or buy their quality products.
One guy said in regards to “Chain Stores”, that we can break the Chains. 🙂