By Scott Graf
A group of hunters in Salmon, Idaho is being criticized for a two-day “coyote and wolf derby” its sponsoring next week.
Idaho for Wildlife’s organized hunt is December 28 and 29. The event is focused on young hunters. Sponsors have put up two $1,000 prizes for teams that kill the biggest wolf and the most coyotes.
The contest has once again highlighted the divide between wolf hunters and wolf advocates.
Christine Gertschen is a wildlife advocate in Sun Valley. She says she’s been a critic of hunting derbies in the past.
“Then when this one came up, I just kind of lost it,” she says. “I started writing Fish and Game, and the commissioners. It sends such a poor message of how we feel about wildlife. That we just throw their carcasses in a pile and count them?”
The event has drawn sharp criticism from all across the country. A Change.org petition to stop the derby had 12,500 signatures as of Friday morning.
The statewide director of Idaho for Wildlife, Steve Alder, says the hunt won’t yield stacks of dead wolves. He says he’s not sure hunters will kill any of the animals. But he does regret the way his group has marketed the derby.
Hear our conversation with Steve Alder of Idaho for Wildlife.
“I would have removed the wolf’s name out of it and just called it a ‘predator youth derby’,” he says. “That would have hopefully circumvented some of the radical [environmentalists’] emotional rubbish about the killing of all these wolves that [they claim] we’re gonna do.”
On Thursday, the Humane Society of the United States issued one of the strongest rebukes of the event so far. It called the contest a “wolf massacre” and labeled organizers as “ruthless”. It urged those who feel the same to write Idaho’s Fish and Game commissioners.
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“Hunting is the tool that Idaho Fish and Game uses to manage, and this is a tool for management,” he says.
Copyright 2013 Boise State Public Radio
Exposing the Big Game 
just disgusting that all the IDFG says is they regret the way it was marketed
This is beyond ruthless or callous. We center on the feelings we have for these animals and not their very survival. I was reading this article http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/The-Truth-About-Lions.html?c=y&page=9 yesterday. The facts need to be presented to the people on a broad scale nationally. The numbers of wolves and coyotes per state, how many are being killed and all the data possible to show what is truly happening to them and broadcast the information to every state. Wild lions in Africa are going to become extinct if something is not done to save them. Africa has 1 billion people now. America is no different. Homes are encroaching into wild life areas, national wildlife parks are no longer safe havens. I fear the loss of these canines because there is an increase in the total lack of empathy from many in these American states who have taught each generation of their family to use guns at a younger and younger age and that killing animals is an acceptable thing to do. The gun industry is growing at a rate unprecedented in the history of this country giving pretty pink guns to children at three years old, unheard of before. In my country this would be tantamount to child abuse.
It IS child abuse, in my opinion. Making killer of our children, we have become the society of death.
Hideous, they should all meet hunting “accidents”.
And coyotes massacre are bad! Poor coyotes! One man never stop talked about cant wait to kills coyotes in west of Wisconsin to sells the furs with good money! One woman was upset about it because don’t wants to the children listens it. She was stuck… Don’t want her children learns about bad hunter! Only for food but not for fun to kill poor wildlife. 😟
Disgusting so ignorant and racist.!
Coyotes are called “song dogs”
By native Americans here first ditto “coyotes ”
Stop the nonsense !
One contradiction that’s hardly ever pointed out in print is how these fools use “radical environmentalist” as a pejorative … but then claim that they, as hunters, are the greatest environmentalists. Of course, slaughtering animals and launching killing contests under the auspices of “conservation” isn’t radical or anything, right?
Exactly. So tired of these idiots labeling those who actually care for our own planet “tree huggers” or worse, as of protecting our own planet is a bad thing. Idiots.
These assholes,really don’t get it…do they! Idiot Adler thinks that by eliminating the word wolf from the hype is going to “circumvent” the “radicals”? Well, they are the flip side of the coin, so what does that make them?!? They don’t seem to have a clue that it’s not only wolves, but coyotes and anything else targeted in their free-for-all slaughters.
Which reminds me…there are 3 coyote “contests” scheduled for New York state between now and early February….and I haven’t heard or read about a single grumble in opposition. The “contests” in NY in previous years seem to have included Red and Grey foxes on the list. The NY DEC told me personally that “it’s really nothing that they (the hunters) couldn’t do on their own anyway…..and coyotes are waaaay abundant”. There is no “bag limit” for them in NY either. Also, they have recently dropped the requirement to “seal” (tag) coyote skins (they call them pelts but i refuse), so trappers and hunters can take them in unlimited numbers and do not have to even report their take to the DEC? Where is the oversight? I’d say there is none.
And if that isn’t enough, there is a bill in the NY Environmental Committee to allow coyote killing year-round. The DEC rep told me “there is a push on to get it passes”. There may be greater numbers of coyotes than wolves, but they are relentlessly pursued AND chased by hounds, which is also legal here. Sick.
if there are any NY resident readers of this blog who would like to join forces, please let me know.
Gail, put it out on f/b, it’s a great way to get word out on things. I think you can go to Change.org. And start your own petition. It’s truly disgusting and what these Morons don’t get is, the more Yotes you kill the more pups are born.
What a lying sack. He deliberately promoted wolf hunting to antagonize IMO. If there were no wolves to hunt, why publicize it? People are too dumb to realize that predators keep their prey in balance, and keep down disease. That’s why the East Coast is the Lyme disease capital of the country, because we no longer have the natural balance. And if they want to hunt coyotes and foxes, it will continue.
I live on the East Coast (Boston) and I had no idea that we are the “Lyme disease capital of the country”. Holy crap!
Hi Ida, it is likely that Lyme Disease was one of the tick borne diseases that escaped the Plum Island Animal Research Facility lab, off the coast of Long Island and only 21 miles from Lyme, CT. Nazi scientists had been working on spreading disease via Moose populations to the Russians during WW2. Many of those scientists ended up continuing experiments in the US after the war. Although it is a very secure facility, they have had a few accidents and acuple where they had to kill and burn all of the animals outdoors.
Some people suspect that ticks may have escaped the fire and been carried to Lyme, CT by a flock of birds? Lyme disease has been around for thousands of years, but it’s suspected the Nazi’s bred a super strain during the war and it was that strain that escaped from Plum Island. I can’t prove it. There is no way the government will ever admit to biological war experiments. Most people don’t even know that the facility exists but I have seen photographs of it. Just the amount of layers of security around it is enough to make a thinking person ask why? Then there is the whole animal abuse issue, too.
The east coast is a major fly way for migrating birds, many who eat ticks, so the logical question to ask next is why the disease isn’t destroyed when the tick is ingested by birds? Maybe I am wrong but either way, this is some crazy sh*t for any government experiments, here or anywhere on the planet! When I pull ticks off myself or animals, I wrap the ticks in duct tape and burn them in the woods stove. My sister, Julie in CT has an incurable case of Lyme Disease, so do I, and some of the neighbor kids where we stayed at our grandparent’s house. It was probably one of the early Lyme Disease Clusters before anyone knew what it was? There were very few deer or moose in the area. DDT was still in use at the time but it didn’t kill the zillions of new ticks we were seeing along the powerlines where we would hunt for rose quartz. The ticks are in Maine now. Some Moose carry a load of 10,000 ticks in the Summer! My husband comes in, after chopping firewood with sometimes multiple deer ticks. Heer, we have many deer and coyotes and a few wild wolves and even big cats. The Lyme Disease is resistant to what in the past would have kept it in check.The harsh early Winter might knock the ticks as well as the Emerald Ash Borers and other invasive species back for a while?
Sorry for the spelling mistakes, I had to take a phone call while I was typing. Also, Sue, that is not the same Plum Island north of Boston. The research facility is closer to NYC than Boston.
well the lyme disease came from Plum Island in Long Island sound. One of their creations. And yes so Long Island Connecticut Rhode Island and I guess Massachusetts is where it is prevalent
Reblogged this on The Monsters Among Us.
Really, really getting tired of the mistakes being made in “print”. HUNTERS only kill to eat. Such as this, is the work of the gay dressed up names of “sportsmen/sportswomen” who only kill for fun; for the physical and mental thrills of taking/ending life…just for fun of killing. These are not hunters, folks; never have been, never will be.
And since humans aren’t true carnivores, we don’t have to kill animals to eat.
I think that is the key, killing is taken so lightly from the time that we are children. I remember being little and realizing with horror that my dinner was once alive. My parents tried to sanitize it, but I never really bought it.
Good for you! You were one of the insightful few.
Michelle, I was like that too, from milk ,meats,fish and they found out I was allergic to eggs so I did not need to try to eat them, luckily my dad figured out just how sensitive my love was for all animals,he realize that when I came across what they called a lucky rabbits foot on a keychain and I found out what really came from I cried,which is a total shock to my mother because I never cried ! Then they made me love vegetables,:-)
I’m driving there to shoot all the hunters.. Not kidding.
I’ll join you.
You don’t need to kill them to put them out of commission, don’t become the same evil as your enemy or you will lose your soul and not be the beautiful person who loves and rescues animals who need you! Free, yummy treats they think are compliments of some sportsmen’s group they trust but actually laced with copious amounts of laxitives will keep them camped out by the port-o-potty and free coffee will just make it happen faster! No animals will be harmed and after a few days, the would be killers will recover. None the wiser. The trick is to fit in and not be critical or you will blow your cover.
I like the way you think Melody. LOL!
🙂 we WILL win in the end. Once the press sees how many people oppose these killing contests, they will work along with us to expose more of them! The more it is exposed in mainstream media as the evil sickness that it is, the faster the change in morals toward animals. In the end, the people who own businesses depending on tourism and local animal lovers money will refuse to sponsor such evil events and change will come.
I pray you are right.
Reblogged this on "OUR WORLD".
I think this should be an all out hunting expedition focused on hunters as predators. This makes me sick to my gut and the destruction of our spiritual/natural sensing of our world.
There hasn’t been any “hunting” since quick loading and repeating rifles. This is just technology aided slaughter. We have to change the conversation. Humans with normal brains headed for the grocery stores as soon as they could because the normal brain doesn’t like killing. What’s left in the woods now are sociopathic thrill-kill high addicts. We weren’t paying attention to those who remained behind, by choice, after the major cultural shift and we certainly weren’t paying attention when these humanoids openly discussed KILLING FOR FUN – killing for the sheer exhilarating fun of it – the very thing that makes those of us who are “normal” feel like throwing up. We’re paying attention now. To start, we have to remove “Wildlife Services” from the United States Department of Agriculture and move it to The Department of the Interior. Wildlife isn’t a “crop”. It’s being treated as the thrill-kill addict’s version of fertilizing and watering poppy fields for heroin addicts. Wildlife isn’t “harvested.” It is SLAUGHTERED. Do not let them use words that imply inaccuracies! We’ve let them get by with hiding under terms like “hunters” and “trophies,” and “harvesting” for just flat out sone sided bloody murder OF OUR ECOSYSTEM for way too long.
This is not “hunting” this is senseless slaughter for idiotic reasons!
Details from last year’s ‘derby’ (I don’t know if this one is annual or just somebody’s notion to relieve Winter boredom) showed the participant’s rabid zeal and undisguised joy at the horror they had wrought.
So this isn’t hunting as I understand it; it’s an agency-sponsored or endorsed Festival of Psychotics.
I have read on anti-predator blogs the foaming-at-the-mouth barbarism these people employ, seen the pictures (that can never be unseen) and witnessed the absolute religious belief that what they’re doing is good for the environment, good for predators and good for other wildlife. But they never seem to be able to explain HOW…
I’m annoyed at being considered a ‘radical’ anything, or hearing about how powerful and influential we are when no amount of logic or scientific principal can sway either the ‘hunters’ or the agencies that support them. Being an advocate for wildlife is vilified or trivialized as an emotional defect, and of course, we can’t see the reasoning behind culling – regardless of how it’s conducted.
It’s kinda interesting, also, that in all my adventures on the internet where I DARE to ask or comment unfavorably, I get threatened and called filthy names regarding my girl parts, my parentage or my mental acuity. What I don’t get are answers.
Perhaps there are none for these people, these great and noble ‘hunters’; perhaps it’s simply the thrill of getting to blast – or worse – a helpless animal out of existence with the state’s blessings.
Yeah, that’s about it.
This really must stop ✋ now, coywolf, Coyote or Wolf 🐺 leave them free in family 👪 :((((