The trapping season on wolves in Montana closed Feb 28.
88 wolves have been reported trapped for recreational and commercial purposes this season.
Anti-predators say killing wolves saves elk.
FWP reports the 2017 Montana elk population estimates at 176,117. Almost double the management objectives of 92,000! FWP’s response: hunting seasons have been added, lengthened, cow tags, more tags….
And consistent with nature’s response to overpopulation, we now have chronic wasting disease in Montana.
White tail deer are estimated at 235,316.
And the ones reported to be most likely affected by this lethal disease:
Mule deer at 386,075 up 20,000 since 2016. Increased 70,000 in just 5 years!
In Montana, we have 2,650,000 cattle and 230,000 sheep.
Basically, 2.6 cows for every one Montanan.
Less than 1% of all livestock mortality in the northern Rockies is attributed to wolves.
The number of wolves estimated in Montana “minimum count 477”. This is before the 245 reported killed by hunters and trappers this season. Hunting wolves closes March 15.
We have no quota for wolves in Montana except in three areas adjacent to national parks. Promotions to SSS, i.e. shoot, shovel, shut up, kill them all, poison, gut shoot, and run them over, are publicly prolific. Even when large rewards are offered, the plague persists and poachers go uncaught.
Wolves are a major economic lift to our state. Yellowstone National Park continues to break records with the main draw for visitors being wolves. These same wolves grown accustomed to people are targeted and easily destroyed once they leave the park crossing an imaginary line.
TFMPL supporters and many others recent requests to change or instill quotas or close areas for killing wolves in Montana were denied and for the next 2 years will remain status quo.
Science shows wolves operate as social family units, help keep prey species strong, and are our allies against disease such as chronic wasting disease.
But science isn’t what this is about anyhow.
Photo: Under fair use for educational purposes.
Exposing the Big Game 
Reblogged this on The Extinction Chronicles.
Thank God! Now we only need be concerned with poaching out of season. Why do we do these most brutal things to the other creatures on earth? Dolphins in Taiji, birds in Iran, wolves in Serbia. We are a violent, brutal species – and our history proves it. And even our present – school shootings and a refusal to ‘manage’ guns in any way at all.
It isn’t wolves at the school bus stops parents need to be worried about – it is human lunatics, with guns.
Killing wolves saves elk–so they can be filled with bullets and arrows.
All day every day we get a record of our barbaric behavior and destruction of animal lives. Then we’re criticised for being misanthropic. Of course many of us are–we’re not stupid.
please STOP THIS BARBARIC ACT ON ANIMALS
“Anti-predators” say killing wolves saves elk. What I don’t understand is, that if predators are the problem, the only thing they should do is getting into their garage, take a gun, barrel into their mouth and pull the trigger , that way one predator short