Yesterday's paper had an article about the wolf kill for this year and here is what they came with. (I'm not making this up)

Everyone is in agreement that we should have approximately 350 wolves roaming around Wisconsin.

The winter count was at least 660 wolves and they expect that to at least double this time of year when the pups are born.

That means we have over 1320 wolves running around right now. So the Wisconsin DNR has decided to kill 156 wolves this year.

Now if you take 156 wolves from 1320 wolves, you will of course end up with 350 wolves.

The fact that they continue to post these figures in all of our papers is what I find hilarious.

P.S. On a lighter note, one of my daughter's neighbors got arrested for shooting at a coyote that was running with a fawn in its mouth. He used a .45 and missed. I'm sure if he had hit the coyote they would have let him go. Can't you just picture the defense lawyer bringing the bloody coyote and the bloody fawn to court as evidence?

Paul,

Are they not counting pups as part of the population due to mortality factors?

Somewhere thereust be a glitch in what is being stated versus the goal, do they want
X number of adult wolves, versus all wolves? Carnivore mortality is generally high, do they
mention this at all.

I'm with you if they aren't giving any other details that factor in they should stop reporting or maybe
grab an accountant!

Lol!

Paul,

I just read a string of these articles from WI with interest in seeing what's being stated or quoted.

The most recent and detailed I found was titled "Wisconsin wants to scale back wolf hunt to assess effects."

While they do talk about an ultimate goal of 350 for a healthy population they talk at length about not
Giving out too many permits and ending up dropping the levels too quickly. They recognize annual mortality
factors in the article and mention that this isn't deer or turkey that large carnivore population dynamics when
dealing with a whole population of less than 1,000 adult animals is different.

They also mention that after pups are born annual mortality factors play into end numbers.

Ultimately they aren't trying to give math figures that relate to something that is straight forward, they are instead
talking about trying to reduce the numbers of the entire wolf population without overdoing harvest I the way there
is they are trying to recognize the potential for an over harvest to occur.

Someone from the dnr should write their own article and not have it filtered by the reporter, IMHO.

They should do a better job of talking about the loss in juvenile wolves as well instead of leaving this all important factor
out.

Trappers and hunters know the harvestable surplus of any species is high. Ducks, coyote, etc....but they should have some
hard figures that would show juvenile wolf mortality ranges from 50-75% within the year for example and this them adds only
X adult animals to the overall balance sheet.

I will say having looked there are lots of blogs and others using these numbers against the states thinking...



Ultimately the crux of the dnrs wolf plan is to keep moving toward the sustainable number of 350 but head there in a way that
allows for careful management decisions to be made adaptively for this population.

The 350 is misleading, they should just say we are working toward a biologically acceptable population level through careful
management.

I do understand the mortality thing but here is the problem. The are looking at an adult winter count of in the vicinity of 350 wolves.

Last year we killed 275 wolves and still had a winter count of over 660 adults. ( Nearly twice the stated goal )

So this year, to bring us closer to our goal, we will only be allowed to kill 156.

I can't help but wonder if Wildlife Services doesn't kill more than that for depredation.

Paul,

I totally get why the numbers aren't telling the logical story.

This is why most biologists never talk numbers of anything.

Politics and careful proper management are often at odds and social
carrying capacity is hardly ever what biological carrying capacity is.

They should stick to stating they are working toward a sustainable
number but making careful decisions as they go based on known science.

Justin, your posts are the reason that I enjoy talking to you. ( Even though it's long distance )

When you agree with me, I learn nothing. When you disagree, I read every word and hopefully learn a thing or two.

If only everything was based on, and I quote: ..."making careful decisions as they go, based on known science."

Thanks Paul, I enjoy any thread or topic that makes me think about the angles. I hadn't looked at any of the articles
and was curious why they would report in such a way as to make simple math extremely difficult to follow and sure
enough it was muddled in a big way!

You are correct on that last statement too, very seldom is anything based on careful decisions and known science.

The awful truth they tell you when you head into a career as a wildlife biologist or the general field of study is that you
will not be managing wildlife, you will be managing people!

I thought as a young student that this was nonsense, however I soon learned even if you are a field researcher or
someone who spends tons of time afield, you will still be blessed with the curse of dealing with people far more
than your species of study.

Of course, having known and met many NPS employees, I think they have the superbly awful lot in that they might
get the awesome benefit of living in a national park, but they get to try to make folks understand you shouldn't pose within
2 feet of ma' grizzly or ma' bison for that family photo!

interesting info ....guys what is your take on the involvement of the insurance companies with wolves ?

MC, you ask a good question. I'm going to tell you what I think happens and then someone who really knows the answer will, once again, make me look like Obama.

If you're a farmer and one of your herd gets pulled down and eaten by wolves, you call WCS, or the local sheriff, or whoever, and they send someone out to access the damage.

If your claim is justifiable, you will be reimbursed by the same state that did not shoot enough wolves last year and will shoot even less this year.

Since you're in northern Illinois, I would get ready for a wolf invasion. ( We did not take kindly to those 3 million beaver that you guys sent up the Fox river a couple decades ago.)

Paul those beaver made you a ton of money I'm sure...lol
My question is referenced to...do you think the insurance companies and dnrs are working together?

I'm not at all sure that the state has insurance for something like wolf depredation. ( What about that, Justin? ) I think that comes out of some sort of fund that the state has for all kinds of animal depredation and it probably comes out of our license fees. ( But I could be all wet )

I'm suggesting that the insurance companies (auto) have an interest in having wolves ...to keep deer/car crashes low.

There are probably quite a few ways to provide some feedback on this theory will try to illustrate some thoughts clearly, but I may ramble... (imagine that!).

Some points first that we can all agree on...

1) Insurance companies prefer not to pay out, a perfect situation for them would be folks who pay in and never have a claim or get to collect.

2) Deer (and other wild ungulates including, elk, moose, pronghorn, bison, wild sheep) do indeed cause major amounts of vehicle damage and loss each year on highways around our country.

3) Wolves kill and consume every one of these groups of species in our country

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Those would likely be "given" statements to all of us, though I may be wrong, they are a good starting point to discuss this.

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Now, to address the question at hand, let us walk through the proposed hypothesis and the statements that are needed to support the hypothesis that insurance companies would have a vested interest and support wolf reintroduction and keeping numbers in established wolf states high to keep deer numbers low or reduce deer numbers to reduce vehicle damage.

To do this we must believe true the following...

1) G&F agencies want more wolves than they already have, or desire to keep them at higher than biologically logical numbers...

2) Insurance companies have found statistical evidence that shows in areas of high wolf populations there are lower vehicle collisions with ungulates (in this case deer).

3) Insurance agencies have a method to influence wolf policy with G&F agencies in various states in an attempt to increase their bottom line.

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No matter what my comments are on this they would be considered opinion, but often that is what any of us are giving on here as fact is often not applicable to fluid situations in our work day...

So, my opinion is that not only do wolves cost state wildlife agencies a ton of money that they often don't have to manage a species that is loaded with lawsuit potential at every corner, but insurance companies work on statistics, cold hard numbers and though the numbers I'm sure show that deer play a huge role in annual vehicle damage, deer and other ungulates that use road side areas and graze in the strip along the highway are less vulnerable to predation by wolves.

For an illustration of this, when wolves were added back to yellowstone, the coyotes moved where? Right up next to the highways where the people were, why? The wolves were not in these areas...

Insurance companies back studies of warning systems to tell people "hey dummy you are driving through a migration corridor for mule deer" or "ever see what a moose does to a car?"

In southern UT on a wildlife society trip for school I remember we were passed in our university van in the middle of a flashing migration corridor by a sports car zipping along with not a care in the world, literally 1/2 mile down the road we pulled over and checked on the same folks who had just smacked a large muley.

I worked as a technician for a grad student while in school in UT, think I received $40.00 a week to go on two trips in the state to different research areas and spotlight (thats right) wild ungulates and do track counts on highway crossings. Saw people hit moose, mule deer, and so forth during this study and most hit them in warning areas with flashing signage... (p.s. would have done that tech job for free!)

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Okay, so rambled off there, if you are still with me, lets assume the insurance folks found some statistics saying in X county in northern MN deer vehicle collisions are 50% of what they are in areas in the state without wolves. Now this would certainly spark some interest by them so we now go a step further....

How would they actually become a player that affects the DNR or G&F agency to protect or enhance the wolf population? There isn't a direct conduit to put money in that causes wolf reproduction to increase or pays for protection of wolves.

I believe many many folks believe that wildlife agencies are wild for wolves when in reality wolves are one of hundreds of species they work with including both game and non game, endangered, threatened, sensitive, and abundant. Most of these agencies are severely and even grossly underfunded and are always under attack for not doing more to protect for example, the wolf.

Lawsuits rule where wolves and other T&E species are concerned and so in closing this excerpt I'd state clearly that if insurance companies want to promote wolves, they would likely back an wildlife group that needs money to sue the DNR or G&F agency as that is frankly how it is done.

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Now if you want my simple off the cuff on these types of theories and conspiracies....

In MI we were stopped no less than 4 times a month during a 4 year field research project on radio collared coyotes and we were asked with deadpan straight faced honest delivery, "are you the folks responsible for reintroducing the grizzly bears around here and mountain lions?"

These were not folks who just fell and bumped their heads, folks truly believed the G&F agency was releasing their own under the radar grizz and lion and why..... (wait for it....)

To control the deer numbers!



And that folks is why I prefer that theory by Occam... "The simplest explanation is usually the right one."

(In case anyone is wondering busiest year yet for the wife and I however I type 60 wpm and love some of these topics, hope that once in a while something I say is valuable, but enjoy the debates either way!)

The state wildlife folks I know are great people whether they work with bats, or fish, or reptiles or big game. Some of the most dedicated and selfless people who don't make near what their time would be worth in the private consulting world. Plus they get to take a ration of crap from the bulk of the public who either want to kill everything, or want to save everything, never a right answer that works for the masses, just trying to find the spot that yields the least amount of backlash and hopefully jives with enough science to stand by...

If you made it through this, you have way more attention span for my stories than my wife!

First of all, I'll have you know that I have bursts where I can type up to six words per minute. ( I can't even think 60 wpm )

What I have found a little backwards is that because of our never ending winter this year, the deer count was down more than usual.

And yet, I have never seen this many dead deer on the highway; at least in our part of the state.

Maybe our coyotes have learned to chase them onto the highways and then wash their paws and get ready for supper.

Paul, don't ever try to figure out government math. It is not taught in the educational institutions of learning.

Paul, Crow's do it with Squirrel's. I saw a video where the Crow's waited for a car to come by, dive bombed the Squirrel, the car missed, the Crow's set up again and got Squirrel for lunch.