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Sorry to hear of the detrimental effects the wolves have had, 9threexFifty7, but I wonder if there is still time to think like a mountain, as Aldo Leopold put it? Could the wolves possibly improve the health of the deer herd and reduce erosion, as he believed? Could the number of people killed when cars hit deer be reduced when wolves are around?

I understand your concern about domestic stock. Farmers over here hate foxes and wild dogs very much - but I remember matching wits with the red varmints that ate our lambs as the high point of life on our farm. As a native animal, even if reintroduced, the wolf probably has more to be said for it than the imported pests that bother us.

Maybe there is a middle way where more wolves could be hunted, making a pastime when deer season is closed. The limited and somewhat humdrum native game of Australia makes me think a formidable predator might even add to the richness of experience. Our people have to invent them, hence the 'puma' seen in many country districts.

Leopold reckoned that the real kick and benefit of hunting and camping was atavistic - reliving the world of our forebears. Savage beasts were part of life for yours - and way back, mine.

Happy Christmas
- Paul

PS: I like your bit of scripture - I subscribe to that 'forum', too.

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Paati: YES, please post pic's or PM me and I'll give you my email address.

Paul:

Thanks for your kind words and glad you bring up Leopold as your summation is well put and addresses the views of many.

All of the points you raise are addressed in the Idaho Draft Wolf Resolution and proposed management plan. They are legitimate points of politics on the wolf issue. Some view it like you do; "wolves have some intrinsic value of their own and they should be managed like other big game".

Two things I have to say about that view. First, that is essentially where the Idaho Fish and Game Department {"State"} is headed with the wolf recovery program. The State {who didn't want wolves in the first place...} sees the best option for them to be as an additional huntable big game animal. Add them to the list: lion, black bear {grizzly may not be hunted} and wolf. Remember though UNLIKE Australia, we HAVE many predators. Add to the list above coyote and bobcat, both of which kill more than there share of ungulates, primarily during spring calving season. From a hunting and management standpoint, we don't need them. They serve no essential purpose that cannot be better served in my opinion, and the opinion of many others, by hunters. Wolves are a different predator in degree. They are the top of the food chain and as such compete with hunters for the same game animals.

Simply put, My freezer is a better place for surplus ungulates than a wolf's gullet.

Secondly, from a purely biological view, we have always had wolves. They were never "extinct" in Idaho. The numbers were small, but they did exist.

Practically-speaking we are stuck with them. We will likely have a hunting season on them in the next couple years. I predict that the numbers taken will be so small as to have essentially no impact on the total numbers of wolves in the state. Hunting opportunities for people will be impacted, as they already are.

The State game management departments used to be for the purpose of managing game animals for best hunting opportunities. Increasingly they are being pressured to manage non-game animals and be "everything to everyone". They have a very tough job. I would say, impossible.

Like others, now that we have wolves at the numbers we do, I'd like to see them listed on equal terms with the coyote, which for Idaho means all-year hunting and trapping. A tag system could be established so the state would know how many were killed. "Shoot on sight" as it were, but let the State know you did.

That type of management would NOT eliminate wolves. It was wholesale poisoning and den-dynamiting and now-illegal methods of trapping that knocked the wolf down to what I think were sufficient numbers and such a program would have to be initiated to get the wolf down to such numbers again, something that, unfortunately, isn't going to happen probably in my lifetime.

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What are the Rosary, the Cross or the Crucifix other than tools to help maintain the fortress of our faith in Jesus Christ, the Son of God?

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