Wolves have not eliminated any prey

Hyperbole and apocr yphal acrimony do not help the dialogue about restoring wolves to Colorado. Instead, let’s learn from the 25-year histor y of wolves in Yellowstone, and in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming. First, let’s recall that wolves and their prey have lived together in North America for 800,000 years, and wolves lived harmoniously with aboriginal Americans for millennia before the arrival of Euroamericans. When bison numbered in the tens of millions, DNA evidence suggests there were also about 380,000 wolves here. Notably, wolves have not eliminated any of their prey species, and are unique in providing food for many scavenging birds and mammals, and even hundreds of species of beetles.

Elk population and harvest figures since wolf restoration do not support the notion that wolves “decimate” ungulates, their prey base.

Wyoming

1995 elk population, 103,448; 1995 elk har vest, 17,695.

2018 elk population, 110,300; 2018 elk harvest, 25,091; average hunter success rate, 44.8%.

Montana

1995 elk population, 109,500; no harvest data for 1995.

2018 elk population, 138,470 (objective 92,138); 2018 elk har vest, 27,793.

Idaho

1995 elk population, 112,333; 1995 elk har vest, 22,437.

2017 elk population, 116,800 (18 elk units at or above objective, 10 units below for a variety of reasons); 2017 elk har vest, 22,751; 2018 harvest, 22,326; 2018 estimated population,120,000+.

In 2005, Joel Berger, a senior scientist with the Wildlife Conservation Society, told Wyoming Game and Fish commissioners, “I know people don’t want to believe this … but moose are not in the diet of wolves.” He pointed out that his study of three moose herds in the Jackson area shows the decline in moose populations is more of a problem with nutrition and habitat than with predators, which includes grizzly bears. Of known mortality in adult Jackson moose, 14% to 18% was due to grizzly bears, and less than 2% due to wolves. Car collisions accounted for about 8% of annual mor tality. “About 60 percent of adult female mor tality is due to malnutrition. … Less than 5 percent of adult females are lost to predation.” Peek commented on Berger’s study, noting that elk are easier prey than moose, and that there are many elk in the Jackson area.

Breaking down 2015 figures on cattle losses in the northern Rocky Mountains by counties shared with wolves, we see 1,648,100 cows and 148 losses to wolves, or a rate of about .01%. Wolves are taking less than 1 head of cattle per 10,000 annually in Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming. Compensation is available in all three states, and help in managing conflicts with wolves and other predators is available for the asking.

Not state biologists, but appointed members of the Parks and Wildlife Commission, rejected wolf reintroduction to Colorado. That’s why it became necessary for citizens to resort to an initiative to get action on a ver y popular issue. The proposition, incidentally, was written by one of America’s top wolf biologists.

CSU’S Department of Human Dimensions of Natural Resources published Colorado voter attitudes towards wolf reintroduction (https://peerj.com/ articles/9074/). Bottom line: 84% of Colorado voters intend to vote for Proposition 114 this fall, and 79.8% of West Slope residents said they will vote for wolf restoration, as did 69.5% of those who strongly identified as ranchers and 66.1% of those who strongly identified as hunters.

Approval of Proposition 114 will be democracy at its best, with the citizens telling the government to do what the public wants. Then, the professional agency with the technical and scientific know-how will turn that policy into reality.

Norman A. Bishop earned a B.S. in botany at the University of Denver (1954), served four years as a naval aviator, then took forest recreation and wildlife management courses (1958-61) at Colorado State University. He was a national park ranger for 36 years. He was a reviewer and compiler of 1990 and 1992 “Wolves for Yellowstone?” and the 1994 EIS, “The Reintroduction of Gray Wolves to Yellowstone National Park and Central Idaho,” and was the principal interpreter of wolves and their restoration at Yellowstone National Park from 1985 until 1997.