Wolf in the Southwest

[Jimmer Negamanee]

Do you hate the idea of wolf reintroduction to the Southwest (Arizona and New Mexico)? Do you love the idea? Are you firmly in the uncommitted camp? You don't have to declare here one way or the other but what are the negatives of reintroduction you see? What are the positives?

 

Post your feelings here but also post your thoughts. Or are the feelings so strong that a rational discussion in not possible? (If so, put that here too.) Can you see the other sides position but simply disagree? Or do you question the mental competence of someone who feels/thinks differently than you do? Scientific, historical, cultural, emotional, personal perspectives are welcome.

 

(And Amanda, if you think this thread should be nuked or never started, feel free to make it go away. It's your site I'm glad to have been a part of it for as long as I have.)

[coues krazy]

I for one hate the idea of wolves being reintroduced. I also believe the ones who want them so badly, dont want me and you in the woods hunting. More wolves, and less deer and elk means less hunting permits. Its a win win for them.

[Snapshot]

I don't like wolves. Wolves are killing machines.

 

These are not 100% Wolf, but a hybrid. Mankind is tampering with evolution. Not a good thing.

 

The big game resources we already have are much more valuable, then packs of wolves raised to make the bunny hugger crowd feel good. But....I am a hunter and very biased.

 

I can see the other sides position on this, as long as they are not using it as a political tool to advance a questionable agenda. Which is likely the case.

 

Honestly, the wolf expansion project has way more negatives then positives. The people behind the program refuse to acknowledge this, but I wouldn't expect anything logical to come from the Federal Feel Good Camp.

 

If Arizona G&F supports this expansion program, what are they getting out of it? Federal dollars?

 

750 -1000 Wolves equals a whole lot of game animals being eaten around the southwest.

 

I would much rather have the Grizzlies back.

[AZkiller]

wolf reintroduction program in Arizona will never make it to a thousand. if it had any chance of getting that far it would have gotten there already. there's a reason they're not doing better than they are. I hope I never have one attack me.

[PRDATR]

I guess we can continue to stir this pot over and over despite the numerous discussions we have already had.

[sjvcon]

I don't like wolves. Wolves are killing machines.

 

These are not 100% Wolf, but a hybrid. Mankind is tampering with evolution. Not a good thing.

 

The big game resources we already have are much more valuable, then packs of wolves raised to make the bunny hugger crowd feel good. But....I am a hunter and very biased.

 

I can see the other sides position on this, as long as they are not using it as a political tool to advance a questionable agenda. Which is likely the case.

 

Honestly, the wolf expansion project has way more negatives then positives. The people behind the program refuse to acknowledge this, but I wouldn't expect anything logical to come from the Federal Feel Good Camp.

 

If Arizona G&F supports this expansion program, what are they getting out of it? Federal dollars?

 

750 -1000 Wolves equals a whole lot of game animals being eaten around the southwest.

 

I would much rather have the Grizzlies back.

Not sure I am in the Grizzly camp, but I think that I am 100% behind what Snap says on this. Hybrids aren't wolves. The program is a HUGE failure in terms of dollars spent per "DOG" released into the wild. This is about decreasing hunt opportunities more than anything, at least in my opinion.

[.270]

Well, I, for one, hate it. And anyone that's for it. Can I say that? Oh well. I did. Can't take it back. The wolf/dogs are just a pawn in a big plan to herd everbuddy into town. Lark.

[dse]

There is a reason that the wolf has disappeared across most of the country, and at the same time the coyote, lion, and bear have thrived. The wolf is an out of date, inefficient, unadaptible predator. The wolf was simply replaced by better predators.

[sjvcon]

I made that exact point in another topic thread that deals with the same issue. Other predators, despite heavy hunting of them, have flourished, and are, in fact, problematic in some areas despite the hunting. The wolf was not suited for survival here ... plain and simple. And like Lark pointed out, they didn't even exist where they are being released. There is an agenda, and it is insidious at its core.

[Non-Typical Solutions]

I am not a big Darwin fan but here is a pretty good quote of his: "It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change."

 

 

 

[Jimmer Negamanee]

I guess we can continue to stir this pot over and over despite the numerous discussions we have already had.

Stirring the pot was not my objective. I was trying hear people's reasons pro or con. It seemed to me that many of the other discussions have been more about exasperated venting ending with calls to commit criminal acts (S.S.S.), so that's why I started this thread. (Some people, on both ends of the political spectrum, don't want to talk politics "with" you, they want to talk politics "at" you and the same can be said for the wolf issue. I was trying to avoid that.)

 

So far this has been interesting and very civil. I'll chime in with more thoughts later but right now the grill is going and I have a beer calling my name and an ASU football game to watch. I'm very busy. : )

[Jimmer Negamanee]

The argument that the wolf has been eliminated from the Southwest and therefore is inadaptable and therefore should not be allowed to return because it was eliminated seems circular to me.

 

I've recently started reading David E. Brown's Wolf in the Southwest and that book shows that the wolf in the Southwest was not eradicated because they were a slow and dim-witted species like the dodo bird. Instead, they were eradicated ("extirpated" as the biologists say) by official government policy. That policy called for the elimination of the wolf by any means necessary including gun, trap, poison, and denning (which involves shooting wolves at their den sites and/or digging the pups out of their dens and braining them with a shovel).

 

But from a bigger picture perspective, even if one found this argument persuasive, it seems that being against wolves in the Southwest for this reason would also logically lead a person to being against elk in Arizona too.

 

For my fellow Arizonans, our native elk (Merriam's elk) were eliminated at the turn of the last century by over hunting and the only reason we have elk in Arizona today is because of reintroduction of Rocky Mountain elk along with strict regulations on harvesting them.

 

But despite the fact that elk were eliminated and only exist because of reintroduction and regulation on their harvesting, none of us publicly suggest that we should S.S.S. when it comes to elk.

[.270]

First off, the yellowstone elk was not reintroduced. The merriam went away and the yellowstone was introduced on its place. Much like the Mexican wolf. It went away and a wolf/dog cross was introduced in its place. But the yellowstone elk, unlike the wolf/dog cross, thrived. Also, unlike the wolf/dog cross, they realeased wild animals that only weeks before had been captured. Being a wild animal and very adaptable, with next to no help from people, they took to the country and never looked back. There are thriving herds isolated from all other elk that escaped from broken down trucks that are still in good shape a century later. In country noone looks at as typical elk habitat. The cost of the elk herds is next to nothing per animal per year. With most of their cost, if there is any at all, being paid for with permit and license fees. Where the wolf/dog cross is somewhere in the neighborhood of $1 million per animal. This is just the program cost and accounts for none of the money lost by the people affected by the program. Elk also contribute a large amount of $ to local economies through guide and outfitter services, hotels, meals, gas etc. Wolf/dogs contribute nothing in any form,except to boost the egos of the folks that love em.

The Mexican wolf is extinct. Period. Like most extinct animals, It died out because of the times. There are no wild lands large enough to support them even if they had any. And they don't have any. Lark

[sjvcon]

How is the Coyote different?? Season is open year round ... kill as many as you want ... yet they thrive. It ain't for lack of hunters trying to get rid of them.

 

The idea of spending over a million per animal is unbelievable. Whoever signed off on that is out of their friggin mind.

[Non-Typical Solutions]

We don't even spend that much on educating our own kids......no common sense in the program. If they had the real deal, turned them loose and let the thrive on their own without all the hoopla........maybe a person could swallow it, but not with a fake dog and pony show to close roads and squelch hunting. No pun intended with the fake dog.....