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Comment today on Wyoming's unsustainable wolf management plan!

Action needed by 10, 2008

Wyoming is trying to slip another bad wolf management plan by Wyoming citizens. Feeling like a kid who wasn’t invited to the birthday party, Wyoming has made revisions to its 2007 wolf management plan in an attempt to be included in U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s new delisting proposal. Otherwise, there’s a chance wolves will be delisted in Idaho and Montana but not in Wyoming.

Yet, the revisions to the plan don’t resolve many of the issues that a federal judge found with Wyoming’s plan. Nor do the revisions alter or repeal Wyoming’s wolf management law.

The plan still classifies wolves as predators in 88 percent of the state, where they can be shot-on-sight. Also, the plan continues to stress aggressive lethal control of wolves.

Read the plan here.

Attend a public meeting about Wyoming’s revised wolf management plan THIS WEEK!

Nov. 5: Cody, Holiday Inn, 1701 Sheridan Ave., 7-9 p.m.
Nov. 6: Lander, Lander Community Center, 950 Buena Vista Drive, 7-9 p.m.

Submit written comments BEFORE Nov. 10:

Wolf Plan Comments
Attn:  Bea Pepper
Wyoming Game and Fish Department
5400 Bishop Blvd.
Cheyenne, WY 82006

Fax: (307) 777-4650

Take Action:

TALKING POINTS for written or oral comments:

-- The revised plan is not likely to satisfy the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service or the courts as it makes regulatory changes only. Wyoming needs to modify its statues governing wolf management. Wyoming should repeal its existing legislation and adopt new wolf management legislation during the upcoming Legislative session that classifies wolves as trophy game animals statewide and leaves the details of wolf management up to the Wyoming Game and Fish Commission.

--Wyoming should adopt statewide trophy game status for wolves, which is similar to the way Idaho and Montana classify wolves.

-- The revised plan commits to maintaining genetic diversity and exchange among northern Rockies wolf populations, but still embraces a major stumbling block to genetic exchange: the predator zone. Wolves dispersing from Idaho or the national parks are likely to cross into the free-fire zone in Wyoming and be killed before they have the chance to breed. The predator zone is not a viable management scheme for wolves in Wyoming.

-- The revised plan gives broad ability to lethally remove wolves if wild elk and other ungulates fall below state objectives. The plan does not spell out the need for a specific correlation between wolves and elk declines in order to remove wolves. The plan also gives Game and Fish the ability to remove wolves that bother elk at state-run elk feedgrounds. Elk feedgrounds artificially congregate elk and attract wolves.

-- The revised plan is still highly aggressive towards wolves and emphasizes lethal control. The plan only embraces non-lethal control techniques if lethal control would cause wolf numbers to fall below the minimum levels required. Wyoming should advocate the use of proactive measures to reduce wolf-livestock conflicts and decrease the need for lethal removal of wolves.

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