Thank goodness, BC is culling wolves
- Thread starter elker
- Start date
when we build roads into remote areas and every wolf in the country moves in and are depleting a species no one can just say let nature take its coarse.
No one can prove culls work but it makes sense if instead of fifty or a hundred wolves and they are culled down to a dozen there will be less game taken. I know they will have more young if game is plentiful so the cull has to be over a period of time.
No one can prove culls work but it makes sense if instead of fifty or a hundred wolves and they are culled down to a dozen there will be less game taken. I know they will have more young if game is plentiful so the cull has to be over a period of time.
Have you ever heard of the greatest wolf culling program in Canada, that occurred in BC during the 1950s?
Most people today will not even have heard of the great wolf kill in BC in the 1950s. Wolves had increased to great numbers and wild game in general was taking a beating, with some bands of caribou and some areas of mountain goats in particular, likely due for extinction. The ranchers were suffering great losses to their cattle and it was the fuss made by the ranchers that was the final straw that caused the BC government to begin the largest wolf killing program in the history of Canada.
Over a nearly ten year period of time, starting about 1951, hundreds of tons of frozen horse meat, laced with poison for wolves, was dropped from aircraft onto frozen lakes over much of central and northern BC.
OK, I'll straighten out the horse meat angle, before someone asks. Until about that time the farmers of the west used horses for farming, but at that period of time, horses were giving way to tractors on farms. Thus, there were thousands of old, worn out work horses being retired. The government approved a plan whereby they authorized a payment of $25 per horse, to be used for wolf bait, that could be paid to the farmers. The odd confiscated moose was also used for bait, but moose amounted to a very small percentage of the bait used.
Anyway, the person in charge of the provincial wolf killing program was a fully licenced game biologist. I will even state his name, it was Al West, from Vancouver. He started a new branch of the game department, named The Predatory Control Branch. Al West enlisted knowledgeable men and gave them the title of predatory control officers and had them placed in about fifty areas, over central and northern BC, to coordinate the wolf poisoning program in their areas.
In spite of all the poison dropped over such an extended period of time, there was still a healthy population of wolves remaining in the province when it was all over.
But the game animals made a tremendous come back. Soon caribou were being legally hunted in areas where they hung on the lip of extinction, prior to the wolf kill. One such area was the highlands of Tweedsmuir Park. Moose were at a low ebb in many areas and they made a tremendous comeback.
Very little was officially written of the history of this poison campaign. Thus, anything you may find on Google was written some time after the program was over and was written from hear say, usually to fall in line with the writers views of it, rather than the truth of the matter.
Bruce
Thanks, took this one above Fort Saint James during a moose hunt. The wolf numbers are out of hand up there and the moose are sure getting harder to
find. The moose don't come to calls much anymore but this guy did.
predator control can work as proved in the document i provided but there is a but when you start you cant stop and predator control means in the west culling bears (black and grizzly) but doing a control on predators we are opening a can of worm because the ongulates wont be pretaded and then the number will be bigger than what the nature and ecosystem can handle ie Yukon is not the Serengeti. predators are aiming firstly the weaks and the sicks.
enjoy the reading anyway.
Bruce,
thank you for the reminder of the History.
i found interesting that the biologist in Yukon that implemented the predator control is now that he is retired absolutely against ....
i can tell you about Europe where they have done that for centuries. Wolf remained only in really isolated pockets but that is interesting because now they are back but nobody knows actually how to deal with them ( cattle raisers, biologists, hunters, nature lovers and greenies ...)
you can see what happened in the north of the southern neighbours they eraticated the wolf bring it back and now they want to remove them again not easy answer to say the least ...
Chuckbuster
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
I have never heard of this particular program, but I am familiar with attempts at wolf eradication in Algonquin Park, and the results of wolf/predator eradication in southern Ontario. In both cases, ungulate populations exploded and either have crashed or are crashing with many animals starving due to complete ecosystem destruction by the sheer number of herbivores which is far above the carrying capacity of their environment. As someone said earlier, this is not the Serengetti and removal of predators often gives the optics of desired results but actually makes things worse for the ecosystem.
EDIT: In reading further on the matter, I see continued mention of habitat degradation and fragmentation due to logging, forestry and development; making it easier for wolves to locate prey. So, in essence, it is a problem people have created and for which we will make another species pay the bill; wolves will be killed for humans having made it easier to be wolves. Again, legal and ethical hunting of wolves is one thing, but slaughter to fix a problem we have created, or at least are largely responsible for is, well, wrong and unethical.
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Chuckbuster,
your ethic and mine may be different and nothing can be said on that because we do not know. the word ethic is used against us the hunters.
you are trying to find something to prove for any reasons that predator control is not working and im telling it is working if the program is not stopped and if the predator control is done will all predators.
the problem we created is being human ... lol
i ve no dog in the fight and im happy to see wolves every year but here i can legally take 7 and if i met one that i can shoot i will ethical or not for some that is not the problem, our problems now are way higher and if the hunters cant accept diversity and competition we are lost.
we are our own worst enemies.
here is a definition for ethic:
a set of moral principles, especially ones relating to or affirming a specified group, field, or form of conduct.
tell me when or where shooting wolves is not ethic? you see where we can go with that?....
your ethic and mine may be different and nothing can be said on that because we do not know. the word ethic is used against us the hunters.
you are trying to find something to prove for any reasons that predator control is not working and im telling it is working if the program is not stopped and if the predator control is done will all predators.
the problem we created is being human ... lol
i ve no dog in the fight and im happy to see wolves every year but here i can legally take 7 and if i met one that i can shoot i will ethical or not for some that is not the problem, our problems now are way higher and if the hunters cant accept diversity and competition we are lost.
we are our own worst enemies.
here is a definition for ethic:
a set of moral principles, especially ones relating to or affirming a specified group, field, or form of conduct.
tell me when or where shooting wolves is not ethic? you see where we can go with that?....
Chuckbuster
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
An exploding ungulate population is not a good thing. We may benefit in the short term from increased hunting opportunities, but in the long term, they and the ecosystem suffer.
Chuckbuster
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
I'm having a hard time following your posts as they are choppy...perhaps a result of your device? Anyway, somebody can hunt wolves if they so choose, that's fine. I believe that shooting from a helicopter is not hunting, it's just killing. Personally, I don't hunt wolves because I like seeing them, but if one was about to eat my golden retriever, then I would remove it from the gene pool.
Predator control may appear to work in the short term, but if an ungulate population is on it's way out due to habitat loss/degradation or a genetic bottleneck, then both the ungulate population and the cull is going to fail. An exploding ungulate population is not an indicator of success, it is an indicator of further problems down the road.
In the end, what I am arguing is that the basic biological/ecological premise upon which such predator control is based is flawed if one is looking for a long term solution.
Just to stir things with a stick...
My son is good friends with an AB conservation officer; word there ( quiet word too ) is that they dropped off a dozen pair of wolves in CFB Suffield.
The elk situation there is a man made ecological mess on a legendary level. Wonder if the wolves will help or will it just be another man made mess...
My son is good friends with an AB conservation officer; word there ( quiet word too ) is that they dropped off a dozen pair of wolves in CFB Suffield.
The elk situation there is a man made ecological mess on a legendary level. Wonder if the wolves will help or will it just be another man made mess...
CreamySmooth
CGN frequent flyer
NE Sask is so full of wolves we have no other animals left. Deer are so far gone they may implement a draw, which we've never had EEEEver! SERM guys have told me it's the Wolves but that's not company line. A trapper buddy of mine is well over 70 this year. Last elk season when you called, wolves came out, not elk. It's gross.
Chuckbuster,
It seems like you are making the incorrect assumption that predator and prey naturally find a balance when undisturbed by outside factors. This is about as far from the truth as possible.
Predator prey relationships follow a cyclic cycle when prey populations climb, followed by climbing predator populations until the carrying capacity of the ecosystem is reached. By that point, there is a prey rich environment where the predators flourish. Because predators have a long maturity period, typically 3 years or so, predator populations lag prey population increases. What ends up happening is the predator populations peak when the prey has already exceeded the carrying capacity of the ecosystem and the prey population is already crashing. This ends up causing a crash in prey populations, as they are out of food and space and are being heavily predated on. Of course, prey populations then crash causing the predators to move to new areas (if possible) or starve.
In BC there are other complicating factors:
*Hunters are a predator and we don't like donating our bag to the wolves. I like to eat deer/moose and the habitat can only support so many game animals...
*Much of the habitat that can support game animals is leased by the government out to the ranchers for cattle range. This means the habitat can not support as many game animals.
*Forest fire suppression causes lack of browsing habitat. The gov't is interested in protecting the trees because they sell them to the mills.
*All the resource roads (logging, mining ect.) bring hunters (both those with guns and those with teeth) to where the prey used to be isolated and somewhat protected.
At the end of all this, nature does not do "balanced", everything is cyclic. And if we want hunting seasons to always have animals, we have to do our best to manage the predator/prey populations.
It seems like you are making the incorrect assumption that predator and prey naturally find a balance when undisturbed by outside factors. This is about as far from the truth as possible.
Predator prey relationships follow a cyclic cycle when prey populations climb, followed by climbing predator populations until the carrying capacity of the ecosystem is reached. By that point, there is a prey rich environment where the predators flourish. Because predators have a long maturity period, typically 3 years or so, predator populations lag prey population increases. What ends up happening is the predator populations peak when the prey has already exceeded the carrying capacity of the ecosystem and the prey population is already crashing. This ends up causing a crash in prey populations, as they are out of food and space and are being heavily predated on. Of course, prey populations then crash causing the predators to move to new areas (if possible) or starve.
In BC there are other complicating factors:
*Hunters are a predator and we don't like donating our bag to the wolves. I like to eat deer/moose and the habitat can only support so many game animals...
*Much of the habitat that can support game animals is leased by the government out to the ranchers for cattle range. This means the habitat can not support as many game animals.
*Forest fire suppression causes lack of browsing habitat. The gov't is interested in protecting the trees because they sell them to the mills.
*All the resource roads (logging, mining ect.) bring hunters (both those with guns and those with teeth) to where the prey used to be isolated and somewhat protected.
At the end of all this, nature does not do "balanced", everything is cyclic. And if we want hunting seasons to always have animals, we have to do our best to manage the predator/prey populations.
Chuckbuster
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
Yes, I am well aware of the cyclic nature of predator prey relationships. That is nature's way, or "balance" , if you will. Your second paragraph speaks to habitat degradation and fragmentation. The aggravating factors you describe are by no means unique to BC; we have the same issues in my part of the country. And here too, the result is that in areas where it is a problem, the remaining fragmented habitat is incapable of maintaining healthy populations of affected species, or, those species are simply incapable of existing there any longer.
At the end of the day, when it comes to wildlife management, we need to ask ourselves if we wish to risk it all to maintain a particular population here and now, or try to do things long term so that the ecosystem can sustain a wildlife community that will provide hunting opportunities for many years to come as the landscape undergoes normal successional changes, including the concomitant faunal changes.
