Largest Wolf Hunted

Where wolves use to be now we have coyotes, so I do not see much difference if we re-introduce the wolves in most places. Am I out to lunch on that statement :)
 
mbogo3 said:
I doubt the surrounding ranchers have been pleased with the wolves being re-introduced after it took 200 years to get rid of them.BTW they don't stay in the park.
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As a layman, IMO only way that will continue to work is if both side's are prepared to make some consolations. Ranchers are going to lose some cattle, and they need to be prepared to live with it, but there needs to be a good compensation system in place (maybe already is). The flip is their government and followers need to be prepared for some wolves getting shot when off they wander off the park and start worrying livestock, and live with it.
 
I seem to be an outlier in liking having wolves, grizzlies, and wolverines around. A place feels empty without its apex predators and their presence, is the best indicator of ecosystem health from here to Africa. There’s a balance, I support hunting predators where it contributes to that balance. But elimination isn’t any sort of balance, and I’d rather see predators than 4000 elk and black bear and little else.
 
There's a place for wolves and grizzlies but they should be shot on sight in residential and agricultural areas.
 
I agree wolves belong in wilderness. Nothing will keep you awake at night like wolves targeting cattle. I’ve trapped and hunted them and probably know them better than most. They will kill for sport, but then again so do I.
My relationship with wolves is kind of like two siblings that just can’t get along, because truth is they’re more alike than different.
 
What's nice is when they're teaching the adolescents to hunt and kill a dozen sheep leaving them piled up in a fence corner with their throats torn out and not a bite of meat eaten.
 
mbogo3 said:
What's nice is when they're teaching the adolescents to hunt and kill a dozen sheep leaving them piled up in a fence corner with their throats torn out and not a bite of meat eaten.
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The owners of a sheep farm could acquire Livestock Guardians Dogs (LGDs). LGDs are often preferred over other forms of predator control, such as trapping or hunting, because they are non-lethal and can provide ongoing protection for livestock. They are also seen as a more natural solution, as they allow predators to coexist with livestock in the same area without resorting to lethal methods.
 
Spent an awful lot of time around, hunting, and trapping wolves in the past. Instances of killing for sport, an activity our species loves more than any it should be noted, are incredibly rare. You need a lot of factors to come together, as wolves are above all else subscibers of the efficiency model. They put out as little energy as they can for the most reward and the least risk, you see this in how and where they hunt, which is where you go when you want to hunt or trap them.

Sheep are soft targets, and go against everything a wolf has evolved understand. They’re bred to be placid and unthinking, they rarely fight back, and they’re fenced and unable to escape. I find it no mystery wolves will surplus kill in a scenario like that, just as humans do when given no bag limit. Think caribou in the past and present day in the far north for certain groups, market hunters and waterfowl, bison hunters on the plains. They go hard where the going is good and they face little resistance, and you can’t be surprised they’ll kill too much when faced with that scenario. Their evolution is for a far harder life.

That doesn’t mean they get a pass when killing livestock and over pressuring wild game, quite the opposite. It doesn’t however make them dispicable. Leave a wild place to the wolves, or leave it to humans, and every single time the wolves will manage it better. My real beef is we’re losing the wilderness, and what’s in it, and that’s not wolves fault.
 
I don't shoot wolves but then again I have no livestock and if they were going for my dogs I'd shoot.

But overall I just like to watch them on the rare occasions I spot them.

The Kaska Dene I worked with won't hunt bears but they will shoot EVERY SINGLE wolf they lay eyes on.
 
Ardent said:
And a hundred and fifty years ago, much of that “a lot” contained wood bison. And wood bison were there because the ecosystem was rich and suited enough to support the continent’s largest land animal, which I don’t find unlikely to have supported a correspondingly larger strain of the continent’s most effective predator. Curiously the “Mackenzie drainage” also supports the largest contiguous moose population, doesn’t feel like too much of a stretch that the ‘a lot’ contained ‘a lot’ that grew to larger than average sizes for the continent feeding upon it. :)

Wood Bison former range map, vs MacKenzie drainage map.

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I wonder how much the treeline has shifted in those 5000 years.a lot of that eastern range portion would make for pretty tough sledding for bison these days.
 
Wood bison love swamp spruce and skag, much to my surprise. I spent a decade working in a herd of them in northern BC that lives in full on moose swamp country and are expanding range rapidly. Should see Wood Buffalo national park too. It’s contains the world’s longest beaver dam, visible from space. It’s unreal what they wallow through at their weight unfazed.
 
So what happened 5000 years ago to cause the range to shrink? That's around when the Dene arrived.
 
Ardent said:
I seem to be an outlier in liking having wolves, grizzlies, and wolverines around. A place feels empty without its apex predators and their presence, is the best indicator of ecosystem health from here to Africa. There’s a balance, I support hunting predators where it contributes to that balance. But elimination isn’t any sort of balance, and I’d rather see predators than 4000 elk and black bear and little else.
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i couldn't agree more. Wolves help define wild spaces. They are a valuable species that do a lot of good, and while doing so also cause a few problems. I think we should be able to tolerate a few wolves in "settled" areas. I'm in agreement with the idea that ranchers should be able to legally shoot problem animals. But eliminate all wolves in agricultural areas? Nope.
Consider the case of African lions and leopards. They have nearly always co-existed with native pastoralists in much of their range. They have a disturbing tendency to kill and eat both people and livestock. Canadian wolves pretty much restrict themselves to livestock when they get in trouble with humans. I believe people cover far too much of the earth already.
If it was OK to eliminate very predator that ever might cause a problem for humans, the beloved African big cat species would already be extinct, and wolves would never be encountered by most Canadians, just those few people willing to fly in to very remote unpopulated locations. I'm glad we're not that greedy (yet). Don't wish for all the land in the world to be safe for livestock or pets or whatever. Big predators belong somewhere. Maybe even in my back 40. If they cause problems, shoot the troublemakers. But don't eliminate them all.
 
Ardent said:
Aside from the boreal producing 21% of the world’s oxygen, and being the largest terrestrial carbon store that is. It may not seem like much to look at but it sure helps this planet stay pleasant to live on.
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I call Bullsh*t. The ocean's are vastly more productive for plants than Swamp Spruce in the Sub-Arctic with a 1-3 month growing season.

CO2 is a plant nutrient.
 
MiG25 said:
I call Bullsh*t. The ocean's are vastly more productive for plants than Swamp Spruce in the Sub-Arctic with a 1-3 month growing season.

CO2 is a plant nutrient.
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Marine phytoplankton are responsible for producing approximately 50% of the Earth's oxygen. Forests and other terrestrial vegetation collectively produce approximately 28% of the Earth's oxygen.
 
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