Since this thread has morfed into a discussion of the wolf re-introduction program I will dip my oar into the muddy waters here.
I was born and raised in Central Idaho right in the middle of this mess and was living there when the whole fiasco started.
1 There were real, wild, local wolves living in Idaho and Montana at the time of the restocking. IDF&G and the feds knew about them and violated the endangered species act by proceeding with the "illegal" plan but why let truth and facts get in the way right
2 In a healthy population of wolves with an intact pack social structure it is generally agreed that out of a full pack only the "alfa" pair will breed. There are many many old maid bitch wolves that help to raise litters within the pack but do not breed on their own. The male pack leader will not tolerate subordinate males breeding and the female will not either. This is not carved in stone as occasionally a subordinate female will breed, when this happens she will usually be killed or driven out. Without the pack to help she will have a real tough time of feeding herself let alone a batch of cubs. I have seen this succeed here in Alaska because the bitch fed on spawned salmon long enough to get the cubs weaned.
3. By trapping and transplanting anything less than a full pack there is no social structure anymore. Instead of one breeding pair out of ten to fifteen animals you now have every pair breeding. This is one of the biggest reasons that the stocking program has exploded was faster than anyone will admit to.
4. Wolves do not respect boundary lines, when the population grows sufficiently the weaker/younger animals will move to fresh areas. This is why there were wolves everywhere and not in just one spot on earth. The people in charge of this travesty will not admit that there have been "stocked" wolves from the stocking in the park area all the way to the cascades on the west, Colorado on the south, beyond the Missouri in the east and unlimited on the north.
5 The big game populations in Idaho have crashed, the wolves are beginning to take game from the cougars and have in fact begun to hunt down and feed on cougars.
6 There has been a tremendous sale of wolf tags in Idaho this year, hopefully this will result in lots of dead wolves but I don't think it will. These things are an "apex" predator" and are extremely intelligent and resilient. The only way wolves were killed off down south was by the use of poisons, shooting, trapping, hunting, and in some strange cases roping from horseback
just did not do the job.
7 Lest anyone think that I am a wolf hater, that is absolutely not so, I love to see them, hear them. I don't even really hate the idea of them being put back into the rocky mtn area. What I really hate is the FACT that the bastards that pushed it got away with breaking every one of their own laws and rules and our own federal govt. aided and abetted it and continue to lie about it to this day.
Rant finished,
SDH
