PLANT EM

OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP) — State wildlife managers are planning to kill some wolves in a northeastern Washington pack after its members killed at least four cattle this year.
Department of Fish and Wildlife Director Jim Unsworth authorized killing a portion of the Profanity Peak pack in Ferry County after investigators on Wednesday confirmed a calf had been killed by a wolf. There are at least 11 wolves in the pack.
The department says preventative measures — such removing carcasses or increasing human presence — have not stopped livestock from being attacked, and such attacks will continue if the animals aren't removed.
The agency says it is following guidelines developed with an advisory group on when to remove wolves, including that there be at least four livestock attacks in a year.
It's the third time the department will remove wolves since the predators began recolonizing Washington about a decade ago, The Capital Press reported (http://goo.gl/PzvaxY ). There are now 19 wolf packs, all of them east of the Cascades.
"I'm disappointed there was another depredation, but happy to see the department is ready to step in," said Washington Cattlemen's Association Executive Vice President Jack Field.
Agents shot one wolf in northeastern Washington's Huckleberry pack in 2014 and seven wolves from the Wedge pack in 2012. In those cases, the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Wildlife Services assisted the state Department of Fish and Wildlife. Since then, a federal judge has ruled the federal agency can't help Washington lethally remove wolves without doing a more thorough study of the environmental impacts.
Several conservation groups objected to the decision, saying in a joint news release they do not want to see wolves killed in remote, roadless areas.
"We appreciate the agency's use of nonlethal measures to try to prevent losses of both livestock and wolves, and are glad to hear the ranchers in question have been working cooperatively with the state, but we are deeply saddened that wolves are going to die," Amaroq Weiss, of the Center for Biological Diversity, said in the news release. "We are not part of the advisory group but have made clear to the group that we don't support the killing of the public's wildlife on public lands."

Story credit the liberal Daily Olympian

My Daughter is wrangling this summer at a working ranch in Republic, and several of their cattle have been chewed by wolves up there this summer. as recently as last week.

The state and ranchers need to figure out what to do long term on this issue, cause it will keep happening resulting in ranchers calls to kill more and more.

Open up limited draw for wolf tags. Instead of costing 10's of thousands of dollars the state could make a few bucks.

My Grand father saw wolves in the 50's around Stampede pass. They're not that far from Baker Oregon as we speak.

I have heard so many reports of wolves over the years, I have come to a conclusion that the department most likely just lies about it until there are so many they can not deny it, and then they under report. Almost every place I heard people say they saw them before they existed in that location, now have established packs.

One of the problems with issuing tags, even limited ones, is that current management tries to target the packs/individuals that are causing the problem. To work, the tag would have to be for a member of X pack in Y area. Who would buy a tag that was so limited and could thy be counted on to kill the appropriate animal?

There are wolverines on the Olympic Peninsula currently. My family has property on Eaglemount near Discovery Bay. I saw one last spring, it crossed the road in front of my truck, it stopped and challenged the my truck, showed it's teeth at me. I called WDFW and reported it, they told me that there had been another report for East Jefferson county a couple months before. Since then there have been two additional sightings within 2 miles of my sighting. The most recent sighting was a different animal. (blondish brown, with white chest patch).

WDFW told me they suspect it swam accross the strait from Vancouver island. The one I saw was mostly black, with a rusty red tail and longer redish hair on he sides. I got a good look at it, as it jumped up on a stump once it got on the other side of the road And looked at me 15 seconds. Thought about plugging it with the 22 mag as I figured nobody would believe me. Truely a buitiful animal, no fear of my vehicle.

It looked to be approximately 40 to 45 inches from nose to end of tail, about 16 inches tall and bowlegged, round ears, black eyes, a face between a bear and dog. Very stout, maybe 40 pounds.

Tried getting some game camera picks of it with no luck, I had 3 camera traps with dead meat hanging from trees, only got coons.

It's only a matter of time before someone shoots one or hits it with their car, WDFW was not that excited about the report, but didn't doubt it either. Thought at first it was maybe a Fisher, but it was too high of the ground, bushy tail and stout, fishers are more like big minks and dont look like a wolvarine at all.

WDFW told me that when trapping was legal, any wolvarine which migrated or escaped from a park would be caught quickly since they can't resist dead meat, they told me that every now and then one would get trapped in the Cascades or east side by accident. They told me that in the mid 80s one escaped from North West Trek and got trapped in the Skookumchuck a month later.

they are on the OP, either by migration or planted but they are here, I think they were eating nesting geese and calf afterbirths, they seem to be around Eaglemount in spring, probably a breeding pair as their is good habitat and food.

Hey Rich, since you are a Bigfoot investigator and often in the woods on backroads...have you thought of installing a dash cam in your vehicle and leaving it on? Probably better chance of getting a pic (squatch or wolverine) with it than fumbling around with your cell phone. Just sayin'.

Very true. Not to mention the difficulty in spot and stalk wolf hunting once they've been shot at a time or 2.

I have an old trapper friend up in Delta Junction that says the fastest way to increase wolf numbers is to take out the alpha. Disrupts the order and encourages them to breed. Even the younger ones.

We saw a Wolverine about 100 yards from a highway in northern Idaho, not too far from from Tieton pass. Only one I've ever seen.

I was in shock when I saw it had to triple take. No doubt what it was.

Another missed opp for revenue by the state. Those 4 wolves could have brought in some serious cash.

The answer is to have managed public hunts. Its a win for all parties involved, including the wolves. All of the problems proposed earlier in the thread are not really problems per se. Other nearby states have shown the way with successful culling & management programs.

Ranchers that have proven depredation issues should be given first priority on tags in conjunction with extreme oversight & hands on cooperation from the state. The ranchers and state know where the wolves are - they aren't hard to find and we have little pack mixing in WA (when compared to other states).

Harvesting collared study wolves should be off limits. Harvesting either of the alpha couple should also be off limits (taking alphas can create more issues than it resolves).

The state better get it figured out real quick or the east side will be over-run inside 10 years (and eastside hunting will go into the crapper). Wolves breed like rabbits given abundant food sources....and they have that in spades.

In Tienaway the wranglers have the radio collar receivers so if the pack moves into the valley the cattle are grazing in they can move them out of the way. I ran into one of the ranchers and his wranglers two years ago and they said it was working well. I'm surprised they don't implement this policy state wide. Probably a lot cheaper to allow those most effected by their presence to keep the closest eye on them.

I'm real interested to hear of her experiences from this summer. Very cool summer job!! Especially since that is one of my hunting areas.

Rich,
In an effort to help you with your game camera skills I'm going to post parts of an e-mail I received while corresponding with a USFS bio. I contacted this bio after my own wolverine sighting. He was very helpful and I hope you find this helpful too.

One interesting fact he told me over the phone was that as wolves expand their range we can also expect wolverines to expand. They make much of their living stealing food from wolves. Also wolves will occasionally kill more then they need which also benefits scavengers.

He also sent me his latest updates to his ongoing study which included a lot of pictures of them chilling in live traps. Cute little buggers until they get pissed at which times they become scary little buggers.

Shoot me a pm if you want contact info for this bio.........

HI Broodbuster,
Thanks very much for sending this information to me! It's much appreciated, as I maintain an archive of verifiable records for 5 forest carnivores of conservation concern in the Pacific states: lynx, wolverine, fisher, coastal marten (west of I-5), and mountain red fox (>3,000 ft. elev.). I think it's entirely possible that what you saw was a wolverine, because they are currently expanding their range in Washington southward in the North Cascades and sighting reports like yours are becoming increasingly common. We have now documented them to occur as far south as the Stevens Pass Highway (Hwy 2), and there is a lone wolverine that has been hanging out on Mt. Adams for several years now. However, we won't know for sure whether you saw a wolverine unless you're able to obtain a photo (i.e., although they are interesting and useful for targeting survey efforts that are designed to produce physical evidence of a species' occurrence (specimens, photos, DNA detections, etc.), I do not include sighting reports or other anecdotal observations in my data base.

I have been putting radio-collars on wolverines in the North Cascades for the last 7 years (we've collared 10 wolverines so far; I've attached our most recent progress report for your information) and it is very clear to me that they are in the process of reclaiming much of their former range in Washington, which once included the Cascade Range from the Canadian border down to about Mt. Rainier in the south.

Re: advice for placing your trail cameras in hopes of getting a photo of this critter, your best bet would be to go off trail and use some sort of bait attached to a tree. Wolverines don't bother using trails like coyotes and foxes do, they just go overland wherever they want! Large pieces of meat are not necessary, as wolverines can smell a dried bone from a long distance away (using less meat will also prevent other critters from running thru your camera card or removing the bait). What we do is drill a hole in a bone (road-killed deer leg bone, or a beef bone will work fine) and then use a 1/4" braided steel cable to hang it from a branch just out of reach, or attach it to a tree. Trapping lures (scents) can also help, but they are not really necessary. If you do get a wolverine coming to the bait, then make sure to look around for scats or hairs that the animal might have left, because we can obtain DNA from both, which can give us very important information on its sex, identity (i.e, we can tell whether or not it's one of our study animals), and the source population it came from.

Hope this is helpful. Thanks again for the information, and good luck with your camera set!! Keith

You go Rich, Plug the thing. That'll bring them back. Maybe you could get Big Foot to capture one then you wouldn't have to plug it. Truely Buitiful? Another Trump genius.

Reminds me of the story related by one of my fishing partners this past week. He has a neighbor girl who has always loved horse riding. She's in college now and has her summer dream job as a wrangler on a ranch in Montana, working with a cattle herding dog. She spends the summer with her horse, the dog, and a herd of cattle. Apparently the presence of a horseback wrangler keeps the wolves away. She has seen wolves, but they see her and the herd dog, and they haven't lost so much as a single calf to the wolves. I thought it is a cool story. Maybe you do too.

The wolves in Idaho will come right down by the highway at night and kill calves in the calving fields among houses, cars, dogs, and people.
Nothing like the smell of hot afterbirth in the frozen evening air to pull them in.
Just talking of the smell probably reminds one of the self proclaimed muther fockers here of some of his past mommy romps.

I can't speak for Little Red Riding Hood and the Montana wolves out on their summer grazing land.

That's cool.
What part of the world?

Instead of fewer wolfs, perhaps better cowboys would help.