Hi guys, I'm not a very good writer but I did do quite a bit of research on all of the information I have provided you. Please take the time to read and tell me what you think! I hope you guys enjoy and I want to hear your opinions on wolf hunting. Do you take a side? What do you think a good alternative would be from hunting? Let me know!
The next blog topic coming up soon will be: Do wolf packs have alphas?
Wolf Hunting
What does the word hunting make you think of? Bears, coyotes, rabbits and ducks probably. Most of us don’t even think that wolves are being hunted as well. Although I support hunting in many ways, but the ways that we do it and WHY we do it I do not agree with.
In a book that I am reading “Wolf Nation” talks about the politics behind wolf hunting, why hunters go after wolves, how we do it and more. It also explains why they do it and how all this hunting affects the wolf population, elk and deer populations and so much more. When we hunt most of us hunt for food, to try something different and yes to also have fun. But when you are out killing for sport, lowering the species population drastically, doesn’t that say something about us humans? Doesn’t something click in our mind that we should relax a little? Wolves are beautiful creatures that have many species among them. One of which that used to be endangered was the grey wolf. Luckily they made a huge comeback in several years but they were endangered once, and that is what many species of wolves right now are going through because we humans keep hunting them. Wolves are dropping drastically in numbers, and the way they are being hunted is terrible. We hunt them by plane, which is called aerial hunting. You hop on a plane or a helicopter and chase the wolf down until it is out of stamina and no longer able to run, you then shoot it and kill it. There was a way that several hunters killed a wolf in the book “Wolf Nation” that made me so sad, and so heart broken.
"Each tossed a lasso over her neck. Senton writes, "then followed the inevitable tragedy, the idea of which I shrank from afterward for more than at the time" Straining their horses, the men rode off fast in different directions, their ropes strangling Blanca "until blood burst from her mouth, her eyes glazed, her limbs stiffened and then fell limp." "As the wolf hunters rode home, they were followed by the haunting howls of Lobo for his lost mate." - Wolf Nation (pg. 18)
Think about that. That is how WE as humans treat other animals for sport and most hunters treat wolves as “pests”. Sadly that is not the only weapon that we use, there are several others such as Denning, poisoning, and trapping. Denning is when you kill the pups while they are still in the den. One pup would be saved only to be chained to a tree outside of the den, calling for its family to come rescue them. When the family would come and rescue their beloved pup, trappers from the government would gun down the entire family on the spot. Sad right? Now we move onto poisoning, trappers would poison dead carcasses to lure in wolves, but it didn’t just attract wolves, it attracted bears, ravens, foxes and even eagles all of who would eat what the wolves didn’t. Causing terrible damage to several species of animals in the wild. Not only did they trap and kill these beautiful creatures they gunned them down for money. The government offered 20$ to 50$ per wolf that was killed. In the book “Wolf Nation” there is a passage that mentions how many animals were killed in 2015 alone. “More recently the USDA reported that Wildlife Services had “Killed at least 3.2 million wild animals in 2015 alone - many of which were larger predators. 1,681,283 of that total were animals native to the United States.” (Pg. 8) 69,905 Coyotes highly targeted as well as 384 grey wolves, 284 cougars, 480 black bears, 731 bobcats, 3,045 foxes, 20,334 prairie dogs, 21,557 beavers, and also 17 domestic dogs. Luckily experts say that the grey wolf is no longer in danger of being extinct from being hunted. But offices in Montana have placed a quota for the number of wolves that can be killed near Yellowstone park for each season so that it minimizes the chance of seeing a wolf in the park. Don’t you see? We are killing off millions of animals, not just wolves, and a lot of us don’t care.
Yellowstone is home to 10 wolf packs on 2.2 million acre land, if you want to see a wild wolf, not a zoo caught wolf but a wild wolf, your best shot is to visit Yellowstone. As the packs in Yellowstone grow, they wander out of the park lands and replenish wild lands, allowing their numbers to grow dramatically, which brought panic to those who own livestock, pushing the states to permit limited wolf hunting once again during certain times.
We need to relax on the hunting, we are pushing boundaries on our world right now. Wolves are at a good population and if we don’t like the rising numbers shooting is not one of the answers. We should be relocating to reduce the numbers of wolves in the area, with the way we are hunting right now we are not just affecting the wolf population but we are affecting bears, foxes and more. We need to use our brains and think of other ways besides killing these beautiful creatures.
This is the site I used for some of my research if you would like to read more on wolf hunting and the effects of it https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/01/science/wolves-hunting-yellowstone-national-park.html
