Wolves // Current TV

Alberta government poisoning wolves to address dwindling caribou population near tarsands

Canada’s caribou population are in steep decline. That’s due in part to the destruction of habitat through logging, expanding tar sands production, and other industrial development in the province of Alberta.

But rather than focus on habitat conservation efforts to protect threatened caribou populations in the province, Canadian officials are poisoning and shooting wolves that prey on caribou.

The practice is not new in Alberta. But the stunning decline in Caribou herds is forcing the Canadian government to ramp up culling efforts around Alberta’s oil sands — potentially resulting in the death of 6,000 wolves over the next five years, according to the Pembina Institute, a Canadian environmental think tank.

Government officials didn’t confirm those figures, but one Canada’s environment minister admitted it would be “very large numbers.”

Environmental organizations are hammering the Canadian government over the killing of wolves, saying that it is proof of the cascading environmental impacts of tar sands production. The National Wildlife Federation released a short report today on the issue:

Two particularly repugnant methods of destroying wolves – shooting wolves from helicopters and poisoning wolves with baits laced with strychnine – would be carried out in response to the caribou declines. Strychnine is a deadly poison known for an excruciating death that progresses painfully from muscle spasms to convulsions to suffocation, over a period of hours. Wildlife officials will place strychnine baits on the ground or spread them from aircraft in areas they know wolves inhabit. In addition to wolves, non-target animals like raptors, wolverines and cougars will be at risk from eating the poisoned baits or scavenging on the deadly carcasses of poisoned wildlife.

These methods have already been used in Alberta to kill hundreds of wolves. Now the Canadian government wants to use them to kill thousands more.

According to a report from the Alberta Caribou Committee, it is very possible that increased industrial activity in Alberta — much of it driven by expanding tar sands mining — will cause the complete collapse of caribou populations living in the Boreal forest:

Boreal caribou will not persist for more than two to four decades without immediate and aggressive management intervention. Tough choices need to be made between the management imperative to recover boreal caribou and plans for ongoing bitumen development and industrial land-use.

The Canadian government agrees that caribou populations around Alberta and British Columbia are “very unlikely” to survive due to decades of sustained industrial development in fragile habitat. The dramatic expansion of tar sands is becoming a key driver of this habitat loss.

But rather than slow this type of environmentally-destructive activity to prevent Caribou (and now wolves) from being eviscerated, the Canadian government only plans to continue aggressive expansion of tar sands.

More at the linkCanada’s caribou population are in steep decline. That’s due in part to... more

JanforGore
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"The Grey": Existentialist wolves

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Frat Boy At the Movies: The Grey

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29 Wolf Dogs Chained to Posts for Years Are Now in a Sanctuary

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Feds Shoot and Kill an Endangered, Lonely Female Mexican Gray Wolf

White Wolf Pack... . December 17, 2011 Feds Shoot Lonely Mexican Gray Wolf... more

EthicalVegan
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16 comments

Waste of taxpayer $$ for this:Federal use of aerial sharpshooters to kill wolves draws fire

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The New War on Wolves

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LIONS TIGERS Escape! Ohio...Freedom to die

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U.S. Congress moves wolves off of endangered species list- a legislative first

Congress for the first time is directly intervening in the Endangered Species List and removing an animal from it, establishing a precedent for political influence over the list that has outraged environmental groups.

A rider to the Congressional budget measure agreed to last weekend dictates that wolves in Montana and Idaho be taken off the endangered species list and managed instead by state wildlife agencies, which is in direct opposition to a federal judge’s recent decision forbidding the Interior Department to take such an action.

While the language on the Rocky Mountain wolves was a tiny item in budgetary terms, environmental groups said it set an unnerving precedent by letting Congress, rather than a science-based federal agency, remove endangered species protections.

The rider is the first known instance of Congress’ directly intervening in the list. While Congress overrode the protections extended to a tiny Tennessee fish called the snail darter about two decades ago, it did so by authorizing the construction of a dam that had originally been tabled to protect the fish. In that case, Congress did not overturn scientists’ findings about the fish’s viability.

There are myriad restrictions and budget cuts for environmental initiatives in the proposed budget. Most appeared modest compared to the more drastic cutbacks in the original House budget. Federal agencies were still working through the extensive and complex list provided by Congress on Tuesday, trying to determine what their impact might be.

Among the cuts were $49 million from programs relating to climate change, $438 million from programs supporting energy efficiency and renewable energy, $638 million from environmental cleanup efforts by the Defense Department and $997 million from revolving funds through which the Environmental Protection Agency provides money for local water treatment and pollution cleanup programs.

The budget rider on the wolves, backed by two Western legislators — Senator Jon Tester, Democrat of Montana, and Representative Mike Simpson, Republican of Idaho — requires the Interior Department to adopt its earlier plan, removing wolves from the endangered list in those two states because it deemed that the states’ management plans, which include hunts of the animals, were acceptable.

The rider also precluded judicial review of this provision.

cont.Congress for the first time is directly intervening in the Endangered Species List and... more

JanforGore
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Tester amends federal budget bill to declare wolves recovered in Montana, Idaho

"This provision would hand over responsibility for wolves to the states when... more

Luna2na
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11 months ago
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"Fiscally responsible" Montana GOP blows off $1 billion in federal funding because it hates wolves

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HarukoHaruhara
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12 months ago
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Who is full of awesome? with Tony DiGerolamo

Tony D examines the news stories that are full of awesome this week.

TonyDiGerolamo
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Suddenly, CGI Wolves.

Turns out the wolves running past traffic cop was part of an advertisement, confirmed.

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More Marauding Wolves In Russia - Cameraman Gets Jumped By One (VIDEO) - The Daily Blender

Moscow, 14 October 2010 - Surely this can't be the same pack as in that clip that... more

dryeraser
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Russian Officer Jumps Into a Motorist's Car to Escape a Pack of Marauding Wolves (Caught On Surveillance) - The Daily Blender

That's some crazy ish. Definitely not something you see every day. Good thing the... more

dryeraser
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Wolf pack interrupting traffic police alert

Saving a police officer from a pack of random running wolves is a sure way to be let... more

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Endangered or not, wolf killings set to expand

BILLINGS, Mont. — Government agencies are seeking broad new authority to ramp up killings and removals of gray wolves in the Northern Rockies and Great Lakes, despite two recent court actions that restored the animal's endangered status in every state except Alaska and Minnesota.

Various proposals would gas pups in their dens, surgically sterilize adult wolves and allow "conservation" or "research" hunts to drive down the predators' numbers.
Once poisoned to near-extermination in the lower 48 states, wolves made a remarkable comeback over the last two decades under protection of the Endangered Species Act. But as packs continue to multiply their taste for livestock and big game herds coveted by hunters has stoked a rising backlash.

Wildlife officials say that without public wolf hunting, they need greater latitude to eliminate problem packs. Montana and Idaho held inaugural hunts last year but an August court ruling scuttled their plans for 2010.

"As the wolf populations increase, the depredations increase and the number of wolf removals will increase. It's very logical," said Mark Collinge, Idaho director for Wildlife Services, the U.S. Department of Agriculture branch that removes problem wolves, typically by shooting them from aircraft.

"You just have to accept that part of having wolves is having to kill wolves," he said.

But wildlife advocates and animal rights groups contend the response to depredating wolves has become too heavy-handed. They say a string of court decisions in their favor underscores that the species remains at risk.

"The draconian lengths they are poised to take really are a throwback, to when the same agency was gassing wolf pups in their dens almost a century ago and setting poisoned baits and trapping them," said Michael Robinson with the Center for Biological Diversity.

At least 1,700 wolves now roam Idaho, Montana and Wyoming. There are more than 4,000 in Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota. New populations are taking hold in Oregon and Washington, and wolves have been sighted in Colorado, Utah and New England.

More at the link:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39017137/ns/us_news-environment

MY TAKE:
Didn't we just get through reintroducing this species?
Isn't this a little early?
Why isn't there predation insurance for farmers anyway?BILLINGS, Mont. — Government agencies are seeking broad new authority to ramp up... more

versasrev
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1 year ago
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Time To Save The Wolves

Time To Save The Wolves is a documentary about a Nonprofit Public Benefit Corporation... more

mcmfilmmaker
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1 year ago
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6 comments

Montana, Idaho consider increased wolf hunt quotas

Hunters in Montana would be allowed to kill nearly three times as many gray wolves... more

ii386
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1 year ago
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1 comment

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