Officials with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game's Magic Valley regional office have scheduled a single public meeting to discuss statewide rules for an anticipated first-ever hunt of gray wolves later this fall.
Announced by Fish and Game officials earlier this week, the meeting will be held at the Magic Valley regional offices at 319 S. 417 E. in Jerome on Monday, May 12. The meeting will be held from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
In addition to the meeting in Jerome, Fish and Game will hold 13 meetings in select communities throughout the state by late next week. Except for the Magic Valley regional meeting in Jerome, all meetings will be held in the late afternoons and evenings.
The meeting schedule does not include a public hearing in Boise.
Speaking Tuesday, Idaho wolf advocate Suzanne Stone, Northern Rockies representative for Defenders of Wildlife, suggested that Fish and Game may have purposely selected the meeting locations, which include meetings in more politically conservative locales like Salmon and Challis, and not in more pro-wolf areas like Boise and Blaine County. Stone said Fish and Game has shown a disturbing trend lately where it solicits feedback only in communities "that they know are going to support their actions."
She also noted that while wolves are known to live throughout Blaine County where no public meeting has been scheduled, they are not known to live near Jerome, the site of next week's meeting. She said the same goes for Boise, which has had nearby sightings of wolves just to the north in the Boise Foothills. The community of Nampa, where the only public meeting on the details of the wolf hunt will be held within Idaho's populous Treasure Valley, does not have wolves residing close by, Stone said.
"That's unfortunate that they're not engaging the public," she said.
Stone said Fish and Game's only meeting in the state's Southeast Region took place in Pocatello on Monday. She said Pocatello wolf advocate Ralph Maughan wasn't even aware of the meeting and was disappointed to learn about it afterwards.
"He's commented on everything they've done," she said.
The series of public meetings throughout Idaho is set for just a week before the state Fish and Game Commission is scheduled to meet in Jerome on May 21-22. On Thursday, May 22, the commissioners will set the details of Idaho's statewide wolf hunt, anticipated for later this fall.
Gray wolves in Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, eastern Washington, eastern Oregon and northern Utah were officially removed from protection under the federal Endangered Species Act on March 28. The delisting from the ESA transferred management duties for the species from the federal government to wildlife management agencies in the six states.
Idaho's wolf management plan calls for managing wolves at a population level of 500-700 wolves for the first five years following the delisting. The plan envisions using hunting as one of the methods of controlling the population.
Under recently developed hunting rules, Fish and Game officials have recommended a total mortality quota of 328 wolves statewide in Idaho in 2008. The tally would include all reported wolf kills—from natural causes, accidents, wolf predation-control actions and hunter kills, according to information posted on the Fish and Game's Web site.
By comparison, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service figures state that 50 wolves were killed in Idaho in 2007. The figure doesn't include illegal killings and death by natural causes.
According to Fish and Game, achieving the quota would result in an estimated population of 550-600 wolves at the end of 2008. According to the latest information available, Idaho's estimated population of the wild canines stood at approximately 732 at the end of 2007. That doesn't count pups born this spring.
Stone said environmentalists are also concerned about how well Fish and Game will be able to monitor Idaho's wolf population. She said the agency doesn't have the same resources the federal government had to monitor overall wolf mortality, including illegal killings.
Stone contended the state should have taken a more cautious approach in the first year.
"They're being pretty aggressive," she said.
A provision of the proposed hunting rules that Fish and Game commissioners will consider stipulates that once the statewide quota is reached, all hunting would cease. Similarly, once pre-set quotas in individual wolf hunting zones established by Fish and Game are reached, hunting in those zones would also stop.
Under the rules, holders of Idaho hunting licenses and wolf tags would be allowed to harvest one wolf.
Mortality quotas established for each management zone vary from a high of 50 wolves in north-central Idaho's Lolo wolf zone, which covers Big Game units 11 and 12, to a low of 5 wolves in the Palouse-Hells Canyon wolf zone, which covers Big Game units 8, 8A, 11, 11A, 13 and 18. In the Southern Mountains wolf region, which covers all of the Wood River Valley and extends east through the Pioneers, White Knob, Lost River and Lemhi ranges to the Montana border, Fish and Game envisions a mortality figure of 34 wolves for 2008.
The statewide quota includes all documented wolf mortality between Jan. 1 and Dec. 31, 2008. Fish and Game will establish a hotline for hunters to call in to find out if the wolf quota has been met in the wolf zones and statewide.
"Quotas may be reached quickly, and hunters are encouraged to check quota status the day they plan to hunt," information posted on Fish and Game's Web site states.
Hunters will be required to report the taking of a wolf within 72 hours after it's been harvested. Fish and Game will require that external evidence of sex be left attached to the animal's hide until the mandatory check requirement has been satisfied. Although hunters will not be required to retrieve meat from a harvested wolf, they will have to present the animal's hide and skull to a Fish and Game regional office within 10 days of the kill.
Under the proposed rules, wolves will not be allowed to be harvested by trapping or through the use of bait, electronic calling or by the use of hunting dogs to attract or pursue wolves. While radio-collared wolves will be allowed to be shot, Fish and Game is asking hunters to avoid harvesting them so it can continue to monitor them.
Comment on wolf hunt
In addition to a series of meetings being held throughout the state, the Idaho Department of Fish and Game is accepting public comment on proposed wolf hunting rules online. To view and comment on the proposed seasons and quotas go to http://fishandgame.idaho.gov/.
Three members of the Stanley-area Basin Butte wolf pack chase a trio of elk across a rocky slope near the upper Salmon River earlier this spring.
Photo courtesy of Lynne Stone
