Biology got shot to shit when the Legislature disallowed the agency from deciding if those units should be closed or not. Because someone asked for the ability to have a 0 quota around the parks, the legislature eliminated the ability for the agency to make a decision relative to those units, or any units by eliminating their ability to have buffer zones anywhere. Do you remember the issues around bison and the slaughter that led to BFC throwing blood on Racicot? That kind of negative PR hurts the MT tourism economy and honestly, makes western states look pretty grim to a lot of people. As we often talk about, wildlife is a public trust resource for all citizens. Does only your view matter here?
The quotas around the parks are absolutely for social issues, but there's a biological component as well in that those two parks provide the only consistent refuge for wildlife, including wolves, in the GYE. They're the production factories and we've seen that those populations go up and down based on a variety of issues.
Elk on private is a pressure issue as well as habitat. Absolutely, wolves change the behavior of elk, and those elk find sanctuary where they can. That includes from the 6 months of bipedal wolves chasing them. But it should be acknowledged that those irrigated hay fields provide much better sustenance than sparse forage on public lands, and those private lands provide escape from fire as well.
Your issue isn't lack of elk, based on your post, it's lack of success and lack of access to them. Robert did yeoman's work explaining why killing all the wolves won't bring back your spots. You know I think the world of you Charles, but we're just gonna end up wildly flailing our arms on this one.
As for Democrats being too far to the left on this, I'm still waiting to see where MT, ID or WY dems did anything other than support state management and follow the wolf management plans everyone agreed to in the 90's. Nationally, yeah, there are some that are ridiculous on all wildlife issues, but they're not winning any policy wars on this issue. The
AG of MI just filed a brief to relist the GL wolves, and that's a bad idea all around. CO voters approved the introduction of wolves, backed by some dems, so is that what your upset about re: politics? We used to have great agreement with moderate republicans and democrats on this issue, at least in MT. Guys like Kelly Flynn, whom we all did battle with on elk management and other issues, lived his ethics and supported state management plans when he was in the Legislature. He killed more anti-wolf bills than anyone else in the state. Plenty of R votes for the right thing in both the senate and the house, but politics became more important than actual management. I've literally told dem legislators not to bring specific bills forward because it just feeds the frenzy. Follow the plan, let the agency & commission make the decisions, and even if I disagree with them, at least the political influence will be reduced (never eliminated).
Is it maddening to watch people with no understanding of biology or the law enact laws that put state management at risk? You bet your ass it is. So many people bled for decades to make this happen, then the moron patrol comes in and undoes all of that work, putting state management in jeopardy over emotional claptrap.
At this point, if the wolf gets relisted, it's the state legislatures and Governors of MT & ID who are at fault. But that's what they want. They want this conflict and they want to be able to run on taking a tough stand against woofs and the federales. Make no mistake, if Dems were in power and doing this kind of crap, I'd be working to end their influence as well. Wildlife management is best served under the state agency/commission model. Empowering those bodies to make the correct decisions and not allow politicians to interfere with that management is the only way to bring some sanity back for every species.
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