Reintroduction of Wolves to Mount Saint Helens..

[vanhornhunter]

Here you go....

In 1931, a pair of Hanaford Valley ranchers outside of Centralia killed a mother wolf and five of her cubs.

    Gray wolves were wiped out across the state of Washington that same decade.
 

    Now they’re trickling back, with at least two confirmed wolf packs in Eastern Washington and another pack suspected in the southeast corner, where sightings are common.

    They are the outliers of ongoing wolf recovery programs in Idaho — wanderers also arrive from Canada —  and they are the cornerstone of re-establishing gray wolves in Washington.

    With each successive pack re-populating the area around Mount St. Helens, gray wolves will get closer to the state’s draft plan for management options such as hunting, once 15 breeding pairs are reached.

    “Certainly they have a capability of doing that,” said Rocky Beach, a wildlife diversity manager for the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, noting how wolves can quickly cover long distances.

   An apex predator, wolves are among the biggest controversies statewide for wildlife management.

    “They were eradicated from populated areas for a reason,” Mark Smith, owner and operator of Eco Park Resort on Spirit Lake Highway near Mount St. Helens, said of wolves’ persecution in the early 20th century to protect of livestock.

    Smith is a strong critic of state Fish and Wildlife and says the department should improve its management of elk and deer before allowing a “super predator” to enter the ecosystem.

    Smith also says the elk herds in the Mount St. Helens area are smaller and not robust enough as a prey base to support a wolf pack.

    “I don’t think it could support one very long,” he said.

    Smith also contends that because most of the Mount St. Helens area’s elevation is between 4,000 and 5,000 feet, winter snow will drive wolves down into populated valleys.

    “I figure I’m really going to have to keep an eye on my horses,” Smith said, adding he wouldn’t hesitate to shoot a wolf on his property.

    The state’s draft plan for management of gray wolves could be finalized by the end of the year. Under state law, the gray wolf is an endangered species.    In 2007 a 17-member citizen working group was formed to help state Fish and Wildlife prepare its draft plan.

    John Blankenship, executive director of Wolf Haven International in Tenino and retired U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist, is a member of the group.

    “When we started the discussion with the working group, I think there were several people that said if there ever got to be more than 100 wolves in Washington, that would be more than people would expect,” Blankenship said, citing the lack of habitat and prey for a robust population.

    Part of the draft plan includes translocation of wolves to other regions once the animals in the northeast corner of the state reach a saturation point: five breeding pairs.

    Blankenship believes that’s how wolves will enter the Mount St. Helens area if they get there.

    “I don’t think they’ll get there on their own,” he said.

    But he believes they can thrive there.

    “The Mount St. Helens area could certainly use a large-scale predator in there to help with the elk population,” Blankenship said.

    The wolf management controversy always begins and ends with ranchers, Blankenship said.

    However, the former Denver deputy regional director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service claims that wolves are responsible for less than 1 percent of livestock predation in the Northern Rockies and Yellowstone National Park area. Statistics, he said, show that cougars, coyotes, bears and wild dogs are largely to blame.

    “I think the wolves are getting a bad rap,” Blankenship said. “But they haven’t been there for 70 years, so they’re easy to blame.”

    Insisting he’s not a “wolf hugger,” and with 20 years’ experience working with wolves, including killing wolves that prey on livestock, Blankenship said he understands the concerns of ranchers who fear livestock depredation.

    “It doesn’t take anything to upset the apple cart,” he said.

•••

    Adam Pearson: (360) 807-8208

[prariewolf]

 Sounds to me That Blankenship IS a WOLF HUGGER. Everyone needs to be aware that part of the "HUGGERS" plan is to infiltrate ALL Fish and Wildlife Agencies; Federal (complete success  IMO), State , County, etc. to help make sure their agenda is met. An example that I personally experinced was when the State of Maine had courage enough to have state coyote control agents the Executive Director was a P.E.T.A member . He intentionally spread dis-information about the program to the press( That it was in effective; NOT TRUE ) and also to the agents themselves whereupon the agents would be prosicuted by the wardens for violatoins. Needless to say the program died and the Deer herd is a lost cause. I don't have all the answers but I know what I've seen