WILDLIFE: Management by contradiction

Only in the distorted politics of Idaho could two such diametrically opposed notions of big game management coexist. I refer to the oft spoken belief that wolf populations are so excessive that elk herds are being decimated in many hunting districts.

Funds are allocated by the Legislature to reduce wolf numbers. Now, this year’s big game regulations allow the added incentive of harvesting a cow elk a mile or two, district dependent, from any border with private land for a period during the general season. I believe it is a common understanding in elk management that removing cows from the herd is a strategy to reduce elk populations. Reducing elk population is surely the goal of this new regulation created to protect the crops and haystacks of Idaho ranchers and farmers.

So can we really have it both ways: blaming the wolves for elk population decline while apparently managing for the reduction of our elk herds for the good of private interests? As a former elk hunter, I will have to side with the wolves, trusting in predator-prey dynamics to self-manage the herds, as opposed to the supposedly injured ranchers and farmers, especially since many farmers and ranchers sit in our legislature making our state laws, often to their benefit. It seems that whoever cooked up the new elk cow harvest regulation lacked the basic understanding that large tracts of private land in North Idaho are forest land devoid of crops and haystacks.

GEOFFREY HARVEY

Hayden Lake