Be the Wind

Upon awakening from a fitful sleep after a cold, windy night, it occurred to me that birds must have to keep an unconscious death-grip on the branch they’re perched on to hold their place until morning. It must be second nature to them; part of what makes them who they are.
Next the thought came to me that a bird’s nighttime death-grip on a perch is analogous to the death-grip “sportsmen’s” groups, “game” departments and the livestock industry have on our wildlife. Like a trembling bird, fearful for its future, animal exploiters must be afraid that if they loosen their grip, they’ll be blown away.

Well, they’re right.

It’s high time we be the wind that finally breaks loose their death-grip on wildlife once and for all, and for the good of all.

Text and Wildlife Photography ©Jim Robertson, 2013. All Rights Reserved

Impossible to Imagine

To those of us who care deeply about wildlife issues and the abuse of non-humans, it seems that no matter how many horrors you hear about, there’s always something else happening to animals somewhere we’re shocked to learn. Even after writing a book against hunting and trapping, I guess there are still places my mind doesn’t want to go.

That’s how I felt when I read the article, “Montana, Idaho trappers catching more than just wolves,” in the Ravalli Republic, which I mentioned in yesterday’s blog post, “Stop the Spread of Psychopathy—End Hunting and Trapping.”

Text and Wildlife Photography ©Jim Robertson, 2013. All Rights Reserved

For a few years my wife and I lived in a house surrounded by a small field on a forested hill above Washington’s Willapa River valley. The field was once an upper pasture of a now long-defunct dairy. We were happy to see it returning to nature. Sword ferns, wildflowers and Douglas fir trees were starting their advance across the expanse of grass, finding soil churned up by moles for their seeds to take root.

Common wildlife there included black-tailed deer, black bear, raccoons, coyotes, field mice and the red-tailed hawks attracted by the latter. Meanwhile, our feeders attracted everyone from squirrels and chipmunks to a varied assortment of birds—Steller’s jays, juncos and chestnut-backed chickadees, as well as flocks of band-tailed pigeons and American goldfinch, the Washington state bird.

But it was always a special treat to wake up to the sight of the local elk herd bedded down in the upper corner of the field, less than 50 yards from the house.

People often panic at the thought of 20 or 30 large animals competing with their cows for pasture grass, but elk are anything but sedentary grazers—they’re always on the move. Sticking together as a group, they make a circuit around their range through forests and across rivers to find themselves in a new place every day for a week or two, before starting the circuit anew. It was always sad to see them move on from the protection of our posted private property, yet you could almost predict to the day when they’d show up again.

But there was one lone elk cow who seemed to shadow the herd, always a few days behind. We saw her far more often than the herd, and we soon figured out that she was staying nearby in the surrounding forest rather than migrating over the miles-long circuit like the rest of her kind. The reason became obvious—she had a pronounced limp as though barely able to use her right front leg.

When we got a good look through binoculars we saw that her foot was in fact missing! What the hell could have happened to cause that? My first thought was that she caught her leg in some overgrown barbed wire, a familiar threat since “livestock growers” almost never remove unnecessary fencing when they finally quit the business.

Asking around to the locals, their standard reaction was a snicker and a half-assed guess that someone must have shot it off during hunting season. Either scenario seemed remotely possible, but not necessarily all that probable, considering the horse-like size of the animal in question. One bullet or a strand of barbed wire shouldn’t do that much damage.

Twice over the years I’ve found dogs caught in steel-jawed foot-hold traps in other parts of the state (one of them had to have his lower leg amputated) and I started to wonder if the elk might have stepped into a trap set for coyotes (whom the locals hate with extreme prejudice).

I knew that smaller mammals, as well as hawks and eagles, were often unintended victims of trapping; but the thought of an animal as large as a deer or elk being caught in a trap was just too hard to get my mind around. It wasn’t until I read the following lines in “Montana, Idaho trappers catching more than just wolves,” and then saw a photo of a hunter-killed cougar who had earlier lost his toes in a trap, that I suddenly knew for sure—that’s how she lost her foot!: “Trappers reported capturing 45 deer. Twelve of those died. They also captured 18 elk and four moose. One of the elk died.”

The article goes on to quote the Idaho Department of Fish and Game’s state “game” manager, looking out for his cronies while objectifying the animals, “No one wants to catch a deer. It costs them a lot of time.” I don’t even want to try to imagine what an ungulate like that goes through to try to escape a trap—even before seeing an approaching trapper.

Traps are often compared to landmines set for any passing animal. But the difference is that while a landmine blows an appendage off instantly, a steel-jawed trap works its evil slowly—the more its victim struggles to escape, the more damage is done.

In the case of the elk, escape meant not only catching up with the rest of the herd, but also getting away from anyone who might happen by. If determined enough, an animal as powerful as that could eventually pull herself free of a trap’s steel jaws, but freedom would likely come at the expense of a foot.

Text and Wildlife Photography ©Jim Robertson, 2013. All Rights Reserved

Washington Another Hostile State Wanna-be

It’s clear from the irrational outbursts at a recent WDFW public meeting on wolves that Washington wants to join the ranks of the hostile, hateful anti-wolf states. At least the eastern Washington cattle ranchers do.

Here are some excerpts from an article in an eastern Washington newspaper, the Wenatchee World entitled, “Wolf management will include lethal removal, state officials say.”

(My comments are within parenthesis.)

OKANOGAN — State wildlife officials assured Okanogan County residents Thursday that some problem wolves that kill livestock will be trapped and euthanized this year.

(Is that a threat or a promise?)

“The lethal side of management is controversial, but it is a very real part of management,” Dave Ware told a standing-room-only crowd that included many cattle ranchers. The state Department of Fish and Wildlife game division manager added, “We’re trying to be more aggressive, and we’re trying to be more responsive.”

(By “responsive” he was no doubt speaking to bloodthirsty cattle ranchers, not those who suggest that wolves have their place and should be allowed to live in the state.)

Ware said his agency has also created a wildlife conflict section to stay on top of problem wolves, and has hired someone in Northeast Washington whose only focus will be on wolf conflicts.

(Sounds like some kind of a bounty hunter).

And, they will share radio-collar information about where the wolves are with ranchers who have cattle in the area.

(I knew there was a reason I hated those burdensome radio collars wolves are forced to wear; while the public is led to believe they are for “research purposes,” those collars can actually be used against the wolves by giving their locations to their sworn enemies.)

Still, more than 200 people who crowded into the Okanogan County PUD auditorium for Thursday night’s wolf meeting weren’t satisfied.

(In other words, they were out for blood.)

Some told Wildlife officials they plan to manage wolves their own way — by shooting them on sight.

(You don’t get much more hostile than that.)

An Okanogan County commissioner told them the county is interested in giving jurisdiction over the wolves to the Colville Tribes. Tribal officials last year issued nine permits to kill wolves on the Colville Indian Reservation.

(The Colvilles were the first in the state to initiate a hunting season on wolves.)

Ware said if problem wolves are located east of Highway 97 — where wolves are federally delisted — they’ll consider trapping and killing them.

(Meanwhile, the feds are planning to delist wolves elsewhere across the country—see below.)

It’s a decision that will still be made by Fish and Wildlife Director Phil Anderson, he said, but added, “Lethal removal is going to be part of that management.”

(Of course, “lethal removal” is standard practice for “wildlife managers”).

Ware also said he’s expecting the federal government to include the rest of Washington in the area where wolves are no longer protected.

(No comment).

 

Text and Wildlife Photography ©Jim Robertson, 2012. All Rights Reserved

 

 

 

“Game” Laws Are a Slap in the Face to the Majority

After posting “Crippling Animals Should Weigh on One’s Conscience” yesterday, I remembered that I actually do know someone who said he swore off bowhunting after his arrow went clear through a deer, which ran off somewhere far away to die. He was an avid “modern rifle” hunter and Forest Service employee I worked with in Montana.

He certainly wasn’t going to go so far as to quit hunting completely—every time we saw a deer his eyes would glaze over; he was clearly daydreaming about hunting season. I didn’t get the idea he felt all that bad about the deer he mortally wounded—he just thought it was a “waste of meat” to shoot an animal with a weapon that’s not up to the task of outright killing.

Unfortunately, bowhunting is growing in popularity. Because local governments and town councils don’t want people getting shot by stray bullets in parks or other semi-urban areas where “game” animals thrive—yet they don’t want to upset hunters by outlawing hunting—they all-too-often allow bowhunting, just to pacify the bloodthirsty, who in turn are fond of portraying themselves as selfless do-gooders out to save the animals from overpopulation. (Funny that you never hear them mention immunocontraception, or the fact that hunting unnaturally increases ungulate populations.)

A case in point of a city council deciding to allow bowhunting is found in the article I mentioned yesterday with a headline that reads, “Shotguns and bow hunting will be allowed in Ecola reserve.”

Here are a few highlights from that article:

CANNON BEACH — Hunters using either bows and arrows or shotguns with slugs will be allowed to hunt in the Ecola Creek Forest Reserve for the next five years.

Although hunting had been allowed temporarily for bow hunters only during the deer and elk season last fall, the Cannon Beach City Council agreed 4-1 Tuesday night to extend the hunting period five years. The council also decided to allow hunters who use shotguns with slugs as well.
 
The proposed area set aside for hunting in the reserve took up half of the reserve’s acreage… (One city council member) said she supported a public survey taken by a professional survey company that indicated most of the respondents opposed hunting in the reserve. In addition, (Councilmember) Cadwallader said, hunting didn’t meet the definition of the “passive recreation” promised during the campaign to seek voter support for the ballot measure. Using “a firearm on a wild creature in the reserve does not seem to be passive to me,” Cadwallader said.

Herman Bierderbeck, district wildlife biologist for the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, told the council that shotgun slugs had an effective range of 80 yards for killing an elk or a deer. The slugs travel about 150 yards, he said.

Although the council had closed the hearing several weeks ago and didn’t accept public testimony Tuesday night, Cannon Beach resident Ed Johnson told the council he was “very upset” at the decision. He suggested the council submit a referendum to voters.

“I feel like I’ve been slapped in the face,” Johnson said. “You not only included bow hunting, you went further and allowed shotguns.”

“The bottom of my heart aches,” he said. “Guns are not the answer.”

Text and Wildlife Photography ©Jim Robertson, 2012. All Rights Reserved

WTF’s Up w/MFWP?

What the Fuck (WTF) is up with the Montana state wildlife officials these days? Now they want to make it even easier to hunt and trap wolves in their state.

Last year, just after wolves were removed from federal endangered species protection, the Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks department (MFWP) seemed comparably tame (well, compared to Idaho anyway). Though they wasted no time in implementing the state’s first season on wolves in seventy-some years, at least they spared wolves the torment of trapping.

Ignoring 7,000 letters in support of wolves, this year they added trapping to their wolf assault and upped the original “bag limit” from one to three per trapper—before the season even started. Instead, they’re bowing to the whims and whinings of ranchers, hunters and trappers who have called for an expansion of wolf killing and more liberal rules than the state had last year, when “only” 166 wolves were ruthlessly murdered. MFWP officials responded to anti-wolf, anti-nature, anti-environmental pressure by making the 2012 season longer, eliminating most quotas and allowing wolf trapping for the first time.

The agency is now mercilessly asking for additional measures in the form of a state House Bill, HB 73. Their proposal would let hunters and trappers buy multiple tags; use electronic wolf calls; reduce the price of a non-resident tag from $350 to $50 and eliminate the potentially life-saving requirement that hunters wear fluorescent orange outside of elk and deer season. (Okay, I’ll go along with that last one—who cares if wolf hunters shoot each other?)

“We want to get a wolf bill out of the Legislature so we can implement those things that can potentially make a difference,” said FWP spokesman Ron Aasheim, adding selfishly, “More management flexibility. That’s what we want now.”

The House committee will also take up a second bill by Republican Rep. Ted (oh shit, not another Ted!) Washburn, of Bozeman, which would also limit the total number of wolves allowed to live in the entire state (we’re talking 147,046 square miles) to no more than 250. Washburn’s plan also asks for an Oct. 1-Feb. 28 wolf hunting season and an even longer season for special districts next to Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks!!

No doubt you all remember that fateful day in 2011 when congress lifted federal protections for wolves in Montana and Idaho, handing management over to those openly hostile states.

Meanwhile, the nefarious Montana state wildlife officials are currently opposing federal Threatened Species protection for the depressingly rare wolverine, down to only 35 breeding individuals in the lower 48.

Not many hunters can honestly say that they don’t mind sharing “their” elk, moose or deer with the likes of wolves, cougars or coyotes. But those few who claim to support a diversity of life need to realize that every time they purchase a hunting license and a deer or elk tag, they validate wolf hunting and trapping. To game managers, every action, right down to the purchase of ammo and camo at Outdoor World, is a show of support for their policies—including killing wolves to ensure more deer, elk, moose or caribou for hunters to “harvest.”

A far cry from living up to their laughably undeserved reputation as the “best environmentalists,” hunters are just foot-soldiers carrying out a hackneyed game department program of “harvesting” ungulates and “controlling” predators. It’s an agenda based not on science or the time-tested mechanisms of nature, but on the self-serving wants of a single species—Homo fucking sapiens (HFS). Modern hunting is about as anti-environmental as mining, clear-cut logging, commercial fishing or factory farming.

Text and Wildlife Photography ©Jim Robertson, 2012. All Rights Reserved

Bye Bye Biodiversity

I’ve said it before and I’ll probably say it again, you can’t really be a wolf advocate or an elk advocate, or any kind of advocate for the environment, and continue to eat beef. That message was driven home by a new Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks Department elk “management” proposal which includes reducing the numbers of not only elk, but also of wolves (who, logically, could have done some of the “management” for them) near Yellowstone National Park, all in the name of safeguarding cattle from the negligible threat of brucellosis—a disease which, in the past hundred years, has come full circle from livestock to wildlife and now back to livestock.

So far, it’s been the bison migrating out of Yellowstone during hard winters who have suffered the brunt of the rancher’s brucellosis paranoia. “Solutions” have included “hazing” bison back into the park and creating holding areas outside the park to warehouse bison before shipping them off to slaughterhouses—those nightmarish death camps where so many of their forcibly domesticated bovine cousins meet their ends. (In a country where some 60 million bison once roamed free, 97 million beef cattle are sent to slaughter each year.) Still other Yellowstone bison are murdered during newly imposed state “hunting” seasons—right outside the park.

Speaking of hunting, it’s interesting (to put it nicely) that hunters in Montana and Wyoming have claimed that elk populations in those states have declined as a result of the wolf reintroduction programs, yet the latest report suggests that elk numbers and density are “too high” (at least for rancher’s sensitivities) in parts of Montana.

Typical of state “game” department bureaucrats and their ideas of a “solution” to any perceived wildlife/livestock “conflict,” their preferred proposal is to reduce the number of wild animals—in this case, both elk and wolves!

It’s the kind of mentality that’s destroying the planet’s biodiversity at every turn: mile after mile of monoculture cornfields in Iowa (grown primarily to fatten cattle crammed onto feedlots)—places where, a century ago, 300 species of plants, 60 mammals, 300 birds and hundreds of insects would have lived—are now devoid of all other life forms other than cornstalks and an occasional tiny ant or a mushroom the size of an apple seed; cows grazing on pastures in Pennsylvania and Louisiana are dying from toxic fracking wastes that have made their way to the surface and meanwhile, arctic ice is melting faster than previously predicted, disrupting ocean currents and weather patterns life on Earth has come to depend on.

Call it “growth” or “progress” or just “our way of life,” but this locomotive is speeding towards a brick wall—yet we keep shoveling fuel into it like there’s no tomorrow…

 

Not that Montana FWP are likely to listen to anyone except fellow hunters and/or their cattle baron buddies, but the public comment period is now open, so feel free to let them know what you think about their elk “management” proposal here: http://fwp.mt.gov/hunting/publicComments/2012elkMgmtGuidelinesBrucellosisWG.html

You can view the working group’s recommendations by clicking on the “Interested Persons Letter” link on this webpage. That site also includes the opportunity to submit online comments about the recommendations. Written comments can be mailed to “FWP – Wildlife Bureau, Attn: Public Comment, P. O. Box 200701, Helena, MT 59620-0701. All comments must be received by 5:00 p.m. Mountain Standard Time on December 20, 2012

Text and Wildlife Photography ©Jim Robertson

What People are Saying about Exposing the Big Game

What People are Saying about the book, Exposing the Big Game

I read this book with wonderment at what our species has done to other species, and with admiration for how staunchly Jim Robertson comes to the defense of those other species, with intelligence, humor, understanding, but above all, compassion. Jim ends his book with these ringing words, both true and eloquent: “Sooner or later, the obdurate hunter crouching in the darkness of ages past must cave in and make peace with the animals or rightfully, if figuratively, die off and be replaced with a more evolved earthling—one who appreciates nonhumans as unique individuals, fellow travelers through life with their own unassailable rights to share the planet.”                                                                                                                     ~Jeffrey Masson, Author of When Elephants Weep, and Dogs Make Us Human

Hard hitting, on target, forthright and foreceful.                                                         ~Ingrid Newkirk, President of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals

Exposing the Big Game blends spectacular photography, indisputable facts and clear reasoning. Jim does not mince words in describing the senselessness and depravity of hunting and the psychopaths who kill for pleasure.                                                   ~Peter Muller, President of the League of Humane Voters

Exposing the Big Game, a passionate and informed indictment of America’s hunting culture, exposes the savagery, cruelty, environmental recklessness and yes, the pathology of this most murderous of sports. Jim Robertson is that rarest of breeds, a talented writer with a gift for telling a story who is also a lifelong outdoorsman with a profound knowledge of the natural world as well as a compassionate human being with a deep love for all living creatures. Exposing the Big Game is quite simply a masterpiece, a treasure not to be missed by anyone who cares about wildlife, the environment and living gently on planet Earth.                                                         ~Norm Phelps, Author of The Longest Struggle: Animal Advocacy from Pythagoras to PETA

Jim Robertson has a gifted eye for wildlife photography and his writing incorporates humor, insight and factual observations. Look at each and every animal in this remarkable book as individual self-aware beings deserving of our respect and admiration. If we all could see these magnificent creatures as Jim sees them, there would be hope, not just for their survival, but for our own survival also.               ~Captain Paul Watson (from his Foreword), Founder and President of Sea Shepherd Conservation Society

Not since Cleveland Amory’s Man Kind? Our Incredible War on Wildlife has a book been more explosive in exposing the politics, hypocrisies and brutality of big game hunting in North America. Exposing the Big Game reveals the suffering, decimation and endangerment of America’s wild animals who are targeted by sportsmen.                        ~Laura Moretti, Founder of The Animals Voice

For years, Jim Robertson has inspired reverence for wildlife through his photography. Now he has created a book that ought to be mandatory reading for those who still think there’s reverence in hunting.                                                                                     ~Ethan Smith, Author of Building an Ark: 101, Solutions to Animal Suffering

For more information, visit: http://www.earth-books.net/books/exposing-the-big-game

Signed copies can be ordered by emailing: exposingthebiggame@gmail.com

Live With It, Elmers!

Sorry Elmers, it’s time to snuff out one of the most overused and overstated rationalizations for your beloved sport.

Hunters would have you ingest the preposterous pabulum that hunting helps animals; that hunters are their philanthropic fairy godparents (well-armed well-wishers, if you will) performing the gallant duty of keeping animal populations in check; that animals won’t go on living unless they kindheartedly kill them (this of course is all the more outrageous in light of how many species have been wiped off the face of the earth, or perilously close to it, exclusively by hunting).

But deer, along with most other animal species—besides Homo sapiens, have built-in mechanisms that cause their reproduction rate to slow down when their population is high or food is scarce.  Though state “game” departments are usually loath to share any information that might work against one of their arguments for selling hunting licenses, even they know that in reality the wildlife can ultimately take care of their own. According to the Western Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, “A mule deer herd that is at or above the carrying capacity of its habitat may produce fewer fawns than one that is below carrying capacity.”

The fact is, hunting encourages ungulates to reproduce more, thus seemingly warranting the alleged need for population controls via, you guessed it, more hunting.

Hunting industry propagandists have a lot of people convinced that culling is a necessary evil for controlling animal overpopulation. Lethal removal is their one-size-fits-all solution, no matter the circumstance. But there are always alternatives to that fatal fallback position. When we finally get past the viewpoint of animals as objects, or “property of the state,” and start to see them instead as individuals, the justifications for culling begin to wear thin.

Many places that provide habitat for healthy populations of deer could also support the natural predators who evolved alongside them. All that’s required of humans is to get out of the way and let nature take its course, or, in some cases, repair the damage they’ve done by reintroducing wolves or other native carnivores who were fool-heartedly eradicated. Yet, in the western US and Alaska, as well as in Canada, natural predators are still being killed to allow deer, moose or elk hunters a better chance at success. While some people complain that these browsers and grazers have gotten too tame, hunters in states like Idaho and Montana are whining that wolves make the elk too wild and thus harder for them to hunt.

I tend to be even more cynical about areas where humans have claimed every square inch for themselves and aren’t willing to share with native grazers. When I hear grumbling about deer, elk or geese pooping on a golf course, I have a hard time relating to people’s grievances. It’s the height of speciesism to expect that these animals should face lethal culling for successfully adapting to an unnaturally overcrowded human world.

Ours is the invasive species, overpopulating and destroying habitats wherever we go. We wouldn’t want some other being jumping to a knee-jerk “cull them all” reaction every time humans reached their carrying capacity in a given area.

Sooner or later Mother Nature will tire of humans’ destructive dominance and come up with a way to bring life back into balance. I can just hear her telling off the hunters: “Other animals have a right to be here too—just live with it, Elmers!”

______________________________________________________________

Portions of this post were excerpted from the book, Exposing the Big Game: Living Targets of a Dying Sport 

Text and Wildlife Photography ©Jim Robertson

Pray for Snow Drought

The customary mantra for those of us who have who have spent much time in search of powder to ski in the semi-arid mountains of Montana is, “Pray for snow!”  Consequently, I never thought I’d catch myself chanting, “Pray for Snow Drought,” but after reading the Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks department’s “2012 elk hunting outlook,” a late winter is what I’m praying for—for the elk’s sake. You’ll see what I mean as you read their outlook (and pay no attention to their glib use of depersonalizing words like “harvest” or “hunting opportunities” for the senseless murder of noble beings like elk—psychopaths can’t help themselves):

“There are elk in Montana’s hills and if the big sky drops some snow hunters could be in for a banner season in many areas.

“’Most hunters are going to find elk populations in good physical shape and will benefit from liberal hunting opportunities,’ said Quentin Kujala, Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks’ wildlife sections coordinator in Helena. ‘If the weather cooperates, and if hunters do their homework and line up access early where it’s needed, we’d expect very good harvest numbers by season’s end in late November.’

“Montana’s general, five-week long, elk hunting season opens Oct. 20.

“Kujala noted that cold and snowy conditions should lead to elk hunting success, while mild weather usually spells lower elk harvests, despite additional elk-hunting permits and more liberal seasons. ‘We’re all hoping the weather tips to hunters’ favor this fall,’ Kujala said.”

All? Not me! Not the elk! Sorry, Mr. Kujala, those of us who care about elk are praying that Montana’s current drought conditions last well into November.

Checking their regional population rundown, it’s clear that—despite the occasional natural wolf predation that sportsmen are quick to freak out over—elk are doing pretty well in the state. According to Montana FWP, “Biologists say elk numbers are at or above management objectives in most hunting districts.” “…the milder winter of 2011-2012 led to good calf recruitment…” “Elk populations are healthy and growing. Elk populations are solid.” and “The biggest challenge for hunters continues to be finding access.”

Whether it’s wolves competing for “their” elk “harvests” or a few darned private land owners who won’t let hunters kill animals on their properties, it seems like hunters and their game department lackeys always have something to bitch about.

Text and Wildlife Photography ©Jim Robertson

Game “Managers” are Slow to Adapt

Judging by their eagerness to kill all the wolves in Washington’s Wedge pack, no matter the cost (helicopters, fuel, rifles fitted with night vision scopes and ammunition can get expensive), it appears that wildlife agencies don’t have their heart into this new-fangled idea of wolf recovery. It’s a shame that state and federal governments don’t have the same dedication and zeal for recovering endangered species that their forerunners had for their part in making our native wildlife, like wolves, endangered in the first place.

In spite of state bounties on predators throughout the 1800s and unrestrained trapping of wolves at the height of the fur trade, some wolves still miraculously survived into the twentieth century in the lower 48. It was a federal wolf poisoning program in the early 1900s, aimed at securing as much prime land as possible for cattle ranchers, which gave the species its last push over the precipice of extinction.

Since then, science has proven (many times over) the importance of wolves to biodiversity and enlightened people have called for the recovery of species essential to healthy, functioning ecosystems. But today’s game “managers” have been slow to adapt.

People who run cattle on our national forest lands should just accept the fact that there’s no guarantee their dehorned, unattended cow-calf “units” (as they so callously consider their animals) will ever be completely safe from natural predators. It’s not like ranchers really care about their cows—they’re just going to send them off to a horrible fate in a slaughterhouse sooner or later anyway.

The wolves of the Wedge pack found their way back to Washington on their own; their kind was here long before humans claimed the land for themselves. Yet game managers continue to side with their cattle rancher cronies, instead of righting a wrong and recovering a species their ham-fisted, anthropocentric predecessors were so keen to eradicate.

Text and Wildlife Photography ©Jim Robertson