Frank Priestley, President of the Idaho Farm Bureau has an article today in the Upper Valley Free Press, the title of which is, “Legal Challenge to Wolf Delisting is Irrational”. In it he lists a number of things that he thinks most people fighting to protect and stop the wolf delisting don’t know about wolves. He lists a few.
Idaho livestock operators and our elk and deer herds have borne the brunt of wolf reintroduction. Wolf depredation on livestock and decreased hunting opportunities has created a drain on our rural economy that isn’t an issue to environmentalists in those faraway cities. They don’t know that only one in ten cows or sheep killed by wolves ever gets confirmed as a wolf kill. They don’t know what it’s like to sit up all night, night after night during calving season keeping watch over a herd. They don’t know what it’s like to ride out to check on a flock of sheep and find 100 or more dead on the ground, their throats ripped out purely for the sport of the kill. This has happened twice in Idaho in recent years. They don’t know what it’s like to have their dogs killed and consumed or to pay the vet bills when horses are torn up after being run ragged through the forest by pursuing wolves. They don’t know what it feels like to be stalked by a pack of wolves or that without a wolf hunting season these predators have nothing to fear.
In addition, they don’t know that even if a wolf hunting season comes to fruition it will have very little effect on the overall wolf population………….
Environmentalists in faraway cities don’t know how living with wolves has changed our lives, and they ought to before they go to court to argue that Idaho doesn’t yet have enough wolves.
Tom Remington
