Open Thread: Was Echinococuss Granulosus Present in NRM Prior to Wolf Introduction?

Bear Valley still has excellent elk hunting.  The deer hunting isn’t good though. 

I was up that way in August scouting for elk and it was hot so we floated Bear Valley Creek and there were quite a few salmon in the river.

Actually at Fir Creek Campgroung on the edge of Bruce Meadows, there was an operation set up with underwater cameras.  Native Americans were counting fish.  They said it was the biggest run in years.  Hopefully it continues.

Cattle in Bear Valley would not be something that I would support. Who wants to walk through nothing but cow chit. If I wanted to do that I would hunt out of Prairie or Featherville. 

I would rather not say.  It was great, we saw over 300 elk and LOTS of calves this year.  A IDFG trapper took out the wolf pack in late September of last year.  Many cows had twins and triplets. 

The thing is that you can’t just drive around and shoot these elk any more.  We have to get in 5+ miles to get into elk. They are in steep country, probably trying to get the upper hand on the wolves.  I missed a monster 6 point last year. I got bull fever and used my top pin (set at 20 yards) and the bull was about 35 yards away. I shot just underneath him. Man, I’m stil ticked about that. Worse yet, my dad was right behind me and tells everyone about it and they laugh there azz off.  How do you miss an elk at 35 yards broadside? Heh.

Now Grandjean is a mess. We hiked all the way to Elk Lake and didn’t see ONE, not even ONE elk or deer track. That was a bit shocking. I guess it just depends where you are looking in the Sawtooths. 

it’s unit 35 of the Sawtooth zone.  I travel all over the Sawtooths and you are correct.  Many areas are void of deer and elk.  There are pockets where the elk have sought refuge (I believe) from the wolves.  They either hang near populated areas or in really steep nasty country.  that is just my opinion though. 

I called up the IDFG elk biologist out of Salmon last year because I was shocked at the lack of bugling during late September.  I asked if it was due to the large number of wolves in the area and he said no.  His explanation was that the bulls that bugle are the ones killed by hunters, therefore the bugling “gene” is slowly being killed off.  Only the bulls that do not bugle live to breed.  I find that really hard to believe though.  They still bugle like crazy in the Blue Mountains out of Meacham Oregon, the Ochoco’s out of Prineville, Southern Oregon out of Rogue River, and alot of other places. 

To be fair though, the bulls DID start to bugle on the 30th of September last year (the last day of the hunt lol).  Maybe it was just a late year or something.  Haven’t heard one bugle this year either yet.

“The thing is that you can’t just drive around and shoot these elk any
more.  We have to get in 5+ miles to get into elk. They are in steep
country, probably trying to get the upper hand on the wolves.”

Really?? How long have you been around here??
In forty years I can count the elk shot from roads on one hand.

Sounds like you’re messing with the Red Mountain elk herd that’s hanging to the north for the summer. Soon as the heavy frosts and rifle season kicks in they’ll be in the central area of that road less section until snow moves em down onto the Payette.

Chandie, Bear Valley is in the Sawtooth Zone, unit 34. There should be 3-6 thousand elk around there between Sulpher Creek, White Hawk Basin, Bruce Meadows, and Wyoming Creek, Seafoam area.

IDFG has been pulling wolves out of there since 2008 with leg hold traps.

” Bear Valley still has excellent elk hunting. The deer hunting isn’t good though.”

Not according the outfitter for that section of that zone. One of the best outfitters in the business, with foreign clients and non resident clients, all but 5-6 of his hunters have stopped coming, and those clients are hunters, this outfitter sets up camp and his clients hunt alone.

So you’re bow hunting north 35 and floating Bear Valley Creek in 34.  Those elk hang north for the summer, maybe east behind Bull Trout Lake, and across to White Hawk, you’re playing with whats left of a once awesome herd. They still use the same migration route across there. The dude in Salmon sounds like a moron. Hunters have been imitating elk bugling for 150 years, and probably longer. This archery season sucked, I hate hunting in hot weather, I can’t move 300 pounds of meat fast enough anymore, I need weather or October-November cold. My rifle and back pack are fine tuned and I’m waiting for the cold. The elk always used to be high in the heat, in the shaded thick timber. Cape Horn Summit was nice before that fire wrecked it.

I’ll be looking for a mule in the spring if you still have any. 

I was thinking about getting about 20 of these instead though

http://www.northwestpackgoats.com/

Well dude, the thing is this, you’ve admitted only four years in the area, hell, in forty years I’ve probably spent four years in that section camping, hunting, fishing, gold prospecting, horse backing, snow machining, and skiing. During the years cattle were in Bear Valley, there might have been 2-4000 head. The only way you’d be hassled by cow pies in all those millions of acres is if you were hunting beef. A little fertilizer and hoove-tilling was good for the place, and if you think the elk hunting is excellent now, you shoulda seen it back when it really was excellent pre 1995, and some of the sweetest 200″ mule deer bucks hung out in there north of bear valley, and in and around the southern mountains of bear valley from Cape Horn to White Hawk. With hunting like that a feller rarely noticed the occasional cow pie in all that vastness. You need to eat the meat of WWP and spit out their bones. You’re listening to city dwellers and ignoring residents offering you eye witness accounts. Stop being like them Matt, you’re walking in on us just like they did and telling us how it could be better according to you and your comforts while hanging out here and to hell with us. But maybe you like wolf shit better I guess.  I get really sick and tired of the Marvel Maughan anti ranching mythological exaggerations being blown all out of any realm of truth and accuracy. Hell, maybe we should just buy beef from China to appease you de-industrialized wolf farmers.

Just saying folks with an agenda like those folks stretch the truth. I often just laugh at them because over the years I’ve noticed they go out of their way to find cow pies when we have millions of acres all around us to choose from with no cow pies. And someday perhaps you’ll realize this, first they removed the loggers, then the ranchers, oh and here we are looking at you the hunter, well now, when you look back behind yourself when that happens, how can you complain, when you pointed to another user acting under that multiple use doctrine, and supported removing them from that use. Now, lets see, you’re gone, lets go get the hiker, horsemen, any other user, and then finally those of us with private ground, like ours since the 1860s. Don’t believe me, well I didn’t write Agenda 21 which is in the U.N. Charter, nor the legal law dictionary one needs to interpret their intent. I’ll see you when you wise up and head on over to the camp you belong in, coffees hot.

“Maybe it was a late year or something”

This is a failed belief, the rut, and therefore the bugling of elk is determined by the timing with calving in the spring. I have had elk bugling in late August with regularity, They may shut down and the temperatures get hot in late morning, but they are still rutting.

If they are not bugling, there is a reason outside of the weather. If ones has a couple of working brain cells, when you find yourself confronted by the federal dawgs for using a cow call or bugle, it becomes obvious as to what that cause is.

I commend your attempting to get information from IDFG, keep calling them, keep asking them questions, keep telling them what you are seeing and not seeing. You will soon find out they are exactly the people we say they are.

Some of their excuses and claims will amaze you, one thing they are getting is creative. They have a reputation and career to protect after all. And some of them are such ingrained wolf loving anti-hunters you will walk away wondering how they ever even got hired in the first place.

Then continue to support the destruction of multiple use by your friends. Those wolves are public property, (supposedly) the public should reimburse the damage done to private property damaged while on or off public lands by public property. Remove the multiple use and you remove yourself from those lands right along with the cattle, and that my friend is the real goal, after the cattle are gone who’s next?? The next eco system terrorist that’s who, man. The ranchers have been stopped from making improvements by the government red tape, and then the enviros come along and cuss the ranchers and sue the government, nice game. The improvements which have been well documented helped create abundant wildlife in and around the lands both public and private. Last fall at this time I watched rutting elk in the same drainage with 1000+ sheep while bow hunting.

Our biggest bulls came off of open-range right by our house.  This was in the 1980′s pre-archery season.  Lucky Clear -cut 6-point, Goat-Head Trail was the largest bull, we tracked him all night, and I had to start at 5 A.M. tracking him and found him 100 yards from the house.  He measures 52″ inches across, 6-points.  The other big 6-point was shot up Sand Mountain which used to be good hunting.  The best hunting was in the 80′s and early 90′s until IDFG started putting in too many depredation hunts, green field hunts, and liberally giving out cow tags.

Now with the wolves, and a pack on Meadow Creek undocumented over the ridge from my house in our Unit 8-A, were are going to see the demise of our elk in this unit. All ready that pack has killed a 40 inch bull moose-left it to rot, only ate it’s anus (all documented on a trail-camera), one bull elk, cow elk, and I heard of a third elk left to rot.

Here is some information on Bear Valley salmon.  The Native Americans were really nice up there and allowed us into the trailer to view the salmon swimming up the river.  Check it out next year, they are expecting an even bigger return.

http://www.salmonrecovery.gov/Files/Bear%20Valley%20Creek%20110310.pdf

That area Unit 35 is that in Bear Valley?

How many hound hunters do you personally know?

I have never heard a hound hunter complain about a dog lost to a bear, cat, raccoon (yes, it happens). They understand the risks, what they have issue with is these federally dumped wolves cutting through an entire pack of dogs.

They do not understand the claim that reimbursements will be made to private property losses from these dumped dogs. 

Nor do they understand why anyone expects them to stand by and watch thousands of dollars of private property being killed, not to mention the attachment factor of these people and their dogs.

Cattle killed on public lands by these federal wolves are reimbursed, essentially that means that there is not equal treatment under the law, and that my friend, is unconstitutional.

But one thing that the nuts need to consider. Hound hunters are both very dedicated and very astute outdoorsmen, when they have had enough, and they turn their attention to these wolves, I don’t want to hear any whining from the galley of people who didn’t have a problem watching these people lose their bear hounds.

For the most part they pay close attention and do their best to avoid these hell hounds, but that still doesn’t boil down to “the cost of doing business” to them. these people love their dogs and their dogs love hunting, it is what they are meant to be doing. I know these city dwellers that have their fluffy little poodles and beagles don’t get that.

I wonder what the opinion would be for one of these urbanites if they had one of their loved puppies ripped from a leash, torn open and gutted right before their eyes. Why of course that is different right, they have a right for some accountability, someone has to pay for that lose, the ‘dangerous’ animal and it’s owner are going to pay severely by dammed. Why, they actually make laws in their cushy little urban settings, all the while, not giving two shits about what they have unleashed on the West.

Barry, you hit the nail on the head-again!  Hound hunters have NEVER complained about losing hounds to bears and cougars. 

Reason number one:  It seldom happens, and when it unlikely does occur, it usually is to an extra-ordinary incidence of an extremely aggressive striker hound vs. an equally more aggressive mountain lion or bear. 

The fact that bears and cougars don’t run in PACKS is the major difference. 

These wolves were brought in under tainted science, stolen money, and the agenda to end hunting and ranching, and hound hunting!

Hound hunting is the number one tool to manage cougars and bears, now we don’t have that tool anymore, thanks to the federal transplanted wolves.

Okay thanks.  I put gene in quotes because that might not have been the exact term used.  Give him a call and see what he thinks the reasons for the lack of bugling. 

He was a bit of a jerk to tell you the truth.  I brought up the POSSIBILITY that wolves had something to do with the lack of bugling and he didn’t like that.  that’s when he hypothesized that hunters were killing off the bugling “gene” (Not sure the actual term used-It was a year ago) and just let it go at that.  It just doesn’t make sense, because they still bugle like crazy in Oregon and there is way more hunting pressure…At least that’s what I’ve found to be the case.

Sorry for the derail of your thread.  I meant to post this in the hound hunting thread

Seeya.

Thanks Matt.  Your information is very important, and I want you to know is consistent from other reports.  Would you mind if Tom gave you my contact information?