Call to Action: Stop Aerial Gunning Wolves on Our Public Lands!
To: Jim Fredericks, Director, Idaho Department of Fish and Game and Chanel Tewalt, Director, Idaho State Department of Agriculture
Recently the Idaho State Wolf Depredation Control Board (herein “Board”) approved spending more than $140,000 to hire private contractors to use aerial gunning and other methods to kill wolves on federal lands and private property across the state. Several of the proposals explicitly provide for predator control in Idaho’s National Forests, including the Caribou-Targhee, Boise, Salmon-Challis, Sawtooth, and Payette National Forests. Among the packs targeted by the Board is the Wood River Wolf Pack in Blaine County, yet wolves in the project area have lived peacefully beside tens of thousands of sheep for the last 16 years.
This year, ranchers in the Wood River Wolf Project area reported no loss of sheep to the Wood River wolves despite over 24,000 sheep being present; making it one of the most successful years on record and the best example of wolf and livestock coexistence in the state. The wolves in the Project area are helping to demonstrate that nonlethal methods are more effective in protecting livestock than randomly killing wolves and other native carnivores. Yet, the State of Idaho continues to fund efforts to kill them and others without cause on our public lands.
IWCN director Suzanne Asha Stone and tribal liaison J. Dallas Gudgell attended your Board’s October 26th meeting in Boise. At that meeting, an out-of-state aerial gunning company claimed to represent the Peavey and Faulkner families, two of IWCN’s long-term Wood River Wolf Project’s partners. IWCN immediately contacted both families and learned that neither had authorized the private contractor to submit applications on their behalf. IWCN also immediately notified the Idaho Department of Fish and Game of these findings. However, there has been no public acknowledgment of these mistakes and consequential policy breaches to the Board’s mandate.
As people who value wildlife on our public lands, we urge you to put a stop to the slaughter of wolves in Idaho by rescinding your decision to fund aerial gunning by private contractors. Aerial gunning is an unacceptable control method, especially on our public lands. When the wolves are innocent of conflict with livestock, it suggests a malicious intent to harm rather than to address actual problems. Allowing the Board’s project funding decision to stand further reenforces what appears to be zero-tolerance for wolves in Idaho.
The Board’s cavalier treatment of this grant program also underscores the lack of due diligence to investigate the contractor’s background or confirm that the Peavey and Faulkner operations had agreed to being named in this application. Failing to even confirm that the ranchers were aware of this application is an unacceptable abdication of your duties to Idaho taxpayers.
We are aware that Idaho is in what Idaho Department of Fish and Game describes as, “the second golden age of elk hunting,” due to the nine-year elk hunting success record that matches only one other such streak for the longest in history in Idaho. Furthermore, USDA Wildlife Services has documented a decline in confirmed livestock depredations over each of the last three years. From July 1, 2022 - June 30, 2023, only 62 sheep (from 220,000 statewide) and 23 cows and calves (from 2.2 million statewide) were confirmed lost to wolves. That equates to wolves having killed one in every 3,500 sheep and one in every 95, 652 cattle in Idaho annually. Even considering any unconfirmed losses, this is clearly not a chronic conflict requiring such increased drastic and brutal control measures
Wolves are essential to a healthy ecosystem. They help cull diseases from elk and deer herds and keep these species from overgrazing sensitive wetlands and valley bottoms, which in turn, helps protect overall biodiversity of wildlife and native plants. Wolves are native to Idaho and should be managed as a valued species. Yet, the State of Idaho is demonstrating beyond any doubt that it cannot be trusted to deliver on its commitment to federal authorities to manage wolves as valued wildlife. We ask that you abandon the current control applications immediately and instead invest your time and resources into providing ranchers with proactive nonlethal measures that protect both Livestock and Wolves.
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To:
To: Jim Fredericks, Director, Idaho Department of Fish and Game and Chanel Tewalt, Director, Idaho State Department of Agriculture
From:
[Your Name]
Dear Idaho State Wolf Control Board Cochairs: Mr. Fredricks and Ms Tewalt,
Recently the Idaho State Wolf Depredation Control Board (herein “Board”) approved spending more than $140,000 to hire private contractors to use aerial gunning and other methods to kill wolves on federal lands and private property across the state. Several of the proposals explicitly provide for predator control in Idaho’s National Forests, including the Caribou-Targhee, Boise, Salmon-Challis, Sawtooth, and Payette National Forests. Among the packs targeted by the Board is the Wood River Wolf Pack in Blaine County, yet wolves in the project area have lived peacefully beside tens of thousands of sheep for the last 16 years.
This year, ranchers in the Wood River Wolf Project area reported no loss of sheep to the Wood River wolves despite over 24,000 sheep being present; making it one of the most successful years on record and the best example of wolf and livestock coexistence in the state. The wolves in the Project area are helping to demonstrate that nonlethal methods are more effective in protecting livestock than randomly killing wolves and other native carnivores. Yet, the State of Idaho continues to fund efforts to kill them and others without cause on our public lands.
IWCN director Suzanne Asha Stone and tribal liaison J. Dallas Gudgell attended your Board’s October 26th meeting in Boise. At that meeting, an out-of-state aerial gunning company claimed to represent the Peavey and Faulkner families, two of IWCN’s long-term Wood River Wolf Project’s partners. IWCN immediately contacted both families and learned that neither had authorized the private contractor to submit applications on their behalf. IWCN also immediately notified the Idaho Department of Fish and Game of these findings. However, there has been no public acknowledgment of these mistakes and consequential policy breaches to the Board’s mandate.
As people who value wildlife on our public lands, we urge you to put a stop to the slaughter of wolves in Idaho by rescinding your decision to fund aerial gunning by private contractors. Aerial gunning is an unacceptable control method, especially on our public lands. When the wolves are innocent of conflict with livestock, it suggests a malicious intent to harm rather than to address actual problems. Allowing the Board’s project funding decision to stand further reenforces what appears to be zero-tolerance for wolves in Idaho.
The Board’s cavalier treatment of this grant program also underscores the lack of due diligence to investigate the contractor’s background or confirm that the Peavey and Faulkner operations had agreed to being named in this application. Failing to even confirm that the ranchers were aware of this application is an unacceptable abdication of your duties to Idaho taxpayers.
We are aware that Idaho is in what Idaho Department of Fish and Game describes as, “the second golden age of elk hunting,” due to the nine-year elk hunting success record that matches only one other such streak for the longest in history in Idaho. Furthermore, USDA Wildlife Services has documented a decline in confirmed livestock depredations over each of the last three years. From July 1, 2022 - June 30, 2023, only 62 sheep (from 220,000 statewide) and 23 cows and calves (from 2.2 million statewide) were confirmed lost to wolves. That equates to wolves having killed one in every 3,500 sheep and one in every 95, 652 cattle in Idaho annually. Even considering any unconfirmed losses, this is clearly not a chronic conflict requiring such increased drastic and brutal control measures.
Wolves are essential to a healthy ecosystem. They help cull diseases from elk and deer herds and keep these species from overgrazing sensitive wetlands and valley bottoms, which in turn, helps protect overall biodiversity of wildlife and native plants. Wolves are native to Idaho and should be managed as a valued species. Yet, the State of Idaho is demonstrating beyond any doubt that it cannot be trusted to deliver on its commitment to federal authorities to manage wolves as valued wildlife. We ask that you abandon the current control applications immediately and instead invest your time and resources into providing ranchers with proactive nonlethal measures that protect both Livestock and Wolves.