Wolf Recovery and Why We Shouldn't Stop Now

Background

In 2011, gray wolves in Idaho and Montana, as well as in eastern Washington, eastern Oregon, and northern Utah, were delisted from the federal endangered species list. Wolves are on track to be delisted in Wyoming sometime in 2012, and the United States Fish and Wildlife Service has formally proposed delisting wolves in Minnesota, Michigan, and Wisconsin in 2012. With the only other regions in the conterminous United States containing wolves being a relatively small mountainous area between New Mexico and Arizona (Blue Range Wolf Recovery Area) for the critically endangered Mexican gray wolf (Canis lupus baileyi), and in a small section of eastern North Carolina for the (also) critically endangered red wolf (Canis rufus).

By the time the Endangered Species Act of 1973 was signed into law, there were only approximately 750 wild wolves living in the United States, all in the dense north woods of Minnesota. The Endangered Species Act was a blessing for the wolf, as it allowed for them to naturally expand their range from Canada and northern Minnesota, and public support for wolf recovery culminated in the reintroduction of red wolves (Canis rufus) into Alligator RIver National Wildlife Refuge in 1987, Rocky Mountain wolves (C. lupus occidentalis) into Yellowstone National Park and Central Idaho in 1995 and 1996, and Mexican wolves (C. lupus baileyi) into the Blue Range Wolf Recovery Area starting in 1998.

What's going on and why wolf recovery should be supported

Although red wolves and Mexican gray wolves still struggle for long-term sustainability, due to a major genetic bottleneck effect (the current red wolf population is descended from a founding population of 14; Mexican wolves from 7), limited space, and lack of appropriate mates, the wolves of Yellowstone and Central Idaho have flourished under federal protection. From 66 wolves that were released into the area, the region had close to 1700 by 2011. This number has gone down significantly since summer of 2011, as Idaho and Montana have made a commitment to greatly reduce the wolf population in those respective states. Wyoming, which has made a tentative agreement with Secretary of the Interior, Ken Salazar, to allow their state management plan to authorize a shoot-on-sight policy in the vast majority of the state, with the tiny other portion of the state (minus the national parks) requiring a permit to kill wolves, is aiming to get as close to the federal wolf population floor of 100 wolves as possible without going under. Between Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming, which had a combined 1600 wolves in 2011, the region's minimum required population is 400, based on the state management plans' guidelines.

The current assault on the region's wolf population could have devastating effects, both for the wildlife which had benefited so greatly from the wolf reintroduction, and for the millions of people who will travel to the area in the future to see the wonderful wildlife of the area. Yellowstone National Park had become a shadow of its former self during the 70 years of absence of wolves. Elk, left mostly undisturbed by predators, decimated the riparian ecosystem by overbrowsing on young aspen, cottonwood, and willow, preventing their growth into maturity. The absence of these trees along the streambeds caused erosion and the resulting silt that fell into the water killed off many fish and amphibian species, which had a negative effect on bird populations. These trees had once served as food for beaver and as the resources for their dams, which created ponds, which benefited fish, amphibians, birds, and insects, but their absence altered the lifestyle of the riparian habitat. The beaver disappeared along with their dams. Further hurting the cause of the fish and amphibians was the lack of shade, due to lack of trees, resulting in a rise of water temperature. Wolves were no longer able to keep coyote populations in check, which caused a significant decrease in the populations of smaller predators such as foxes, whose populations are often kept in check by coyotes. Bears and eagles saw their numbers fall, as they could no longer scavenge off the elk and bison carcasses served by packs of wolves after (or in the bear's case, sometimes before) they had their fill.

The return of the wolf changed all of this. Yellowstone National Park today looks much more like the Yellowstone National Park of two hundred years ago than the Yellowstone of twenty years ago. This could revert once more though, for wolves are being, or soon will be in Wyoming's case, "harvested" in state-sanctioned hunts in the states (ID, MT, WY) initially involved with the 1995-96 reintroduction and are having two-thirds of their current population threatened. As wolves continue to expand their ranges elsewhere in the United States, there are many the Yellowstone/Central Idaho area, where wolves had made such a miraculous comeback story 15 years earlier, who threaten to allow the ecosystem to decline to a substandard condition once again by taking out the apex predator.

Besides the tremendously important role wolves have in their ecosystems, wolf recovery is the right thing to do just because wolves never did anything to deserve to be relegated to just 5% of their historic range, and it is our generation's responsibility to correct the mistakes of our ancestors from a time when no one knew any better than to believe that the "big bad wolf" stereotype was an accurate portrayal. We have the evidence of wolves' ecological impact now, and a greater general appreciation for nature as the world becomes more urbanized every year, reducing the level of truly wild land to a dangerously low level. If we don't start fixing the world, starting with allowing apex predators such as the wolf to play their important role, it may eventually be too late, especially with the unprecedented high level of extinction currently taking place.