Yellowstone wolves crash, Idaho's thrive Since the beginning of wolf reintroduction in the Northern Rockies, Idaho and its more than 20 million acres of wild lands have taken a back seat in the debate to Yellowstone National Park. Yellowstone simply had more star power for wolf advocates seeking a remarkably ambitious program to restore wolves into a region where the animals were hated, poisoned and eliminated. The 2.2 million-acre national park at the core of the greater Yellowstone ecosystem, along with nearby Grand Teton, also offered wolf advocates a level of government control like few places on Earth. When wolves were finally released in 1995, all the national hoopla went to Yellowstone. The releases in Idaho were almost a footnote. The Idaho wolves quickly found each other, along with the few native wolves that hadn't been illegally shot or poisoned. They formed their own packs and flourished in the wild backcountry of the Salmon-Selway ecosystem, which has ample supply of elk. With managers balancing protection with the needs of livestock owners, the Idaho wolves also found homes on the edges of the ideal habitat. Wolf numbers grew in Idaho at rates far higher than either Yellowstone or Northwest Montana, where they had been repopulating since the 1970s. When they were delisted back in March, there were as many wolves in Idaho - more than 700 - as there were everywhere else in the northern Rockies. Even in the face of relatively high mortality due to official killings to protect livestock, Idaho became the place where wolves grew old....