Outdoors Column: States keeping the heat on in wolf wars

Earlier this month, federal officials signaled preliminary support for state plans to kill up to 60 wolves from packs occupying a 2,355-square-mile Lolo zone in Idaho. Wolves have been removed from the Endangered Species Act protections on a number of occasions, only to be listed again by federal courts after anti-hunting groups filed lawsuits. This week, a coalition of the nation's largest hunting and conservation groups thanked members of Congress for taking several steps in the right direction for wolf conservation. Two Montana Senators introduced a bill to remove protections for wolves in Montana and Idaho. Two other measures before Congress would remove those protections nationwide. The coalition — Congressional Sportsmen's Foundation, the Boone and Crockett Club, National Rifle Association and Safari Club International — reminded Congress that all wolves in the Rockies and Great Lakes area are recovered and should now be managed by state biologists. "The wolf is recovered biologically but population management is hung up in legal questions that judges call 'ambiguous,'" said Bob Model, chairman of government affairs for the Boone and Crockett Club and vice chairman of the Congressional Sportsmen's Foundation. "Lawyers and judges disagree on the law. But no one disagrees with the numbers. The strength of the large and growing wolf population is obvious, and the numbers meet and far surpass the established threshold for recovery." Wolf populations in the Rocky Mountains and Great Lakes are at least five times larger than the federal recovery goals...more