The Effects of Wolves on Game Populations

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Recommended: reintroducing wolves to national parks

The reintroduction of wolves has effected game a crossed the western Rockies. In many ways wolves have been a negative influence. They have caused problems in many wild game populations, including deer, elk, and many more. What has caused these problems, how do wolves hunt, and how do we control them? The original wolves were very different from the ones that were planted. So while environmentalists thought they were helping to level out environmental problems, they succeeded in doing the opposite, by bringing back the wrong kind of wolves they started, depleting elk populations, and wild game.

In 1995 the environmentalists started to repopulate the wolves. The wolves started spreading like rabbits, across many states including Idaho, Wyoming, Utah, and Washington. The main area in the spot light would be Yellowstone because of the national park there it instantly hit the News and Press. People would come from all around the world to see a Yellowstone wolf. They figured that if they planted more wolves that it would bring back balance to the game. For almost seventy years wolves were very few and far between. Mostly because of trapping hunting and the fact that anyone who lives in Idaho hates wolves. Wolves now days kill whatever they can find they don’t care if it’s your dog or a farmer’s cow they see they kill. A unknown hunter had gone hunting with his dogs 3 of them got lost the next day he went out to find that they had all been killed by wolves. One of them was eaten almost to the bone while the other two had been harmed just to the point that they died. He was very upset and could do nothing about it because there is no law protecting the dogs.

To fully understand how wolves affect wild game you need to fully under...

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...ally. There is many rules and regulations on how and where they can be harvested.

Environmentalists thought they were helping to level out the environment but instead made it legal to harvest the wolves. By overpopulation they have caused many problems from farmers to hunters, even some game. In some small way they may have helped with the illegal poaching of the wolves by making it legal to purchase tags and trapping permits. There are many ways in which the government and the people who care about the wolves and the people that are effected are working to fix this problem.

Works cited

(1) http://www.ask.com/question/how-do-wolves-hunt

(2) Rob Pennell

(3) http://www.fws.gov/wafwo/species/Fact%20sheets/gray%20wolf%20final.pdf

(4) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mackenzie_Valley_wolf

(5) http://fishandgame.idaho.gov/public/wildlife/wolves/?getPage=260

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