Opponents of wolf killing launch referendum drive to overturn Michigan's new hunting law

Article by: Associated Press
Updated: January 14, 2013 - 5:49 PM

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tcatheartJan. 14, 13 5:24 PM

What people in MN, WI, or MI don't realize, is that whether or not hunters can hunt wolves, there are a certain number of them that will be killed by man every year. There is always going to be a certain number killed because of nuisances to livestock, damage to property, or being a threat to humans. Before, it was just done quietly by the DNR or someone licensed by the DNR. Like it or not, we have infringed on their land and they don't have many predators. If we are going to co-exist, humans will have to control their population.

normmackeyJan. 15, 13 9:19 PM

Because wolves have few predators they control their own numbers to some extent, most simply not breeding animals. The DNR or cooperative agency has not has incentive to kill ones not causing problems, and randomly killing additional ones is a deliberately inefficient way of targeting the very few causing problems. To the extent that controlling them this way can require tolerating half the problems that could have been quickly taken care of before or removing more than that proportion of the wildlife. Whether people should/must control wolves is secondary to the question of doing it with random removal of wolf pack members.