Horror of wolf hunt coming into focus
"Forget hunters' feeble rationalizations and trust your gut feelings: Making sport of killing is not healthy human behavior." — Jim Robertson, author of "Exposing the Big Game: Living Targets of a Dying Sport"
The wolf was delisted by the federal government. The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources planned a five-year moratorium on hunting, issuing wolf kill licenses to farmers with depredation losses. The plan was trashed by Rep. Scott Suder, R-Abbotsford, and his bear hounding cronies, excluding the general public. A similar five-year plan was also trashed by the Minnesota DNR. In a Minnesota survey, 79 percent of 7,351 responders including hunters opposed a wolf hunt. In Wisconsin, 898 were opposed and 20 were for it, according to a governor's office tally.
The outdoor columnists in Minnesota ridiculed Howling for Wolves for challenging the hunt: "It's seeking to challenge the DNR for not having sound reasons for opening the animals to hunting and trapping. That's backwards. All our natural resources are here to be used. … There needs to be a reason not to allow the killing of a particular animal."
The reason not to kill wildlife is the majority's desire for interaction with living wildlife in intact, peaceful ecosystems that enrich and support our lives. This is "backwards" by DNR standards.
One Wisconsinite lamented this "just allow gangs of 'hunters' and their hounds to roam and control the back roads of our neighborhood as they do now when they are 'hunting' bear. What's next, dogs for deer season?"
Another epitomizes the arrogance of hunters: "We can take back our woods from these apex predators. … An aggressive approach will balance the ecosystem and allow stewardship of our hunting heritage." He must get his science from the Suder academy.
What he really wants to do is save the political ecosystem of hunter absolute control. The DNR's real role is laid out in that political ecosystem: to protect, not healthy intact ecosystems and wildlife, but hunting/trapping/hounding "rights" to destroy.
The Natural Resources Board, now mandated to hunter/farmer control, completes that "stewardship" of killing dominance. The three new members, appointed by Gov. Scott Walker, are William Bruins, owner of Homeland Dairy; Terry N. Hilgenberg, general manager of Hilgenberg Realty; and Gregory Kazmierski, president/owner of Buck Rub Outfitters Ltd. They rubber-stamped Suder's hounding agenda, passing the night hounding of all wildlife year-round by default. Clever.
According to Wisconsin Outdoor news writer Dean Bortz, hounders can run their dogs on wolves right now without any license. The DNR sells unlimited licenses to run packs of six dogs on bears (over 10,000 licenses) from July 1 through the five-week bear slaughter ending in mid-October. Seamlessly, the bear hounders can begin killing wolves before the bear blood has dried on their dogs' muzzles. The wolf hunt will start Oct. 15 and run through February.
There will be a free-for-all with no limit on the number of dogs or men who run wolves except respite for the northern third of the state May 1-June 30. This means wildlife will have dogs run on them statewide 10 months of the year, through the breeding seasons. Although the Natural Resources Board banned the use of dogs in night hunting, DNR's Scott Loomans emailed, "There are no dog training hours restrictions so they could be trained at night."
Nobody, including the DNR, will know how many are in the woods. This is an invitation to systemic private land trespass, long sought by the Wisconsin Wildlife Federation. Hunters can carry guns and there will be poaching. They will terrorize wildlife and landowners. Since dogs run miles ahead of their "trainers" and are radio-collared (or not), and since dogs attack any creatures that move, this — as shown on this YouTube video — is pure insanity.
Add trapping newly mandated on all publicly purchased lands. Add grouse and waterbird hunters and their dogs, and dogs run on snowshoe hares, possums, raccoons and bobcats. Add the sadistic bear hounding and slaughter of thousands of baby bears. Add in packs of dogs to run and kill coyotes statewide year-round. Hunting dogs (and any wild creature) will be falling into wolf traps. (The grouse hunters are grousing about that.)
Add in the several hundred children successfully recruited by the trappers (soon to be expanded through accredited trapping taught in the school system). Mix in dogs loosed on trapped or injured animals, surviving bears trying to den threatened by dogs, and all wildlife stalked, harassed, stressed or killed by dogs or men, constantly.
This is permanent chaos that the DNR has created, with a Legislature legalizing nonstop dog fighting across the entire state. Dog fighting is criminalized and condemned in most states with dog-wolf fighting only Wisconsin's market niche. Many legislators voted to trump our own cruelty laws.
This DNR is an irresponsible rogue agency that should be brought up on criminal charges for trashing this state.
Patricia Randolph of Portage is a longtime activist for wildlife. madravenspeak@gmail.com or www.wiwildlifeethic.org
The outdoor columnists in Minnesota ridiculed Howling for Wolves for challenging the hunt: "It's seeking to challenge the DNR for not having sound reasons for opening the animals to hunting and trapping. That's backwards. All our natural resources are here to be used. … There needs to be a reason not to allow the killing of a particular animal."
The reason not to kill wildlife is the majority's desire for interaction with living wildlife in intact, peaceful ecosystems that enrich and support our lives. This is "backwards" by DNR standards.
One Wisconsinite lamented this "just allow gangs of 'hunters' and their hounds to roam and control the back roads of our neighborhood as they do now when they are 'hunting' bear. What's next, dogs for deer season?"
Another epitomizes the arrogance of hunters: "We can take back our woods from these apex predators. … An aggressive approach will balance the ecosystem and allow stewardship of our hunting heritage." He must get his science from the Suder academy.
What he really wants to do is save the political ecosystem of hunter absolute control. The DNR's real role is laid out in that political ecosystem: to protect, not healthy intact ecosystems and wildlife, but hunting/trapping/hounding "rights" to destroy.
The Natural Resources Board, now mandated to hunter/farmer control, completes that "stewardship" of killing dominance. The three new members, appointed by Gov. Scott Walker, are William Bruins, owner of Homeland Dairy; Terry N. Hilgenberg, general manager of Hilgenberg Realty; and Gregory Kazmierski, president/owner of Buck Rub Outfitters Ltd. They rubber-stamped Suder's hounding agenda, passing the night hounding of all wildlife year-round by default. Clever.
According to Wisconsin Outdoor news writer Dean Bortz, hounders can run their dogs on wolves right now without any license. The DNR sells unlimited licenses to run packs of six dogs on bears (over 10,000 licenses) from July 1 through the five-week bear slaughter ending in mid-October. Seamlessly, the bear hounders can begin killing wolves before the bear blood has dried on their dogs' muzzles. The wolf hunt will start Oct. 15 and run through February.
There will be a free-for-all with no limit on the number of dogs or men who run wolves except respite for the northern third of the state May 1-June 30. This means wildlife will have dogs run on them statewide 10 months of the year, through the breeding seasons. Although the Natural Resources Board banned the use of dogs in night hunting, DNR's Scott Loomans emailed, "There are no dog training hours restrictions so they could be trained at night."
Nobody, including the DNR, will know how many are in the woods. This is an invitation to systemic private land trespass, long sought by the Wisconsin Wildlife Federation. Hunters can carry guns and there will be poaching. They will terrorize wildlife and landowners. Since dogs run miles ahead of their "trainers" and are radio-collared (or not), and since dogs attack any creatures that move, this — as shown on this YouTube video — is pure insanity.
Add trapping newly mandated on all publicly purchased lands. Add grouse and waterbird hunters and their dogs, and dogs run on snowshoe hares, possums, raccoons and bobcats. Add the sadistic bear hounding and slaughter of thousands of baby bears. Add in packs of dogs to run and kill coyotes statewide year-round. Hunting dogs (and any wild creature) will be falling into wolf traps. (The grouse hunters are grousing about that.)
Add in the several hundred children successfully recruited by the trappers (soon to be expanded through accredited trapping taught in the school system). Mix in dogs loosed on trapped or injured animals, surviving bears trying to den threatened by dogs, and all wildlife stalked, harassed, stressed or killed by dogs or men, constantly.
This is permanent chaos that the DNR has created, with a Legislature legalizing nonstop dog fighting across the entire state. Dog fighting is criminalized and condemned in most states with dog-wolf fighting only Wisconsin's market niche. Many legislators voted to trump our own cruelty laws.
This DNR is an irresponsible rogue agency that should be brought up on criminal charges for trashing this state.
Patricia Randolph of Portage is a longtime activist for wildlife. madravenspeak@gmail.com or www.wiwildlifeethic.org
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