Senator Menendez of New Jersey is calling for a ban on importing Wildlife trophies(heads of killed animals) into the the USA...............I think that is all perfectly positive if simultaneously we ban trophy hunting and trapping(for skins, heads, etc) of carnivores here in the USA............Why is it always ok to do positive things elsewhere and not do the "positive heavy lifting" back at home????...........In my opinion(and supported by best science),baiting, hounding, treeing and "blowing away" carnivores in North America is as wrong as luring a carnivore out of a Park in Africa.................I subscribe to what outdoor writer and ecologist George Wuerthner has to say on the subject---"THERE IS NO GOOD REASON TO KILL CARNIVORES,,,,,,,,,PERIOD!!!!, ANYWHERE ON THE PLANET(WUERTHNER ESSAY's ON THIS SUBJECT BELOW)

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Illinois Opens Bobcat Hunting Season

Aug 1, 2015 by Mike Willand Leave a Comment

This bobcat was captured on trail camera in Northwest Illinois last summer.

After a 40 year hiatus, bobcat hunting will return to the state of Illinois in 2016. Current Republican governor Bruce Rauner signed the bill into law earlier this month, but not without controversy.

Immediately following the news of the latest hunting regulation, Wayne Pacelle, president and CEO of the Humane Society of the United States issued a press release condemning the newly elected governor’s decision, stating, “to get the bill passed through the Legislature, lawmakers relied on absurd and outlandish exaggerations about bobcats — who are shy and elusive creatures that only wei"there is no good reason to h slightly more than an average house cat — and it’s unfortunate that the Governor apparently fell for this fear-mongering.”  As a side note, the average male bobcat weighs 20-22 lbs while the average male house cat weighs less than 10.  Although as many hunters know, the HSUS has never been big on actual facts.

Democratic Representative Patrick Verschoore, of Milan, was one of the proposal’s sponsors. He and others supporters of the bill argue that there are an estimated 5,000 bobcats in Illinois today, with as many as half of those living in the thirteen counties that cover the entire southern portion of the state.

While opponents of the bill like Pacelle and the Humane Society of the United States continue to argue against the science surrounding the bill, Bob Bluett, a wildlife diversity biologist at Illinois DNR gives most the credit surrounding the study and comeback of the Illinois bobcat to the state’s hunters and trappers. Stating that most of the funding used for reintroduction efforts came from the purchasing of state conservation stamps.

In 1999, bobcats were taken off the state’s threatened species list after scientific studies confirmed their growing numbers and statewide distribution. The Illinois Department of Natural Resources (IDNR) has been monitoring populations closely through first hand sightings from researchers, trappers, and state hunters.

The first Illinois bobcat season is set to run from November 1st – to February 15th, 2016. State issued permits will cost $5 and no more than 300 bobcats may be taken statewide.

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Grizzly Recovery does not require hunting

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by GEORGE WUERTHNER on JANUARY 1, 2013 · 154 COMMENTS · in ACTIVISM, ADVOCACY,BEARS, CONSERVATION, ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT, FEATURED, IDAHO, MONTANA,WILDLIFE, WILDLIFE MANAGEMENT, WYOMING

In their December 29^th editorial in the Billings Gazette, Scott Talbott of the Wyoming Game and Fish and Harv Forsgren of the U.S. Forest Service wrote that hunting was another step towards grizzly bear recovery.

To read their editorial, go to this link: Guest opinion: Hunting another step toward grizzly bear recovery.

Specifically, the authors claim that regulated hunting will recover grizzly bears. Boy is that a leap. We haven’t hunted grizzlies for several decades now, and the bears appear to be doing fine without being shot or trapped. There is no legitimate reason to indiscriminately kill any predator.

Those, like the authors, who advocate the hunting of grizzly bears continuously, proclaim that state management will not cause the extirpation of bears (or wolves, mountain lions, etc.) This is a straw man they construct so they can knock it down. Few opponents of predator hunting/trapping are worried that these animals will be completely eliminated from the West.

By trying to frame the issue this way, proponents of bear killing misrepresent the real concerns of those who question state wildlife management of predators. The concern of opponents of bear hunting, wolf hunting, mountain lion hunting has more to do with ethics and how we should be treating other living creatures—a concern to which the authors and others appear tone deaf.

They further claim that state agencies use the “best available science.” Nothing could be further from the truth. The best available science is disregarded by the authors as well as all state wildlife management agencies that manage predators because it would challenge the validity of many of their management prescriptions.

With regards to grizzly bears, conservation science suggests we need many more bears in many more places to sustain their populations over the long term. There is plenty of unoccupied bear habitats in the Northern Rockies. Many parts of Montana, Idaho and Wyoming that could support grizzlies where they are currently absent, including Wyoming’s Salt and Wyoming Ranges, the Bitterroot Mountains of Idaho, and the Centennial Mountains of Montana to name just a few.

The best available science also suggests that many predators including bears, wolves, mountain lion and coyotes have intricate social interactions that are disrupted or damaged by indiscriminate killing from hunters and trappers.

At best hunting and trapping are blunt tools to address what may be in some rare instances legitimate conflicts such as the surgical removal of a food-habituated bear–though I hasten to add that many conflicts are self-created by humans who exercise sloppy animal husbandry or camping practices.

Hunting, and most trapping, does not specifically target any particular offending animals—such as a bear that might be killing livestock. Rather the majority of bears (or wolves, mountain lions or coyotes) killed are not causing any conflicts at all. They are innocent by- standers who happen to be caught in the cross hairs of predator persecution.

For instance, dominant bears will occupy the best habitat and prevent other bears from occupying the territory. Yet in many cases, if a bear has lived long enough to become a dominant animal, it is not one that causes troubles for humans. Yet it is the biggest bears, in other words, the dominant bears that hunters seek to kill opening up habitat for occupation by another bear that may not be so friendly to human desires.

To suggest, as the authors do, that hunting will reduce human conflicts directly contradicts the best available science which they profess to use, but obviously ignore. This growing body of research suggests that hunting of predators actually increases human conflicts. For instance, there are many predators that live among livestock without ever killing cattle or sheep. Yet because they inhabit the territory, they keep other members of their species from occupying the area. If a hunter should kill this livestock-friendly bear, the habitat, if it’s any good, will be filled quickly by another bear that may or may not be so livestock friendly.

Indeed, one study of black bears in the eastern US found that as states increased the killing of bears to “reduce conflicts”, the number of bear-human conflicts increased.

Similar studies of mountain lion have documented exactly the same pattern. As mountain lions are killed, and even as the population is declining, the number of conflicts increases—the exact opposite of what state wildlife agencies predict will occur. Hunters tend to kill the dominant toms (male) mountain lion opening up space for immature young lions, who like human teenagers, are bolder, less cautious, and more inclined to attack livestock and even humans.

Thus the typical “management” approach advocated by state wildlife agencies exacerbates, rather than reduces human-wildlife conflicts.

To suggest that regulated hunting is a “solution” to perceived problems with humans is like arguing that the best way to address crime in our cities is to shoot all young men since the majority of crime is done by youths. Obviously you might eliminate some of the criminal element by such a policy, but you would be unavoidably be killing many innocent people.

Why aren’t Fish and Game agencies using that science in their management decisions? I will answer it. Because they are a regulatory agency that has been captured by the very group they are supposed to regulate—namely hunters and trappers.

Follow the money. State wildlife agencies run on the sale of licenses. Anything that contributes to greater license sales is looked upon favorably.

To be fair, it should be acknowledged that these agencies are not immune from political pressure from the hunting and trapping community. Many western state Fish and Game agencies are already under duress from ill-informed hunters and trappers and legislatures ignorant of ecology and animal behavior.

Some of the more extreme predator killers even go so far as to suggest that that these agencies are coddling predators and god forbid bowing to the wishes of animal rights advocates. Thinking that any animals have “rights” is heretical to these folks who believe wildlife exists for their sole pleasure and exploitation.

So these state agencies practice a vicious cycle; whereby predators are indiscriminately killed, which disrupts their social organization, which leads to greater human conflict, and thus more demands for predator control.

Worse, the authors as well as many state wildlife agencies eulogize the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation. That model, among other things, specifically requires the highest ethical behavior from hunters. What is ethical about killing a bear for self -aggrandizement just because you are so insecure the only way you can so you can prove your manhood is by killing a bear? Most hunters are not going to eat the meat—isn’t that wanton waste? Is killing a bear just to have a “trophy” rug on the wall a legitimate and ethical use of wildlife, especially when that destruction of a wild creature denies the rest of the public of its wildlife heritage?

Others argue that we “need” to permit hunting and trapping of predators to reduce the anger of some members of the hunting and trapping community. Is killing any animal justified just to address the emotional problems of some members of the public? These people need counseling, not a license to kill.

I am a former Montana hunting guide. I studied wildlife biology and currently work as an ecologist. I believe that hunting can lead to some valuable insights about wildlife and individuals. Some of my hunting experiences have been almost transcendental experiences—ironically more often when I did not kill an animal. If one is going to take the life of another creature, one must be absolutely certain that killing is justified.

Unfortunately that high bar is not met by advocates of grizzly hunting and/or trapping. The unnecessary and indiscriminate persecution of predators is what fuels public opposition against all hunting, not to mention it does not help grizzly or any other animal’s recovery.

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Wolf Hunts Are Morally Corrupt........George Wuerthner

September 1, 2011 at 9:03am

Wolf Hunts Are Morally Corrupt
by Jerry Black on Thursday, September 1, 2011 at 9:56am
Wolf George Wuerthner

The resumption of wolf-hunts in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming illustrates why citizens must continue to oppose such unnecessary and senseless slaughters.

The wolf-hunts are predicated upon morally corrupt and inaccurate assumptions about wolf behavior and impacts that is not supported by recent scientific research. State wildlife agencies pander to the lowest common denominator in the hunting community—men who need to booster their own self esteem and release misdirected anger by killing.

Wolf-hunts, as Montana Fish and Game Commission Chairman Bob Ream noted at a public hearing, are in part to relieve hunters’ frustrations—frustration based on inaccurate information, flawed assumptions, and just plain old myths and fears about predators and their role in the world.

Maybe relieving hunter frustration is a good enough justification for wolf-hunts to many people. However, in my view permitting hunts to go forwards without even registering opposition is to acquiesce to ignorance, hatred, and the worse in human motivations. Thankfully a few environmental groups, most notably the Center for Biological Diversity, Wildearth Guardians, Alliance for Wild Rockies and Western Watersheds had the courage and gumption to stand up to ignorance and hatred.

All of the usual justifications given for wolf-hunts are spurious at best. For instance, one rationale given for hunting wolves is to reduce their presumed affects on big game populations. Yet in all three states, elk and deer populations are at or exceed population objectives for most hunting units.

For instance in Wyoming, one of the most vehement anti wolf states in the West, the 2010 elk population was 21,200 animals over state-wide objectives, and this did not include data for six herds, suggesting that elk populations are likely higher. Of the state’s elk herds most were at or above objectives and only 6 percent were below objectives. Similar data is found for Idaho and Montana elk herds as well.

However, you would not know that from the “howls” of hunters who characterize the elk populations as suffering from a wolf induced Armageddon. And Fish and Game departments are loath to counter the false accusations from hunters that wolves are somehow “destroying” hunting throughout the Rockies.

Experience in other parts of the country where wolves have been part of the landscape longer suggests that in the long term, wolves while they may reduce prey populations in certain locales generally do not reduce hunting opportunities across a state or region. Despite the fact that there more than double the number of wolves in Minnesota (3000+) as in the entire Rocky Mountain region, Minnesota hunters experienced the highest deer kills ever in recent years, with Minnesota deer hunters killing over 250,000white-tailed deer during each of those hunting seasons – an approximate five-fold increase in hunter deer take since wolves were listed under the ESA in 1978.

Another claim made by wolf-hunt proponents is that hunting will reduce “conflicts” with livestock owners. Again this assertion is taken as a matter of faith without really looking into the veracity of it. Given the hysteria generated by the livestock industry one might think that the entire western livestock operations were in jeopardy from wolf predation. However, the number of livestock killed annually by wolves is pitifully small, especially by comparison to losses from other more mundane sources like poison plants, lightning and even domestic dogs.

For instance, the FWS reported that 75 cattle and 148 sheep were killed in Idaho during 2010. In Montana the same year 84cattle and 64 sheep were verified as killed by wolves. While any loss may represent a significant financial blow to individual ranchers, the livestock industry as a whole is hardly threatened by wolf predation. And it hardly warrants the exaggerated psychotic response by Congress, state legislators and state wildlife agenciesIn light of the fact that most losses are avoidable by implementation of simple measures of that reduce predator opportunity, persecution of predators like wolves is even more morally suspect. Rapid removal of dead carcasses from rangelands, corralling animals at night, electric fencing, and the use of herders, among other measures, are proven to significantly reduce predator losses—up to 90% in some studies. This suggests that ranchers have the capacity (if not the willingness) to basically make wolf losses a non-issues.
In light of the fact that most losses are avoidable by implementation of simple measures of that reduce predator opportunity, persecution of predators like wolves is even more morally suspect. Rapid removal of dead carcasses from rangelands, corralling animals at night, electric fencing, and the use of herders, among other measures, are proven to significantly reduce predator losses—up to 90% in some studies. This suggests that ranchers have the capacity (if not the willingness) to basically make wolf losses a non-issue.

However, since ranchers have traditionally been successful in externalizing many of their costs on to the land and taxpayers, including what should be their responsibility to reduce predator conflicts, I do not expect to see these kinds of measures enacted by the livestock industry any time soon, if ever. Ranchers are so used to being coddled; they have no motivation or incentives to change their practices in order to reduce predator losses. Why should they change animal husbandry practices when they can get the big bad government that they like to despise and disparage to come in and kill predators for them for free and even get environmental groups like Defenders of Wildlife to support paying for predator losses that are entirely avoidable?

But beyond those figures, wolf-hunting ignores a growing body of research that suggests that indiscriminate killing—which hunting is—actually exacerbates livestock/predator conflicts. The mantra of pro wolf-hunting community is that wolves should be “managed” like “other” wildlife. This ignores the findings that suggest that predators are not like other wildlife. They are behaviorally different from say elk and deer. Random killing of predators including bears, mountain lions and wolves creates social chaos that destabilizes predator social structure. Hunting of wolves can skew wolf populations towards younger animals. Younger animals are less skillful hunters. As a consequence, they will be more inclined to kill livestock. Destabilized and small wolf packs also have more difficulty in holding territories and even defending their kills from scavengers and other predators which in end means they are more likely to kill new prey animal.

As a result of these behavioral consequences, persecution of predators through hunting has a self fulfilling feedback mechanism whereby hunters kill more predators, which in turn leads to greater social chaos, and more livestock kills, and results in more demands for hunting as the presumed solution.

Today predator management by so called “professional” wildlife agencies is much more like the old time medical profession where sick people were bled. If they didn’t get better immediately, more blood was let. Finally if the patience died, it was because not enough blood was released from the body. The same illogical reasoning dominates predator management across the country. If killing predators doesn’t cause livestock losses to go down and/or game herds to rise, it must be because we haven’t killed enough predators yet.

Furthermore, most hunting occurs on larger blocks of public lands and most wolves as well as other predators killed by hunters have no relationship to the animals that may be killing livestock on private ranches or taking someone’s pet poodle from the back yard. A number of studies of various predators from cougars to bears show no relationship between hunter kills and a significant reduction in the actual animals considered to be problematic.

Again I hasten to add that most “problematic predators” are created a result of problem behavior by humans—for instance leaving animal carcasses out on the range or failure to keep garbage from bears, etc. and humans are supposed to be the more intelligent species—though if one were to observe predator management across the country it would be easy to doubt such presumptions.

Finally, wolf-hunting ignores yet another recent and growing body of scientific evidence that suggests that top predators have many top down ecological influences upon the landscape and other wildlife. The presence of wolves, for instance, can reduce deer and elk numbers in some places for some time period. But rather than viewing this as a negative as most hunters presume, reduction of prey species like elk can have many positive ecological influences. A reduction of elk herbivory on riparian vegetation can produce more song bird habitat. Wolves can reduce coyote predation on snowshoe hare thus competition for food by lynx, perhaps increasing survival for this endangered species. Wolves have been shown to increase the presence of voles and mice near their dens—a boon for some birds of prey like hawks. These and many other positive effects on the environment are ignored by wolf-hunt proponents and unfortunately by state wildlife management agencies as well who continue to advocate and/or at least not effectively counter old fallacies about predators.

Most state agencies operate under the assumption that production of elk and deer for hunters to shoot should have priority in wildlife management decisions. All state wildlife agencies are by law supposed to manage wildlife as a public trust for all citizens. Yet few challenge the common assumption that elk and deer exist merely for the pleasure of hunters to shoot.

I have no doubt that for many pro wolf-hunt supporters’ predators represent all that is wrong with the world. Declining job prospects, declining economic vitality of their rural communities, changes in social structures and challenges to long-held beliefs are exemplified by the wolf. Killing wolves is symbolic of destroying all those other things that are in bad in the world for which they have no control. They vent this misdirected anger on wolves-- that gives them the illusion that they can control something.

Nevertheless, making wolves and other predators scapegoats for the personal failures of individuals or the collective failures of society is not fair to wolves or individuals either. The entire premises upon which western wolf-hunts are based either are the result of inaccurate assumptions about wolf impacts or morally corrupt justifications like relieving hunter anger and frustrations over how their worlds are falling apart.

I applaud the few environmental groups that had the courage to stand up for wolves, and to challenge the old guard that currently controls our collective wildlife heritage. More of us need to stand up against persecution of wildlife to appease the frustrations of disenfranchised rural residents. It is time to have wildlife management based on science, and ecological integrity, not based upon relieving hunter frustrations over the disintegration state of their world.

For on predator studies and management seehttp://www.thewildlifenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/Predator-report.pdf

George Wuerthner is an ecologist and former hunting guide with a degree in wildlife biology