Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Leaving Black Bears to the side as the apex trophic carnivore roaming the New York State woodlands, farms and fields, the Bobcat and Coyote are the Empire States' two largest mesocarnivores..............The NY State Dept. of Conservation released its proposed 5 year Bobcat management plan and of course hunters and trappers got "first dibs" on establishing the protocols........The DEC did step up and acknowledge that there are other "users" of Bobcats, including wildlife enthusiasts and photographers (as examples of non-hunting "workers of the outdoors".............The problem that so many of us readers of this blog still see with this thinking goes back to "use",,,,,,,,,,,,We humans should be factored into any wildlife mgmt plan,,,,,but not only on how we "consume wildlife",,,,,, Also critical to incorporate into any plan is how wildlife works into the circle of land health.........Leopold's land ethic is never even given lip service from land managers when devising plans on wildlife populations.........If only they(and we) would start "thinking like the mountain" which knows far too well the negative impacts that come about when carnivore populations are either stripped from the land or reduced to so minute levels so as not to be able to fulfill ecosystem services(thanks to our friend Frank Carbone for sending me this article)

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Bobcat Scientific Name: Lynx rufus New York State Bobcat Management Plan The Management Plan for Bobcat in New York State, 2012-2017 (PDF) ...
Monday, January 23, 2012

When it comes to wolves and pumas, th pundits are always quick to go negative and state that there is "virtually no chance" that they will ever recolonize a region that they formally called home.............Last seen in Illinois as the civil war broke out in 1860, forest and prairie conversion to farm and town seems to leave only "fragments" of wild lands remaining for C.lups.........There is a viable deer population for both wolves and pumas to prey on,,,,,,,,there is an attempt by the State to put aside more open space,,,,,,,,,and road densities in sections of Illinois are still modest in scope...............Additional forest preserve cover seems to be the key if Wolves and pumas are to once again make their home in prairie country

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Gray wolves unlikely to make a comeback to Illinois by Lorena Villa-Parkman Illinois shouldn´t be crying wolf. At least not yet.

 There hav...
Saturday, January 21, 2012

A new friend of this blog, independent wildlife and wilderness advocate, Robert Goldman, published a recent article setting the record straight on why Wolves should be restored to Maine........." Wolves in Maine would naturally strengthen moose and deer populations here"....." It is what they do as vital, natural predators in every ecosystem they inhabit"....... "Field biologists report that with wolves back on the land, the entire ecology is healthier"........"The same ecological principles at work in the Rockies apply here in Maine"..... "With the wolves' return to their native New England homeland, prey species and the land itself will be healthier".... "That is the way nature works, just as we were taught in grade school"...."In the vast forest lands of Maine and across the region, there is ample room and prey for wolves to live here again, as they did for thousands of years"

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Robert Goldman: Of wolves, ecology and justice By Robert Goldman The Sun Journal of Maine   The paw print was almost the size of my hand....

Frequent blog contributor George Wuerthner(a good friend of ths publication) supplied us with this disheartening story on Montana ranchers blocking the State initiative, "BIGHORN SHEEP CONSERVATION STRATEGY,,,, by saying that the Dept of Fish& Wildlife has an obligation to consult with landowners abutting the planned release site, the Lewis & Clark Caverns area..........One of the statewide objectives in Montana's bighorn sheep strategy is to "establish five new viable and huntable populations over the course of the next 10 years and augment existing populations where appropriate." Relocations typically consist of 20 to 40 bighorns being released for two consecutive winters........ FWP has "struck out" with every attempt at sheep relocation during the past six years, and if that continues, Montanans will have to reconsider how to move forward...... Some large landowners fear bighorns interfere with ranching operations.......... Others worry that the public will disregard private property to view or hunt the sheep.........Bottom line that once again a narrow segment of the population(ranchers and hunters) determining the fate of wildlife populations.........THIS MUST CHANGE IF REWILDING IS TO TAKE PLACE AS GEORGE HAS SPOKEN ABOUT ELOQUENTLY IN HIS COLUMNS ON STATE GAME COMMISSIONS BEING CONSTANTLY "IN THE POCKETS" OF RANCHERS AND HUNTERS........ AND THOSE COMMISSIONS NOT SEEKING TO HEAR FROM ANY OTHER STATE RESIDENTS AS THEY MAKE THEIR LAND USE DECISIONS

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Bighorn transplant called off; neighbors say state tried to ram plan past them By EVE BYRON Independent Record The Billings Gazette   ...

Chris Spatz of COUGAR REWILDING clued me in on this MSNBC article on the proliferation of alleged Puma sightings taking place all across the Eastern half of the USA since this past Spring when a Dakota Puma wandered into Connectitcut and was killed in a vehicle collision.........Our friend Mark McCollough up at the USFW office in Maine once again reaffirming his belief that there is not a breeding population in the East outside of Florida.........Mark Dowling of THE COUGAR NETWORK reaffirms McCollough's findings stating "Cougars couldn't go undetected",,,, "They betray their presence readily by becoming road kill or chasing people's pets".............Spatz and Helen Mcginnis of COUGAR REWILDING have told me previously that they agree with this assessment,,,,,but Spatz and colleagues are in favor of rewilding our Eastern forests saying "Cougars' presence would change the way deer browse"........ "They would keep moving; you would see regeneration of your understory"....." Cougars are not a threat to people, pets and livestock".... "California, where there are an estimated 5,000 to 6,000 cougars and no hunting allowed, proves "we can coexist."........

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Cougars extinct in East? No way, say those who claim sightings Department of Energy and Environmental Protection This June 2011 photo by t...
1 comment:
Friday, January 20, 2012

So few Political leaders and Clergy are willing to speak out about our massive and unsutainable 7 billion human population that is headed to 10 billion by 2050....... As the utlimate trophic predator, we humans are at the heart of every environmental problem we face from animal extinction to pollution.....There are only a handful of notable folks like Thomas Friedman(NY Times columnist) and Dave Foreman(Rewilding Institute) who are willing to take on our archaic age old concepts about procreation and "growth",,,,, telling l it like it is and letting the chips fall where they might....... Friedman titled one of his recent books HOT FLAT AND CROWDED where he discussed how impossible it is for all 7 to 10 billion humans to carve out a USA middle class existance..............It would take 3 planet earths worth of resources for this to happen and that just "ain't" in the cards...........As Harvard University biologist Dr. E.O. Wilson said, "The worst thing that will probably happen—in fact is already well underway—is not energy depletion, economic collapse, conventional war, or the expansion of totalitarian governments. As terrible as these catastrophes would be for us, they can be repaired in a few generations. The one process now going on that will take millions of years to correct is loss of genetic and species diversity by the destruction of natural habitats. This is the folly our descendants are least likely to forgive us".............Dave Foreman writes, "We have come on like a swarm of locusts: a wide, thick, darkling cloud settling down like living snowflakes, smothering every stalk, every leaf, eating away every scrap of green down to raw, bare wasting earth. It's painfully straightforward. There are too many men for Earth to harbor…we are crippling Earth's life support system by such a flood of upright apes is bad news for us"

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By Frosty Wooldridge The Rewilding News A book review: Man Swarm and the Killing of Wildlife by Dave Foreman The Bible said, "Be...

The Catalina Fox that inhabits the Catalina Islands off the Coast of California has stepped back from extinction and now stand strong at over 1500 animals.........Great steps have been taken to keep the Foxes free from rabies, a key killing agent of this tiny carnivore.........Innoculating the foxes as well as educational programs alerting people to get their dogs rabies and distemper shots have led the foxes to the point where they one day soon might be removed from the Endangererd Species List

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Catalina Island fox makes astounding comeback Los Angeles Times Since falling to a low of 100 in 1999, the Catalina Island fox has rebounde...

While rabies outbreaks among foxes is a cyclical and reoccurring phenomena, Coyotes are much less prone to harbor the disease..............Interesting that Southwestern Texas seems to have experienced periodic epidemics in both canine groups over the past 20 years............Airplane drops of bait laden rabies vaccine have been successful in breaking the cycle and reducing new outbreaks to virtually zero............

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Texas nearly ends rabies with aerial vaccine drops Reuters Three King Air planes are lined up on a small runway in the town of Del Rio prep...
Thursday, January 19, 2012

Black bear harvests in Tennessee have increased on average by 21% annually since 1977. Prior to 1980, the annual harvest in the state was usually less than 20 bears. Today the picture could not be more astounding. Since 2004, Tennessee’s annual bear harvest has exceeded 300 animals! In 2009, a harvest of 571 bears in Tennessee set a new state record. These harvests are indicative of a growing bear population that is possibly higher today than it has been in the last 150 years........2011 hunter numbers just coming in with a new record of 581 Black bears taken.............Let me reiterate that the number of animals killed in a hunting season is just one barometer of the population status of that particular animal.........Does not take into account age classifications or the disruption of social bonds of the animals..........does not take into account that many biologists feel that there should be no hunting of carnivores based on their trophic funtction in keeping the land healthy............At least, Tennessee Wildlife Officials have moved the hunting season to December allowing prenant females to den,,,,however in this mideastern State, warming temps might begin to disrupt historical denning dates and it might be necessary to push hunting back into January to ensure least disruption to the female bear population

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New Era in Black Bear Management in Tennessee By David M. Brandenburg, Wildlife Biologist, Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency .The gro...

Our friend Norm Bishop shedding a spotlight on how wrong it is to artificially feed wild animals like deer and elk..........Feeding Stations like the kind at play on The National Elk Refuge in Jackson Hole, Wyoming congregate Elk in finite areas............Like in crowded human cities where illnesses can spread rapidly because of proximity of people, so does chronic wasting disease(CWD) and Brucellosis explode exponentially in Bison, Deer, Elk and other browsers in artificial feeding areas............Norm shares portions of biologist Bruce L. Smith's excellent peer reviewed paper, WHERE ELK ROAM-CONSERVATION AND BIOPOLITICS OF OUR NATIONAL ELK HERD which reinforces how aberrant and harmful artificial feeding stations are to both wild and domestic animals and uses it as a "point/counterpoint" to suggest how off-base Idaho Senator Monty Pearce is in calling for perpetual winter feeding of Elk in Jackson Hole

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From: Norman Bishop < nabishop@q.com > Date: Thu, Jan 19, 2012 at 2:37 PM Subject: Re: Urgent Idaho Legislative update! Feeding elk ...

Joe Carnahan, Director of the new movie, THE GREY claims he was not intending to show Wolves as man eaters,,,,,,,,I have to shout out to Joe: "WAKE UP MAN,,,,,,,YOU AND YOUR EDITORS ARE NOT NAIVE CHILDREN,,,,,,YOU HAD TO KNOW THAT THE DEPICTION OF WOLVES SEEKING TO KILL PEOPLE WOULD ENGENDER AGE OLD "LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD" FEARS IN THE AVERAGE FILM VIEWER",,,,,,,,,,,,SO DISAPPOINTING THAT YOU ACT NAIVE AND ACTUALLY EXPECT US TO BELIEVE THAT YOUR FILM IS ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLY AND POSITIVELY PORTRAYING WOLVES IN THE WILD........JEEZ LOUISE, THIS IS AN EXPLOITATION MOVIE PLAIN AND SIMPLE..........JUST OWN UP TO IT AND SAY YOU WANTED TO PROVOKE PRIMAL FEAR IN PEOPLE,,,,,,,DON'T BE A COWARD AND ACT ALL INNOCENT

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'The Grey' director Joe Carnahan: wolves win The alpha wolf challenges the Liam Neeson character, Ottway, and other plane crash ...
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Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Yes, you can temporarily increase Moose numbers in the Kenai Peninsula section of Alaska by shooting Wolves from airplanes,,,,,,,,,,, but it is not the long term solution to Moose sustainability...........Habitat protection as discussed weekly on this blog is always the key to optimum predator and prey occupancy on the land.............The Moose in what is known as Units 15A and 15C have been on the decline for 30 years and Alaska Fish & Game acknowledge that "the main problem in 15A has been identified as a lack of quality habitat for moose"......... "Nutritious moose browse is most effectively produced by fire, and 15A hasn't seen a big wildfire in 40 years"......... "The Kenai National Wildlife Refuge, which covers about 80 percent of the land in 15A, hasn't conducted any large-scale controlled burns"........ "Doing so is challenging, what with oil and gas development, a busy airspace, expanding human development and a lack of a defensible firebreak between civilization and wilderness".............."To add another wrinkle, the refuge has said it does not support aerial wolf control and will not allow it on the refuge, leaving Fish and Game only a small chunk of state and privately owned land in 15A to possibly conduct an aerial wolf-control program on if private landowners give their approval now that the board has".......With the limitation of available land on which to conduct aerial wolf kills, and the evidence that poor habitat is the biggest hindrance to a robust moose population in 15A, Fish and Game has been reluctant to pursue wolf predator control in the past............. But declining moose harvest numbers has prompted the department to proceed, with the idea that killing wolves will free up moose for human hunters..........Talk about hypocrisy, polititical "b.s" and utter wildlife mismanagement policy that is resulting once again with wolves wrongly in the crosshairs

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Aerial wolf killing set for March • Kenai Peninsula units unanimously approved for game management units 15A and 15C By Jenny Neyman Red...