Veteran and highly regarded Wolf Biologist Lu Carbyn is at the head of the "environmental line" seeking an end to the $500 per Wolf kill Bounty that is currently in effect in Alberta, Canada....600 or so Wolves "bountied" over the past 5 years in the Province......"If they(Alberta) have a wolf control program, it should not be a broad-scale program"...... "It should be problem-specific, limited in duration and carefully monitored"........“It’s a blanket approach, it’s open for abuse".......... "There’s no way that you can control how the animals were killed, where they come from"....... "You can be bringing in wolf carcasses from, you know, Saskatchewan and you can present them here for sale as bounties"..............Most studied Wolf experts concur with Carbyn and are only in favored of "surgical removal" of Wolves proven to be preying on livestock, not wholesale removal via bounties........................Alberta’s management of wolves was also condemned by Kevin Van Tighem, a former superintendent of Banff National Park who has recently released a book, The Homeward Wolf................ “We need to start managing wolves based on biology, not bigotry"............. “These are all sorts of violent things we are doing to these animals"..........."There’s no question wolves need to be managed"........ “They are predators and can become a real problem, but you need to manage them humanely and based on their biology"............. "The random killing of wolves breaks up packs and causes more problems because they lose their hunting ability"

http://fw.to/qtMOsmR

CONSERVATIONISTS ASK ALBERTA GOVERNMENT TO END WOLF BOUNTY

An international conservation group says Alberta should get rid of bounties on wolves.

Several municipalities and some private hunting groups pay the bounty, but the International Union for the Conservation of Nature says it's not an effective way to control the population.

• Carolyn Campbell of the Alberta Wilderness Association agrees, arguing the Alberta government has to find a better method.

"It should be leading the scientific management of wolves, not a bunch of private hunting groups or local municipalities that may be well-meaning but are not actually addressing the problem in a modern way."

Campbell says Alberta Fish and Wildlife's own scientists have also said bounties are not effective and the province needs a more scientific method to deal with problem wolves.

Lu Carbyn, a retired wolf biologist and a member of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, agrees the bounty system used in Alberta is flawed.

“It’s an archaic and old-fashioned way of managing wildlife,” he said.

“It’s a blanket approach, it’s open for abuse. There’s no way that you can control how the animals were killed, where they come from. You can be bringing in wolf carcasses from, you know, Saskatchewan and you can present them here for sale as bounties.”

Carbyn says Alberta should instead use predator control officers to specifically target wolves that are preying on livestock.

Officials in Idaho and Wyoming have had good success going after problem wolves using aerial hunting, he said.

One reason wolves are thriving in Alberta is that the deer and elk populations are also doing well, according to Carbyn.

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Ludwig "Lu" Norbert Carbyn (born 19 August 1941) is an internationally recognized expert on wolf biology,^[1][2] a research scientist emeritus at the Canadian Wildlife Service, and an adjunct professor at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Alberta. He has studied wolf ecology and behaviour in Canada since 1970, including pioneering research into the ecological role of wolves as predators in the Canadian Rocky Mountains and great plains as well as the wolf-bison ecosystem of Wood Buffalo National Park. On a Canadian Wildlife Service assignment in Jasper National Park, he became the first human to study wild wolves from within a wolf pack using habituation, a method of gaining insights into the biology of wolves portrayed in fiction by Farley Mowat's popular book and film, Never Cry Wolf.^[1]
Carbyn has conducted research on the ecology of various species of canids in Poland, Portugal, and throughout North America, and was the chairman of the successful Canadian Swift Fox Reintroduction program Recovery Team from 1989 to 1993.^[3] He has published six books and numerous articles about wolves, including The Buffalo Wolf - Predators, Prey and the Politics of Nature (2003, Smithsonian Books) which was distinguished as "Best of the Year - Wildlife" in 2004 by the Canadian Geographic magazine.^[4] In 2013, Carbyn received the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal for services to wildlife conservation in Canada.^[5]
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http://www.montrealgazette.com/technology/Global+science+group+criticizes+Alberta+wolf+bounties/9494818/story.html

Global science group criticizes Alberta wolf bounties, says they don't work

BY BOB WEBER, THE CANADIAN PRESS FEBRUARY 11, 2014

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• STORY
• PHOTOS ( 2 )

The world's largest network of conservation scientists is calling worlf bounties an archaic and ineffective way of controlling wolf populations.

Photograph by: Gary Kramer , AP Photo/U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

EDMONTON - Alberta programs that offer cash for dead wolves are obsolete and ineffective and the provincial government should take steps to forbid them, says the world's largest network of conservation scientists.

In a letter to Alberta Premier Alison Redford, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature asks the government to "eliminate the archaic and out-dated methods of wolf bounty payments."

But defenders of the program say wolf populations are growing in Alberta and something needs to be done to keep them in check.

Last spring, environmentalists warned that privately-funded bounties for killing wolves are shifting control over Alberta's wildlife management to special interest groups.

They pointed out that at least six municipal districts, as well as two branches of the Alberta Fish and Game Association, were paying wolf bounties of up to $500 per wolf — several times the value of the animal's pelt.

U.S. hunting groups such as the Wild Sheep Foundation have paid out thousands of dollars on wolf bounties through local fish and game clubs.

As of last spring, at least 643 bounties had been paid out in Alberta, they said.

The information about bounties spurred the international union, which advises the United Nations on conservation matters, to write letters to both Redford and Alberta Environment Minister Robin Campbell.

"The bounty payments ... are (an) ineffective method of predator management and would be unacceptable in many countries around the world," said the Feb. 4 letter.

Bounties don't target the specific wolves and wolf packs that attack livestock and reduce big-game populations, said Lu Carbyn, a University of Alberta biologist and member of the union's canid specialist group.

"If you have just trapping and shooting, you're not necessarily killing all the pack — just a portion of them," said Carbyn. "The wolves get smarter, and they're going to do their thing."It makes some inroads into the wolf population, but it won't solve the problem."

Carbyn said U.S. game managers radio-collar one member of a pack — called the Judas wolf — and use that to locate and eliminate an entire pack if it starts causing problems.

Gordon Poirier of the Alberta Fish and Game Association said he's aware of the skepticism over bounty programs, but said the combined take of hunters and trappers in the province don't begin to control burgeoning wolf numbers.

"The wolf population is almost out of control," he said.

Alternative measures, such as sterilizing a pack's alpha male and female, have been blocked in the past by public outcry, he said. He maintains bounty programs are targeted and do work.

He acknowledges the problem is made worse by increasing human encroachment into wolf habitat, but adds that doesn't change anything.

"You have to do something," Poirier said. "They have to be controlled."

In his response, Campbell seems to acknowledge that scientists have a point.

"Government staff have met with several of the municipalities offering wolf bounties and provided them with information indicating that these types of programs are not effective in reducing wolf depredation," he wrote on Jan. 3.

Carbyn said Alberta's current approach goes against internationally agreed-on standards for wildlife management."If they have a wolf control program, it should not be a broad-scale program," he said. "It should be problem-specific, limited in duration and carefully monitored."

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