New Study Maps the Way for California Wolves, Highlights Key Strategies for Coexistence. Now that wolves have returned to California after a nearly 90-year absence, where are they most likely to live? Will their new territories overlap significantly with grazing lands and create conflicts with livestock? What kind of proactive strategies are most feasible for northern California ranchers to implement on their operations to keep both livestock and wolves safe from harm?
These are important questions if we are going to have successful wolf recovery in California. Getting better insight on these questions will help protect both wolves and ranchers by reducing the risk of potential predation by wolves on livestock, and thereby reducing conflicts.
A dynamic duo reunites: Defenders and the Bren School
To help us answer these questions, we partnered with the UC Santa Barbara Bren School of Environmental Science and Management. The Bren School focuses on finding science-based solutions to environmental problems, and has a well-earned reputation as one of the top schools of its kind in the nation. The Bren Master’s Program challenges students to use real world scenarios to solve environmental problems faced by an actual client that has a real interest in the outcome.
This is the second time Defenders’ California Program has worked with the Bren School. Our first Bren School project focused on identifying areas for solar energy development in the San Joaquin Valley in a way that avoids or minimizes adverse impacts to wildlife, habitat and high-resource value agricultural lands. We truly enjoyed our partnership with Bren and were so pleased with the professional-level results that we jumped at the opportunity to work with them again.
Bren Students, AKA “Los Lobos” Map Conflict Hotspots
Our wolf proposal to Bren was accepted by a five-member group of graduate students that promptly dubbed themselves Los Lobos. Their overarching project goal was to help ranchers and livestock producers in northern California reduce the likelihood of conflicts with wolves. Their key objectives were to:
- Analyze current or potential livestock grazing areas, and overlap those with areas where experts believe gray wolves will live, in order to map out where wolf-livestock conflict could most likely happen.
- Recommend proactive strategies for livestock producers in northern California to use to reduce conflicts between livestock and wolves.
To complete the first project objective, Los Lobos identified potentially suitable wolf habitat using three separate models that looked at many different variables that can make an area good or bad habitat for wolves. These included things like how much forest cover there is, how much prey is available, how many humans live nearby, who owns the land, and how many roads cut through the area.
Los Lobos found that prey density and forest cover ended up being the most important factors. Once they mapped predicted wolf habitat, the team overlaid a map of grazing lands statewide to identify potential conflict hotspots:
The team then developed and distributed a survey to livestock producers in seven northern California counties closest to the Oregon border where California’s wolves are most likely to originate: Del Norte, Humboldt, Trinity, Siskiyou, Shasta, Modoc and Lassen. These counties were also selected because agriculture, especially livestock production, makes up a large part of their economies. The survey was designed to collect information on general attitudes towards wolves in the area, and get a feel for how open livestock producers might be to taking new, proactive measures to reduce potential conflicts with wolves. It asked about specific tools and strategies that could work in the area, including special fencing, alarms and scare devices, livestock guardian dogs, changing timing and/or location of grazing or birthing season of young, increasing human presence with range riders, and removing attractants like injured or sick cattle and carcasses.
The team’s model predicted more than 50,000 square kilometers (or 19,305 square miles) of potential suitable wolf habitat in California. This habitat is primarily found on forested lands in the northwestern part of the state from the Oregon border south through Mendocino County, southern Cascades and portions of the western foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Since livestock grazing occurs in much of northern California on both private and public lands, there is extensive overlap between predicted wolf habitat and grazing lands. Lands in western Siskiyou and Shasta counties, eastern Humboldt County, much of Trinity County, the southern Cascades and northern Sierra foothills all include potential conflict hotspots.
Simple solutions can make a big difference. Removing attractants and using range riders across the vast rangelands in northern California ranked high on the list of the most preferred and feasible options for avoiding conflicts between wolves and livestock. One way to encourage more producers to take on these methods is through cost-sharing programs, which Defenders and other conservation groups have done successfully in other states.
It’s worth noting that all seven strategies listed in the survey are effectively being used by at least some livestock producers in northern California in an effort to protect their livestock from wolves and other predators. And that’s why Defenders continues to work with northern California ranchers. As wolves continue to return to this landscape, we’ll help livestock producers test different tools and strategies to determine the best way to keep their livestock and California’s wolves safe.
Fight for wolves in court. Help Us Win Our Courtroom Showdown for Yellowstone's Wolves. Wolves need our help. We're rushing to defend Wyoming's wolves in the U.S. Court of Appeals. Please lend your strong support so we can wage and win this legal battle for wolves.
Help
Us Win Our Courtroom Showdown for Yellowstone's Wolves
We're
rushing to defend Wyoming's wolves in the U.S. Court of Appeals. Please lend
your strong support so we can wage and win this legal battle for wolves.
Wolves are in the crosshairs again:
We're gearing up for the next crucial round in our legal fight against the senseless slaughter of Wyoming's wolves — this time, a major showdown in the United States Court of Appeals.
At stake in this important case is a state's right to declare open season on wolves — allowing them to be shot on sight across most of Wyoming with no questions asked. And the court's decision will decide the fate of hundreds of wolves in Wyoming.
When the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service tried to boot Wyoming's wolves from the endangered species list in 2014, we rushed to court. With your support, we won a resounding victory that forced the agency to restore protections and required Wyoming to put forward a reasonable wolf recovery plan.
Yet today — 18 months after our win — Wyoming still has not delivered a credible plan for protecting its wolves. Instead of holding the state's feet to the fire, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has chosen to appeal the court's decision, opening a new legal front in the war on wolves.
It's going to be one tough fight. Arrayed against us are the federal government, the state of Wyoming and the National Rifle Association — all determined to keep Wyoming's disastrous plan in place.
Your tax-deductible donation will enable us to take on that three-fold opposition in court ... hold Wyoming's extreme wolf-killing policy at bay ... and keep wolves on the endangered species list until the state puts forth a legitimate plan to protect them. You can be sure we will defend our environment in the most effective way possible.
Make no mistake: We haven't fought so hard — for so long — only to let the government abandon Wyoming's wolves and slam the door shut on wolf recovery.
Please stand with NRDC in the U.S. Court of Appeals by lending your strong support today. Thank you for helping us keep the dream of wolf recovery alive.
BREAKING: A despicable new low in the war on wildlife. You and I could be looking at the end of endangered species protection as we know it.
Senator Rand Paul introduced S. 855, the so-called "Endangered Species Management Self-Determination Act," and now a companion bill has been introduced in the House.
If passed, these bills would be nothing short of a dagger in the heart of the Endangered Species Act (ESA).
Your urgent donation will help us turn back this catastrophic attack on endangered wildlife.
As you know, wildlife and wildlife protections are under a brutal wave of assault worse than anything I have ever seen. This is the 105th legislative attack on the Endangered Species Act this Congress. And it’s by far the scariest.
If passed:
- All endangered and threatened species would be automatically delisted five years after listing, even if they still desperately need protection;
- No species could be listed without approval by the states and by Congress;
- Government officials would no longer be required to respond to listing petitions, the main tool by which species gain ESA protections;
- Approximately 900 species – over half of all listed U.S. species – could lose protections
...And those are just a few examples of the destructive policies that would be put in place.
Let’s be realistic, this would be the end of endangered species protection as we know it. That’s why we call it the “Extinction Acceleration Act.”
You and I know this is not what Americans want. This war on wildlife is driven by states’ rights extremists, developers and other special interests who consider protecting wildlife a nuisance at best.
Without the Endangered Species Act, countless species could be lost forever.
We’re fighting back. And with you at our side, I am confident that we, and the wildlife we all love, will win.
Stop U.S. Fish and Wildlife from Killing the Dell Creek Wolf Pack.
To conserve, protect and enhance fish, wildlife, and plants and their habitats for the continuing benefit of the American people.
This is the mission statement of the US Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS). Yet, their actions this spring have conveyed an entirely different intention: USFWS has been on a wolf killing spree in western Wyoming. 10 wolves from three separate packs have been “eliminated” by aerial gunning, and, in the words of Mike Jimenez, the USFWS’ wolf coordinator, “if we could have got more, we would have taken more.”
What was these animals’ crime? Behaving like wolves. They have attacked some cattle on a local ranch, and for this, the USFWS has decided to kill all of the remaining 11 members of the Dell Creek pack. It is spring. These wolves have likely just had pups. Mowing down the remaining 11 adults will mean starvation and death of the new puppies.
The USFWS is simply acting as ranchers’ henchman in Wyoming right now. A 2014 study funded by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife found that livestock killings actually increase when area wolves are killed. But the very next year, Jimenez wrote a response saying that killing lots of wolves from aggressive packs is an effective deterrent, and this has been the policy ever since.
54 Wyoming wolves were killed in 2015, and 2016 is on track to see an even higher body count. We must stop this. We must demand that the USFWS stand up first and foremost for the protection of wild animals, and use nonlethal means to reduce wolf-livestock conflict in the case of the Dell Creek Pack.
Nonlethal techniques to deter the Dell Creek pack have not even been attempted this spring. Instead, the service resorted immediately to collaring one member of the pack, then using that “Judas” wolf to track and shoot the others from planes.
This is not the will of the public. The USFWS is serving special interests from private cattle ranchers, and is wreaking havoc on endangered wolf populations in the very areas where they were reintroduced by us, to save them from the brink of extinction in the U.S.
Please sign this petition to make your voice heard. Call on the USFWS to act on behalf of wildlife and the public trust, and cease the extermination of the Dell Creek wolf pack immediately.
NATIONAL NEWS MEDIA--WE URGE YOU TO DO AN INVESTIGATIVE REPORT ON POACHING AND THE TREATMENT OF WOLVES IN THIS COUNTRY!
Update #3
This petition will take and make the case to the National news media to do an investigative report on the rogue wildlife service agency under the direction of the USDA. And to show people exactly how barbaric traps are on not only the wildlife , but many pets and NOW , in Montana , on the outskirts of Missoula , people are afraid to let their pets and even children out to play in the grasslands and brush around their homes because of Traps set everywhere. It must stop
Update #2
Since this petition was started , the war on wolves in Idaho has only gotten twice as bad. Now , Idaho, with the backing of the WELFARE RANCHERS and TROPHY HUNTING OUTFITTERS in this state has manipulated the Fish & wildlife of the U.S. and the U.S. Forest service into using the Wildlife Services of the USDA to collar wolves in very remote areas and have admitted that they have collared these wolves to use as JUDAS wolves.
Update #1 9 months ago
This petition will only wok if it receives at least 100,000 signatures. We have to make the media listen to us and bring the problem that WE have right here in the U.S.. Our wildlife and wolves are being butchered by the tens of thousands. We must also tell them to investigate the Mckittric policy. It states that the courts have to prove that when a person shoots an animal that it was endangered-- a free ticket to poach.
Since the news media reported the senseless killing of Cecil we need to take advantage of how this opened peoples eyes to the treatment and hunting of our imperiled wildlife. We need to make everyone in this country aware of and to realize how bad the wolves are mistreated through trapping , poisoning, hunting, aerial shooting and Poaching. We need the national media to do this. We need a large amount of signatures on this petition to hopefully get one to do a story on wolves.
Make it illegal for hunters to hunt wolves all over the USA
TARGET: President Barak Obama, White House, Congress
I live close to the white house and where President Barak Obama lives I will some how get this to the white house. The hunters hunt down wolves in the winter when they have no place to hide and shoot them from a plane and chase them until they are totally exhausted. That and they use snares and poisons and traps that hurt the wolves. And those wolves could have a family of their own and they wouldn't be able to get to their cubs before death and sometimes they get to the den only to die in front of the cubs how sad. sign this petition to make it illegal to hunt wolves in the USA tell president Obama to make it illegal to hunt wolves no wolf should be tortured in such a horrible way.
Welcome Home, Lobos. This is a moment for tears of joy. Two Mexican wolf pups from a captive-bred
population in Missouri made the long trek to the Gila National Forest this
month, where researchers carried them to a den site and placed them with a
wild-born litter. The release of these precious puppies marks a monumental step
forward. With just 97 lobos roaming the wild at the end of 2015, this first
release of 2016 is vital progress toward the species’ recovery. Let’s keep the
pressure on to ensure more releases. Tell the Service to release more wolves
today! Take action >>>
Help Us Save the World's Last Red Wolves. Red wolves are in terrible trouble -- there are as few as 45 left in the wild. That's why earlier this week the Center for Biological Diversity and our allies filed an emergency petition to force the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to establish new populations of red wolves, take steps to reduce shooting deaths and reclassify all red wolves as "essential" so they get the protections they desperately need.
This can only happen with your help. A contribution to the Center's Wolf Defense Fund will give us the resources we need to take on Washington's apathy and secure a future for these beautiful animals.
It's infuriating that we have to force the government to do its job. Red wolves are one of the most endangered animals on the planet, but the Service, charged with protecting these wolves, caved under anti-wolf pressure and allowed some of the last, wild red wolves to be shot, trapped or "go missing" without a whimper of protest. Sadly the wolf population has declined by more than 50 percent in the past two years.
Help Us Save the World's Last Red Wolves. That's why the Center has moved decisively to establish a future for red wolves. With your donation to the Center's Wolf Defense Fund, we'll ensure the Fish and Wildlife Service resumes the recovery efforts critical to the survival of these wolves.
The future of red wolves hangs in the balance. They urgently need new pups to shore up their genetic viability -- plus strong, unequivocal protection if they're going to stave off extinction. Instead these wolves are winking out one by one, while the agency designated to protect them does nothing. With your help the Center and our allies are fighting back to force the Service to do its job -- because if we don't fight, we'll lose this mysterious, social species for good.
Help us now with your generous gift to the Wolf Defense Fund and send a clear message that red wolves are precious. We can't just turn our backs and let them slip away forever.
Emergency Help Sought for Dwindling Red
Wolves
Red wolves are in trouble. Since the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
abandoned efforts to recover these exceedingly rare animals, which today live
only in North Carolina, their population has dropped by more than 50 percent in
just two years. Now they're down to as few as 45.
That's why the Center
for Biological Diversity and allies filed an emergency petition this week
calling on the agency to establish additional populations of red wolves, take
steps to reduce shooting deaths, and reclassify all reintroduced populations of
red wolves as "essential" experimental populations so they get the protections
they desperately need.
"Red wolves face the very real possibility of
vanishing forever," said the Center's Brett Hartl. "Sadly the Fish and Wildlife
Service seems more concerned about appeasing a small minority of anti-wildlife
extremists in North Carolina than preventing the extinction of these wolves." Read more and watch a video at Examiner.
Stand with Guardians to Protect
The Tuccanon Pack, one of the 18 gray wolf packs now living in Washington State, was looking down the barrel of a Wildlife Services’ gun this past Christmas. Once doomed by a scorched earth, carnivore-killing plan, their fate is now temporarily secured.
With your help, WildEarth Guardians stopped Wildlife Services’ plan to kill more wolves in Washington, and, as a result, the Tuccanon Pack runs wild and free today, and will have more pups within weeks.
Every time you support Guardians, you help us restore the balance on our public lands by standing up to the daily and weekly threats to wolves and other wildlife and the wild places they need to thrive.
Thanks to you, we’ve got the villains threatening our West’s wildness on the ropes. Villains like Wildlife Services, Big Coal companies like Peabody, and the wackos that occupied the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge.
But there are many more battles to fight, and they’re in state legislatures, rural towns, and courtrooms across the West.
Wildness is essential. Wildness belongs to you. Wildness belongs to us!
We are in this together and can give wildness its voice; and we can be just as loud, assertive, and tenacious as we need to be.
Inappropriate Appropriations
The House Interior, Environment and Related Agencies Subcommittee has released its draft FY 2017 Interior appropriations bill, and it includes a number of harmful riders that would undermine protections for our air, land, water and wildlife. Some of the most egregious additions would overturn two federal court decisions and stripEndangered Species Act (ESA) protections for gray wolves in the Great Lakes region and Wyoming. Other riders would block potential ESA protections for the greater sage-grouse, approve mining of ancient groundwater reserves in California and attempt to undermine wildlife safeguards for logging on important forest lands. Once again, the House is using the Interior appropriations bill, which is intended to fund government programs to conserve wildlife and public lands, to instead attack species, undermine environmental protections and give away our natural resources to big business. Stay tuned as this bill and the Senate version move forward.
The House Interior, Environment and Related Agencies Subcommittee has released its draft FY 2017 Interior appropriations bill, and it includes a number of harmful riders that would undermine protections for our air, land, water and wildlife. Some of the most egregious additions would overturn two federal court decisions and stripEndangered Species Act (ESA) protections for gray wolves in the Great Lakes region and Wyoming. Other riders would block potential ESA protections for the greater sage-grouse, approve mining of ancient groundwater reserves in California and attempt to undermine wildlife safeguards for logging on important forest lands. Once again, the House is using the Interior appropriations bill, which is intended to fund government programs to conserve wildlife and public lands, to instead attack species, undermine environmental protections and give away our natural resources to big business. Stay tuned as this bill and the Senate version move forward.
