Recent WSU Wolf Study Has Some Flaws -Continued

Recent WSU Wolf Study Has Some Flaws -Continued

Yesterday I began a conversation with Western Wyoming sheep producer and editor of The Shepherd magazine Cat Urbigkit about a recent Washington State University research paper concerning livestock depredation — the research claims that by killing wolves who kill livestock in the long run would only cause more livestock depredation.
Urbigkit disagrees with the assumption of the paper and shares
Urbigkit: “We all know that we have wolves on the landscape and that is something that we have to deal with. We realize that but having this false information put out there is not helping anyone in learning how to deal with wolves on the landscape. I think this was an extremely flawed paper that the press are having a hey day with and it is really unfortunate because it really not reflective of what is like to live on the ground with wolves.”
Urbigkit shares one of the paper’s claims that hasn’t much been mentioned in the media.
Urbigkit: “It appears that lethal wolf control to reduce the number of livestock depredated is associated with increased not decreased depredation the following year on a large scale at least until the mortality exceeds 25 percent. What they were looking at was a wolf population that was increasing substantially over this period of time. So, it takes at least killing 25 percent of the wolf population in order to stop the growth rate. So if control efforts exceed 25 percent then the wolf population begins to decrease and that results in lower livestock depredation. But that isn’t the kind of stuff that has been making the headlines from this paper.”

 

Previous ReportRecent WSU Wolf Study Has Some Flaws
Next ReportHops Researched as Possible Aid for Horse Diseases