Based on the population dynamics in Idaho\u2019s wolf population, the state estimates humans would need to kill about 37% of Idaho\u2019s estimated wolf population each year for six years to reach the goal of an average population of 500 wolves<\/p>\n
While nearly everyone in the wolf debate says it\u2019s extremely difficult to get an accurate count of the animals within the state\u2019s borders, some wolf advocates don\u2019t agree with Idaho officials on how many wolves are actually in the state due to the research methods used until recently.<\/p>\n
And some worry that if the state doesn\u2019t have an accurate wolf population count, it doesn\u2019t know how many wolves should be killed under the management plan.<\/p>\n
Current wolf hunting, trapping policies a grim reminder of eradication campaign from the past, early wolf member of wolf management team says<\/p>\n
Idaho legislators are driving the policy by responding to concerns from farmers and ranchers who have had animals like sheep and cattle killed by wolves.<\/p>\n
Between 2014 and 2023, wolves in Idaho killed a minimum of 1,291 domestic livestock animals, according to state records. The losses affected 299 different ranchers and farmers.<\/p>\n
But for Marcie Carter, one of the early members of the Nez Perce Tribe\u2019s program<\/a> that managed wolves in Idaho, the expansion of wolf hunting and trapping and the government-sponsored killing of wolves in Idaho is a grim reminder of the eradication campaign that nearly killed off all wolves in the U.S. Rocky Mountains by the 1940s.<\/p>\n Wolves are a native species in Idaho and all across the U.S. But as setters moved West, the U.S. government passed wolf-killing bounties<\/a> meant to encourage westward expansion. By 1926, rangers had killed the last wolves in Yellowstone National Park. The last wolf in Idaho was killed in the 1930s<\/a>, according to the Idaho Department of Fish and Game.<\/p>\n In one of the most successful and controversial wildlife comeback stories in American history, the U.S. government reintroduced wolves to Yellowstone and Idaho in 1995.<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cWe did all this great work, and we spent hours and hours out in the woods and then to come to this point where they\u2019re treated like vermin, it\u2019s really disorienting,\u201d said Carter, who now works as the watershed coordinator for the Nez Perce Tribe\u2019s Department of Fisheries Resource Management.<\/p>\n The impact of wolves on livestock in Idaho<\/p>\n Having livestock killed is a big deal to the rancher who owns that animal.<\/p>\n But some wolf advocates say that, big picture, the number of livestock killed by wolves is pretty low every year.<\/p>\n From 2018 to 2022, there were an average of 259 livestock deaths each year in Idaho that were deemed \u201cconfirmed\u201d or \u201cprobable\u201d wolf kills, according to the Idaho Department of Fish and Game. <\/a>(Depredation is the term officials use when a predator like a wolf kills or maims livestock like cattle. Idaho Department of Fish and Game officials said \u201cconfirmed\u201d or \u201cprobable\u201d determinations are dependent on sufficient evidence remaining, which is dependent on very rapid detection and investigation of the carcass and minimal disturbance by scavengers. Those criteria often aren\u2019t met in remote environments, therefore the documented \u201cconfirmed\u201d and \u201cprobable\u201d depredations should be considered a minimum number, Fish and Game officials said.)<\/p>\n That\u2019s in a state with about 2.5 million head of cattle and 235,000 sheep \u2013 including on feedlots and dairies where wolves and other predators are not present.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n That means wolves kill an average of about 0.01% of Idaho\u2019s combined cattle and sheep population each year.<\/p>\n How does Idaho estimate its wolf population?<\/p>\n All sides in the wolf debate agree it is extremely difficult to produce an exact population count of wolves in Idaho.<\/p>\n The state is too big, the terrain is too rugged and wolves are too elusive for that to happen.<\/p>\n Instead, officials use multiple different techniques to estimate that wolf population.<\/p>\n Until recently, Idaho Fish and Game officials used wildlife trail cameras and a statistical model to estimate the state\u2019s wolf population.<\/p>\n Some outside researchers expressed concern with the accuracy of using wildlife cameras to estimate wolf populations.<\/p>\n Scott Creel, an ecologist and conservation biologist who works for Montana State University, has studied carnivores since 1987 and studied wolf-elk interactions since the 1990s.<\/p>\n Creel has been critical of wolf population methods used in Montana and Idaho.<\/p>\n \u201cI was frustrated with seeing methods being used to estimate wolf numbers that were very indirect and, in my opinion, were unlikely to produce accurate estimates,\u201d Creel said. \u201cI was particularly worried that the methods I was seeing used would produce estimates that wouldn\u2019t change, even if the wolf numbers were really changing. So the wolf population would appear to be constant, even though the policy changed just because of the way we were counting them, which is extremely oblique in both of the two methods that I was reviewing.\u201d<\/p>\n A human hand shows how large this wolf print on the Blacktail Ponds Trail actually is. (File photo courtesy of Jacob W. Frank\/Yellowstone National Park)<\/p>\n The Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks declined an interview request for this story.<\/p>\n Creel stressed that accurately estimating wolf populations is extremely difficult.<\/p>\n Idaho Department of Fish and Game officials disagree with Creel\u2019s criticism, but acknowledged trail cam population estimation methods become less reliable when the number of images of wolves from the trail cameras declines.<\/p>\n In July 2024, Idaho Fish and Game announced a new wolf population estimation procedure.<\/p>\n Instead of using trail cams, officials are using new methods involving combination of genetic and information taken from a tooth of every wolf mortality documented by the state, information on the biological range of wolf population dynamics, a statistical model, and actual wolf hunting and mortality data.<\/p>\n It\u2019s called the ABC method, short for Approximate Bayesian Computation, which Idaho Fish and Game officials said has been used widely in other scientific fields like epidemiology and population genetics. Biometricians\u00a0use that method to estimate the total number of new litters of wolf pups each year and the average estimated wolf population.<\/p>\n When he introduced the new wolf population estimate in July 2024, Idaho Fish and Game Wildlife Bureau Chief Shane Roberts said the new population estimation method independently produced similar population estimates to the trail cam method\u2019s population estimates from 2019 to 2022 using different data.<\/p>\n Roberts said that gives him confidence the new method produces consistent and reasonable population estimates.\u00a0He also said it backs up the old trail cam method that outside researchers have publicly criticized.<\/p>\n \u201cAlthough no population estimation technique is perfect, we now have an independent source of information that validates the camera-based estimates that we\u2019ve been using to guide wolf management since 2019 and refutes the idea that those estimates are wildly erroneous, as some have claimed,\u201d Roberts said during the July 2024 Idaho Fish and Game Commission meeting.<\/p>\n But for 2023, the trail cam method and the new method produced different population estimates.<\/p>\n The new method estimated 1,150 wolves, while the trail cam method estimated 840 wolves, Roberts said.<\/p>\n Even though it has been a year since Idaho Fish and Game officials announced their new estimation methods, the methods do not appear on the Idaho Department of Fish and Game\u2019s website for public review.<\/p>\n Howl reporters Clark Corbin and Heath Druzin asked Idaho Fish and Game officials for a copy of the state\u2019s new methods for estimating the wolf population.<\/p>\n In March, Fish and Game officials said the only available information is a YouTube video of officials announcing their wolf population presentation<\/a>. The relevant discussion takes place more than four hours into a six-hour Idaho Fish and Game Commission meeting on July 24, 2024.<\/p>\n Officials said they are working to publish their methods.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are in the process of preparing a manuscript for peer-reviewed publication on the method, which we hope to have submitted for publication later this spring or early summer,\u201d Roberts said in March.<\/p>\n As of June 24, the department had not yet published its new wolf population estimation methods in a peer-reviewed publication. Roberts said June 24 that officials are close to submitting it and hope to have it submitted for peer-reviewed publication before the upcoming July 17 Idaho Fish and Game Commission meeting.<\/p>\n Despite questions and criticisms of past methods, Roberts said he is confident in using the new population estimation to drive wolf management decisions in Idaho.<\/p>\n \u201cBecause we were able to produce five years of virtually identical estimates between (the new methods) and the camera-based methods we\u2019ve used before, we are confident this transition will result in consistent information to inform wolf management in the state,\u201d Roberts said during the July 2024 Idaho Fish and Game Commission meeting.<\/p>\n Why Idaho\u2019s wolf population estimate is important<\/p>\n Bob Crabtree, who founded the Yellowstone Ecological Research Center,<\/a> said accuracy in wolf population estimates is extremely important.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s like asking a business owner to try to make a profit or try to avoid losing money by not knowing what items they have on the shelves that they stock in their store,\u201d Crabtree said. \u201cPopulation size, or abundance, is the No. 1 criteria used to successfully manage and conserve and restore wolves. And without it, you just can\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n Many wolf laws and policies rely on wolf population estimates.<\/p>\n State Sen. Van Burtenshaw,<\/a> a Republican rancher from the town of Terreton, Idaho, sponsored Senate Bill 1211<\/a>, which Gov. Brad Little signed into law in 2021.<\/p>\n The law removed the limit on the number of wolf tags hunters could buy each year, legalized wolf trapping year round on private property and allowed the state of Idaho to contract with federal agencies and other third parties to kill wolves.<\/p>\n Burtenshaw said he pushed for the law because his constituents told him there are too many wolves eating too much livestock.<\/p>\n \u201cThe big thing was the amount of farmers and ranchers that were dealing with significant losses because of the wolf population,\u201d Burtenshaw said. \u201cOriginally when the wolf was reintroduced, they were talking about 150 or something in the Idaho region. And we had well over 1,500, almost 1,600, for a long time. So the depredation cost was huge to those that had livestock and other animals as well.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThat population has kind of got out of balance, and that\u2019s what we\u2019re trying to figure out is where that balance is,\u201d Burtenshaw said.<\/p>\n The impact of wolf hunting in Idaho<\/p>\n Idaho sold more than 53,000 wolf tags to hunters in 2023 even though there are only an estimated 1,150 wolves in the state, according to documents provided by the Idaho Department of Fish and Game.<\/p>\n More than half of those wolf tags were sold in the popular \u201csportsman\u2019s package,\u201d which includes a hunting\/fishing combo license and tags for deer, elk, bear, wolf, mountain lion, turkey, salmon and steelhead. (State officials said they do not know the percentage of hunters who bought a wolf tag because wolves are the primary animal they are hunting vs. the percentage of hunters who primarily hunted other animal species but still bought a wolf tag.)<\/p>\n From the 2019-20 wolf hunting season through the 2023-24 hunting season, hunters and trappers killed an average of more than 400 wolves a year in Idaho, according to Idaho Fish and Game.<\/p>\n In addition to expanding wolf hunting and trapping, Idaho also financially reimburses expenses for hunters who successfully kill a wolf.<\/p>\n Since 2019, the state of Idaho has paid out $849,750 in reimbursements to successful wolf hunters, according to data provided by the Idaho Fish and Game.<\/p>\n The money is Idaho Fish and Game funding that is transferred to the Wolf Depredation Control Board for the Foundation for Wildlife Management\u2019s reimbursement program<\/a>, Fish and Game officials said. Separately, the foundation has applied for and received Idaho Fish and Game Commission Challenge Grants.<\/p>\n \u201cOur end (goal) in this originally was focused on trying to direct the harvest where we were seeing the greatest impacts \u2013 chronic livestock depredation, elk populations below objective, where predation was a factor \u2013 to try to focus that effort where harvest at that time was not sufficient to stabilize the wolf numbers,\u201d said Idaho Fish and Game Deputy Director of Operations Jon Rachael, who was an original member of the wolf recovery team.<\/p>\n In the context of hunting, the word harvest means successfully killing a game animal such as a wolf.<\/p>\n The reimbursement money can be used for firearms, ammo, traps, trail cameras, gear, license fees, fuel and even ATV vehicles used to scout or hunt wolves, according to the foundation.<\/p>\n Rusty Kramer, the president of the Idaho Trappers Association, said he has used state reimbursement money to make payments on his truck, which he uses when he is tracking and trapping wolves.<\/p>\n The standard reimbursement in Idaho is capped at $750 per wolf.<\/p>\n But in areas where elk populations are below their objective, or livestock have been repeatedly killed by wolves, the reimbursement limit increases to $2,000 per wolf.<\/p>\n Some wolf supporters call the program a bounty system and scoff at the idea of the state sending checks to people who shot wolves to help pay off their trucks and ATVs.<\/p>\n But Idaho Fish and Game officials insist it is only a reimbursement program \u2013 not a bounty.<\/p>\n \u201cAny of the funds that come from the state of Idaho, from the Wolf Depredation Control Board, or, in the past, from the Fish and Game Commission Challenge Grants did require that this money was not just a straight payment of a certain amount, but rather the individual claiming compensation present evidence of their expenses,\u201d Rachael said. \u201cAnd so in that regard, it was compensation for their investment of buying traps or fuel to run a trap line.\u201d<\/p>\n U.S. Department of Agriculture confirmed it killed juvenile wolves in Idaho<\/p>\n When the state kills wolves, it doesn\u2019t just kill adult wolves that are confirmed to have attacked livestock.<\/p>\n The state, other government agencies like the U.S. Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services and third party contractors can kill wolf pups in their dens and their nursing mother \u2013 even if those specific wolves never attacked a cow or sheep.<\/p>\n \u201cYou can kill wolf puppies,\u201d said Carter Niemeyer, a former government trapper who helped bring wolves back to Idaho and Yellowstone National Park 30 years ago and opposes killing wolf pups and many of Idaho\u2019s wolf policies. \u201cThey\u2019re plum legal if you kill them at a day old. Stomp their head in with your boot if you want to.\u201d<\/p>\n Carter Niemeyer howls while looking for wolves just outside of the Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness. (Photo by Heath Druzin\/For the Idaho Capital Sun)<\/p>\n Students at Timberline High School in Boise spoke out a few years ago after the U.S. Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services killed wolf pups from a pack that the school symbolically adopted<\/a>, the Idaho Capital Sun previously reported.<\/p>\n In an October 2021 letter to Suzanne Asha Stone, <\/b>a prominent Idaho wolf expert and a member of the wolf reintroduction team,<\/b> former U.S. Department of Agriculture Undersecretary Jenny Lester Moffitt, confirmed the government killed eight juvenile wolves in Idaho<\/a> in an attempt to relocate the larger pack and reduce the number of livestock killed.<\/p>\n Carter, who was on the Nez Perce Tribe\u2019s wolf reintroduction team in the 1990s, is sickened that the state would authorize the killing of wolf pups that never disturbed livestock.<\/p>\n \u201cI mean, it\u2019s one thing to shoot an adult,\u201d Carter said. \u201cBut to trap puppies in the den hole? It\u2019s just so awful. And I don\u2019t understand how people can be that hateful to one species of animal that has a right to be here. But for sure, the state has not done their due diligence.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2018ll just stop there,\u201d Carter added. \u201cThe state of Idaho is not taking care of this species.\u201d<\/p>\n Since wolves were removed from the Endangered Species List in 2011, the USDA Wildlife Services and other agencies have killed 961 wolves in Idaho, according to Idaho Department of Fish and Game documents.<\/p>\n Since 2018, Idaho Fish and Game has spent $817,668 on lethal control actions to kill wolves in Idaho, according to documents the department provided. That total specifically refers to Idaho Fish and Game funding through the Wolf Depredation Control Board that was not spent on reimbursements made by the Foundation for Wildlife Management.<\/p>\n One of Idaho\u2019s policies is that even when nonlethal tools are available to reduce conflicts between livestock and wolves<\/a>, the state can kill wolves without first trying the nonlethal tools.<\/p>\n \u201cLivestock producers may use deterrents to aid in protecting their property; however, they are not a prerequisite for lethal removal,\u201d the Idaho Gray Wolf Management Plan 2023-2028 states. \u201cRegardless of use or success of nonlethal methods, landowners may request a special kill permit from IDFG for use on lawfully permitted public and private lands. IDFG will continue to employ lethal removal as needed to address both individual depredations and overall population goals\u201d<\/p>\n 30 years after wolf reintroduction, some of the people who brought wolves back worry about their future<\/p>\n Longtime wolf advocates say the government-sponsored killing of wolves and expansions in hunting and trapping is reducing the number of wolves.<\/p>\n Now, 30 years after the first wolves were returned to Idaho and 14 years after they came off the Endangered Species List, several prominent members of the team that brought wolves back worry about the threats wolves face today.<\/p>\n Niemeyer is a longtime government trapper who has tracked wolves across Idaho and Montana since before reintroduction in 1995.\u00a0Intimately familiar with wolves, he\u00a0was a member of the team that traveled to Canada 30 years ago to capture wolves to reintroduce them to Idaho and Montana.<\/a><\/p>\n For years after reintroduction, Carter studied the packs and knew the location of many dens in central Idaho.<\/p>\n Niemeyer was so confident in his ability to find wolves that he regularly guided donors who supported conservation organizations into the wild to see wolves.\u00a0 He knew the landscape well enough he could set up camp just close enough for the donors to see and howl for wolves as Niemeyer cooked cowboy-style dinners for the group.<\/p>\n But those days are over.<\/p>\n Over the last few years, Niemeyer said he and his longtime contacts are no longer seeing wolves in the wild the same places they always used to.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen they\u2019re in there, they see virtually little or no sign of any wolf existence in the Frank,\u201d Niemeyer said, referring to the Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness. \u201cIf you put together what I\u2019m seeing, or better yet, what I\u2019m not seeing\u2026. Nobody\u2019s finding any wolf evidence. So where are these 1,300 or 1,500 wolves?\u201d<\/p>\n Niemeyer\u2019s luck isn\u2019t any better than his friends.<\/p>\n During a Howl reporting trip in July 2024, Niemeyer found wolf scat and wolf tracks, but no wolves. And during another, separate expedition in 2024, he said he struck out entirely \u2013 he didn\u2019t even see a wolf track.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Big Buck Pack, Steel Mountain Pack, Jackson Pack, Archie Pack, I can name all these packs up there, Thorn Creek \u2013 there\u2019s no packs in those places anymore, mostly because of domestic sheep that came in there and Wildlife Services just went to hammering wolves,\u201d Niemeyer said. \u201cAnd then you\u2019ve got the recreational hunting and trapping that started when (wolves) were delisted.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019ll still find a wolf track up in that country,\u201d Niemeyer said. \u201cBut to say there\u2019s anything like the numbers there were, I don\u2019t believe it. You wouldn\u2019t convince me.\u201d<\/p>\n Carter worries about new expanded wolf hunting, trapping and lethal control policies in the state of Idaho.<\/p>\n \u201cThe state of Idaho is going to \u2013 if they haven\u2019t already \u2013 plunge wolves back towards extinction, at least in Idaho,\u201d Carter said.<\/p>\n \u201cHow do you manage if you don\u2019t know how many you have?\u201d Carter added.<\/p>\n She isn\u2019t alone in worrying about the state management of wolves and the removal of limits on hunting and trapping.<\/p>\n \u201cIs it a violation of our treaty?\u201d Nez Perce Tribal Executive Committee Chairman Shannon Wheeler said. \u201cIs it a violation of something that we were meant to protect? Of course it is. Of course it\u2019s a violation of what was here in 1855 and before then. And that\u2019s a part of tam\u00e1alwit, or the unwritten law, which we know that Article Three and the Treaty of 1855 with the Nez Perce represents.\u201d<\/p>\n Some members of the wolf reintroduction teams say attitudes are even worse today than they were 30 years ago.<\/p>\n \u201cOur country\u2019s worse now than it was in terms of polarization, so those extreme divisions have only widened and become more cemented,\u201d said Stone, executive director of the International Wildlife Coexistence Network and a co-founder of the Wood River Wolf Project. \u201c Back then, if I had told anyone from the opposition that didn\u2019t want to have wolves back that they would be trapping and killing wolves 365 days of the year, using bounties to kill even pups in the den, they would have told me I was crazy and that would never happen \u2013 never happen. And we\u2019re living it today. That is the reality on the ground today.\u201d<\/p>\n Doug Smith, who headed up the wolf project at Yellowstone National Park for nearly 30 years ties his shoelaces before setting out on the trail to scout for wolves on July 10, 2024, at Yellowstone National Park. (Photo by Pat Sutphin\/For the Idaho Capital Sun)<\/p>\n Stone isn\u2019t alone.<\/p>\n \u201cOh, I\u2019m pretty worried,\u201d said Doug Smith, who headed up the wolf program at Yellowstone National Park for nearly 30 years until he retired in 2022.<\/p>\n \u201cAttitudes haven\u2019t changed,\u201d Smith said. \u201cThe fact is, they\u2019re worse now. I\u2019ve been studying wolves for over 40 years, and wolves have always been controversial. There\u2019s always been people who like wolves and people who hate wolves. Now it\u2019s like people are willing to do anything to get rid of wolves or anything to protect wolves, and they don\u2019t want to talk to each other. I don\u2019t think that\u2019s progress, and right now the anti-wolf forces are winning in Idaho and Montana especially.\u201d<\/p>\n Journalists Clark Corbin and Heath Druzin reported and wrote Howl over the course of 14 months, trekking deep into the backcountry in some of the most remote places in the Lower 48 chasing the story of America\u2019s wildest and most controversial wildlife comeback story \u2013 wolf reintroduction.<\/b><\/p>\n SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX<\/a><\/p>\n![\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/d3ca818ac9673b59de0a7d4b82be3375.jpeg\"\/)
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