First Michigan wolf hunt falls short of quota as controversy still swirls

December 29, 2013 

• Gary Heinlein
• Detroit News Lansing Bureau

At least four wolves appear in this trail camera picture shot by Baraga resident Bill Delene on his property in September. (Bill Delene)

Lansing— Roughly half the intended number of wolves will be taken during Michigan’s first wolf hunt in 53 years, but Department of Natural Resources officials still deem it a success. Twenty-one wolves were slain as of Friday in the three designated Upper Peninsula hunting areas. The most recent was a young male wolf shot Christmas Day. The quota of 43 won’t be reached in the 48-day special season that began Nov. 15 and ends Tuesday. “We were able to pull this off using a system unique at least for Michigan,” said wildlife biologist Brian Roell of the DNR’s Marquette office. “We’re the first state that went to a very small quota in specific zones.”

The DNR issued 1,200 licenses to hunters wanting to try their luck in three UP zones where wolves preying on pets and domestic animals had been reported and investigated by game biologists. Each area had a specific quota and hunters had to report their kills by phone the same day so the DNR could shut down an area if its quota had been reached.

Jill Fritz, head of a Michigan group hoping to end wolf hunting after one season in Michigan, took small comfort in the fact that far fewer than 43 of the state’s 658 wolves would be killed. Her group aims to have two anti-wolf-hunt proposals on Michigan’s 2014 general election ballot. “It’s always good news they’re killing fewer wolves than they intended to kill, but the hunt never should have been held in the first place,” said Fritz, state director of the Humane Society of the U.S. and director of Keep Michigan Wolves Protected.

Fritz said hunters are learning that, contrary to claims they’d attack kids at day care centers or playing outside at home, “wolves are shy, elusive creatures that will avoid human contact as much as possible.” Fritz and the Humane Society maintain wolf hunts are being held purely for sport and aren’t necessary to control the animals’ populations or prevent them from killing domestic animals.

Proponents of the wolf hunt say DNR experts such as biologist Roell should be entrusted to make science-based decisions about what animals to hunt and how many should be killed. Roell said coming up short of the quota doesn’t signal the agency will raise the quota next year — should there be another hunt — or that it will permit trapping of wolves, as neighboring Minnesota and Wisconsin do. “We’ll look at the effects,” he said. “Did we change the behavior of these animals? Did we have lower depredation?”

Cold a factor

Soon after Jan. 1, DNR officers and biologists will conduct their annual wolf count. Those findings, coupled with the observations they make in the field, will help influence decisions about future wolf hunting in Michigan, Roell said. He speculated extreme cold in the U.P. during the first two weeks of December contributed to the limited number of wolves taken. “To me, it would be prohibitive,” he said. “I wouldn’t want to sit out there when it’s 10-below.”

Fritz fears that if there’s another wolf hunt, Michigan’s DNR will expand hunters’ options to include methods that proponents might have seen as too controversial in the first year. This year, Michigan hunters could use only wolf calls and stalking techniques. Besides trapping, Wisconsin and Minnesota permit wolf baiting. Wisconsin also allows hunters to use dog packs to hunt down wolves.

In Wisconsin, where the season just ended, hunters took 257 wolves, six over the goal. Minnesota’s goal of 132 wolf kills already has been exceeded by eight and the season isn’t over. It will be the second straight year in which Minnesota hunters exceeded the wolf kill quota.

Appeal to voters

Fritz said her group is on target to collect the required number of signatures by March 12 for a 2014 ballot initiative banning wolf hunting in Michigan. On the ballot also will be the groups’ earlier referendum, seeking to undo a 2012 law the Legislature passed and Gov. Rick Snyder signed, allowing wolf hunting.

After Keep Michigan Wolves Protected turned in the requisite number of petition signatures for that first referendum, lawmakers and Snyder maneuvered around it by passing a second new law. It gave the Michigan Natural Resources Commission — not the Legislature — the right to determine which critters can be hunted in Michigan. The governor-appointed commission then authorized this year’s wolf hunt.

Conservation groups and sportsmen now are circulating petitions for a rival initiative to counteract the two Keep Michigan Wolves Protected proposals. It also may be on the 2014 ballot, aimed at keeping wolf hunting alive. Their effort, if successful, would first call on lawmakers to pass a law allowing wolf hunting. As with the recently passed petition initiative banning basic insurance coverage of abortions, lawmakers would have 40 days to act or allow the proposal to automatically go to the ballot.

State Elections Director Chris Thomas recently told the media that, based on a past court ruling, the ballot proposal garnering the most votes would prevail among the three.

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