— The Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation (RMEF), which has funded wolf-killing derbies in Idaho to the tune of $150,000 since 2013, is now seeking to expand its $1,000-per-kill bounty program to the neighboring state of Montana.
RMEF provides funds to the Foundation for Wildlife Management (F4WM), which says its mission “is to promote ungulate population recovery in areas negatively impacted by wolves.” While F4WM is based in Idaho, RMEF is stationed in Montana. F4WM held a meeting on April 5 in Sandpoint, Idaho, in an attempt to drum up support for the expanded bounty program. On April 6, Justin Webb, Mission Advancement Director for F4WM, wrote on the group’s Facebook page, “We had several folks from Montana expressing interest in F4WM expanding into Montana, and all were willing to help create Montana funding!”
Webb cautioned however, that it might take some time to determine if F4WM will go ahead with the effort. “[We] should be able to announce yay or nay on an F4WM expansion into Montana within a couple weeks. We have some business operational hurdles to work through, and fine tuning the legistics [sic] of the expansion.”
“These wolf lottery efforts are dismantling a century-long conservation heritage that is shared not just with environmental groups but with a lot of sportsmen groups as well,” said Erik Molvar, Executive Director for the Western Watersheds Project, in an exclusive interview with EnviroNews.
F4WM’s sole sponsor is RMEF. The group published an open letter to President Donald Trump on its website, calling the reintroduction of wolves to Yellowstone and Idaho “illegal” and telling the President that this “was one extreme criminal act of fraud and theft committed under the administration of William Jefferson Clinton that truly needs to be revisited.”
In 2012, Montana elk hunter Dave Stalling wrote in an op-ed for High Country News about what he described as the RMEF’s “all-out war against wolves.” Stalling worked previously for RMEF and saw changes that he linked to the hiring of David Allen as its director. Today, Allen is President and Chief Executive Officer at RMEF. Allen has supported the delisting of wolves as an endangered species in both Wyoming and Oregon.
“This is an organization that has always been at the fringes of the conservation movement,” said Molvar. “Basically, they are really anti-conservationists in disguise.”
In Idaho, the Department of Fish and Game (IDFG), which regulates hunting in the state, is beset with a funding scandal. An op-ed authored by local hunter Dave Cappell in the January 14, 2017 Idaho State Journal, alleges that two IDFG commissioners were told their terms would not be renewed so that new commissioners, who would approve a system of auction tags for game hunters, could be appointed.
IDFG relies on hunting fees for one-third of its budget. Faced with license fees that have not increased since 2005, the Department has looked at alternative strategies including salary savings.
The 2015 population of wolves in Idaho was documented as 786 animals. During the same year, humans were responsible for the death of 352 wolves, including legal hunting and trapping that took 256 animals. IDFG allows each hunter or trapper to take up to five wolves per year. Wolves may not be baited but electronic calls can be used.
In Montana, where hunting, fishing and other recreational activity fees account for more than two-thirds of the budget for the state’s Department of Fish, Wildlife & Parks, 246 wolves were harvested in 2016. License fees have been increased recently, but are still not sufficient to cover expenses.
Wolf culls are seen as a way to increase the elk population, providing more game for hunters and more license fees for states. But Molvar holds a different view, telling EnviroNews, “There is no place in responsible wildlife management for this kind of killing for fun and money.”
Comments
This is dispicable…. THIS SHOCKI NG CRUELTY UNDER THE GUISE OF WHATEVER UOU LIKE TO CALL IT IS STILL SHOCKING CRUELTY… ONLY SADISTIC DEPRAVED MINDS WANT TO MURDER AND TORTURE OUR BEAUTIFUL ANIMALS… IS AMERICA A LAND OF PSYCHOPATHICS…. SEEMS TO ME….PLEASE STOP THIS INSANITY… ANIMAKS ARE HERE TO SHARE OUR WORLD NOT TO BE SOME CRUEL SOURCE OF DEPRAVED ENTERTAINMENT… LOOK TO THE ABSOLUTE BEAUTY IN THOSE FACES AND ALLOW THEM TO LIVE IN PEACE WITH THEIR FAMILIES… TO WALK WITH THEM IN THE WILDERNESS IS ABSOLUTE PURE JOY…PLEASE NO MORE OF THIS WICKED CRUELTY
RMEF and F4WM are nothing but domestic wildlife terrorist groups showing a classic example of white privilege. They MUST be stopped by any means necessary.
Also, there needs to be a counter-letter reminding Trump of who Bridges REALLY is.
I am a fervent protector of nature un general and of wolves un particular
There is ABSOLUTELY Nothing right about letting this ever happen. No amount of greed is okay with letting that ever happen.
We no people have the rights to keep killing wildlife, destroying nature, natural resources. It’s wrong in every way it’s barbaric and no one should even consider letting them keep killing lives of our gifts God have us.
Please consider helping us to put the Indian Trust To work 😉 https://continuetogive.com/protectthewolves
People grow up with different cultures. I grew up watching the wildlife. My message to these parents that think killing predators is the challenge, is this is NOT conservation. You are killing animals designed to make herds healthier, by bring down the sick, old, and ill ungulates. You are teaching lack of respect for nature!
Hunting Period is not Conservation in Our Eyes… We believe subsistence hunting should be allowed.. Having a difficult time wondering how they call trophy hunting conservation