PICTURE dynamics of wolves in Washington are significantly different from those used in the model, these conclusions will need to be reevaluated. Incorporating wolf demographic data specific to Washington will allow WDFW to update predictions of population persistence during wolf recovery phases and to revise the recovery objectives, if needed.” I’m no mathematician, but I do pay attention to probabilities (which I use to collect more than my share of fivers from coworkers during the NFL season) and I now think the odds of having four successful breeding pairs in the South Cascades – where there currently are no known wolves – for three straight years as
required for delisting by the end of 2021 are very long at best. I wouldn’t put much more money on four there plus four in the North Cascades and 10 elsewhere in any single year – the recovery shortcut – by 2021 either. But if I’m wrong, hell, feed me to ’em.
MEANWHILE, WOLF NUMBERS in Washington’s upper righthand corner – where no less than 75 percent of the state’s population, 16 of its packs and 12 of the breeding pairs occur – continue to grow. “We’ve been hearing from Northeast Washington for years now, ‘We’re overrun with wolves,’” said Kehne during that March commission meeting. “At first we thought, ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah, they’re just new there and they’re not used to them.’ But they are overrun with wolves. Southeast Washington will be sooner or later full up
on their quota of wolf packs.” “We’re there,” Commissioner Jay Holzmiller of Anatone interrupted him briefly to say. Kehne, who is a hunter and retired from USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service, said that with state legislators having granted WDFW $183,000 to look into the State Environmental Policy Act process for translocating wolves around Washington, staffers should also tack on doing so for making a couple “simple changes” to recovery map boundaries. “I guess what I feel now is, we’re at recovery, we just don’t meet it by definition that we established seven years ago,” he said during the commission meeting. “And that bothers me because there’s people that come to these meetings, you know, and tell us their stories about losing livestock. And that’s all part of wolf
CRY ‘HICCUP!’ AND LET SLIP THE DOGS OF SPOOR Dr. Samuel Wasser and his dung-detection dogs are set to begin searching for wolves in Washington’s South Cascades, where the number of public wolf reports is growing but no packs let alone breeding pairs are known to exist. The University of Washington researcher heads up Conservation Canines, which received $172,000 from state lawmakers earlier this year to survey a 2,000-square-mile patch of countryside between I-90 and the Columbia River. Since 1997, Wasser and his rescue dogs have been deployed around the world to help monitor other species, collecting poop the pups find for labs to analyze. Sending handlers and their canine companions into the woods and meadows around Mts. Rainier, Adams and St. Helens should produce results faster than leaving it to wildlife biologists chasing down intriguing leads or hoping to cut tracks in winter’s snows. “Our goal is to maximize coverage of the study area, sampling all areas around the same time, within and between seasons to maximize comparison,” explains Wasser. “Currently, the plan is for a fall and spring sampling, the latter being important to sample for pregnant females. We are still gathering data to identify the best sampling areas. Cost permitting, we hope to have four teams.” Wasser has 17 dogs, including Hiccup, who’s also trained to find moose doots. Which ones are deployed to the recesses of the Gifford Pinchot and south ends of the OkanoganWenatchee and Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forests hasn’t been determined yet, but he’s confident in his pack’s abilities. “If there are wolves south of I-90, the odds of the dogs locating them should be quite high,” Wasser says. “Colonizing wolves range widely, our dogs can cover huge areas, and their ability to detect samples if present is extraordinary.” Under the state’s wolf delisting scenarios, there must be at 24 Northwest Sportsman
MAY 2018 | nwsportsmanmag.com
Conservation Canines field technician Jennifer Hartman and dog Scooby collect a sample during carnivore research in Northeast Washington’s Colville National Forest. (JAYMI HEIMBUCH) least four breeding pairs here to meet the management plan’s current recovery goals. If wolves are found, that might decrease the need to translocate packs here from elsewhere in Washington, notably the northeast corner where most territories are full and conflicts with livestock occur annually. State wildlife managers haven’t been inclined to move wolves around, despite that tool in the plan, but earlier this year Rep. Joel Kretz (R-Wauconda) successfully kick-started efforts to at least consider it. Legislators also asked Wasser to gather data on the effect any wolves in the region might be having on predator-prey dynamics, and if they’re not, establish base-line data for when they arrive. –AW