Wolf Hysteria
Image by Joel Sartore
Wolves are stunningly beautiful, extremely intelligent animals: the kings of pack animals, with terrific teamwork and sophisticated social networks. There is no glory in killing a wolf. But. The "but" is, it is not about killing wolves at all: it is about SAVING elk herds that are presently doomed. Hunters are horribly inefficient at reducing wolf populations. It won't work: it can't work, it didn't work before.
The whole idea was never about wolf-saving. It was a sick anti-hunting mentality, that pretends it is better for wolves to eat baby elk alive right out of the womb and eat whatever else they can, chewing them alive: that includes bull moose. You cannot fault a wolf for being a wolf: a superb predator. It was man who decimated wildlife herds in the beginning, as in the American Bison. Stampede them off of cliffs, slaughter them and leave them to rot was the method. The "why" was to starve hunters, in this case the Native Americans that celebrated the Bison.
If you can't kill Indians, well . . . easier to starve them, thanks to the government of the United States of America. The United States' genocide of the American Indian, the killing of Indigenous people in the Western Hemisphere since the beginning of colonization, has numbers estimated at 120 million and above. Yet nobody wants to speak about it. We cry for the 9/11 loss of 2,996 people: but who cries for the last 100 million dead American Indians? It is selective morality and selective outrage at its finest. The belief in an American mission to promote and defend democracy throughout the world, as expounded by Thomas Jefferson and his "Empire of Liberty", and by Abraham Lincoln, Woodrow Wilson apparently did not apply at home: just throughout the "world" other than our portion of it.
Humans don't like predators: we wiped out the grizzly bear (and the American Bison) in a few short years from much of North America. Just what animals depended on the giant herds of Bison? It wasn't just Indians that we could cheat, lie, and steal from. It was nature itself.
Many folks don't "get" hunting. But if not for hunters, you'd have no wildlife at all. And, no national parks. Right now, Buicks kill more deer in many areas than hunters. Who wants to give up driving? It is man itself and man-made structures, roads, traffic, airports, wind farms, railroads, etc. that has changed what was nature. Does anyone think that irrigation is "natural," or an act of God?
Buicks and wolves hunt year-round. They buy no tags, enter no lotteries, observe no bag limits, follow no "legal hunting hours." All this is the reality of the situation, a matter of recorded history. There is no debate. The answer is not a happy one. The hate posters and wise-acre remarks about dead wolves solve nothing, adding up to just a bunch of obnoxious hot air. It isn't about killing wolves: it is about saving elk and moose, etc.
Does anyone really wonder why the American Bison is no longer a hub of the North American eco-system? It was over 30 million Bison reduced to less than one thousand in quick order by all-out slaughter: the driving ecological force in North American grasslands is no more.
The sad reality is that man changed North America for good: the white man. There is no role for large predators in North America, for man has seen to that. Really, really dumb people (so dumb that it hurts) underestimated the intelligence and resourcefulness of wolves. You cannot re-introduce the wolf: the American Bison herds are no more. Man eliminated the balance of nature. Again.
The ONLY way to save elk and moose is to trap and poison wolves to extinction in the lower 48 states. Not that wolves themselves could ever truly be extinct, for Canada has some 60,000 wolves, Russia has some 30,000. That is the only answer, the ONLY way it worked before. Man screwed the pooch yet again. It is nothing to be happy about. We should all be ashamed. See http://www.aws.vcn.com/fact.html .
For through our own actions, the wolf has now become an invasive species that has to be eliminated in the lower 48. Don't blame the wolf for being intelligent, beautiful, resourceful, and outstandingly good predators. Blame MAN, for man has screwed things up to the extent where there is no longer a role for the majestic predators of North America: the wolf and the grizzly bear.
The clever third-grader, while contemplating a new pet, thinks about how to care for it: considering what it needs to eat. The more thoughtful third-graders also think about babies, for they know that their mothers would not be pleased with a house full of baby rats, mice, snakes, and spiders. Yet, the collective unconsciousness of the people and government of the United States apparently is incapable of such simpleton-level considerations.
While our cities wretch with the stench and disease of pigeon and rat droppings, feral cats and feral hogs plague the nation: we continue to kill animals 24 / 7 with our Buicks, planes, and trains . . . oblivious as to why re-introduction of a predator species in the wild might not be such a grand idea.
--Randy
Wakeman
12/2/2013
Copyright 2013 by Randy Wakeman. All Rights Reserved.
