Oregon Just Killed a Family of Wolves

[DigitalDrifter]

Nice going guys, must feel really great to take them out from a helicopter. What brave men !
Maybe these guys should consider becoming drone pilots.

Anyway, calves are soooooo much rarer than gray wolves, so it's a good thing these killers were gotten rid of.

The bullet he’d been dodging for many years finally caught up with the great Oregon wolf, OR4, on March 31. In the early afternoon, officials from the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife shot to death the patriarch of the Imnaha Pack from a helicopter over Wallowa County, an area where gray wolves dispersing from Idaho first began returning to Oregon, where they’d been killed off in the mid-20th century. Shot along with OR4 was his likely pregnant partner, OR 39, known as Limpy for an injured and badly healed leg, and their two pups.

The animals were killed for being presumed guilty of the deaths of four calves and a sheep on private pastureland on the fringes of the pack’s territory in northeast Oregon.

Rob Klavins, who has been a wolf advocate on the frontlines of the cultural and political battles that have accompanied the reemergence of wolves in the West as field coordinator for the conservation group Oregon Wild, heard the helicopters take off and knew the sound spelled doom for OR4. “It was hard for a lot of people,” said Klavins, reached on Friday at his home near the town of Joseph in Wallowa County. “Even some of his detractors had a begrudging respect” for OR4, the fourth wolf to be fitted with a location-tracking radio collar in Oregon. He weighed at least 115 pounds, the largest known wolf in Oregon at the time of his death, and survived for 10 years, three years longer than most wolves in the wild.

RELATED: One Wolf's Extraordinary Journey

OR4 and his progeny have been largely responsible for the gray wolf’s intrepid return to lands where the species was long ago hunted, poisoned, trapped, burned, and otherwise chased nearly to extinction.

Cattle farmers, who receive a subsidy from taxpayers to graze their animals on vast ranges of publicly-owned land where the wolves also dwell, worry about wolves killing their property. Hunters want first shot at the game, such as deer and elk, that wolves favor. But livestock depredations in Oregon are extremely rare, and have become scarcer even as the wolf population has increased. Meanwhile, ODFW’s data shows that Oregon’s wolves are having no effect on elk, deer, and wild sheep populations. Of course, those statistics are small consolation to the rancher who suffered the loss of property in March.

In early 2008, OR4 and his mate at the time, OR2, were among the first wolves to swim the Snake River, scale enormous mountains, and establish a foothold for wolves in game-rich Wallowa County. Since then, more than 110 Oregon wolves have spread from the remote northeast corner of the state, over the Cascades, and to near the California border. Many of these pioneering wolves were spawned by OR4.

Beginning with his first pack in 2009, OR4 fathered, provided for, and protected dozens of wolf pups that survived in the Oregon wild—and made their way all the way south to California, where OR7, known as the “lone wolf,” trekked in 2012. Today, OR7 has his own pack in the California-Oregon border region. The alpha female of the Shasta pack—the first gray wolf pack to make California home since 1924—is the offspring of OR4.

That OR4 lasted this long is source of wonder to those who have followed his starring role in Oregon’s gray-wolf comeback story. In 2011, a brief cattle-killing spree by the Imnaha pack had him slated for execution. A suit by Oregon Wild and other conservation groups stayed the execution order and OR4 settled into a mostly incident-free life as Oregon’s biggest and baddest-ass wolf.

Oregon Just Killed a Family of Wolves

 

[9thIDdoc]

Good for Oregon!

 

[waltky]

Some El Lobo thanks ya...

... now he got the pack's females all to himself.

 

[Alex.]

"The animals were killed for being presumed guilty of the deaths of four calves and a sheep on private pastureland on the fringes of the pack’s territory in northeast Oregon."

Very sad

 

[Moonglow]

So now one should cry when the wolves kill a cute fuzzy bunny?

 

[9thIDdoc]

"The animals were killed for being presumed guilty of the deaths of four calves and a sheep on private pastureland on the fringes of the pack’s territory in northeast Oregon."

Very sad

What do you think is sad?
The death of the calves and sheep? The death of the wolves? The rancher having his livelihood threatened?

 

[DigitalDrifter]

I don't think we're going to run out of ranchers and calves any time soon.

 

[Luddly Neddite]

There's really no reason to wipe out the wolves. Its all politics.

I'd like to see the so-called hunters harvest each other.

 

[HenryBHough]

Liberals are so wolf-like at times. There's a moral lesson in this. Anybody got a good rental deal on a helicopter?

 

[9thIDdoc]

I don't think we're going to run out of ranchers and calves any time soon.

Does that mean you'd be willing to reimburse the rancher for his loss?
Didn't think so. So much easier to talk shit when somebody else has to pay.

 

[theDoctorisIn]

I don't think we're going to run out of ranchers and calves any time soon.

Does that mean you'd be willing to reimburse the rancher for his loss?
Didn't think so. So much easier to talk shit when somebody else has to pay.

Why the fuck should anyone reimburse the rancher?

There are risks to business. That's just the way it goes.

 

[DigitalDrifter]

I don't think we're going to run out of ranchers and calves any time soon.

Does that mean you'd be willing to reimburse the rancher for his loss?
Didn't think so. So much easier to talk shit when somebody else has to pay.

As a matter of fact, now that you mention it, I would rather have seen the state reimburse the rancher over his losses, than take this action.

Now of course, I would rather they had not done either, but if I were forced to choose I would have went with the reimbursement.

 

[theDoctorisIn]

Liberals are so wolf-like at times. There's a moral lesson in this. Anybody got a good rental deal on a helicopter?

I don't see how being "wolf-like" is a bad thing, although with the whole "strict hierarchy" thing, I'd say it's more of a Conservative thing than a liberal one.

 

[DarkFury]

There's really no reason to wipe out the wolves. Its all politics.

I'd like to see the so-called hunters harvest each other.

Wolves ARE hunters you moron.

 

[Alex.]

"The animals were killed for being presumed guilty of the deaths of four calves and a sheep on private pastureland on the fringes of the pack’s territory in northeast Oregon."

Very sad

What do you think is sad?
The death of the calves and sheep? The death of the wolves? The rancher having his livelihood threatened?

The wolves

 

[Luddly Neddite]

I don't think we're going to run out of ranchers and calves any time soon.

Does that mean you'd be willing to reimburse the rancher for his loss?
Didn't think so. So much easier to talk shit when somebody else has to pay.

Tax payers already 93% of their grazing fees AND they get subsidies for ALL stock losses.

Besides WalMart and other slave-wage Repub corps, who else gets their cost-of-doing-business paid for them by the consumer?

Hmmm ?

 

[Luddly Neddite]

I don't think we're going to run out of ranchers and calves any time soon.

Does that mean you'd be willing to reimburse the rancher for his loss?
Didn't think so. So much easier to talk shit when somebody else has to pay.

As a matter of fact, now that you mention it, I would rather have seen the state reimburse the rancher over his losses, than take this action.

Now of course, I would rather they had not done either, but if I were forced to choose I would have went with the reimbursement.

They are already reimbursed much more than they actually lose.

This is an enormous scam and, as usual, the tax payers are the ones penalized.

 

[Luddly Neddite]

There's really no reason to wipe out the wolves. Its all politics.

I'd like to see the so-called hunters harvest each other.

Wolves ARE hunters you moron.

True. And they're the real thing.

Not like the assholes who are too scared to come out from under mommy's bed without a loaded gun.

And certainly not like the cowards who actually shoot from helicopters.

And the wolves can't fight back.

I'm not at all surprised to see you in favor of cowardice like this. Very typical of you.

 

[9thIDdoc]

I don't think we're going to run out of ranchers and calves any time soon.

Does that mean you'd be willing to reimburse the rancher for his loss?
Didn't think so. So much easier to talk shit when somebody else has to pay.

Why the fuck should anyone reimburse the rancher?

There are risks to business. That's just the way it goes.

Just like there are risks to being a wolf. People will defend their property. That's just the way it goes; and rightfully so.

 

[theDoctorisIn]

I don't think we're going to run out of ranchers and calves any time soon.

Does that mean you'd be willing to reimburse the rancher for his loss?
Didn't think so. So much easier to talk shit when somebody else has to pay.

Why the fuck should anyone reimburse the rancher?

There are risks to business. That's just the way it goes.

Just like there are risks to being a wolf. People will defend their property. That's just the way it goes; and rightfully so.

I have less of a problem with people "defending their property" than the government shooting the wolves from a fucking helicopter.