Remember this story about a large canid that was shot in New Brunswick?
DNA samples were taken from the animal to confirm its exact identity.
Well, the results were released this week. It was a wolf!
This was the first wolf killed in New Brunswick since 1876.
Wolves are coming back to their original ranges in both Eurasia and North America.
We just have to leave them alone.
Wolves are so beautiful. Too bad he killed it. Why are wolves so notorious throughout history? Is it because they are aggressive towards humans or they just killed livestock?
Both. But attacks on people in modern times have been rare.
During the Middle Ages wolves were killing people on a regular basis, but that’s because Medieval agriculture destroyed the habitat of their prey species. Poaching destroyed their numbers, too, and the only easy prey for wolves was livestock. And in most of Europe, commoners were not allowed to have weapons, so the wolves discovered that people were a prey source. Russia and Indian have had issues with wolves preying upon people.
In North America, there have been very few confirmed fatalities from wolf attacks. One was just a few years ago in Alaska, and another is much more debatable and contentious in northern Canada.
But in general, people have had little to fear from them– especially in North America.
The real issue is that wolves kill livestock or are considered competition for wild game. They have often been scapegoated in so many ways.
People have also come up with cruel ways to kill them.
Humans need to realize how big of an impact we have over wildlife and their natural habitat. If we encroach then it will lead to things like wolves preying on humans. Then in turn we kill them for it. Doesn’t make much sense.
In the Middle Ages, we didn’t know better.
But we do now….
Will wolves ever be able to recolonize the South East USA?
Maybe in a hundred years.
But they will recolonize the northeast soon.
Maybe they’ll be in my neighborhood in 50?
Sadly, I think while the American gun and hunting culture and its powerful lobby (from another age) still has such strong voter support, there will always be these photographs of mindless grinning individuals showing their “superiority” over one threatened species or another.
This was in New Brunswick, in Canada.
If this had happened across the border in Maine, the United States, he would have been arrested and tried for killing an endangered species.
I thought he did it on accident. I mean if everyone thought they were extinct at least in that area and they resemble Coyotes how was he to know? Am I wrong?
He thought he was shooting a coyote.
In most states in the United States, shooters are entirely responsible for choosing their targets.
If the hunter had shot a wolf in Maine, he probably wouldn’t be charged if he could legitimately say that he was shooting at a coyote.
But it’s a very touchy line.
I would apologise except for the photographic evidence I saw a few days ago on British tv. I repeat – “there will always be these photographs…”
Okay to kill coyotes then apple sauce? What have they done to deserve the death penalty in your opinion?
not necessarily. it depends on if it was legal to kill them in that area. if they are over populated and the meat is being eaten and fur being used then he shouldn’t be vilified. i don’t believe in waste.
Not quite what I’d call an answer based on morailty and respect for wildlife, apple sauce -sorry if that sounds a bit pompous and self righteous from me, but no one is perfect.
You do know that coyotes kill livestock, right?
They also will take pets, including small dogs.
In Nova Scotia, some coyotes killed a Toronto-based folk singer:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8331106.stm
i have the utmost respect for wildlife. your argument was about hunting endangered species and from what i can see he thought he was hunting a coyote, not a wolf. of course hunting an endangered species is crazy. but if you have issues about hunters killing for food, then you should have a bigger gripe with cattle farms and chicken farms, not hunters who gather their food in the wild.
erratum – sorry the word is MORALITY, butter fingers!
Sorry apple, didn’t know you had coyote for Sunday dinner over there – with apple sauce? I know, I’m being facetious but its getting late over here.
I don’t know of anyone who eats them, but their fur is sold.
I know we are two cultures divided by one language, but do you have the saying “hard cases make bad law” that was to you retrieverman.
I think you fundamentally don’t understand our culture.
And yet we seem to have greater biodiversity in one little area than exists on your entire island.
You’re feeding the troll.
I’m trying to be patient.
Clicks for your restraint. Have a cookie.
Maybe that singer killer had a sensitive ear for music, retrieverman.
What costs more, spending a day out hunting, transport, ammunition, clearing up the blood and gore etc or buying a couple of burgers from the corner supermarket?
Depends on where you live.
If you live in Alaska, supermarket beef is very expensive compared to moose.
And if you want to add environmental costs, beef is hands down more expensive.
Well retrieverman, look after that spacious diversity, signs are your nation may not be.
I don’t eat beef retrieverman, it’s relatively unhealthy compared to fish and fowl the experts say, but they all have cost, though we gotta eat something. Since we are petty point scoring today I lay claim that our beef is well sustained on some of the greenest grass the planet provides, so there.
Dude, can you PLEASE stop derailing every post and keep your comments on topic? You are literally driving away most of the regular commenters here because of your refusal to stay on topic and your diarrhea of the keyboard. Some thread drift is natural and expected but you are taking it to extremes and basically ruining it for everybody but you.
“Their fur is sold” is that supposed to be an argument for killing a wild animal ,which maybe has cubs, who knows, or would you also say well that is a plus – six or seven corpses with just one bullet?
.”.don’t understand our culture” What do you mean – we’ve got chewing gum, pot and ice cream just like you. We don’t kill one another other quite so much is that what you mean?
We have a hunting and fishing culture that is more analogous to Russia or Scandinavia than Great Britain.
We’ve never had a system where the wildlife was privately owned. We had no Enclosure and shooting estate system.
Wildlife is the ultimate socialist resource in America. It is managed by big government for the benefit of all.
And in this case, it’s largely worked. We have unbelievable wildlife resources– all of it scientifically managed for the benefit of everyone.
We have a very good conservation record compared to virtually every Western European country. We still have all our large predators. The only place with a lot of bears in Europe is Romania.
And it was only because the dictator liked to shoot them that they were preserved.
Peter,
I appreciate your contribution to the blog, but some of your comments are very upsetting to other readers.
I would like it if you’d try to stay on topic, and not use this space to launch into an anti-hunting commentary at every opportunity.
You’ve not changed any minds here, and other people would like to come to this blog and leave comments without having to deal with it.
I respectfully disagree with you, and I am happy to allow your comments.
But you’ve made your point.
There are lots of other people who leave comments on this blog. We get over 3,000 page views a day. Some of these people have been commenting since I started the blog.
Thank you for your contribution and for hearing me out.
A lot of people mistaken agouti-coated dogs as wolves or coyotes if they are not relatively common in the area. So I am not too surprised this hunter thought he shot a coyote. It is why I am not sure why dog owners with rare breeds complain about Conservation Officers or Fish and Wildlife Officers cannot do proper identifications.
Are people expected to know what a Shikoku look like if there are only about a hundred of them outside of Japan? Likewise for many other breeds.
When I first came across this great site a few days ago it looked set up for a lively dialogue which wasn’t much in evidence at the time, nor was there much being said to counter the on message assumption that hunting was good for us. It then seemed to liven up a bit. However now I stand accused of saying too much per se and certainly too much off message – and I now get the strong hint that my participation is no longer welcome. Okay, have a cosy chat among the converted….
Your participation is still welcome.
If I wanted you to stop commenting, you’d be banned, and you comments never would pop up.
I have about 20 people blocked right now.
Okay, thanks for that anyway. I’ll try not to push it.
DEER HUNTING IN UK
I have to make a retraction: I was out of date saying that our deer were all generally protected. It seems that in response to complaints from suburban gardeners, for the past two years or so, people here have been permitted to hunt (control) the reeves muntjac, supposedly under certain rules.
This engaging less than yard high species has a short history in England since it escaped and gradually made most of our southern counties its home, and in that short time has adapted perfectly, appearing around most southern villages and all their surrounding fields and woods. You could say they are truly ubiquitous.
So the English have got used to the muntjac and the muntjac has got used to us. They don’t immediately leg it at the mere sight or smell of a homo sapien any more, but continue in their unflustered way if we don’t make a dramatic movement.You have similar interreactions in America with some deer and people I know.
I clicked onto a video put on by landowners who have begun to allow people to pay for hunting muntjac on their land (costs a lot so some deer may be saved by this recession) under the supervision of a warden. Anyway it was both sad and ridiculous.This presumably new ‘huntsman’ had turned up in a brand new camouflage outfit, his ornate state of the art rifle with huge telescopic sight attached – and because people are close, the rifle apparently had a silencer attached.
First to be executed was a little chap who had a slight limp, well of course he had to go. He was quickly followed by the doe who had been his companion. The warden could be heard saying she was a prime target as she was “heavily pregnant” so down she went with a slight movement detectable from inside her as she lay dead. Then immediately we could hear on the video the distressed voice of a woman who had apparenty been walking her dog nearby. The warden’s response to this was just obnoxious and rude. If the land owner thought this video might attract more customers to his killing field then surely he was wrong. We felt sick.
STOP PRESS:
A dog called Pudsey just won ‘Britains’s Got Tallent’ on tv a couple of minutes ago and Simon Cowell did a celebration dance with this little mongrel. You couldn’t make it up!
Deer are only protected in close seasons in the UK.
http://www.basc.org.uk/en/departments/deer-management/advice/deer-seasons.cfm
Muntjac are not protected at all.
Elizabeth
How do you make an effort to protect your dogs-especially hunting and herding dogs-from the wolves? Are people starting to use those Central Asian-style anti-wolf collars?
In Scandinavia, they use anti-wolf suits for their hunting dogs:
http://www.prickeared.com/blog/2011/09/14/suit-up/
Thanks for pointing me to that information, Elizabeth, evidently I was a bit naive supposing more protection for deer officially existed than the hunting body lists.
However, when this body acknowledges sensibly that rights of way should be avoided by hunters, I think they are being disingenous not also mentioning that there has been an official legal right to roam over most British countryside since 2004. I guess they were just referring pointedly to footpaths, bridleways and roads and not the open countryside where the nation also rambles freely.
It would not suit the hunting agenda to mention this change in the law.
More walkers do tend to use footpaths than wade through high vegetation obviously, but shorter grassland especially downland plus woodland is full of walkers well dispersed, especially at weekends. Because of our greater population density this is not a suitable country for hunting overall. My family and friendswalk often daily all over the local countryside here in the chiltern hills and none of them have ever mentioned seeing or hearing guns apart from annual pheasant shoots for which bizarrely the pheasants are specially bred like chickens.The pheasant shooters cannot be very good shots in the main since there is is pheasant roadkill spread over every country road all the time. The kites, buzzards, corvids, foxes etc dine out on this every day it seems. We even pick up the odd one ourselves which has not yet been mashed up by a car.
What I’m saying is that around say the south east of England hunting would be deadly which is maybe why we and and those around us dont get disturbed by the sound of gunfire. I accept it must be different in the wider spaces of north america.
I also accept that we meet a lot of the smaller deer, like roe, fallow and muntjac when out walking and numbers are increasing to the point where some may think control is approprate. Actually in a way we already have ‘wolves’ controlling their numbers; the wolves being our local dogs some of which seem adept at catching rabbits and the occasional muntjac, although that said, they don’t have a hope of catching your eastern grey squirrels as these first class athletes leap mockingly among the beech trees.
Sometime it is the dog which comes worst off due to the sharp canines and hooves possesed by muntjacs, but admitedly there are some very unpleasant results sometimes for both dogs and deer from these encounters.
As I was saying previously, the muntjac and the humans are habituated towards one another. Last year we saw a muntjac giving birth under one of our garden hedges for example; they breed any time of year. Shooting them would be like gunning down a bunch of sheep and the so called “hunters” would not usually need telescopic sights or be dressed in camouflage like military snipers in a war zone, but I expect it’s all part of the drama they want to create around their activity.
I forgot to add that England especially is covered by a fine network of footpaths, roads and other rights of way which also makes it very unsafe for hunting to take place. In that respect this is a very different countryside than what you have in the USA. Even Australia and New Zealand are mech less enriched by such great public access . We will soon be able to walk rround our complete coastline without any barriers to progress on foot – for those who have the energy that is.
Peter
Then you must have the world`s most retarded hunters.
You might want to check the local bylaws about firearms discharge, designated areas and the regulations on hunting before continuing to opine on a situation that might not exist.
It has nothing to do with space or population density, and everything with regulations and protocols.
Gun law is very strict. You cannot shoot within 50 feet of any public road. You must have a permit signed by the landowner, and show it on demand. Wandering the countryside with a gun and without such a permit is defined as armed trespass. I have had to deal with that……damned Right to Roam!
Elizabeth
Okay Dave you may be right as we don’t have many tragic hunting incidents reported in the media it’s true, but, as I said, not much sound of gunfire anyway even in this south east area here they call, officially, an “area of outstanding natural beauty” – can’t even build many houses – not that there is much demand for house building just now since the banks had to be rescued, though who is to rescue the rescuers we don’t yet know! I digress as always.
You may also be right about “retarded hunters” of which maybe the world has more than a few anyway – excepting those who are so deperate for food, living in poverty and not always aware they may be “killing the goose that lays the golden egg”. Show me an antelope in Africa and I’ll show you an endangered species.
TOWER TO SHOOT DEER FROM
Talking of efficient killing technology – there suddenly appeared in the wood next to us a sort of miniature eifel tower complete with bucket seat on top. Being quite bright, locals soon agreed it must be a way to shoot deer from a convenient perch and was presumably erected by permission of the then owner of the wood.
Unfortunately soon after its discovery the ‘eifel tower’ was seen to be slightly in a state of disrepair with various essential nuts and bolts missing. A few days later this wreckage vanished from the wood. and since it had been erected less than twenty feet from a much used woodland track the locals were not altogether displeased, it was rumoured.
There was a bonus to this episode when soon the wood was sold to the village and can never be abused again. The previous owner had also allowed 4×4 drivers to rally in this wood and a centuries old badger sett had consequently been flattened out of existence. Luckily there was one other badger colony not touched. We love our badgers, which evoke a similar image here to China’s giant panda.
Peter
There have been some thoughtful discussions going on here about whether or not to reintroduce wolves to the Scottish highlands. where something more radical needs to be done to counter the over grazing by deer.
As an alternative to wolves there have been discussions on whether instead to reintroduce the eurasian lynx which lived in Scotland about a thousand years ago. On the face of it this sounds more practical provided the lynx can do the job adequately. Sheep herding is no longer what it was of course.
Shooting does not seem to be controlling deer overpopulation as envisaged.but there are obvious doubts about wolf reintroduction since3 they travel quickly and far and one can just imagine the reactions to a pack of them running down Princes Street Edinburgh on a Saturday night…!
Beavers have been reintroduced plus the Sea Eagle and the red kite, but of course those species are not traditionally feared.
Romanian wolves have invaded the streets of large cities, and there have been no problems:
By some people’s logic, this female wolf would be a different species from her littermates who happened to live off of hunting wild boar!
Lynx or wolf ( and I would favour the wolf), Scotland is a small country and I`m afraid they could only be offered a rather restricted range. How much room does a wolf pack need?
Elizabeth
Thanks again retrieverman
I must admit grey wolves show such variability and I think we can easily underestimate their ability to adapt. The Romanian urban she wolf in the video could easily be taken for a GSD type or feral dog. This gives hope that a variant could fit unremarkably into the Scottish countryside after all. Obviously they don’t necessarilly have to be all like the larger north american wolf nor form the big packs necessary for hunting larger type prey. European brown bears for example are very much smaller than those found in Alaska. The white wolves of the arctic are another example of wolf variation.
It would be nice to get an update on the Romanian wolf situation.Obviously Romania’s wolves were being well monitored when this female was being filmed in 2008. Let’s hope maybe some of her ten offspring made it.
[…] This confirmation of a wolf in Newfoundland follows close on the heels of the discovery that wolf wa… […]