Population Status
As a species recently delisted from the Endangered Species Act (ESA), the gray wolf (Canis lupus) population in the United States remains much lower than historical estimates, which range from 250,000 to as many as two million individuals. Once European colonization began, wolves were perceived as a threat to people and livestock. The gray wolf was hunted to extreme endangerment, but recovery efforts after becoming listed in the ESA saved the species from extinction. Since the populations have recovered, just over 7,500 wolves live in the lower 48 states as of 2020. Our focus in this blog is to discuss the listing of wolves by examining the population in Idaho.
The reintroduction of wolves into Idaho began in 1995 with the release of fifteen of them that year and twenty more a year later. As of 2020, that population has grown to roughly 1,556. According to Idaho Fish and Game, as reported by Life on the Range, the wolves are split into at least 80 packs spread across Idaho. These numbers show that wolves in Idaho are thriving and have benefited from the conservation movement. The question is, however, is their population too high or not high enough?
Habitat Status
As a result of conservation efforts in 1995, wolves were reintroduced in central Idaho, specifically the northern Rocky Mountains that run throughout the state. As a part of their historical range, Idaho was an ideal habitat for wolf reintroduction. Wolves are mainly found in habitats such as forests, woodlands, and grassy plains throughout Central Idaho. They are a truly adaptable species and will also live in deserts and tundra. Idaho’s habitat is ideal because it provides an abundant food source. Grey wolves have a diet of elk, deer, moose, and even smaller animals like hares. During the time of reintroduction in Idaho, the elk population was very high, and this abundant food source aided the increase of wolves throughout Idaho. Idaho also has a good amount of public land, with only 31% private, allowing for more accessible conservation efforts. This has helped land throughout Central Idaho to maintain well connected, allowing better access to habitat for wolves. Central Idaho has proven that it has the necessary habitat to support a large population of wolves, with the proper landscape, an abundant food source, and connectivity.
Primary Threats
Primary threats to wolves before and after the reintroduction are somewhat similar. Conflicts with humans, intolerance, and habitat loss, as well as state and federal endangered species regulations, are all threats to wolves. Westward development in the 1800s brought settlers and their livestock into direct contact with natural predator and prey species. As agriculture grew, much of the wolves’ prey base was lost. With the prey base gone, wolves proceeded to hunt on domestic stock, resulting in humans eradicating wolves from the majority of their historical habitat. The 1973 Endangered Species Act (ESA) contributed to the reintroduction of around 7,500 gray wolves in the lower 48 states by 2020. The U.S. Department of Fish and Wildlife assessed gray wolf recovery so successfully that the canids were “delisted” from the ESA on January 4, 2021. Unfortunately, with the delisted action, there will be more annual hunting that is harmful to their natural reproduction, and the death rate would be higher than the birth rate.
Recovery Options
While wolves have increased since conservation efforts began, the definition of “recovered” varies, especially now since hunting them in many areas has become legal. Not only do the population numbers have to increase for the sake of genetic diversity, but the populations must remain stable over many years. There have been positive results from research on carrying capacity and population stabilization in protected areas such as Yellowstone National Park. One study shows that wolf populations will stabilize on their own due to a mix of factors such as food quantity as well as complex intraspecies social dynamics. This graph from a study done in Yellowstone National Park shows that, while wolf populations initially increased for some time, eventually, they reduced to a steadier level. There is no need to kill wolves since the data shows that natural forces will regulate them.
In other areas, such as Isle Royale, the data currently shows that continuing research is needed to find the minimum number of immigrants required for a population to retain genetic diversity. Even though 19 gray wolves were introduced to a failing wolf population on Isle Royale, that amount of genetic diversity is predicted to not be enough to keep the negative effects of inbreeding away for more than about 50 years. There are also very few long-term conservation studies done on populations that reside outside of national parks due to the organisms themselves being harder to study as well as the fact that researchers would have to factor in many more anthropogenic elements into any project.
As studies continue to be conducted, there are some actions that can be taken to aid in the immediate conservation of wolves on public lands. Idaho, along with many other states, have laws related to open rangelands. The open range includes “all uninclosed lands outside of cities, villages and herd districts, upon which cattle by custom, license, lease, or permit, are grazed or permitted to roam”. Most open-range land is managed by the Bureau of Land Management, but the law allows anyone’s cattle to legally graze there. The owners of the cattle are also protected from any damage caused by accidents between their animal and a vehicle.
This means that ranchers have very few responsibilities to their cattle when they are using this land, but gain large benefits since the cattle have more access to a natural food source. It seems then that due to the fewer responsibilities placed on them, owners should have an equal trade-off when their cattle are killed on this land specifically. While ranchers are entitled to defend their property on their land, they should not be allowed to preemptively hunt wolves on public lands. Only if a wolf is caught actively attacking cattle should a rancher retaliate, but a wolf moving around on public lands is not considered an immediate threat.
While this choice might seem harsh at first, it serves two main purposes. The first is that ranchers must determine the size of their herd based on how risk-averse to wolves they are. They could opt for fewer cattle due to less total land, but all ranchers would be assured that they can kill any wolf that is on their land, even if it doesn’t engage them. If ranchers choose to continue to have a larger herd and use public land, then they run the risk of wolf encounters and possible losses from the cattle. While ranchers can be reimbursed for cattle lost to wolves, they lose out on the profit. Most ranchers would fall somewhere between the two extremes, with the average herd most likely decreasing some.
This choice would then create a barrier of space between wolves and cattle, with wolves eventually learning which places are and are not considered safe. By keeping the wolf and cattle interactions to a minimum, the wolves would consider the cattle as less of a food source than their traditional prey, which in turn would become pressure on the packs that would regulate their numbers to a sustainable level. This potential course of action would not solve every issue, as it counts on the fact that the assumptions can be enforced, but it is one option that could aid in wolf conservation on public lands.
Figure 1. Wolf populations will stabilize on their own over time, exemplified by this graph of wolf populations in Yellowstone National Park where wolf hunting is illegal.
Recovery Outlooks
In Idaho, Gray wolves once existed throughout the state however, hunting and poisoning began shortly after settlement, almost completely wiping out the population. Gray wolves were nearly completely wiped out from the United States in the mid 20th century. In the last forty-five years, a recovery effort to reverse their extinction has resulted in exceptional population growth. This restoration issue led to the gray wolves being added to the Endangered Species Act (ESA). It is also because of this success that gray wolves are to be removed from the ESA. Wolves were reintroduced to central Idaho in 1995 and 1996. This was an attempt to facilitate the recovery of the gray wolf in the Northern Rockies states. Wolves continue to be controversial, and public attitudes vary in Idaho.
Poaching, Hunting, and Ranchers are wolves’ primary risks to recovery. In some areas like Oregon, where laws are in place to continue protecting both the livestock and wolves, populations continue to climb and stabilize. For hunting, due to the threat of the livestock, there must be a lawful investigation into the depredation. When looking at Oregon and their regulations, statistics show that even since wolf populations numbers have increased significantly, and more importantly depredation events have stayed relatively the same, as shown in this figure by the Oregon Wolf Conservation and Management 2020 Annual Report. Similar implementations of protection were seen in Yellowstone, where they have found that with monitored conservation and limited hunting in the park, Wolf packs naturally limit their own numbers to not overproduce.
In Idaho, the governor feels that there are too many wolves and they are becoming more confident and are jeopardizing prize elk in the area, as elk can be the main part of a pack’s diet. Wolves are known to be a healthy part of the ecosystem, as they kill sick or diseased parts of the herd, meaning stronger reproduction. What is also happening, that has trophy hunters annoyed, is elk are moving to higher elevation due to the behavior change with the predators present. However, a law is moving forward that calls for 90% of the state’s wolves to be killed.
Figure 2. The left graph shows the number of confirmed depredation events and the right graph shows the number and trend of depredation events and minimum wolf count in a 2020 wolf conservation and management report.
Considering the following, the outlook of recovery for wolves is promising even as they move off the ESA. With laws in place that protect both livestock and wolf populations, there can be cohabitation without endangering the species. As explained in the previous section, wolves naturally limit their numbers, so there should not be any fear of overpopulation. In Oregon, gray wolf numbers should continue to steadily increase. If the law passes, the situation in Idaho would not be the same. As the state is considering a plan to reduce its population by approximately 90 percent, meaning the wolf population after seeing regrowth would fall from 1500 down to 150 wolves. This is an extreme risk to the states and the country’s efforts to rehabilitate and recover the gray wolf population.
Evidence
Because legislation in Idaho now allows for the take of 90% of the wolf population, they may need to be relisted. According to the article, “The Endangered Species Act and Its Impacts on Gray Wolf Recovery in Yellowstone National Park” (Larson, 2011), wolves could be delisted once at least 300 individuals in each state of Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming were present. However, after the wolves were delisted in March 2008, Wyoming created a state management plan that classified wolves as varmints, meaning that they could be killed at any time without cause. Wolves were then quickly relisted in October of that year in order to prevent the plan from causing more harm to the existing populations.
This scenario is likely to be repeated in Idaho today. Wolves were delisted as of November 3, 2020, which leaves them vulnerable to Idaho’s new management plan. This could reverse all the work that had been done to increase their numbers and stabilize their ecosystems. If the management plan were successful in its goals, only about 150 wolves would be left in the state of Idaho, half of the 300 wolf requirement in the original recovery plan.
Previous attempts by states to create management plans below the federal minimum had resulted in relisting and court cases favoring the original recovery plan from the ESA (Larson, 2011), but that has not yet been the case yet with Idaho’s current plan. Due to more intense political gridlock, as well as slower government movement due to the pandemic, officials have not had the time, resources, or in some cases, the incentive to call out the management plan and potentially strike it down for being contradictory. However, wolves do need to be relisted in order to prevent the Idaho population from falling too low.
In addition to the legal precedent laying out the basis for wolf population numbers within each state, there is also the ecological evidence that points to the idea that wolves, when left to their own devices, will self-regulate their numbers to form a more stable and consistent population. For instance, Figure 1 above displaying the Yellowstone National Park wolf population over time shows an initial increase in numbers, but then decreases back to just about 100 wolves. In Yellowstone, wolves are protected, so this graph is an example of what would happen to the populations if humans did not regulate them. Therefore, there is no scientific evidence to support human-led regulation of wolf populations.
Wolves, just like every other species, are complex living organisms. Both the legal history and ecological evidence reflect that. Wolves should be relisted until a time where each state can create a management plan centered around the wellbeing of its wolves.
