Best PBS Nature Ever?
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My DVR is permanently set to record PBS’ wonderful Nature series, which is one of the best outdoor documentary programs I’ve ever seen (and I’ve been watching them since back when that’s all Discovery showed).
As Yellowstone has developed into a wild place once again, (thanks to NPS decision-making in the 1970s), it’s provided excellent fodder for documentary television.
Zach…help me out.
Has this series/episode already aired?
It debuted on Sunday the 4th, but it should be running all week in re-runs until the next episode comes out.
For anyone that liked the show, or anyone that’s interested in wolves in general, I highly recommend Decade of the Wolf by Douglas W. Smith and Gary Ferguson.
Having traveled to Yellowstone several times, this year was my biggest thrill since I finally was able to see the wolves.
Saying the word Wolf in my part of Montana is like saying the “F” word in church! Probably the most hated creature on earth to every rancher in the valley. Our ranch alone lost over twenty calves to a wolf pack. Nice to have them back in the park now they need to come up with a management plan.
Joel
Nice to have them back in the park now they need to come up with a management plan.
I think that’s totally fair.
How has the reintroduction affected the populations of elk, mule deer, bear, etc?
Seafood –
The Park was way, way over the limits of what it should naturally have carried in elk and deer (and arguably in bison – google up “brucellosis” sometime).
One of the interesting effects of the wolf reintroduction has been that elk and deer species have to avoid the open bottomlands where they had been making their living since the 1920s.
Damn…I wish I could get this show.
Zach, I know there is a plan that is being pushed right now, but I am not sure of the particulars of the plan. I think it is very similar to many big game hunts where they do a drawing for certain areas where the packs are a problem. The problem is that it is a tri state plan which include Montana, Wyoming and Idaho. Idaho is the big hold up on the plan right now because their stance on the wolf is to kill them all and let God sort them out. Once Idaho enters the talks in a more reasonable manner it will make it much easier to come up with a plan that work for everyone.
Joel
There’s a section of one of the wolf recovery websites that cites an incident early in the reintroduction when an Idaho school superintendent pleaded with the NPS committee not to re-introduce because (paraphrasing) “Idaho is a rural area with lots of schoolchildren getting on the buses alone in the wilds.”
Um, dude, slavering as the wolf may be portrayed on television, there are exactly zero documented cases of wolves attacking people in the U.S., and ten years into the re-introduction, the only hurtin’ anyone’s been putting on anyone else is us on them.
I have travelled to YNP several times and have seen the wolves. I have to try to catch the Nature show, have seen several good shows on the Discovery Channel too. Here’s a pic of a wolf track I took the last time I visited the Lamar River Valley:
JH
Idaho is the big hold up on the plan right now because their stance on the wolf is to kill them all and let God sort them out. Once Idaho enters the talks in a more reasonable manner it will make it much easier to come up with a plan that work for everyone.
Joel
Folks in WY are quite pleased with Idaho……just sayin’.
It is very easy for those located in other geographical areas to tell everyone out here what they should do about wolfs.
Jeepers…how much snow do you guys have out there already?
Um, dude, slavering as the wolf may be portrayed on television, there are exactly zero documented cases of wolves attacking people in the U.S., and ten years into the re-introduction, the only hurtin’ anyone’s been putting on anyone else is us on them.
Zach
Um, dude……………………………………..not in the US, but it can happen.
Coronor’s jury makes it official: Wolves killed and ate engineering studentSubmitted by Rocky Barker on Tue, 11/06/2007 – 8:37am.
It’s now official.
A man was attacked, killed and eaten by a pack of wolves in Saskatchewan, Canada. A jury decided Nov. 1 that a 22-year-old Ontario man was killed 2 years ago in a remote mining camp by a pack of wolves.
The jury’s decision makes Kenton Carnegie the first confirmed killed of a human in North America by wolves. The decision has delighted anti-wolf advocates, who have been skeptical of the most powerful claim made environmentalists who pushed to get wolves reintroduced into the Northern Rockies: Wolves don’t kill people.
Now, of course this single incident suggests that wolf attacks on human are rare. More people are killed by dogs, grizzly bears and mountain lions.
But at least one scientist says everything we learned about wolves when they themselves were decimated during the 20th Century might not be true with large, healthy populations in the 21st Century.
Val Geist, one of Canada’s most noted biologists,emeritus professor from the University of Calgary, who had written a paper entered into evidence in the inquest, said he has personally seen a shift in wolf behavior among wolves that live in and among humans that are not hunted. Those near his home on Vancouver Island are more aggressive then those he studied for decades in the wild.
Another Canadian wolf expert Paul Paquet, said during the inquest that Carnegie was likely killed by a bear, but could have been killed by wolves.
The witnesses on the scene thought differently.
They found the engineering student surrounded by a pack of wolves and identified the tracks near the body as wolves.
“Collectively, there is little doubt in my mind that these two exceptionally qualified witnesses correctly identified wolves as the species killing and consuming Kenton Carnegie, but also correctly read the process of events as evidenced by the track and sign patterns in the snow,” Geist wrote.
Wolves and other animals had become habituated eating a large garbage dump left by the mining company and its workers. They and other wild animals had lost their fear of humans.
Paquet doesn’t buy the jury’s verdict and he dismissed the quality of the inquest according to Anchorage Daily News. <http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/newsreader/story/9432230p-9344434c.html>
“I’d put in the same category as ‘O.J. Simpson is innocent,’ ” Paquet, told the Daily News.
No one witnessed the attack. An overnight snow covered much of the tracks and the rarity wolves getting close to people drives his doubts, the Daily News said. The position of the body and the wounds suggested to Paquet that it was a bear that ate him.
Needless to say, environmental groups believe Paquet.
Anti-wolf advocates now have the evidence they have been hoping for to paint the predator as the bloodthirsty threat to children and lone backcountry hikers they have always suggested.
“The story of Kenton Carnegie’s death and the struggle of his parents to find the truth against political bias stands as a precursor to events that may all to soon unfold in Idaho,” said John Runft, the attorney who wrote the anti-wolf initiative that Stanley lodge owner Ron Gillett is circulating.
One thing is certain. Westerners are going to hear the name of Kenton Carnegie a lot in the next few years as the debate over wolves continues.
I just got this from Idaho Fish and Game.
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