New Mexico Wolf Problems Reach Breaking Point For Ranchers
By David Bowser
SILVER CITY, N.M. — Of the five wolves released this spring and summer in southwestern New Mexico as part of the Mexican gray wolf recovery program, at least one is already being sought by government hunters for killing livestock, says Laura Schneberger with the New Mexico Cattle Growers Association.
"A year ago in Arizona," Schneberger says, "the female was involved in five livestock deaths that we know of. They're considered two incidents, so she was eligible for re-release. The reason they were considered two incidents is because four of them happened in a 24-hour period. That's supposed to make them better wolves instead of worse wolves."
The wolf recovery team re-released her along with an unknown wolf that they can't link through DNA to any of the lineages they found on the San Carlos Reservation, Schneberger says.
The female was a yearling with the Aspen, Ariz., pack that wolf recovery officials released last summer for the first time.
"She immediately got herself into some major trouble and became a problem right off the bat," Schneberger says. "She was born in captivity."
She's a city girl, Schneberger says, and has not adapted will to the wilds of the Gila.
"This is her second time out," Schneberger says. "They trapped her three or four times while they were trying to mitigate the problem in Arizona and stop her from killing livestock."
Wolf recovery officials say they released a male and a pregnant female in April in the Gila. Two females, including the one now being sought by government hunters, and one male were released last month in Sierra County, N.M.
"In the last two weeks, they have been convicted of four incidents," Schneberger says of the trio released in Sierra County, "that involve 13 cattle."
Schneberger says the trio would kill a calf about every two days.
"Then when they ate the calf," Schneberger says, "they would turn around and kill the cow and eat nothing but the udder full of milk."
She estimates that one ranch alone lost about $15,000 worth of livestock in the last two weeks. She questions how much money the family will have to lose because of the wolves.
"This animal shouldn't have been re-released," Schneberger says.
Schneberger says the wolves released in Sierra County are livestock depredators of the worst order.
She accuses the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which oversees the wolf recovery program, of rewriting their depredation policies to allow the government agency maximum flexibility and maximum harm to local ranchers.
"It doesn't matter what harm the ranchers suffer," Schneberger says. "The Fish and Wildlife Service will keep releasing these bad livestock killing wolves in the middle of livestock territory until someone holds them accountable. So far no one has been able to get a handle on the manipulative tactics they have brought into play."
Schneberger says injuries are no longer considered depredations and no longer apply toward removing the offending wolves from cattle country.
"This agency is completely out of control and are wantonly supporting the feeding of privately owned livestock to their Mexican wolves," she insists. "The program has all of these detrimental anti-grazing policies in place, and the program will be expanded to eastern New Mexico and western Arizona. That will take a rule change unless the Fish and Wildlife Service can figure out a way to do it with sneaking dark of night policy changes like they did when they decided to feed livestock to the wolves."
While the Fish and Wildlife Service says there was a public comment period on the rule that allowed the animals three offenses, Schneberger says neither she nor her neighbors remember such a comment period.
"We in wolf country just woke up one morning, and they would not remove livestock killers until there were three strikes," Schneberger says.
Studies indicate that for every confirmed kill there are at least eight more, Schneberger notes.
"Then we woke up a couple months later and four depredations were one if they happened in a 24-hour period," she says. "Then we woke up a several months later and injuries were not counted as depredations."
Schneberger says one of the major problems facing the ranchers in southwest New Mexico is that the government keeps changing the rules of the wolf recovery program.
"They started picking up livestock depredators like the rule said," Schneberger says. "They'd remove them, and then when it got bad, they'd shoot them. When they decided they didn't like shooting them as often as they were having to shoot them, they decided there was going to be a three-strike deal. They implemented that publicly in late 2003, early 2004."
The wolves quickly reached that threshold of killing three different animals, she says.
"The Fish and Wildlife Service implemented a three-incident rule," Schneberger says. "That means if they kill more than one in a 24-hour period, it's only considered one incident."
"That's a real problem," she says. "In my book, it doesn't make them better animals. It makes them four or five times worse."
Schneberger says that when she talked to the government hunters about the livestock deaths, they admitted that the wolves are killing differently now.
"They were just playing," Schneberger says. "They were having a good time. They were having what the Fish and Wildlife Service was calling a killing spree."
Ron Shortes, a rancher near Pietown, N.M., says that Catron County Commissioners declared an emergency based on wolf depredation in February.
"I believe the calculations as of that point in time," Shortes says, "was up to about a half-million dollars in losses to the county because of the wolf issue."
Shortes says the county hired its own wolf investigator in March because the government investigators were ineffective.
"They were overworked," Shortes says. "A lot of the problems were not being investigated or not being investigated competently. The county now has its own investigators that the ranchers can call about wolves to investigate in a timely manner."
One of the major problems since the beginning of the program has been verifying wolf kills.
"It's a problem because the ranchers don't necessarily find out with calves because the whole calf is just gone," Shortes says. "If you don't find the wet cow right away, you don't realize the calf is gone."
That's what made the most recent killings so interesting, Schneberger says. The wolves would kill the calf and then kill the cow.
"At least we were able to know how many calves were lost," she says.
"Obviously," Shortes says, "there's a giant problem there."
The rancher who has suffered the most this summer has taken the time to track the wolves.
"He has gotten every single kill," Schneberger says. "The only kill he hasn't been able to verify is the one where he couldn't get in there quick enough and a bear messed up the evidence, but there was a GPS collar on the male, and we know the wolves were there for seven hours prior to death."
She says ranchers in this part of the state are living a nightmare.
"I lived there for over 18 years," Schneberger says.
She says she and her husband and kids plan to stay, though she admits that they have discussed moving out of the area.
"We have that discussion every third month," Schneberger says. "We live a roller coaster. We're doing okay for a little while, and we're working on the issue and we feel like we're accomplishing something. Then we just get slammed with another bad decision."
"My family has owned a ranch there for 35 years," Shortes says. "We're not in the primary area yet, though Pietown had a wolf that sat down and watched people go in and out of the post office."
"The Fish and Wildlife and the Game and Fish Commission claimed there hadn't been a wolf there for 100 years," Schneberger says.
The local ranchers have taken to calling it the Brokeback Pack after the movie "Brokeback Mountain."
"Fish and Wildlife claims it wasn't a breeding pair," Schneberger says. "So I guess it's the Brokeback Pack. Some guys hanging around."
Schneberger says there was at least one confirmed kill.
"They were seen," she says in exasperation.
The head of a nearby school for the deaf has threatened to close the school because he feels his students may be in danger from wolf attacks, Shortes says.
"My kids have been exposed to wolves," Schneberger says. "It's a very real deal. My daughter squared off with a pair of them when she was 14 years old and riding bareback on her mare. It is not something you want your kids to deal with."
Along with his investigations into wolf depredations, the county's wolf investigator, Jess Carey, is gathering data on child trauma, Schneberger adds.
Catron County is bringing in a child psychologist, she says.
"There's a lot of traumatic stress involved in this," Schneberger says. "We've known that for a while. Now, they're trying to do a little research into that."
"If you believe their figures, which are not believable," Shortes says, "if they only have 60 wolves, they've spent $60 million on them."
"They only have 40 now," Schneberger adds.
"That's a million and a half dollars a wolf that program has cost," Shortes emphasizes.
There's a lot more that money could be used for in these communities, Shortes says, that would benefit the rural communities more than the wolves.
He expects the program to cost in the neighborhood of $200 million before it's over.
"There's so little being accomplished," Shortes says.
Schneberger says ranches in western Sierra County and eastern Catron County in New Mexico are being sold and platted for subdivisions. She says the private land in this rural part of New Mexico is being subdivided because of the actions of the Fish and Wildlife Service.
"It is true that some livestock kills are attributable to other predators," Shortes says. "The idea of doing a competent investigation to know what was going on rather than just saying that probably a lot of these were bears or mountain lions or coyotes, now there's at least an effort being made to identify the predator. That's kind of interrelated to the other problem with this program, which is neither the state nor the federal government, which are both supposed to be cooperating agencies, ever bothered to do any kind of a study about the effect on wildlife, including other predators."
Wolves, he says, have a substantial impact on predators like coyotes as well as predators that are arguably more sophisticated, like mountain lions.
"If your goal is protecting the ecosystem or preserving it," Shortes says, "when you focus all of your attention on one species and ignore whatever else happens, you ignore the effect on the rest of the ecosystem."
By David Bowser
SILVER CITY, N.M. — Of the five wolves released this spring and summer in southwestern New Mexico as part of the Mexican gray wolf recovery program, at least one is already being sought by government hunters for killing livestock, says Laura Schneberger with the New Mexico Cattle Growers Association.
"A year ago in Arizona," Schneberger says, "the female was involved in five livestock deaths that we know of. They're considered two incidents, so she was eligible for re-release. The reason they were considered two incidents is because four of them happened in a 24-hour period. That's supposed to make them better wolves instead of worse wolves."
The wolf recovery team re-released her along with an unknown wolf that they can't link through DNA to any of the lineages they found on the San Carlos Reservation, Schneberger says.
The female was a yearling with the Aspen, Ariz., pack that wolf recovery officials released last summer for the first time.
"She immediately got herself into some major trouble and became a problem right off the bat," Schneberger says. "She was born in captivity."
She's a city girl, Schneberger says, and has not adapted will to the wilds of the Gila.
"This is her second time out," Schneberger says. "They trapped her three or four times while they were trying to mitigate the problem in Arizona and stop her from killing livestock."
Wolf recovery officials say they released a male and a pregnant female in April in the Gila. Two females, including the one now being sought by government hunters, and one male were released last month in Sierra County, N.M.
"In the last two weeks, they have been convicted of four incidents," Schneberger says of the trio released in Sierra County, "that involve 13 cattle."
Schneberger says the trio would kill a calf about every two days.
"Then when they ate the calf," Schneberger says, "they would turn around and kill the cow and eat nothing but the udder full of milk."
She estimates that one ranch alone lost about $15,000 worth of livestock in the last two weeks. She questions how much money the family will have to lose because of the wolves.
"This animal shouldn't have been re-released," Schneberger says.
Schneberger says the wolves released in Sierra County are livestock depredators of the worst order.
She accuses the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which oversees the wolf recovery program, of rewriting their depredation policies to allow the government agency maximum flexibility and maximum harm to local ranchers.
"It doesn't matter what harm the ranchers suffer," Schneberger says. "The Fish and Wildlife Service will keep releasing these bad livestock killing wolves in the middle of livestock territory until someone holds them accountable. So far no one has been able to get a handle on the manipulative tactics they have brought into play."
Schneberger says injuries are no longer considered depredations and no longer apply toward removing the offending wolves from cattle country.
"This agency is completely out of control and are wantonly supporting the feeding of privately owned livestock to their Mexican wolves," she insists. "The program has all of these detrimental anti-grazing policies in place, and the program will be expanded to eastern New Mexico and western Arizona. That will take a rule change unless the Fish and Wildlife Service can figure out a way to do it with sneaking dark of night policy changes like they did when they decided to feed livestock to the wolves."
While the Fish and Wildlife Service says there was a public comment period on the rule that allowed the animals three offenses, Schneberger says neither she nor her neighbors remember such a comment period.
"We in wolf country just woke up one morning, and they would not remove livestock killers until there were three strikes," Schneberger says.
Studies indicate that for every confirmed kill there are at least eight more, Schneberger notes.
"Then we woke up a couple months later and four depredations were one if they happened in a 24-hour period," she says. "Then we woke up a several months later and injuries were not counted as depredations."
Schneberger says one of the major problems facing the ranchers in southwest New Mexico is that the government keeps changing the rules of the wolf recovery program.
"They started picking up livestock depredators like the rule said," Schneberger says. "They'd remove them, and then when it got bad, they'd shoot them. When they decided they didn't like shooting them as often as they were having to shoot them, they decided there was going to be a three-strike deal. They implemented that publicly in late 2003, early 2004."
The wolves quickly reached that threshold of killing three different animals, she says.
"The Fish and Wildlife Service implemented a three-incident rule," Schneberger says. "That means if they kill more than one in a 24-hour period, it's only considered one incident."
"That's a real problem," she says. "In my book, it doesn't make them better animals. It makes them four or five times worse."
Schneberger says that when she talked to the government hunters about the livestock deaths, they admitted that the wolves are killing differently now.
"They were just playing," Schneberger says. "They were having a good time. They were having what the Fish and Wildlife Service was calling a killing spree."
Ron Shortes, a rancher near Pietown, N.M., says that Catron County Commissioners declared an emergency based on wolf depredation in February.
"I believe the calculations as of that point in time," Shortes says, "was up to about a half-million dollars in losses to the county because of the wolf issue."
Shortes says the county hired its own wolf investigator in March because the government investigators were ineffective.
"They were overworked," Shortes says. "A lot of the problems were not being investigated or not being investigated competently. The county now has its own investigators that the ranchers can call about wolves to investigate in a timely manner."
One of the major problems since the beginning of the program has been verifying wolf kills.
"It's a problem because the ranchers don't necessarily find out with calves because the whole calf is just gone," Shortes says. "If you don't find the wet cow right away, you don't realize the calf is gone."
That's what made the most recent killings so interesting, Schneberger says. The wolves would kill the calf and then kill the cow.
"At least we were able to know how many calves were lost," she says.
"Obviously," Shortes says, "there's a giant problem there."
The rancher who has suffered the most this summer has taken the time to track the wolves.
"He has gotten every single kill," Schneberger says. "The only kill he hasn't been able to verify is the one where he couldn't get in there quick enough and a bear messed up the evidence, but there was a GPS collar on the male, and we know the wolves were there for seven hours prior to death."
She says ranchers in this part of the state are living a nightmare.
"I lived there for over 18 years," Schneberger says.
She says she and her husband and kids plan to stay, though she admits that they have discussed moving out of the area.
"We have that discussion every third month," Schneberger says. "We live a roller coaster. We're doing okay for a little while, and we're working on the issue and we feel like we're accomplishing something. Then we just get slammed with another bad decision."
"My family has owned a ranch there for 35 years," Shortes says. "We're not in the primary area yet, though Pietown had a wolf that sat down and watched people go in and out of the post office."
"The Fish and Wildlife and the Game and Fish Commission claimed there hadn't been a wolf there for 100 years," Schneberger says.
The local ranchers have taken to calling it the Brokeback Pack after the movie "Brokeback Mountain."
"Fish and Wildlife claims it wasn't a breeding pair," Schneberger says. "So I guess it's the Brokeback Pack. Some guys hanging around."
Schneberger says there was at least one confirmed kill.
"They were seen," she says in exasperation.
The head of a nearby school for the deaf has threatened to close the school because he feels his students may be in danger from wolf attacks, Shortes says.
"My kids have been exposed to wolves," Schneberger says. "It's a very real deal. My daughter squared off with a pair of them when she was 14 years old and riding bareback on her mare. It is not something you want your kids to deal with."
Along with his investigations into wolf depredations, the county's wolf investigator, Jess Carey, is gathering data on child trauma, Schneberger adds.
Catron County is bringing in a child psychologist, she says.
"There's a lot of traumatic stress involved in this," Schneberger says. "We've known that for a while. Now, they're trying to do a little research into that."
"If you believe their figures, which are not believable," Shortes says, "if they only have 60 wolves, they've spent $60 million on them."
"They only have 40 now," Schneberger adds.
"That's a million and a half dollars a wolf that program has cost," Shortes emphasizes.
There's a lot more that money could be used for in these communities, Shortes says, that would benefit the rural communities more than the wolves.
He expects the program to cost in the neighborhood of $200 million before it's over.
"There's so little being accomplished," Shortes says.
Schneberger says ranches in western Sierra County and eastern Catron County in New Mexico are being sold and platted for subdivisions. She says the private land in this rural part of New Mexico is being subdivided because of the actions of the Fish and Wildlife Service.
"It is true that some livestock kills are attributable to other predators," Shortes says. "The idea of doing a competent investigation to know what was going on rather than just saying that probably a lot of these were bears or mountain lions or coyotes, now there's at least an effort being made to identify the predator. That's kind of interrelated to the other problem with this program, which is neither the state nor the federal government, which are both supposed to be cooperating agencies, ever bothered to do any kind of a study about the effect on wildlife, including other predators."
Wolves, he says, have a substantial impact on predators like coyotes as well as predators that are arguably more sophisticated, like mountain lions.
"If your goal is protecting the ecosystem or preserving it," Shortes says, "when you focus all of your attention on one species and ignore whatever else happens, you ignore the effect on the rest of the ecosystem."
