Animal Protection Groups Launch Advertising Campaign Calling Attention to Even More Wolf Killing Instigated by a Single Rancher Hell Bent on Grazing Cattle on Federal Lands

Research shows “smart grazing” and non-lethal methods will reduce depredation incidents and allow wolves to live in habitats well suited for them

Washington, DC — The Center for a Humane Economy and Animal Wellness Action launched an advertising campaign that began yesterday in Washington to protect wolves, with a full-page ad appearing in Sunday’s Seattle Times. The ad highlights how a single Stephens County cattle rancher, by goading state authorities, has been the instigator for a repeating series of “wolf depredation” actions across the state.

This campaign comes on the heels of an effort by Animal Wellness and other groups to oppose federal de-listing of wolves across their range in the lower 48 states. That campaign, along with the efforts of so many other national organizations with a shared purpose, generated perhaps as many as 1.8 million comments in opposition to de-listing. Animal Wellness expressed concerns in its ad about support for federal de-listing by Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife director Kelly Susewind.

Washington officials estimate there are perhaps as few 120 wolves in the state, and to the consternation of citizens, the state wiped out the Profanity Peak pack in 2016, and now it has issued kill orders for members of a new pack called the Old Profanity Territory pack.

“We hope our campaign grounds the aerial gunners and foot soldiers working to kill the OPT wolves,” said Wayne Pacelle, founder of Animal Wellness Action. “We support the process of stakeholder engagement through the Wolf Advisory Group, but the continued appeasement of one stubborn-minded rancher has been a long-running disaster for wolves.”

Wolves are slowly reclaiming small portions of their original range in Washington, living in more than 25 packs throughout the eastern reaches of the state. They have been involved with very few attacks on livestock and the use of non-lethal management methods has generally proved very effective in allowing wolves and people to co-exist.

“Rancher Len McIrvin and the Diamond M Ranch are responsible for killing an astonishing 85 percent of wolves killed through depredation permits in Washington on public lands over the last decade,” observed Rob Wielgus, a wildlife biologist and former director (retired) of the Large Carnivore Conservation Laboratory at Washington State University. “My research shows that non-lethal controls, such as keeping livestock and salt blocks one kilometer away from wolf denning and rendezvous areas, are very effective in deterring rare wolf attacks on livestock.” Wielgus points out that livestock losses to wolves were one-third of one percent (0.003) in wolf occupied areas of Washington, except when it comes to the ranching operations of Len McIrvin, who refuses to modify his grazing and salting locations and suffered 10 times the losses of other ranchers.

Wielgus’s research has reveal that non-lethal methods are generally far more effective in deterring the rare number of attacks on livestock and that depredation killing of wolves may also disrupt existing social relationships and spur continued depredations on livestock, as has been continually observed on McIrvin’s public grazing allotments.

“One man is badly disrupting and undermining a largely successful wolf management program in Washington, and the efforts to appease him should be stopped,” added Pacelle. The campaign asks Washington residents to complain to Mr. Kelly Susewind, the director of the Washington’s Department of Fish and Wildlife. Susewind has authorized the killing of the OPT pack members.

The ad notes that there hasn’t been a single documented attack on a person by a healthy, wild wolf in the lower 48 states in the last century. There have, however, been countless human attacks on wolves. We humans have trapped, shot, and poisoned these animals – tens of thousands of them. The federal government and the states, including Washington, even paid bounties to promote slaughter.