Resurgent gray wolves killed, despite protection

Living with wolves
Ben Bartlett, member of a DNR advisory panel on wolf management, said farmers are learning to live with wolves — as long as they're compensated for lost livestock and authorities respond promptly to reports of repeated predation.

"People are happy to let the DNR sit out there and trap and shoot so they can go about their work," Bartlett said. He's raised cattle and sheep for 30 years with no wolf raids, although coyotes have been a problem.

According to Michigan DNR data obtained by the AP, nearly 200 wolf carcasses have been recovered in the Upper Peninsula within the past five years. Of those, 39 were referred to investigators as likely poaching cases.

The population has continued rising about 10 percent annually, though this year's increase was half that. That could be just a blip or an indication the peninsula is running out of room for new packs, but biologists don't believe poaching is causing the slowdown.

At least 28 wolves were killed illegally in Wisconsin in 2006-07, said Adrian Wydeven, wolf coordinator for that state's DNR. In Minnesota, state wildlife biologist Dan Stark said poaching happens "to some extent" but less frequently than in the Northern Rockies, home to about 1,500 wolves.

About 10 percent of Rockies wolves are killed illegally every year, said Ed Bangs, recovery coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Helena, Mont.

"Most people try to follow the law even if they disagree with it," Bangs said. "But there's also a knucklehead element in the hunting society."

Tracking a wolf killer
Roell and Beyer lugged the 78-pound wolf's body through waist-high swamp grass on the crude logging road. They spotted a camouflage-style glove on the ground and took it along as possible evidence.

Before long, the tire tracks entered a privately owned parcel where the investigators noticed two hunting blinds on stilts. Farther on, they found a small cabin. Parked nearby was a Chevrolet Blazer with tires matching the tracks on the road.

After determining who owned the backwoods camp, Holmes confronted the owner's son, 28-year-old William Jason Morgan of Iron Mountain.

Faced with evidence — including the glove, which matched another the investigators saw on the kitchen table — Morgan admitted shooting the wolf from a deer blind. He'd thought it was a coyote, he explained. But after seeing the radio collar, he realized he had killed a wolf and hid the animal in the swamp.

The coyote defense again. Holmes and Roell had heard it before. It popped up repeatedly in a stack of poaching incident reports obtained by the AP through FOIA requests.

In 2004, a trapper killed what he thought was a coyote near the tip of Michigan's Lower Peninsula. It turned out to be the only wolf seen in Lower Michigan in modern times — one that apparently had traversed a 5-mile-long ice bridge from the Upper Peninsula near the spot where Lakes Michigan and Huron converge.

Roell said experienced hunters and trappers should know better than to mistake coyotes, up to 18 inches high and weighing 25-40 pounds, with wolves, which are twice as large. Coyotes make clipped yapping sounds, in contrast to drawn-out wolf howls.

Morgan was booked on a charge of violating Michigan's endangered species law.

Daisy melts into darkness
The sun hadn't yet peeked over the eastern horizon one morning last May when Sandy Augustine and Dan Haltug were jolted awake by howling outside their farmhouse north of Bruce Crossing.

Their two dogs heard it, too. When Augustine opened the front door, they burst outside, barking furiously.

Suddenly, a squeal.

A wolf grabbed her poodle, Daisy, and melted into the darkness. "Just a couple of seconds and it was gone," Augustine said. She and Haltug never saw Daisy again.

Then, in early September, they awoke to a grisly scene: The yard was littered with feathers and carcasses of 38 geese and 12 ducks. Most were uneaten, which seemed odd until a DNR officer explained that "surplus killing" is common when wolves assault poultry farms — particularly if adults are teaching pups to hunt.

"They get while the getting's good," returning later to continue dining, Roell said. Sure enough, the next morning Augustine shot video footage of four wolves devouring a goose.

Frustrations and slogans
Such incidents help explain the anger many feel toward the predators — and toward laws and interest groups they believe tie their hands.

"People are getting frustrated," said John Hongisto, a member of the U.P. Sportsmen's Alliance. "I will not kill a wolf myself, but if I hear about it I wouldn't turn somebody in. I understand where they're coming from."

If there's a poster child for the peninsula's wolf critics, it would be 63-year-old farmer John Koski, whose pickup has a bumper sticker reading, "Michigan Wolves — Smoke a Pack a Day."

He's unsure how many cattle he has lost over the past decade. But it's happened so much that government sharpshooters, concealed in blinds and wearing night-vision goggles, have killed nearly two dozen wolves on his 925-acre spread near Matchwood.

Koski carries photos of wolves — loping across his pasture, eating dead cows, lying dead after being shot — and of a gutted white calf. He keeps decomposing remains of another victim — brown, matted hair, bleached bones, a severed head — a cow killed in July.

"It's not right," Koski said with a sigh, strolling amid his mooing herd recently.

MORE FROM ENVIRONMENT

Environment Section Front

Catching up with South Pole adventurers   Belugas off Anchorage could get federal help   Scientist in climate flap to step down for now Shark fins traced to endangered populations   Mount Everest glacier worries scientists Steel town plans return to its green roots On climate emissions cuts, costs may vary U.S. ecoterror suspect in China jail Much less ice for polar bears, expert says Brazil: ‘Gringos’ must pay to save Amazon Environment Section Front   Add Environment headlines to your news reader: