Wolf portrayal in film not based in reality

Fleeting images from the official trailer for the new Hollywood film The Grey suggest a love story, a violent plane crash, then a flash of bristling fur, the glint of a knife blade, and, in the background, the sound of a haunting howl.

Opening in theatres this weekend, The Grey is described as the story of an “unruly group of oil-rig roughnecks” whose plane crashes in the remote Alaskan wilderness. Amid a mountain backdrop – in reality, Whistler and Smithers, B.C. – the cast, headlined by Liam Neeson, must battle mortal injuries, merciless weather and, most menacing of all, “a vicious pack of rogue wolves on the hunt.”

Before you settle in with a tub of buttery popcorn, take note that wolf experts are giving the reality factor of the production a unanimous thumbs-down.

Paul Paquet, a senior scientist with the Raincoast Conservation Foundation, says such a film serves to feed into negative myths that have surrounded wolves for centuries.

“I think it’s kind of an embarrassment for the studio and the producers and writers and actors,” Paquet says. “It’s such a blatant misrepresentation of reality. Unfortunately, though, there are consequences that are pretty negative for wolves.”

Portraying wolves as manhunters creates unnecessary antipathy and fear, he says. In the long term that can mean people are less accepting of wolves and may even lead to people killing them.

The very idea that wolves would stalk humans, says Canmore’s Gunther Bloch, a canid behaviour expert who has studied wolves for two decades, has no basis in reality.

“It would be extremely exceptional behaviour, and only if they didn’t have a food resource – which in itself would be rare,” Bloch says.

Wolves are opportunistic eaters whose food choices are dictated by availability and habitat. A wolf living in the northern Canadian tundra will hunt migrating caribou. In the Rockies, wolves eat deer, elk, bighorn sheep and snowshoe hares, and snack on mice and voles. In the Arctic, they hunt muskox. A West Coast wolf might feast on running salmon for several weeks.

Given the opportunity, however, wolves will also help themselves to the offerings of an urban garbage dump.

While a rabid or food-conditioned wolf might on very rare occasions lose its fear of humans and attack, a person who finds himself close to a wolf’s food source – even a kill – should not expect a fight.

“They would bark an alarm bark, a warning,” Bloch says. “They wouldn’t attack; in the end, they would run away. They would figure out how to get the pups out of there.”

For the most part, Bloch adds, wolves are very intelligent and have become well conditioned over thousands of years to fear humans who have so often – and successfully – persecuted them.

Since the 1950s, wolves have enjoyed a period of recovery from widespread “control” efforts, the result of prejudices that arrived in North America with the first Europeans. But, while attitudes have changed, in some places where the population had recovered, wolves are again in jeopardy and being targeted.

Wolves have long suffered from misconceptions, including the idea they operate exclusively by pack rules.

For the first five or so months after a litter of pups is born in April, the parent wolves individually hunt small prey, bringing meals back to the den to feed their pups. Then, once the pups have grown, they assemble as hunting groups.

Another misconception people have about wolves, Bloch says, is that wolf behaviour is restricted to hierarchy and status.

“To say that wolves congregate in a pack suggests hierarchy, when the reality is a family-type situation – mother and father, pups and older pups helping look after younger ones, functioning as babysitters,” he says. “Wolves are very close. If a member is injured, they will feed it until it is well again. There are a lot of emotional things going on.”

No one thing in the ecosystem is essential, but, as apex and summit predators, wolves interact with and influence a suite of other species, Paquet says. By extension, their presence has a profound effect on the ecosystem, as their behaviour affects not just the balance between predator and prey but also the plants their prey feed on.

They can also have a positive influence on humans.

“Nature and the wildlife it contains provide physical, emotional and intellectual benefits to people,” Paquet says. “The beauty and symbolic nature of large carnivores inspires many people. As a result, animals such as bears, tigers and wolves often form the foci of literature, poems, paintings, sculptures and dance.”

Wolves figure prominently in First Nations’ cultures, but urban people too can develop strong emotional attachments to large carnivores.

Few might ever see a polar bear or grizzly in the wild, but they want these animals to exist, not just for themselves, but also so their children or grandchildren might have an opportunity to see them in their natural habitat.

Large carnivores, including wolves, top the list of species people hope to catch a glimpse of when they engage in wilderness-based recreation, which can translate into people spending money to travel for such opportunities.

Unfortunately, though, Paquet says, some people harbour the attitude that wolves as predators are in competition with – and a threat to – humans.

In the case of ranchers, farmers and hunters, the potential for wolves to physically harm a person is very rare, but the competition aspect is real.

And the growth of the human population and subsequent encroachment on wolf habitat makes conflicts inevitable.

“Humans tend to push out other species,” Paquet says.

“That, in my view, has been one of the great mistakes of the conservation movement. All these years we’ve asked for tolerance, when all along we should have been asking for acceptance.”

By Chris Genovali, Paul Paquet and Chris Darimont

In western Canada, wolves are routinely, baselessly and contemptuously blamed for the demise of everything from marmots to mountain caribou. Given that attitude, we at Raincoast Conservation Foundation are appalled, though not surprised, by Canada’s proposed strategy to recover dwindling populations of boreal forest caribou in northern Alberta’s tar sands. Essentially, the plan favours the destruction of wolves over any consequential protection, enhancement, or expansion of caribou habitat (“Federal recovery plan for caribou suggests thousands of wolves stand to die,” Winnipeg Free Press, September 12, 2011).

To read the full article please visit The Huffington Post website.

by Paul Paquet

Guardian.co.uk,  Saturday 17   September 2011

Wolves are routinely, baselessly and contemptuously blamed for the demise of everything from marmots to mountain caribou in western Canada. Given that attitude, we at Raincoast Conservation Foundation are appalled, though not surprised, by Canada’s proposed strategy to “recover” dwindling populations of boreal forest caribou in northern Alberta’s tar sands territory. Essentially, the plan favours the destruction of wolves over any consequential protection, enhancement or expansion of caribou habitat.

Clearly, the caribou recovery strategy is not based on ecological principles or available science. Rather, it represents an ideology on the part of advocates for industrial exploitation of our environment, which subsumes all other principles to economic growth, always at the expense of ecological integrity. Owing to the breadth of the human niche, which continues to expand via technological progress, the human economy grows at the competitive exclusion of nonhuman species in the aggregate. The real cost of Alberta’s tar sands development, which includes the potential transport of oil by Northern Gateway and Keystone XL pipelines is being borne by wolves, caribou and other wild species.

Consistent with Canada’s now well-deserved reputation as an environmental laggard, the caribou recovery strategy evolved over several years and many politicised iterations, carefully massaged by government pen pushers and elected officials who did their very best to ignore and obscure the advice of consulting biologists and ecologists. So, the government should quit implying that the consultation approach provides a scientifically credible basis for decisions. Apparently, scientists can lead federal Environment Minister Peter Kent to information, but they cannot make him think.

Egged on by a rapacious oil industry, the federal government has chosen to scapegoat wolves for the decline of boreal caribou in a morally and scientifically bankrupt attempt to protect Canada’s industrial sacred cow: the tar sands.

To read the rest of this article please visit The Guardian website.

B.C.’s Open Season On Wolves: Ranchers Relieved But Critics Rankled By Suspect Science

The Chronicle Herald

 B.C. wolf hunt raises hackles 

The Guardian – PEI

 Ranchers relieved but critics rankled by B.C.’s open season on wolves

News 1130 Radio

 BC’s open season on wolves has supporters and critics

Sympatico.ca News

 Ranchers relieved, critics rankled by open season on wolves

Metro U.S.

 B.C. Interior wolf hunt raises hackles

Penticton Herald

 Ranchers relieved but critics rankled by B.C.’s open season on wolves

CTV News

 Critics rankled by B.C.’s open season on wolves

By DENE MOORE The Canadian Press
Sun, Sep 4

100 MILE HOUSE, B.C. — Hunted to near-extinction in North America by the 1950s, the British Columbia wolf population has long since rebounded.

Now, this secretive nocturnal predator finds itself in the glare of the public eye once again after the provincial government lifted hunting restrictions on wolves in a region of the province.

Ranchers in the Cariboo region say they’re relieved that they’ll be able to hunt and trap wolves preying on their cattle, but critics say the open season is bad management based on poor science…Paul Paquet, a biologist with the Raincoast Conservation Foundation, said the ministry doesn’t even have the information it would need to make that decision.

“What they’re basing it on is entirely anecdotal,” said Paquet, an adjunct professor in the faculty of environmental design at the University of Calgary.

To read the full article please visit the Chronicle Herald website.

The Huffington Post

100 MILE HOUSE,  B.C. – Hunted to near-extinction in North America by the 1950s, the British Columbia wolf population has long since rebounded.  Now, this secretive nocturnal predator finds itself in the glare of the public eye once again after the provincial government lifted hunting restrictions on wolves in a region of the province.

Ranchers in the Cariboo region say they’re relieved that they’ll be able to hunt and trap wolves preying on their cattle, but critics say the open season is bad management based on poor science.

Read the full article at Huffington Post

Click here for the pdf version BC’s Open Season on Wolves- Huff Post

The B.C. government justifies an open-season policy on wolves in the Cariboo region by saying their numbers are at a historic high and they are having a ”significant” impact on livestock.

But official government payments to ranchers for predator-killed livestock tell a different story, suggesting the problem is in fact getting better, not worse.

There were 78 verified livestock losses to predators on Crown land across the province last year – the lowest in four years – for which the government paid out $32,931 in compensation. The province estimates 150,000 cattle (cows, not including calves) graze on Crown range land across B.C.

Ministry of Agriculture statistics provided at The Vancouver Sun’s request show those compensation numbers were down from 93 verified losses in 2009-10 costing $38,292 in compensation, 98 losses in 2008-09 worth $33,440, and 84 verified losses in 2007-08 worth $33,425.

The province cannot accurately say how many predator-compensation claims came from the Cariboo, but estimates that at least 40 per cent of the payouts last year went to ranchers in that region, said Vivian Thomas, spokeswoman for the Ministry of Forests, Lands, and Natural Resource Operations.

Paul Paquet, an associate professor of environmental design and adjunct professor of biology at the University of Calgary (and senior scientist for Raincoast Conservation Foundation) who has studied wolves for 40 years in Asia, Europe and North America, including extensively on the B.C. coast, argued there is a vast discrepancy between government policy and solid information on wolves…

To read the rest of this article please visit the Vancouver Sun website.

by Larry Pynn Vancouver Sun

The B.C. government has declared open season on wolves in the Cariboo region to benefit cattle ranchers, a move that critics contend is unjustifiable and based on politics, not science.Under new wildlife regulations, there is no closed season and no bag limit on hunting wolves in 10 management units in the Cariboo region, which ranges to 100 Mile House, Williams Lake, Quesnel and the Chilcotin.

Read the full story at:

http://www.vancouversun.com/technology/declares+open+season+wolves+Chilcotin/5196188/story.html#ixzz1U5SHGp5L

Raincoast wolf scientists have published a paper in the Cdn Journal of Veterinary Medicine on diseases in dogs and the potential transfer between dogs and wildlife.  CFAX’s Adam Stirling interviews Raincoast Sr. Scientist Dr. Paul Paquet about the study and it’s findings.

Click here to listen

Canadians love the iconography of big wildlife, like wolves, grizzly bears and cougars. Unfortunately, this fascination with animal symbolism fails to translate into policies that further the conservation and welfare of these large carnivores. But the disconnect between symbolic adoration and on-the-ground reality isn’t limited to Canada; the phenomenon is clearly North American-wide….

To read the whole story ‘Death Cults Among Us: The War on Wolves’ visit the Counterpunch website.

To read ‘The Death Cults Among Us’ visit The Huffington Post website:

Re: Mint sees silver lining with new wolf coin, Postmedia  News, Sept. 9.

The Royal Canadian Mint’s silver coin series dedicated to wildlife  is laudable. However, the irony of this announcement is inescapable  given the level of persecution wolves face across the country.

This is particularly true in British Columbia where an estimated  800 wolves are killed annually for recreational purposes. In  addition, B.C. wolves are regularly scapegoated for the decline of  everything from marmots to mountain caribou, and then subjected to  government-sanctioned culls and lethal “predator control” actions.

Canadians love the iconography of big wildlife, like wolves,  grizzly bears and cougars but unfortunately, this fascination with  animal symbolism doesn’t seem to translate into policies that  further the conservation and welfare of these large carnivores.

CHRIS GENOVALI is the executive director of Raincoast Conservation, Sidney,  B.C.

Although Dr. Chris Darimont initially made his mark with seven years of cutting edge research on BC’s coastal ‘rainforest wolves,’ he actually specializes in all large carnivores, not just Canis lupus.

A University of Victoria graduate trained as an evolutionary ecologist, Chris has developed strong scholarly and practical interests in animal welfare. As a Conservation Biologist for the Raincoast Conservation Foundation and a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of California (Santa Cruz), his research focuses on sensitive carnivores, like wolves and bears, which endure some of the most severe suffering among wild animals due to direct (e.g., trophy hunting) and indirect (e.g., food competition with fishers) human effects.

As a vocal advocate for animals, Chris subscribes to an ‘informed advocacy’ approach. Several television documentaries have focused on his work including Discovery Canada’s Rainforest Wolves, Canadian Geographic’s Secrets of the Coast Wolf, and National Geographic’s Last Stand of the Great Bear. His work is also commonly featured in print (Discover Magazine, Nature, New York Times, Oprah magazine) and on radio (CBC, National Public Radio).

Chris also believes that conservation biologists must lead by example.

Accordingly, his research employs exclusively non-invasive methods. His current focus for Raincoast is assessing how much salmon is required to sustain key terrestrial species, such as grizzly bears.

This question probably means more to Chris now than ever, as he explains: “I’ve been blessed with my own ‘cub’ this spring (our first). My partner, Alison and I were fortunate; we had access to abundant and high qualityfoods throughout our pregnancy. Our daughter Maëlle emerged from the womb happy and healthy. The same may not be true for the bears.”

“My family will travel with me and the Raincoast team to BC’s Great Bear Rainforest this field season,” he says. “We will embark on the second year of what we believe to be the most important applied conservation work on the coast; counting bears and cubs, and assessing their health in an era of dwindling salmon runs.”

Chris Darimont’s work with Raincoast is more urgent than ever. At the policy level, we are pushing for meaningful changes to salmon harvest regulations that now allocate only a small amount of salmon to bears and other wild creatures.

Did You Know?

Grizzly reproduction includes delayed implantation in which the embryo waits for a signal of good things to come before developing.

Female coastal grizzlies – even if pregnant – can only have cubs if they consumed enough salmon before heading for winter hibernation.

For the full story in the Seaside times click here

A collective of Canadian environmental groups has written an open letter to Premier Gordon Campbell decrying the provincial government’s proposal for an aerial wolf kill in efforts to protect the dwindling mountain caribou population.In the letter, sent Monday, 16 environmental groups state they are strongly opposed to the killing of wolves — as well as other carnivorous animals including cougars and bears — arguing human activities such as the logging of old-growth forests and snowmobiling are the main causes of mountain caribou population decline.

“These herds are small because they have lost habitat on a massive scale,” the letter stated. “Even if we could kill all the predators, these herds could still be wiped out by incidents such as automobile accidents, avalanches, stress from snowmobiles and fluctuating winter conditions unfavourable to their survival.”

The collective — which includes groups such as the Valhalla Wilderness Society, Raincoast Conservation and the Animal Alliance of Canada — proposes four alternate solutions: stopping clear-cutting and road-building in mountain caribou habitat; stopping snowmobiling and heli-skiing in historical mountain caribou wintering areas; habitat restoration in clearcut areas; and reducing the speed limit on the Salmo-Creston Highway, where a number of animals have been hit by passing vehicles.

Anne Sherrod, chair of the Valhalla Wilderness Society, said on Tuesday the group had not yet received a response.

The provincial goal is to increase the mountain caribou population — now estimated at 1,800 to 1,900 animals — to the pre-1995 level of 2,500 animals within 20 years.

The proposal for the aerial wolf kill first surfaced in February.

In March, the B.C. Supreme Court put the brakes on development of a coal mine near Moberly Lake because the provincial government did not sufficiently consult with the West Moberly First Nation or accommodate its concerns.

By Larry Pynn, Vancouver Sun, March 18, 2010

The public has rejected the idea of an aerial wolf kill in B.C. to benefit threatened mountain caribou, even before the first gun has been loaded.But whether the B.C. government listens to the public, or to the scientists who say the kill is vital for caribou recovery, remains to be seen.  Chris Ritchie, manager of species at risk recovery for the ministry of environment, said Wednesday the response has been overwhelmingly negative since the proposed aerial wolf kill became widely known in February.

“I’m trying to think about anything that was supportive and I can’t think of anything,” Ritchie said in an interview.

The province’s mountain caribou science team has recommended: immediate aerial removal of wolves that threaten herds with fewer than 50 animals; immediate augmentation of the South Purcell herd and all herds with fewer than 20 animals; and immediate but gradual reduction of moose densities throughout the mountain caribou range through adjustments to hunting regulations that allow for increases in cow moose harvest and hunting seasons.

The provincial goal is to increase the mountain caribou population — now estimated at 1,800 to 1,900 animals — to the pre-1995 level of 2,500 animals within 20 years.

Ritchie said the science team’s advice is “not to be taken lightly” but noted that their recommendations do not necessarily consider the political challenges in the face of adverse public opinion.

“It makes it a challenge. The practical, technical side, I think, is sound.

“If we want to maintain some of these specific herds that are in peril, we need a tough decision.”

He said no specific recommendation has yet been made to government.

As of last fall, trapping and hunting had killed about 35 wolves over the past three years in mountain caribou recovery areas, not nearly enough to sufficiently boost threatened herds, he said.

Christie said wildlife officials “basically need to remove an entire pack,” rather than pick off one or two by hunting or trapping. “That leaves us with not many options.”

The caribou recovery program has a budget of $630,000 in the fiscal year ending March 31, covering everything from caribou surveys to monitoring snowmobile activity to predator-control projects.

Sterilization pilot projects targeting the breeding alpha male and females are also underway in at least four packs to determine the effectiveness in controlling wolf populations, he said.

The strategy behind liberalized hunting of moose? Fewer moose (the primary prey of wolves) means fewer wolves and therefore a greater chance for caribou (a secondary prey source) to increase.

So far, hunters haven’t responded as the ministry had hoped in two pilot areas, one near Revelstoke and one in the Parsnip drainage east of Prince George. “The hunters have to recognize an opportunity,” Christie said. “There’s human nature: ‘I’ve always hunted here. Why should I go there?’ It doesn’t happen overnight.”

Caribou population surveys are underway and will give officials a better idea of the success of recovery initiatives.

Robert Serrouya, a member of the B.C. mountain caribou science team and a doctoral student at the University of Alberta, said tough decisions across the board are needed to save the mountain caribou, including management of predators and prey, mechanized recreation and forest harvesting.

“It does sadden us that some wolves and cougars will have to be killed to save these endangered caribou. Aerial gunning is the most humane way of removing wolves, compared to all other alternatives, and it also allows people to selectively remove animals that pose the greatest risk.”

If the caribou die off, then the urgency to protect and enhance the old-growth forests on which they depend will lessen, he fears.

Caribou are already almost extirpated from Glacier and Mount Revelstoke national parks, in large part due to predation, he said.

Not all scientists agree with the caribou science team.

Chris Darimont, a wolf researcher with Raincoast Conservation Foundation, said overharvesting of mountain caribou habitat is the real cause of the species’ plight.

“Logging has deprived mountain caribou of critical food and made them more vulnerable to predation [by providing roads, and better moose habitat, which attracts wolves to an area]. Likewise, snowmobiling — by scaring caribou from prime habitat and granting easy travel routes to wolves — is also in part to blame.”

He said once wolves are shot out of one area, others from neighbouring areas will simply move in. “Helicopters are not cheap. Voters get outraged. And losing wolves is devastating to ecosystems.”

The province has committed to protect 2.2 million hectares of mountain caribou habitat from logging and road building.

With financial backing from big-game trophy-hunting organizations such as the U.S.-based Foundation for North American Wild Sheep, biologists with shotguns flew over the northern Muskwa-Kechika area in the 1980s, shooting more than 700 wolves in four years.

lpynn@vancouversun.com

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