Dear Editor,
I believe Norman Bishop is the one having trouble distinguishing a hole in the ground.
I re-read Rod Miller's column and couldn’t find one thing where he said anything about wolves specifically. His column was about the reintroduction process, and it was very interesting to hear from somebody who was on the inside. He pretty much hit the highlights.
We were living 10 miles from Cody at the time and I took a keen interest in the whole wolf reintroduction. Anybody with a good eye could see Yellowstone was severely over-grazed.
The Lamar Valley had eroding stream banks and any bushes were trimmed up as far as an elk could reach. I really didn’t have a problem with wolves in the park. The problem was keeping them there.
You didn’t have to read many books on wolves to find out that a pack has a circle of influence that is around 50 miles in diameter.
If you overlaid circles of that size on a map of Yellowstone there wasn’t room for very many. So what do you do?
The only resource was to follow the same argument. Allow the next animal up the food chain to show them where the line was.
Wyoming did a wonderful job of handling the situation.
This state had some experience with being in bed with the federal government over the grizzly bear. And like most education it didn’t come cheap.
Wyoming never said no to managing the wolf. They just had a plan that was, in reality, the only practical way to do it.
Because of outside influences, this plan at first seemed unacceptable. So the feds had to keep management of the wolf.
It wasn’t long before it became apparent that managing wolves wasn’t going to be an 8-5 job. It was real work.
Suddenly the Wyoming plan looked really good. It’s simple. Even I can understand it. The trophy area is more of a compromise than I would of made, but it makes sense.
Wolves are smart, they can figure out the rules to the game. But, an education doesn’t mean much unless there is some cost.
What better way to show respect for those who pay the price for that education than to honor them with a free beer at the bar.
Brent Winter
Buffalo, WY
