Alaska Tourism Boycott Continues

On November 6, 2004, Nancy wrote:

Will you take care of the wolves when they starve to death from over-population? Will you save the Caribou from the wolves eating them? Perhaps, instead of living in eastern U.S., you should spend about 5 years living in Alaska, then, make your decisions.

On November 8, 2004, Karen S. wrote:

It’s not too many hunters, it’s called a subsistence lifestyle, maybe there are too many natives for you. Native people of Alaska have been living off the land for generations, if taking a few wolves out of the food chain will keep a family from starving, I am all for it.

Have you ever had to hunt your dinner? On one hand, we could stop hunting, and let our children starve, or we can hunt and gather and live the way we have for generations. In rural Alaska, there is no McDonalds or Safeway.

You outsiders kill me, you think you know what is best for us. How about we take those 500 wolves and park them in your back yard, we’ll see how much you love them, when they start killing your kids, and eating your pets. Because you couldn’t manage to save wolves in the lower 48, your guilt has driven you north. Stay out of our business and we’ll stay out of yours.

Game Management works in Alaska. And for the record, you are not hurting my feelings by keeping tourists away.

On November 8, 2004, Karen S. wrote:

Your campaign may not target Native people, but it does target the lifestyle. You misunderstood what I said about families starving, I said that thinning the wolf population would keep this from happening.

Many villagers don’t have work to earn cash to buy provisions, they really live off the land. They use every bit of the Moose (and all other animals) to feed, clothe or otherwise provide for their families.

You will never stand in our shoes, you will never understand our lifestyle, and I shall not waste anymore time trying to explain it to you.

Hoping the tourists stay home.
Karen in AK

On November 9, 2004, Hank wrote:

Just stay home on the east coast. Alaska has no need for your style of politics. Leave game management to the Alaska Fish and Game department.

On November 12, 2004, Gordon wrote:

Where do you get the right to say that the wolves belong to the lower 48 states,How would you feel if I felt the same way about where you live , and came along and told you what to do, and yes the moose are getting slaughter by the wolves, right where I live we have had a young calf moose hanging around because it mother was kill by wolves trying to save it. And they didn’t even finish eating her. It stay close to our home but now it is winter and there will be two death moose because it won’t make the winter, And to have the idea people can eat beef or something you call food, is not right, I should have the right to eat what I want to eat basic on my Alaska Native Heritage , what I grew up eating, and what is better to eat then drug fill beef that you like to eat.

On November 16, 2004, Felicia Chavez wrote:

This morning I phoned Governor Murkowski#8217;s office to log my opinion about the aerial gunning of wolves. For the record, I am sickened. Wondering how they can justify this, I then searched the state#8217;s website for information about their #8220;program.#8221; I found a report from the [Alaska Board of Game dated March of this year.](
http://www.boards.adfg.state.ak.us/gameinfo/regs/04150bog.pdf)

It appears to lay out the calculated, scientific reasoning behind the shooting of wolves. Throughout#8212;as would be expected#8212;this report puts the needs of human beings before all else, assuming that human beings have THE cardinal right to exist and absolute dominion over land and animals, giving wolves but one tiny concession: #8220;At no time should the wolf population in the Central Kuskokwim Wolf Control Implementation Area be reduced to fewer than 40 wolves.#8221;

To take this document at face value from the point of view of someone who does not believe that beings other than humans have an inherent right to life, one would draw the following conclusions: a) This document is a scientific#8212;not political#8212;report; b) the data presented is the most relevant scientific data available and therefore conclusions drawn from this data are the most relevant, scientific conclusions available at this point; c) moose populations in these areas are threatened to the point that hunters #8220;taking#8221; moose for sustenance are suffering in some way; d) wolves are plentiful in these areas; e) killing a scientifically calculated number of wolves is a sound course of action to allow for the increase of moose populations to standards set by this department; f) local residents of these areas would benefit as a result of the killing of wolves and thus the increase of the moose population over five years.

Here is a quote from this report: #8220;Data from moose mortality and predator/prey studies conducted throughout Alaska and similar areas in Canada suggest that reducing the number of wolves in the Central Kuskokwim Wolf Predation control Area can reasonably be expected to increase the survival of calf as well as older moose. Mortality studies conducted in Unit 19(D) East have shown that wolves accounted for 37% of calf mortality and 40% of yearling and adult mortality. In terms of the total population, wolves killed approximately 26% of the calf population and 8% of the adult and yearling population annually. Reducing wolf predation on moose, in combination with reducing harvest (particularly of cows), can reasonably be expected to initiate an increase of the moose population toward the population and harvest objectives.#8221;

If I understand this correctly, this report also suggests #8220;reducing harvest#8221; of moose by human hunters. However, of the ten recommendations made by this report, no where does it make this recommendation outright.

Unfortunately, not having a #8220;wildlife management#8221; background, I have only a limited understanding of this report. However, I assume that politicians, government employees and involved Alaskan residents justify the killing of wolves with this information derived from such reports. This coupled with a view that human needs should come before all else is a very difficult thing to surmount. Are there holes we can poke the argument ostensibly based on facts? If there really is a lack of moose and this threatens the wellbeing of locals, then some serious creative problem solving needs to happen to address the needs of locals and while avoiding the senseless slaughter of hundreds of wolves. When one group of people needs a resource that another group of people is using, ideally we don#8217;t endorse the murder of one group over the other.

Wolves and moose have been coexisting for tens of thousands of years. The modern human population is the most obvious interlopers in this equation. I don#8217;t believe that Native American groups enacted vast killing #8220;programs#8221; of competing predators to ensure the availability of their resource animals. You would think that with all of our creative thinking and technology we could come up with a more intelligent and less barbaric solution than chasing down wolves in airplanes and shooting them. I would like to volunteer to ask travel agencies to boycott travel to Alaska this summer.

On November 18, 2004, Gordon wrote:

Danial, Sorry dude but your wacked to say that it is obscene practice for humans to eat meat, that has been going on for 1000 of years just like the wolves do, where the hell do you thing you came from, you are just animal also, you crawl on your belly intill you evolved further up the food chain. Have a great day and please keep you and your plant eating friends out of Alaska, we like being animal and eating meat. Life is good

P.S. I am not the one that said the wolves did not belong to Alaska your leader is the one to claim that they did not belong to Alaska but to the lower 48 states.

On November 23, 2004, Art Greenwalt wrote:

I’m afraid I cannot read the postings from the subsistence and Native writers trying to justify the wolf massacres any longer without injecting some reality.
First, when I arrived here in Fairbanks 36+ years ago I came with a great deal of respect for both groups. I felt they knew the land, the wildlife and must have immense respect for both for sharing such an intimacy of existence. Over the years I have seen how that has changed. The Native corporations now sell off logging, mineral, gas and oil rights as fast as possible without regard to environmental considerations. The profits go back to their Native members who have the power to stop such sales…but don’t. With federal subsidies, free medical care, corporation dividends and the annual PFD check it’s no wonder villages abound in snowmobiles and ATV’s costing several thousands of dollars each. The maintenance and fueling of these machines is no small cost, either. I won’t say village life is inexpensive; I know better. But it is the choice of each villager to live where they do and that is in full awareness of the attendant costs. If you want the lowered costs of city life, move to the city. If you want the enrichment of living in the wilderness then live with the cost and stop trying to “manage” the wildlife in some obscenely skewed fashion. When I read the allusions to this grand knowledge of their surroundings some of these writers have submitted I am reminded of the inhabitants of McGrath. Lifelong residents in this small hotbed of anti-wolf sentiment gave heartrending testimony on how the local moose population was down to less than 900 animals in the late 90’s. They further added how the wolves were the primary killers of the moose calves. Then Fish and Game did some proper surveys and found not 900 moose but 2700. They also found that wolves take about 5% of the calves while grizzly and black bears account for the vast majority of predation on them. Some “intimate knowledge”, eh?

It once was that the Native population was taught a respect for wildlife, a respect that included wolves, bears, coyotes, etc. Anymore, though, judging from these writings and letters in local papers that respect has died out and it is impossible to tell from the contents whether it is a Native or non-Native writing the anti-wolf letters.

Most amazing is the constant Native support for the Alaska Outdoors Council, a group strongly in favor of wolf slaughter and composed mainly of non-Native recreational hunters and trappers. It’s amazing because this same group pretty much singlehandedly has killed any subsistence preference in game allotments. Kinda like supporting the hand that beats you.

As for the subsistence writers, gol, but you can whine better than a hungry pup! When I hunted caribou and sheep (before I got sick of the unjustified killing) I knew if I didn’t get what I was after it was simply because I didn’t hunt well enough. I didn’t come back emptyhanded and immediately start ranting and raving about the wolves taking everything. I knew that hunt the game was smarter or more aware (or both) than I. The sheep, the caribou, the moose were out there; I just wasn’t finding them and that was my fault. Now it’s fashionable to complain that the predators are at fault as though every subsistence hunter is a modern Leatherstocking. Bull! I’ve heard more BS from such folks at Board of Game testimony meetings than you could hear from a gaggle of politicians. If you can’t find’em, you’re just not hunting well enough and that’s the reality you choose not to face.

It’s ironic, though. As an amateur paleontologist with a strong history (and 30 years’ experience) in collecting Pleistocene fossils I enjoy a perspective on predators and their prey that goes back 50,000 years in Alaska. Moose, caribou, bison, mammoth, sheep, elk, wolves, bears, coyotes, wolverines, foxes, and many other species co-existed for tens of thousands of years without any problems. The biomass of the bison herds alone constituted a third of the ecology and that of horses another third. With saber-tooth cats, lions, dire wolves, short-faced bears (which dwarf brown bears) and other major predators in relative abundance the prey populations remained massive. It isn’t until the advent of humans into Alaska that sudden die-offs begin to happen. The question is unresolved as to whether they caused it, changing climate and vegetation caused it, or a combination. Fact remains, though, once humans enter the picture things change and not for the better. Still, the Native population was never large enough to really dent the surviving species…until non-Natives and guns, modern trapping tools and “wildlife management” came into play. Now, it seems wildlife is to be managed for the ultimate purpose of being killed and no other view is to be considered.

When I came to Alaska there were less than 300,000 residents. Now there are 650,000+. Doubling the hunters with modern rifles, increasing greatly those with riverboats, ATV’s, planes, snowmachines (which are pretty much ubiquitous) leaves few areas where wildlife can go undisturbed or unhunted. Even Denali National Park allows limited hunting and trapping in some of its acreage.

The problem isn’t the natural predators who have lived in balance with their prey over the millenia. The problem is in the shortsighted humans who can’t see beyond their gunsights or scopes to understand the havoc they are wreaking with each passing year demanding more moose so they have to work less, more caribou so they don’t have to walk more than 20 feet to find one, more trapping so they can sell their birthright to ensure Lower ‘48 millionaires don’t freeze while in their limos.

Traditional values? Respect for the land and the animals? Sorry. Not when the dollar signs are crowding the horizons.

That brings us to the boycott. I’m sorry to have to say this, but it is largely ineffective. The reason is simple. The folks in the Lower ‘48 sending thousands of letters, emails, postcards do not vote up here. Murkowski sees only two things: dollar signs and votes. Without the power of the latter the former is the only other tool and until there are demonstrable cancellations amounting to a tourism loss in the hundreds of thousands of dollars (and not just notes saying you won’t visit) ol’ Uncle Frank is just going to laugh. He understands only those two aspects of the situation. This past year tourism enjoyed one of its best years in Alaska. It is our second biggest source of revenue. You want to change his thinking, then swallow the non-refundable deposit and cancel the trip you have made, telling your travel agent to be sure to let Murkowski know what it has just cost Alaska. Enough of you do that and then, and only then, will he listen and stop the massacre. Until that happens, all the howl-ins and writings will mean nothing to him. I truly wish that was not the case but it is. For now, those efforts are just items of derision in Alaska because they carry no real dollar impact.
Ya gotta put your money where your mouth is, eh?

(PS: I wish you luck on the legal actions, however, I have a feeling the Alaskan courts are somewhat biased and with Bush still in the White House you know the federal courts are useless. Still, I hope you can find a legal hook by which to hoist Murkowski and his wolf-killing cowards by their little petards!)

On November 23, 2004, Art Greenwalt wrote:

Oh…some other subsistence/village-life aspects to consider…
According to published information from our state Fish and Game dept. they figure villages commonly reach poaching levels of 30 - 40% of the reported moose killed by hunters each year. That’s a very significant take that may not be figured into the decline of moose populations around villages.

The other aspect to consider in this mishmash is incidental kill. Alaska has about 10,000 registered trappers about half of whom use steel cable snares (the other half use leghold traps). Saturation snaring is a set technique wherein 20, 30, even 40 snares are set along a trail commonly used by wolves. When the first wolf hits a snare and begins to struggle it panics the rest who in running down the trail are apt to hit the other snares. Entire packs have been wiped out in this fashion. Though the Alaska Trappers Assoc. claims there is no such set their own “Alaska Trapper” magazine for Mar. ‘98, I believe was the issue, describes a “wedge set” which is exactly the same thing. Semantics aside, it is the same brutal and lethal method.

What the trappers won’t admit…and F&G has no real info on…is incidental kill, i.e., moose, caribou and other non-target species killed by these snares. In ‘94 a professional trapper supported by the state set traps in Unit 20 south of Fairbanks as a “wolf control” project. It resulted in many wolves taken but also several moose and caribou as well as some golden and even bald eagles. Oddly, the feds didn’t prosecute for the last and, of course, the state did nothing about the other incidental kills. More interesting is what happend to Andrew Johnson’s snares in the Tok area. He is the trapper who sued Gordon Haber a few years ago. The same incident involving the lawsuit also concerned 6 caribou killed by his snares. His actions regarding them literally broke every regulation in the hunting/trapping handbook yet nothing was ever done despite the News-Miner even publishing an article with a photo of the dead caribou in the snares in the paper. If you figure at least 2 snares per each of the 5,000 snare trappers (and many trappers run hundreds of snares as they are dirt cheap) the possibility for incidental kill suggests the take of moose and caribou could be considerable. Trappers will tell you the snares are designed to break away with the force a moose can exert but what they don’t tell you is even the Canadian government, which does considerable R&D for trapping, admits they only work about 23% of the time. Furthermore, even when a snare does break away that doesn’t mean the moose is free of it from around its muzzle should that be where it was caught. A slow death from starvation can then ensue. Such dead moose, caribou, etc, are often used by trappers as bait and numerous snares will be set around them to catch predators coming to the carcass.

All in all, trappers operate with little enforcement or regulation in Alaska. Nothing requires they check their sets once they put them in place nor is there a limit to the number they can set. There are daily take limits but most are 5 wolves a day which is a figure rarely met so hardly applicable. They can set their traps and snares pretty much anywhere, even along established trails, and rarely are required to post a notice or a tag of ownership. Thus, dog owners, including skijorers and mushers, may encounter the sets with injurious or even lethal effects on their dogs. However, as a law legislated some years ago placed a $1,000 fine on anyone disturbing a trapper’s set in any way such accidents can actually result in the dog owner being fined. A musher lost the use of his lead dog about 5 years ago when it stepped in a leghold trap (mind you, trappers say they are humane and not really painful) and in panicking and trying to escape shredded its ankle. Taken to a vet it survived but will never run as a lead dog again due to permanent injuries.

Since there is very little enforcement or patrol of traplines, incidental kill could be occurring at a high rate and we would never know it. Snares are often forgotten at the end of the season but remain in place and quite able to kill as when the Denali Park Headquarters pack was wiped out by illegal snares still in place after the end of the trapping season back in the late ‘90’s. The penalty for that trapper? Just 150 hours of community service. He still traps the area.

On November 23, 2004, Art Greenwalt wrote:

Oh…and as for the comments by Nancy, Karen S., and Hank, you might consider that Gordon Haber, who often does work for FOA, has worked in the field since 1961 when he took over studies in Denali from Olaus Murie, the grandad of wolf researchers. He has more field time including air time than the majority of trappers and probably far more familiarity with subsistence life requirements and village living than many Alaskans. I’m sure you won’t want to acknowledge those facts but regardless they are so. You might want to be careful about your sweeping and categorizing comments for some of the folks you include in them could well put your knowledge and experience to shame.