I now live in New York (not the city, but the pretty parts). I visit Idaho frequently as I still have family there.

You know, the city of Boise has grown in size BIG TIME in the last 10 years. But you ask a resident of the city that has been there for 20, and they “don’t see that is has grown much”.

The problem is everyone in Idaho is on the inside looking out. I am now on the outside looking in.

My last visit to Idaho, I saw a MOOSE in down town Cascade Idaho. It was only about an hour and a half or so from its normal habitat.

I saw Elk in McCall. Quite a few of them. More than I ever saw when I was growing up in Idaho.

I had near misses on the highway for more deer in the two weeks I was there, than in the 8 years I was driving in the state.

I look at the “numbers” given by the Feds for elk counts in the three states that wolves have been planted in. MT is steady, WY is up, and ID is down slightly.

But Idaho has also started sprawling out in the towns, with them spreading into animal territory.

This will, and likely has, effected elk population. Sure, wolves are taking some elk. But the IDF&G killed some 130 or so wolves for “killing livestock”, and those livestock owners were reimbersed.

From the outside looking in, it see no reason for hunting wolves at this time, other than the same fear of wolves that spurred near extinction of wolves in the northwest to begin with.

To the hunters, if you get one, eat the meat. A real hunter eats what he kills. The difference between hunting and murdering is that hunting is for a NEED. Need for food, need for the money from pelts etc.

Are you a hunter or…???

The short list begins with developments called Boise, Nampa, Caldwell, and the interconnecting ag land. Deer, elk, and more used to migrate out of the central mountains all the way to the Snake River down toward Marsing and Homedale each winter. Hint, the Lake Lowell area is called deer flat because historically, there were a lot of deer there. Cut off from their winter range, their numbers dwindled.

Emmett used to be prime winter range for deer and elk. Ditto Horseshoe Bend No more. Roads, houses, and hay fields put the kibosh to that. Big game numbers tanked.

There used to be a prime bit of winter range in the Portneuf Valley that was chock full of elk, deer, bison, and the odd grisly bear. They were wiped out by a development called Pocatello.

The wood river valley used to host a plethora of deer and elk each winter. Wiped out by Ketchum, Hailey, and Bellevue.

There was a valley further east originally known as Pierre’s Hole (Close to Jackson Hole.) The early trappers liked to rendezvous there because the big game, mostly elk and deer were so thick. A little development called Driggs, and the surrounding ag land nipped that problem in the bud.

Even where towns are pretty scarce, the impact of non-wolf activities can be severe. The construction of I-84 through Raft River down toward Salt Lake City cut hours of the time it takes to get from Boise to Utah’s capital. It also blocked the migration route of thousands of deer and elk to their winter range in northern Utah. Animal counts plummeted.

And, how about dams. Pick one, just about any one. Diversion, Lucky Peak, Black Canyon, Deadwood, Milner, American Falls, Palisades, and on and on. Most of them destroyed hundreds of square miles of prime bottom land where big game wintered. The feds knew game numbers would plummet when they were built, and built them anyway. (Footnote, most of them have still yet to be mitigated, even though the feds promised to as far back as the 1930s!)

Maybe these things, city’s, roads, dams, and fields, are necessary. As they say, people gotta live somewhere. However, there are better and worse ways to do things.

They knew about, and could have included overpasses and other features in the design of I-84 to facilitate migration. Didn’t.

Most cities could have set a no-build boundary that maintains space for wildlife. It works in Jackson (enforced by the Feds).

Locally, we didn’t have to approve Avimor, Harris Ranch, or the Hammer Flat, all places known as last remnants of good winter range, and where big game will be nevermore as soon as they build out. There were plenty of other places to build that would not have impacted big game, but they approved them anyway.

So, keep it up. Keep ignoring the impact of diminishing habitat. (For homework, go find a cattle rancher and ask him how well his herd would do if he or she had to keep them all winter, without feed, on a side hill, up where the snow is three or four feet deep. (hint, the answer is: Not good. And, it doesn’t work well for deer and elk either.)

Anyway, when you’ve destroyed all the habitat, particularly all the winter habitat, and the game is all gone, remember to blame it on the wolf.