Nearly 10 years after wolves were first reintroduced to Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming’s lawmakers still cannot reach consensus on how to properly manage the species.

The debate in Cheyenne was contentious. Few seem able to discuss the topic of wolves without getting lost in a tangle of hyperbole and rhetoric. The newspapers are full of heated editorials and letters to the editors. Wolves are vilified on one page and glorified on the next. The "Feds" are bullying Wyoming on the issue according to some–Governor Freudenthal among the most outspoken in that camp—and just doing their job in the minds of others.

Fish & Wildlife Service rejects Wyoming’s wolf plan
Last fall, United States Fish and Wildlife Service officials rejected the Wyoming Game and Fish Commissioners’ wolf management plan because it—and existing Wyoming statutes relevant to wolves—failed to provide adequate controls over the taking of wolves. Specifically, Wyoming statutes classified wolves as trophy game in the wilderness areas adjoining Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks, but as predators, subject to killing on sight without a license, everywhere else in the state.

To meet the federal government’s requirements, the state must drop predator status for wolves and require licenses for the killing of any of the animals. Under the USFWS’s recommended alternative, the Wyoming Game and Fish Department would have the authority to determine the number and cost of a wolf license, which leaves the state a great deal of freedom in controlling wolf numbers. But this concession did not appease lawmakers, who appeared to be angry with the federal government for "misleading" the state with respect to the acceptability of its plan for dual classification. According to Governor Freudenthal and others, the Fish and Wildlife Service had assured the state its wolf plan would be accepted.

"Now, in the face of direct representations to the contrary, and in the face of nearly unanimous agreement that the best-available science supports the dual-status approach, Wyoming’s wolf management plan has been rejected," the governor wrote to Interior Secretary Gale Norton in early February.

Wolves in the legislature
Wyoming’s obstinacy appears, at least according to some observers like Jason Marsden of the Wyoming Conservation Voters, to be based largely on political maneuvering rather than hard science—the state just doesn’t like being told what to do by Washington. "The mainstream Wyoming conservation community, and many among the general public…strongly believe that the state’s professional wildlife managers can protect both wolves and the people living in wolf country, if raw politics are left out of the equation," Marsden wrote in his online legislative report.

Wyoming’s legislators had three opportunities to address the wolf issue: HB 111, which sought the dual classification of wolves as either trophy game or predators, and SF 73 and HB 155, both of which called for trophy game status for the animals throughout the state. None of the bills made much headway. HB 111 died in the Senate Travel Committee, SF 73 failed in the Senate, and HB 155 died on General File without debate.

WOC’s position
WOC has consistently argued for designating the gray wolf as trophy game animal throughout the state, with harvest quotas based on biological needs and the prey base. This position is basically the same as the plan that was originally advocated by Wyoming Game and Fish Department wildlife biologists before the Game and Fish Commission modified the department’s recommendations and called for dual classification.

In addition to assuring a controlled, science-based management of the species, trophy game status will provide some financial support for the wolf management program through the sale of wolf licenses. Trophy game status also allows control of nuisance wolves to minimize wolf/livestock conflict and wolf/wildlife conflict.

Delisting of wolves delayed indefinitely
In the absence of a wolf management plan acceptable to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, wolves will continue to be managed according to Endangered Species Act protections—protections which seem to be leading to an expansion of the animal’s geographic range and an increase in its numbers.

"Ironically, the legislature’s inability to draft legislation that meets the minimum requirements of the Endangered Species Act has led to the continued protection of wolves," said WOC Executive Director Dan Heilig. "Their lack of consensus on proper management of the species serves as a reprieve to the wolves’ death sentence, which was really what Wyoming’s wolf management plan meant."

The legislature’s failure to amend Wyoming statutes to address the USFWS’s concerns also means that it will be many years before the wolf debate cools. Currently, the governor’s office is moving toward filing a lawsuit against the federal government on the issue of wolves. Meanwhile, Idaho and Montana are moving ahead with plans to manage the species under state wildlife law—plans that have already been approved by the USFWS.