[azbackpackr]

A meeting on the Mexican wolf project, FYI:


Mexican Wolf AMWG Public Meeting in Pinetop AZ on May 27, 2009

This is a reminder that a Mexican Wolf Adaptive Management Work Group (AMWG) meeting will be held on May 27 in Pinetop AZ. Preliminary details for the public meeting are as follows:

Adaptive Management Work Group Meeting

Location: Pinetop AZ, at the AGFD Regional Office, 2878 East White Mountain Blvd
Time: AZ Time: 4 pm – 8 pm
Host: Arizona Game and Fish Department
Participants: Public meeting, open to all

Note: agenda may be modified during meeting; meeting will be adjourned early if business has been completed.)

Draft Agenda
4:00 pm Welcome, introductions, ground rules, and agenda review
4:15 pm Miscellaneous Interagency Field Team items
· Staffing changes
· Annual report for 2008
· 2009 breeding season (results to date)
· Depredation and nuisance responses in 1st quarter 2009 and summary for 2008
· Outreach activities in 1st quarter 2009 and summary for 2008
· Proactive measures to reduce risk of livestock depredation
· Other IFT items
5:30 pm Break
5:45 pm Miscellaneous AMOC items
· AMOC and AMWG Summary Notes
· Proposed Mexican wolf education center in Silver City NM
· Update on consideration of constructing a temporary holding pen for the Project
· Update on Lead Agency consideration of Clarification Memos for SOPs 11.0 (Depredation Incident Investigation) and 13.0 (Control of Mexican Wolves)
· Update on NEPA process for possible changes in the 10(j) rule
· Discussion of annual population objectives
· Other AMOC items
7:30 pm Other business
7:50 pm Dates and locations of future AMWG meetings
8:00 pm Adjournment

[big_load]

Proposed Mexican wolf education center in Silver City NM

Didn't they learn anything from the Native American experience? Shipping wolves off to school in NM is going to damage their culture and promote social dysfunction.

[azpride]

Sounds painfully boring... I guess someone's gotta do it though.

[Jim_H]

Proposed Mexican wolf education center in Silver City NM

Didn't they learn anything from the Native American experience? Shipping wolves off to school in NM is going to damage their culture and promote social dysfunction.

But if the wolves can learn to live in our culture, to accept our religion, and to accept profits and private ownership as a part of their lifestyle, then they will be able to integrate in to modern society. The pups might not like it, but if there is plenty of free meat to go around I'm sure they will learn to like it.

[big_load]

Yes, I think the transformation from hunting and gathering to wage labor will be hard on them, especially in a credit-based economy. The schools will probably promote vegetarianism as well. The wolves will find it hard to understand why it's not OK for them to kill animals who are being raised for slaughter anyway, so I guess it really is important for them to learn our economic system.

[azbackpackr]

[azbackpackr]

Sounds painfully boring... I guess someone's gotta do it though.

Yeah, sounds very boring, and it just might be, in Pinetop. Hold the same meeting in Reserve, NM, and it'll be another story! A LOT of controversy, and everyone for miles around will show up and scream and holler and shout down anyone who is the least bit in favor of wolves, or even people who are trying for some kind of consensus. Not boring. More like scary!

[desert spirit]

A LOT of controversy, and everyone for miles around will show up and scream and holler and shout down anyone who is the least bit in favor of wolves

Isn't it bizarre that the creature barely removed from "man's best friend" can be the object of such hatred and revilement? Wolves are hated much more and arouse stronger sentiment than grizzlies, for instance, which are far more fearsome predators. This hatred is incorporated into everyday language ... we have the "big bad wolf" ... the "wolf at the door" ... men give "wolf whistles" ... not to mention werewolves.

I thought I'd look into this a little ... I discovered that the fear and hatred of wolves really started in Europe in the Middle Ages. There were terrible outbreaks of rabies in native wolf populations around that time, so I'm guessing that wolf-extermination campaigns became very big, and parents started telling anti-wolf stories to their kids. This would also explain why the anti-wolf sentiment is pretty much confined to Western cultures.

Just my theory, but it makes no sense to me that dogs are loved as treasured family members, and their closest cousins are hated and feared like no other creature on earth, except possibly snakes.

[azbackpackr]

Interesting book on the topic, if you haven't already read it, is Barry Lopez' Of Wolves and Men

Another one is The Ninemile Wolves, by Rick Bass.

[desert spirit]

Interesting book on the topic, if you haven't already read it, is Barry Lopez' Of Wolves and Men

Another one is The Ninemile Wolves, by Rick Bass.

Yep. Bass also wrote The Lost Grizzlies, about finding a "lost" griz population in Colorado.

[big_load]

I haven't seen those, but Barry Lopez is always a great read.

[azbackpackr]

Yes, The Lost Grizzlies is very good, too. Another thing about that book--its main character, as I recall, is none other than the person who was the model for "George Washington Hayduke" in Edward Abbey's The Monkeywrench Gang. Doug Peacock is his actual name. He himself wrote an interesting book, Grizzly Years. I hear he has come out with another book recently.

[Jim Lyding]

Essential books for anyone interested in the subject(s) are David E. Brown's 'The Grizzly in the Southwest' and 'The Wolf in the Southwest.' He also wrote 'Borderlands Jaguars' which is also a fantastic book.
The big differences between wolves and grizzlies in our beloved Southwest are that wolves are very hazardous for big, stupid cows, but grizzlies only occasionally take stock...and that grizzlies occasionally kill people. That is why we'll never see grizzlies reintroduced into the Southwest, and why some redneck pumpkin-holes keep shooting wolves.
Bearing Down on hearing a wolf howl in Arizona this summer

[azbackpackr]

Have seen that jaguar book, will have to check out and read all of them. But the library is going to be closed for a month because we now have a brand-new, beautiful, well-designed library in Eagar, and they are moving into it during this month. Not sure why it takes a month to move, but they let us check out about 30 books on Saturday!