The future of our wildlife management plans.

[Bugle M In]

.....

[Fisher-Dude]

This all sounds good in theory and will work in some situations.
Throw a pack of wolves or a couple cougars into the scenario and watch how fast the deer of the future turn into turds.

I can't disagree with that dynamic.

What BC has to do in conjunction with ungulate science is to manage predators as well.

Currently, predators (besides grizz) are not managed by first asking "How many wolves/yotes/b-bears/etc do we want on the landscape?"

All that's done is set arbitrary limits and "political/social licence" seasons that project whelping periods (babies are so cute), and the numbers are left to fluctuate on their own.

That's piss poor. All wildlife needs to be managed on a landscape level with interaction between species considered and the numbers of each that can be supported in the various regions. Back to funding...which is needed to accomplish it.

[GoatGuy]

The issues with USA stats is so many of the conclusions were made on what could be called a closed system. They had little natural predation and need to be managed kinda like a lake.
But here is the rub. Local here I could with current regulation ,family and friends make a big dent in cougar population. Just my immediate family we can kill ten..I can catch them too. But that would be stupid. The cougar's been doing a good job keeping the deer numbers down across age classes. I already got a first hand view of winter kill. 75% of fawns just up and died. And on the heels of that winter the wolves moved in and camped. F! Me was that hard to watch. But I will tell you the deer were ripe for the wolves.
It is clear to me that any predator control has to be matched with compensatory regulations to insure BC hunters take up the slack. Our harvest should be to emulate natural mortality if it's not nature will step in.
At current time I am not sure hunters are ready for that.

Agree on practically everything you have and are saying.

The good thing about the money they have south of the border is they now have cougars, wolves, black bears and grizz and they are busy monitoring the entire system. Idaho has a huge project on the go, including a wolf/cougar monitoring project, Washington, Montana, Colorado all working on wolf stuff including interaction with mule deer. Idaho also has 400 collars on mule deer does/fawns and 360 collars on elk every year.

Imagine the power we could harness if we had money to work collaboratively with them on cross-border research and enhancement projects.

[bownut]

.....

Thats the best conclusion I have seen so far.
Nice one

[bownut]

Agree on practically everything you have and are saying.

The good thing about the money they have south of the border is they now have cougars, wolves, black bears and grizz and they are busy monitoring the entire system. Idaho has a huge project on the go, including a wolf/cougar monitoring project, Washington, Montana, Colorado all working on wolf stuff including interaction with mule deer. Idaho also has 400 collars on mule deer does/fawns and 360 collars on elk every year.

Imagine the power we could harness if we had money to work collaboratively with them on cross-border research and enhancement projects.

So much does the Alternative Prey Study play into the lack of funding?

[GoatGuy]

So much does the Alternative Prey Study play into the lack of funding?

On the caribou file they've been studied to death - literally. No shortage of money. Researchers identified human induced habitat change and secondary to that predation as the issues decades ago. Hindsight is 20/20 but I feel as though if hunters got on board with caribou recovery in the 90s by managing predation most of the current issues wouldn't be issues.

I feel as though your issue with alternate prey is not the science, it's the management outcome. I think that's probably true for most people. You are frustrated by what is being applied on the management side because until recently managers didn't have the tools to deal with the problem, they just had to work around it. Managers are/were frustrated too.

But, then again, maybe not.

If you feel you have a compelling argument around apparent competition that hasn't been covered and dealt with in the past please work feel free to present it.

[bownut]

On the caribou file they've been studied to death - literally. No shortage of money. Researchers identified human induced habitat change and secondary to that predation as the issues decades ago. Hindsight is 20/20 but I feel as though if hunters got on board with caribou recovery in the 90s by managing predation most of the current issues wouldn't be issues.

I feel as though your issue with alternate prey is not the science, it's the management outcome. I think that's probably true for most people. You are frustrated by what is being applied on the management side because until recently managers didn't have the tools to deal with the problem, they just had to work around it. Managers are/were frustrated too.

But, then again, maybe not.

If you feel you have a compelling argument around apparent competition that hasn't been covered and dealt with in the past please work feel free to present it.

Nope, just asking.

I am pretty sure that if we were to look at the past road blocks they would be similar to the present ones.
Don't think that the hunters were the ones making the decisions then either.

But good to see that the funds didn't influence that study.

[GoatGuy]

Nope, just asking.

I am pretty sure that if we were to look at the past road blocks they would be similar to the present ones.
Don't think that the hunters were the ones making the decisions then either.

But good to see that the funds didn't influence that study.

That is part of the disconnect. Public is not that concerned about caribou or wildlife in general; politicians care about what votes care about; hunters were not "the ones making decisions then." So who's responsible for driving decisions?

I don't buy the blame it on everyone else excuse. It seems no one else is going to stick up for wildlife, so why is it everyone else's fault?

We should be accountable for something.......at some point.