Yesterday I told you about part one of Thomas Knudson’s meticulous take down of wildlife services. Today makes yesterday’s articles look like cocktail hour. I wasn’t sure how effective this reporting was going to be until I heard from my parents taking with their neighbors the upsetting reports. My dad is an 83 year old man who walks a mile to get his “Bee” every morning, and then gossips with the other residents about what’s inside all the way back. Other examples of its effectiveness? I heard from the newly formed group at beaver-killing El Dorado Hills that they bought copies for all their members and are having a meeting to discuss the news.
Stories make a difference, and this story is going to shine a lot of light on a government agency that has thrived in darkness for a long time now. You really should go to the Bee’s website to see everything yourself, because there are four new stories today and some documents from his FOIA. But a summary of what most got my attention follows.
Wildlife Services’ Deadly Force Opens Pandora’s Box of Environmental Problems
Here, in rugged terrain owned by the American public, a little-known federal agency called Wildlife Services has waged an eight-year war against predators to try to help an iconic Western big-game species: mule deer.
With rifles, snares and aerial gunning, employees have killed 967 coyotes and 45 mountain lions at a cost of about $550,000. But like a mirage, the dream of protecting deer by killing predators has not materialized.
“It didn’t make a difference,” said Kelley Stewart, a large-mammal ecologist at the University of Nevada, Reno.
The article goes on to describe in detail the vast array of devices they use to kill coyotes. From instruments invented in the dark ages to the apex of modern technology – no purse strings remain unopened and no holds are barred for the fauna-fiends at APHIS. Snares, Cyanide, aerial shoots!
Aerial gunning is the agency’s most popular predator-killing tool. Since 2001, more than 340,000 coyotes have been gunned down from planes and helicopters across 16 Western states, including California – an average of 600 a week, agency records show.
“When they take that plane up, they kill every single coyote they can,” said Strader, the former Wildlife Services hunter who worked with aerial gunning crews in Nevada. “If they come back and say, ‘We only killed three coyotes,’ they are not very happy. If they come back and say, ‘Oh, we killed a hundred coyotes,’ they’re very happy.
“Some of the gunners are real good and kill coyotes every time. And other ones wound more than they kill,” Strader said. “Who wants to see an animal get crippled and run around with its leg blown off? I saw that a lot.”
There is even a quote from the UC professor I implored for help a million years ago about our beavers. I believe his compassionate response mentioned something about hats, but that’s blood under the bridge now…
“I call it the boomerang effect,” said Wendy Keefover, a carnivore specialist with WildEarth Guardians. “The more you kill, the more you get.”
In California, researchers have found that having coyotes in the neighborhood can be good for quail, towhees and other birds. The reason? They eat skunks, house cats and raccoons that feast on birds.
“The indirect effects (of predators) are often more important than the direct effects,” said Reg Barrett, professor of wildlife ecology and management at the University of California, Berkeley. “We just don’t know enough about what’s going on.”
This follows a nice discussion of the value of predators, noting how they tend to keep a herd healthy by killing off weak or sick animals. although it’s not as nice as this:Go to 2:33 for the very best description you are ever likely to hear of why predators are important.
Part three of the series airs sunday and will focus on nonlethal devices. I’m hoping he talks about flow devices!
