The Forum Agrees: More Data Needed Before Hunt Continues

The March 19, 2014 editorial of the Forum states; "Legislation to temporarily suspend wolf hunting, trapping and snaring in Minnesota is a rational response to legitimate concerns about the management of the state’s wolf population." The Forum describes Howling For Wolves as a wolf advocacy group making a reasonable request to have better information before a wolf season proceeds. Read more here: http://www.inforum.com/event/article/id/429701/

Within the past two years,  Howling For Wolves (HFW) made formal requests to the DNR for information kept and/or a database on all sources of wolf deaths. HFW learned that there is no overall tracking of wolf diseases and deaths and there is no publicly accessible data on wolf-ivestock conflicts for farmers either.  No one tracks when wolves are killed as incidental catches in traps or snare set for other animals. The long and short of it is, DNR conservation officers fill out an "Incident report" which is filed away and not analyzed or available for public scrutiny. The photo below is the data we acquired: a banker's box of incident reports.