A4 Opinion wallowa.com November 18, 2015 Wallowa County Chieftain Oregon wolf ruling based on facts, not undue fears W olves are thriving across the West. In Montana, Idaho, Washington and Oregon they are becoming a ¿[ture on the landscaSe. $ wolf SacN has even turned uS in Northern California. In that conte[t, the Oregon )ish and Wildlife Commission made a solid decision last weeN to taNe wolves off the state¶s endangered sSecies list. )our breeding Sairs have been in Eastern Oregon for three consecutive years, as is required in the state wolf Slan. $ctually, the Voice of the Chieftain number of breeding Sairs is nine, signaling that the SoSulation is far healthier than the wolf Slan requires. $dd that to the fact that a minimum of 82 wolves are Nnown to live in Eastern and 6outhwestern Oregon and there is little reason to worry about wolves disaSSearing. Their numbers have increased from 14 in 2009 to 82 this year. $nd remember Those are minimum numbers that wildlife managers have con¿rmed. The actual SoSulation may be far larger. The criteria for delisting the wolf in Oregon were in the state¶s wolf management Slan, which was the Sroduct of Srolonged and Sublic debate when it was written. Now that wolves have met those criteria for delisting, some folNs are looNing for looSholes to bacN out of the Slan. They are way out of line. )irst, wolves in the western twothirds of the state remain Srotected Must as they have been all along. Only in the eastern onethird of the state, where all but seven of the wolves live, are they affected at all, by allowing wildlife managers more Àe[ibility. 6econd, Oregon ranchers, who have been most affected by the return of wolves, have lived uS to their Sart of the deal. They¶ve done it in the face of a Sredator that as of the ¿rst of the year had Nilled 114 cattle, sheeS and herding dogs and inMured many more. That is only the number of Nillings that wildlife managers con¿rmed. /ast year, for e[amSle, 4 deSredation investigations resulted in only 11 con¿rmed wolf Nills. Though ranchers are indemni¿ed for their livestocN, it doesn¶t reSay them for the weight their other cattle lost because of wolves or the e[tra hours and effort required to Srotect against wolf attacNs. Third, the Endangered 6Secies $ct was aimed at Srotecting Slants and animals that were in danger of e[tinction. Wolves do not ¿t in that category. They are robust Sredators that follow the food and do not need sSecial treatment. In fact, wolves were never reintroduced in Oregon or Washington state they sSilled over from Idaho and %ritish Columbia, where the estimated wolf SoSulation is 10,000. More than 50,000 wolves live in Canada and 0,000 live in $lasNa, It de¿es logic to argue that the wolf is on the brinN of e[tinction.