FROM PAGE ONE
Saturday, april 2, 2022
tHE OBSErVEr — A7
WOLVES
Continued from Page A1
protections of wolves do not under-
stand that the livelihood of inde-
pendent ranchers like him is at
stake — especially now that one of
the few tools ranchers had to take
out wolves that habitually prey on
livestock has been taken away.
Vardanega said it is easy for
city dwellers to romanticize
wolves because they do not have
to live with them.
“That’s not how it works in
America,” Anderson said. “That’s
not how it is supposed to work.”
Even before last month’s court
decision returned some wolf pop-
ulations to federal control, many
Oregon ranchers were already
suspicious of the state’s wolf plan,
part of a policy structure that they
believe is rigged against them by a
hyper-liberal majority in Salem.
Vardanega said he does not
trust ODFW and believes the
agency has made wolf depreda-
tion too hard to prove.
The reason, he said, is because
the agency has to toe a left-leaning
political line. Thus, the process of
establishing wolf depredation is
fundamentally skewed to favor an
environmentalist agenda.
Not only that, he said ranchers
suffer in ways that the current
system doesn’t even touch. In addi-
tion to above-average losses in cir-
cumstances where they can’t prove
wolf kills, non-lethal measures
mean a lot of additional work for
ranchers that involves extra vigi-
lance and the cost of paying a range
rider upward of $1,500 a month.
Along with paying the range
rider, Vardanega said he is often
anxiously awake at 2 a.m., casting
spotlights into the dark to defend
his herds.
Why were wolves relisted?
Environmental groups sued
the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Ser-
vice and former Interior Secre-
tary David Bernhardt in 2021,
after the Trump administration
removed wolves from the endan-
gered species in the waning days
of his term. The conservation
groups argued the delisting was
premature.
In last month’s ruling, Judge
Jeffrey S. White of the United
States District Court for the
Northern District of California
said U.S. Fish and Wildlife did
Steven Mitchell/Blue Mountain Eagle
Izee rancher M.T. Anderson moves his cattle in February 2022. A state investigator
could not determine whether a pair of wolves seen feeding on the carcass of one of
Anderson’s cows in February caused the animal’s death.
not take into account wolves out-
side the Great Lakes and Northern
Rocky Mountain regions when
the agency proclaimed wolf con-
servation a success and removed
the apex predators’ federal
protections.
Ironically, removing wolves
from the endangered species list
is one goal that conservative and
liberal administrations have long
had in common.
Even though the decision to
delist wolves came down during
the Trump administration, attor-
neys for the Biden administration
defended the rule that removed
protections, arguing wolves were
resilient enough to bounce back
even if their numbers dropped
sharply due to intensive hunting.
Not only that, but other Dem-
ocratic and Republican adminis-
trations have tried to delist wolves
over the years, failing every time.
The last attempt to take wolves off
the endangered list came during
the Obama years.
According to John Williams,
who chairs the wolf committee
of the Oregon Cattlemen’s Asso-
ciation, the U.S. Fish and Wild-
life Service has 60 days to decide
whether to appeal the U.S. Dis-
trict Court ruling. So far, Wil-
liams said, the cattlemen’s associ-
ation has not heard if the agency
intends to contest the decision.
Williams said the judge denied
the livestock industry’s request
for intervenor status, which would
have given groups like his the
ability to appeal.
Meanwhile, the Center for Bio-
logical Diversity, one of the envi-
ronmental groups behind the law-
suit that overturned the Trump
administration’s delisting deci-
sion, is trying to extend federal
wolf protections still further.
A question of trust
Ranchers who lose livestock to
wolf depredation are supposed to
be compensated for the value of
the animals, but getting paid is not
as simple as filing a claim.
First, the cattlemen’s associa-
tion’s Williams said, the livestock
producer has to find the carcass
— and they need to find it quickly,
before decomposition makes it
impossible to identify as a wolf
kill. Then, he said, an investiga-
tion has to prove beyond a reason-
able doubt that it was wolves that
killed the animal.
If a wolf kill is confirmed,
Williams said, the rancher can
submit a request for compensation
through their county’s compensa-
tion committee. That’s assuming
the rancher’s county has a com-
mittee — not all counties do.
Finally, he said, there has to be
money available in the county’s
compensation fund. Those funds
can be depleted by prior claims,
and counties must apply to the state
for more money on an annual basis.
The cattlemen’s association
supported House Bill 4127, a mea-
sure in the 2022 Legislature to
provide an additional $1 million
for the state’s wolf compensation
fund to reimburse ranchers for
dead and missing livestock and
the cost of non-lethal methods for
preventing wolf attacks.
After a public hearing last
month, the bill died in committee
without ever getting the chance
for a floor vote.
Danielle Moser, coordinator of
Oregon Wild’s wildlife program,
said she wanted to see more trans-
parency in the compensation pro-
gram. Other critics argued that
the wolf compensation fund is
prone to misuse, and putting more
money into it would encourage
ranchers not to look for missing
animals but instead simply default
to blaming wolves.
Rep. Mark Owens, R-Crane,
was one of the bill’s chief spon-
sors. He contends environmental
groups targeted the bill not on its
merits but simply because killing
it would make their supporters
feel good about protecting wolves.
“Bumper-sticker politics won
the day without substance,”
Owens said.
Who makes the call?
There were 49 confirmed wolf
depredations across the state last
year, according to Ryan Torland, a
district biologist with the Oregon
Department of Fish and Wildlife.
ODFW will continue to be the
agency conducting depredation
investigations, Torland said, even
in parts of Oregon where wolves
are now under federal jurisdiction.
However, he added, only the U.S.
Fish and Wildlife Service will be
able to authorize lethal take of
wolves in those areas.
“As far as I know they have not
approved the take of any wolves
while the wolves have been on
the endangered species list,” he
said. “They possess that authority
while listed, and ODFW does
not.”
Torland said an ODFW inves-
tigation of a possible wolf dep-
redation is similar to a detec-
tive’s evaluation of a crime scene.
He told the Eagle that biologists
gather information and send it
to the agency’s wolf experts in
La Grande, who make the call
whether a wolf was responsible
for the death of an animal.
He said ODFW investigators
operate much like sheriff’s depu-
ties, who would submit evidence
from a crime scene to the district
attorney to decide whether there
is enough to prove someone com-
mitted a crime.
Grant County Sheriff Todd
McKinley agreed with that
assessment.
“It is not much different than
a fairly major crime scene,”
McKinley said. “You’ve got
something that’s been killed or
attacked, and you’ve got to find
the facts. And if you’re going to
do it, you better put the effort into
it and do it right.”
McKinley had something like
that in mind when he invited
Baker County Sheriff Travis Ash
to speak to the Grant County
Stockgrowers Association about
how Baker County handles wolf
depredations during the group’s
March meeting at the Grant
County Fairgrounds.
Ash said he has heard the
complaints, concerns and argu-
ments from livestock producers
regarding wolf depredations
and how ODFW investigates
them. However, he said, Baker
County is about five or six years
down the road from where Grant
County is when it comes to wolf
depredations.
“Build those relationships with
those guys that have to do the
work,” he said. “And understand,
though, that if the evidence isn’t
there, they have to say that the
evidence is not there.”
McKinley’s staff is gearing up
to do depredation investigations in
Grant County. McKinley told the
stockgrowers that Undersheriff Zach
Mobley and Sgt. Danny Komning
have been through ODFW’s wolf
training and that he could get other
deputies trained as well.
An emotional issue
For Vardanega, wolves are a
personal issue. Many of those who
support putting wolves back on
the endangered species list do not
realize how hard ranchers work
and how protecting their cattle
against predators brings a high
cost in both money and time.
“This is real life,” he said.
“This is how we make a living.”
Oregon Wild’s Danielle Moser
takes wolves personally, too. To
Moser, wolves are an iconic spe-
cies that deserve protection.
“I think (wolves) are the essen-
tial American animal in many
ways,” she said.
For Williams, the wolf com-
mittee chair for the cattlemen’s
association, the wolf debate boils
down to two competing sets of
values: one that prioritizes ani-
mals, and one that prioritizes
people.
“(Environmentalists) have
different priorities,” Williams
said. “They’re more interested in
hearing a wolf howl than they are
(a rancher) being able to have their
way of life.”
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