Is that what passes for your thinking?
That's the dumbest thing I've seen as a rebuttal for a long time here. You should go into Democrat politics.
100 was the "recovery" goal, until there were 100, then they moved the goalposts. Repeatedly. As RC, says, the woofer uber alles crowd will never find a "recovery" goal met.
Restore the Western US to the condition it was in when there were "several hundred thousand wolves", and we'll talk.
In the early exploration of Alaska, there was little game to feed the explorers, who were often on starvation diets. Natives several times saved lives of same. By feeding them fish- wolves had pretty much eliminated most of the land herbivores.
First rule when you are in over your head in a hole is to stop digging. "STFU before you get any deeper" would be good advice, if I cared to offer it.
I don't. Keep digging.
If you are interested in improving your wolf management education, start with Jim Reardon's "Wolves of Alaska". Not a documentary per se- more like historical non-fiction fiction. Mech, Lopez, et al have good info on the biology, etc.
The man in charge of the Yellowstone reintroduction did much work here on the Kenai National Wildlfe Refuge before geting the recovery job.. Ran into him one night years ago at a mutual friend's place and the three of us got to tipping a few. Too many, that is....
He said that during the reintroduction he tried to keep the number of death threats from both sides fairly well balanced..... he figured that way he was doing it about "right".
The man is not without a sense of humor.
When wolves eat all of their food supply, the wolf population itself will crash. Both populations are then liable to remain for long periods - many decades- at low levels. By managing the wolf population to a controlled level, prey species will thrive, and then can support a higher wolf population than if the wolves are uncontrolled or allowed at too high a "recovery" level. The peaks and valleys for both populations will be somewhat evened out, and the decades long starvation periods will be shortened or even eliminated.
"Recovery" is not an unlimited except-by -themselves level of wolves. It is a sustainable, self perpetuating level that allows for optimum prey species levels which can then support both (higher than low, but lower than high) wolves aas well as humans. That means human intervention, management, and reasonable, sustainable wolf populations where even feasable. The problem is wolves are better breeders than humans are able to easily control except by extraordinary means. Hunting and trapping by the public alone usually won't do it.
"We can't just let Nature run wild!" - Wally Hickle (then Governor of Alaska).
