By JAYNE BELSKY | Necedah
This week’s wolf hunt happened without public input, without science, and with very little legally required consult with the Tribes. Many don’t agree with it; few will speak out. Some DNR and hunters would like you to believe “they pay for the right to hunt; it’s their right to do what they want.” NOT TRUE. Know the facts, and understand that you have every right and responsibility to have equal representation in resource management. If we are going to have ethical and science-based wildlife management, we need to stop being silent. This forced wolf hunt (which will go over quota in two days) is a prime example of how our silence has allowed the atrocities that are happening on our public lands this week. If we are silent, we are complicit.
According to Dr. Cameron K. Murray (2020), “Trophy hunting of native carnivores is likely to contribute just 0.13% of funding, $1 out of every $770 of funding, and the high cost of regulating hunting means that it is unlikely that there is a net funding contribution from trophy hunters to wildlife conservation. Wildlife-watching expenditures were $76 billion in 2016, three times higher than all hunting-related expenditures.”