On Nov. 8, the San Francisco Chronicle released an investigative report on forced wolf reintroduction in Northern California. After four months and 18,000 hours of staff time logged, California Fish and Wildlife determined that wolves are killing more cattle than wild game.
Does this sound familiar to Coloradans? California Fish and Wildlife will start efforts to cull several wolf packs in Northern California. Colorado Proposition 114 was passed in November 2020, by roughly 50,000 votes, with 55 of 64 Colorado counties voting no.
At the same time, Prop. 114 was on the ballot, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife delisted wolves as endangered. Groups such as the Rocky Mountain Wolf Project, Rocky Mountain Wolf Fund, Colorado Wolf Wildlife Center and a handful of non-Colorado resident large financial donations erroneously reported that wolves were endangered and that a yes vote on 114 would resolve that “endangered” nomenclature. Wildlife management by ballot rather than biology needs to be overturned with a new ballot initiative in 2026.
Colorado Parks and Wildlife opposed what became Prop. 114 back in 2016. Wolves are coming from British Columbia instead of Washington state and Oregon.
B.C. is three and a half times larger than Colorado, the same population, and wolves have way more room to roam free in B.C. than coming, in late autumn no less, to Colorado, where the wolves have very little time to adapt to their new surroundings before facing starvation.
The groups mentioned earlier should face consequences for ignoring biology and instead serving their collaborators.
Dave Bishop
Louisville
