Help Representative George Miller Save Wolves From Aerial Hunting
Representative George Miller from California is working hard to protect Alaskan wolves from being gunned down by cowardly “hunters” shooting them down from helicopters. But Representative Miller needs all of us who support his efforts to contact their own representatives and/or sign the Defenders of Welfare online petitions.
Here’s some information from the Defenders of Wildlife petition:
Support the PAW Act — End Alaska’s Aerial Hunting Program!
Rep. George Miller (CA) has introduced the Protect America’s Wildlife (PAW) Act, legislation to close a federal loophole and curb Alaska’s brutal aerial hunting program — and prevent programs like it from spreading to places like the Greater Yellowstone region. But he needs your support to win passage of this wolf-saving measure.
[...] (more…) representativegeorgemillerhelicoptersrepresentativemillercontactrepresentativesand orsignthedefendersprotectalaskanwolvesgunnedcowardlyldquowelfareonlinepetitions here rsquohunters rdquoshootingthedefenders October 05th 2007 Posted to Uncategorized [...]
This legislation is so very important! Thank you for spreading the word! My family and I have already signed this important legislation. Please everyone take time out and support the PAW ACT! The lives of these beautiful creatures depend on it!
GO SIGN!!!
So everybody here loves wolves as much as they their dogs?
Go to the Anchorage Daily News website http://www.adn.com
and do a search for “wolves” so you can see how many dogs like yours have been KILLED AND EATEN BY WOLVES.
BUT BEFORE YOU DO, READ THE STORY BELOW, to find out how REAL PEOPLE would be affected by the so-called “PAW Act”, and what they’ll have to do to the wolves threatening their lives if this bill were to become law.
And if you’re not an Alaskan, you have know idea what it means to live in the Bush with hungry wolves in your backyard. So, butt out!
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Group asks permission to kill wolf pups in their dens
By ALEX DeMARBAN
(01/18/08 14:43:26)
Residents along the Kuskokwim River want state game managers to allow them to kill wolf pups in their dens.
Wolf numbers seem to be rising in the wilderness around Aniak, McGrath and other villages, and the task once carried out by young Native men should be employed again to help moose populations recover, said Greg Roczicka, natural resources director with Orutsaramuit Native Council in Bethel.
The tribal government and a Fish and Game advisory committee along the central Kuskokwim River have submitted separate proposals asking the Board of Game to overturn regulations outlawing the practice.
The Game Board is scheduled to consider the proposals at upcoming meetings later this month and in February.
At least one group plans to speak against the idea.
“We’re fervently opposed to it,” said John Toppenberg, director with Alaska Wildlife Alliance. “It’s been illegal in Alaska for a long time and deservedly so. It’s a Stone Age concept of wildlife management and has no place as a management tool for civilized people. It’s just barbaric.”
The tribal council and advisory panel also want the board to let hunters kill bear cubs in dens. Along with wolves, bears are blamed for low moose numbers around central Kuskokwim villages, said Doug Carney of Sleetmute, former chairman of Central Kuskokwim Advisory Committee.
Last year’s poor aerial wolf-kill and trapping season in Game Unit 19A, located around Aniak, is factoring into concerns that wolf numbers are rebounding, he said. Aerial gunners and trappers killed 10 wolves last winter and spring, compared to more than 70 in each of the two previous years, because a lack of snow made tracking and spotting wolves difficult, he said.
This winter, people are seeing wolves more often than in the past two years, and trappers are finding more wolf tracks, said Carney, a trapper.
Roczicka said pup killing is necessary because the central Kuskokwim region once teemed with moose, consistently providing subsistence meat for hunters from Bethel and villages. Because moose numbers have plummeted in the last five years, subsistence hunting has been eliminated or sharply reduced, he said.
“It was the best moose habitat in the country and it’s almost totally gone now,” he said. “We want to do everything we can to get moose numbers up back to the way they were.”
Reviving the practice will allow predator management to continue if the state’s aerial wolf-kill program ends, said Roczikca. Efforts to stop it include a citizen’s initiative to appear on the state ballot in August.
Many of the Yup’ik hunters who once controlled wolves in Western Alaska have died, but their stories have passed down, Roczicka said. People who are still alive today often share those stories, including members of Orutsararmuit, Roczicka said.
The group’s seven-member council asked Roczicka in the fall to submit the Game Board proposal, he said. The old practice is referenced in a 1997 report by the National Academy of Sciences called “Wolves, Bears and their Prey in Alaska.”
According to the report, Athabascans in the Interior controlled wolf numbers to protect caribou and moose by keeping track of wolf dens in hunting areas and systematically killing pups.
Other methods of wolf control that are no longer practiced – and are not requested in the proposal – include wiping an animal’s blood on knives or sharp rocks, he said. Wolves cut themselves as they licked away the blood, bleeding to death through their mouths.
Also, some trappers would coil sharpened baleen or willow sticks into taut wads, cover them with fat and freeze the device, he said. Once gobbled by wolves, the wads would open, piercing stomachs and killing the animal, he said.
Game Board chairman Cliff Judkins said the pup-killing proposal is worth discussing.
“It certainly has merit if it’s effective and is done by Native and Eskimo people,” he said.
“They certainly know where the dens are at and they’re not interested in wiping out wolf populations any more than we are.”
If the Game Board doesn’t pass Orutsararmuit’s proposal at its meeting beginning Jan. 25, the central Kuskokwim Advisory committee wants its proposals passed at the Game Board’s next meeting beginning Feb. 29.
The proposals only apply to Game Management Unit 19, surrounding Aniak and McGrath.
Hi im 10 years old.Wolfs been my favoritet anmals.For six years.Can i do any thing to save the wolfs at aerial hunting.
Cody,
Thanks for barking in.
Even though you can’t sign petitions yet you can encourage the adults around you to sign petitions that will help wolves and other animals.
Just because you’re young doesn’t mean you are voiceless. If you really want to help wolves, learn as much as you can and share that information in class assignments and other chances you have to educate your friends.
The first time I spoke out about an environmental issue I was in 6th grade. I couldn’t vote but I wanted to let people know what I had learned. You can do that too.
Best barks, Cody!
Here’s what this right-winged conservative thinks of Palin.
McCain picked the worse evil person ever! Pulling 14 one month old pups out of their den to shoot them. Does this sound like Pro-life to you?
This women is HITLER of animals.
Under Palin, the state Board of Game authorized for the first time in 20 years the shooting of wolves by state wildlife officials from helicopters. The order resulted in the controversial shooting this summer of 14 one-month-old wolf pups taken from dens on a remote peninsula 800 miles southwest of Anchorage — an act that environmentalists claim was illegal.
“If you have men who will exclude any of God’s creatures from the shelter of compassion and pity, you will have men who deal likewise with their fellow men.”
-St. Francis of Assisi
Support the PAW Act — End Alaska’s Aerial Hunting Program!
Rep. George Miller (CA) has introduced the Protect America’s Wildlife (PAW) Act, legislation to close a federal loophole and curb Alaska’s brutal aerial hunting program — and prevent programs like it from spreading to places like the Greater Yellowstone region. But he needs your support to win passage of this wolf-saving measure.
Fill out the form below to urge your Representative to sign on as a cosponsor to Rep. George Miller’s PAW Act.
https://secure.defenders.org/site/Advocacy?pagename=homepage&page=UserAction&id=845&s_einterest=C3C4&s_Affiliate=savewolves_