KUOW's Weekday discusses wolf plan with Jasmine

Hear the interview yourself!

But first the business of wolves in Washington State. Over the weekend Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission approved a still contentious proposal for managing grey wolves in the state. Four breeding pairs would be required in eastern Washington, four in the North Cascades, four in the South Cascades, the northwest coast, and three other pairs occurring anywhere in the state. Ultimately the goal of a viable wolf population and remove wolves from endangered species protections. Yesterday we had Jack Field on the program, he’s executive vice president at the Washington Cattlemen’s Association. I told him he sounded a little skeptical of the state’s plans.

Field – That would be putting it very politely. I’m just looking at neighboring states, we are charting a course for a lot of struggle, strife, and bloodshed from impacted stakeholders, our livestock and wildlife communities. This is not going to be a pleasant and smooth paved road.

Scher – Field went on to say he thought skeptics’ opinions of the state’s wolf management plan were ignored because the departments said they had been based on enough observed scientific evidence. Today we have Jasmine Minbashian on the line, she’s the special projects director at Conservation Northwest. Jasmine Minbashian what do you say to that? Are the recommendations from ranchers lacking scientific evidence?

Minbashian – Well that’s what we heard from biologists, Steve. This plan that was adopted went through some really rigorous review. Sixty-five thousand people commented on it but also there was a blind scientific peer review, and those were done by experts in the field of wolf recovery and they overwhelmingly said that if you have less than 15 breeding pairs, which equals about 200 wolves, any less than that, you’re not going to have wolf recovery in the state. So that was kind of a guiding principle that we wanted to work within so that this recovery plan did have scientific integrity.

Scher – When you look at wolves and other states right now and how many wolves are allocated: 37 breeding pairs in Montana, that’s 566 wolves. Wyoming has 19 pairs, 250 wolves approximately. Idaho 46 pairs, 705 wolves. Then there’s along the border, 22 documented border packs, so they move back and forth. What do you think Washington will look like 4, 5 years hence?

Minbashian – It’s hard to say. It really is hard to say because we haven’t had wolves here for decades. But my guess is it will be similar to Idaho and Montana. Although you look – you know we often talk about the Rockies – but you look at other parts of the country like Minnesota that is pretty similar to Washington in terms of population they’ve got five million people there living and heavily populated. And they’ve got 3,000 wolves and a pretty stable population of deer and successful hunting. So it’s really hard to say but my guess it will be similar to what we see in Idaho and Montana.

Scher – And that was one of Mr. Fields’ criticisms that he was afraid that poor management would occur and we may see a decline in deer and elk populations that hunters rely on. He didn’t see the report, the final recommendation as a real compromise. How about you, do you feel you compromised and gave something up?

Minbashian – Oh, I think it absolutely was a compromise. Conservation Northwest spent over three years at the table with various interests that included livestock producers, and sportsmen and really with goal of trying to find a solution, and for the most part I think we’ve succeeded and the evidence there is the commission, the Fish and Wildlife Commission, unanimously, voted to unanimously adopt the plan. And I think that’s a sign that it’s a good plan, because it serves the various interests while allowing for wolf recover. So I think it’s actually a plan that’s going to be able to avoid some of the conflicts and controversy we’ve seen in other parts of the West.

Scher – Do you think we’ll see the kind of support for ranchers and other folks that are out in the field, that they’ll get the compensation they think they deserve when their, when their livestock is taken, for example? Will there be that kind of working together between conservation groups and the livestock associations?

Minbashian – Yeah, we’re already starting that work. Conservation Northwest is working with ranchers who are grazing their cows in areas where wolves are already coming back and we’re learning lessons from other parts of the West on what works and what doesn’t and trying to apply those lessons here at home. And the plan also provides I think one of the beefiest compensation programs in the West. So larger ranches would get compensated for two cows for every one loss. And that was something we heard from ranchers loud and clear that they wanted and that was given to them as part of this plan even though generally compensation isn’t hugely popular with taxpayers, we thought it was an important tool to basically improve the acceptance of wolves on the landscape over time.

Scher – So two, twice as much if you lose livestock. What’s that going to cost? What’s the budget, do you know?

Minbashian – Well it will all depend on how well behaved our wolves are, but we’re already seeking some funding through some creative mechanisms, as we all know funding is hard to find these days, but the department has identified some revenue through license plates, specialty license plates that would help fund that program. And we’re not expecting it to be very expensive.

Scher – Will the livestock managers themselves pay into some fund as sort of an insurance policy, or will it all be backed by the taxpayer?

Minbashian – So far it’s primarily through the purchase of license plates and also we’re hoping to get some funding from the federal government, but I like – those are the kinds of creative ideas that you just mentioned that I think we need to be looking for the future.

Scher – Yeah I’m sure they’d love that. Jasmine Minbashian, what happens next?

Minbashian – Well, the next step is just implement the plan, to get out on the ground and make sure that as wolves recover that we’re minimizing impact to livestock owners and to sportsman, and make sure to keep wolves out of harms way from, for example from poaching.

Scher – And how many – well we saw that already with the pack out at Cle Elum. How many – Cle Elum right? Was it Cle Elum or further north?

Minbashian – That was the Lookout pack up in the Methow. That was a, that pack was the first one to be documented as having pups in Washington in over 70 years, but sadly it was decimated by poachers. So actually I think the biggest challenge with wolf recover is keeping the wolves themselves away form cars and bullets.

Scher – Yeah those guys are trying to send the wolves through FedEx if I’m not mistaken. If they used the Post Office it would have been different. How many wolves do we have right now in Washington State? What’s the estimate?

Minbashian – We’ve got five confirmed packs so if you estimate about ten animals per pack, that’s about 50 wolves. There’s three in the far northeastern corner of the state in the Columbia Highlands, and we’ve got two confirmed packs in the Cascades, only one of which we know is breeding and having pups and that’s the one further south.

Scher – Over the weekend the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission approved a still contentious proposal for managing grey wolves that would require four packs in the North Cascades, four in the South Cascades to the coast, and three other pairs occurring anywhere throughout the state. Jasmine Minbashian is special projects director at Conservation Northwest. Jasmine, thank you.

Minbashian – Thank you Steve.