My Favorite Targets

[Sourdough]

Some people think it's awful I shoot these animals, everyone I can get into my sights.  With my 30-06 Handi, out to 500 yards.


      http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/wildlife/wolves/story/9408620p-9320303c.html

[wtroger]

My philosophy on this Shoot Shovel and Shut up. Any animal that turns into a marauder, up to and including the two leg ones, need to be dispatched ASAP. What if a small child had been outside. And they want to disarm us.

[aulrich]

The last trip up to my cabin one morning there is a either a large coyote or a small wolf just inside the tree line, had I know it had been a regular visitor I would have used that 270 in my hand.

Sourdough how would you tell the difference between the two.

One thing people don't understand about predator control is that it is necessary because what the killing of the odd pet or head of livestock does is likely prevents the natural starvation of a predator. they talk about how this happens every year before he snow falls and the moose are too hard to kill, so predator populations stay high because of the domestic "emergency rations".

[Sourdough]

I really don't care I shoot them both.  Wolf season is Aug 10 to May 31, coyotes Aug 10 to April 30.  But here in Alaska wolves are much bigger than coyotes.  Also look at the ears and feet.  Coyotes have bigger ears in relation to their heads, wolves have bigger feet.  Once you've stared a wolf in the face, you will never forget it, and you will from that point on remember and can tell immediately if it's a wolf or coyote just from the face. 


My Dad tells me that the Red Wolf is cross breeding with coyotes down in the land between the lakes in Tennessee and Kentucky.  How are they going to be classified?  I understand the local game departments are still in denial.  I've also heard that crossing is taking place else where in the states.  Again how are the hybrids going to be classified?

[wtroger]

As for the cross breeds I call them dead if they fall in my sighting radius. We had an idiot turn a mating pair of wolves loose in our area. He said the where indigenous to Kansas. Yep they sure where about 150 years ago. You know I haven't seen them for a long time. Wonder what happened?

[darat100]

sourdough

I could be wrong, but in the land between the lakes, we have no wolves at all.  lots of coyotes, but never heard of anyone sighting a wolf of any type.

[Sourdough]

darat:  I understand the government released several of the small Red wolves on a wildlife refuse there about 15 years ago.  The Red Wolf is about the size of coyotes.  My Dad and brothers told me about it.  I also remember reading about it during that time.

[PeterCartwright]

Lots of wolves in Michigan's Upper Penninsula.  Plenty of coyotes, too.  Once  you've seen a wolf, you're not likely to mistake a coyote for its much bigger cousin.  Watched a big salt and pepper colored rascal eating a road killed whitetail two miles south of my small town two weeks ago.  They're beautiful and there's something special about being able to see one once in a while.  Places that have livestock have some predation problems (very little stock in my area) and dogs that don't have human "escorts" are vulnerable.  (Hounds that run bears are especially vulnerable).

It's nice that the Feds have taken them off the endangered species list and given legal control to states.  I can foresee a day when the DNR will have to do some control one way or another in our area.

[bluebayou]

Sourdough, I read a deal that the coyotes around the eastern side of the Great Lakes, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia were showing genetic markers from the red wolf.  The biologist was saying that they were still technically coyotes. 

Here in OK there are coydogs for sure. 

There was an article in Field and Stream that talked about how a coyote population had strayed from the Midwest to Canada and then southeast around the Great Lakes.  I can't find it now.

This article mentions the release of Red Wolves in NC and somewhere else.

http://www.enature.com/fieldguides/detail.asp?shapeID=1028&curGroupID=5&lgfromWhere=&curPageNum=5

I can't say that I would shoot wolves if I saw them, but I am not in your situation either.  There are some hard choices to make with the Yellowstone and the Minnesota wolf populations in particular. 

[Sourdough]

Hope4 you went and seen the Elk at Yellowstone, for there numbers are definitely cut down, and in a few years they will be real scarce.  The wolves are still protected in Wyoming, Montana, and Idaho I believe.  Last I read the Feds were not taking them off the endangered list till the states promised not to hunt them.  The articles I have read state that the time for implamenting controls is past.  From this point their numbers are going to increase so fast they are going to be uncontroliable.  So in a few years parents better keep a close eye on their kids.  They will be in the same boat we are in now.