Smith: With a change in status and legal challenges, the DNR needs to take action on wolf issues

When it comes to Wisconsin wildlife, the white-tailed deer has historically been the most controversial species to manage.

Even armed with sound, science-based arguments, famed conservationist and UW-Madison professor Aldo Leopold wasn't able to win the "deer wars" in the 1940s.

Leopold took people into the north woods and showed them the decimated browse and starving animals that resulted from an overpopulation of deer. Yet those who wanted more deer carried the day.

Whitetails have continued to be a hot button issue for the Department of Natural Resources.

In the last decade, for example, Gov. Scott Walker brought in James Kroll from Texas to oversee a Deer Trustee Review process in Wisconsin. And legislators have entered the fray on several occasions, including in the 2010s when they passed bills that removed regulations such as Earn-A-Buck from the state wildlife managers’ tool kit.

Now, as deer glut the agricultural regions of the state, regeneration of key native plant species suffers and chronic wasting disease spreads virtually unchecked, many hunters still resist efforts to curb deer numbers. 

In the last six years three county deer advisory councils have proposed the strongest medicine at their disposal – antlerless-only seasons – to reduce local deer numbers. In each case, the proposals drew hundreds of hunters in opposition and the councils backed down to less aggressive season formats.

Yes, deer management still creates controversy.

But not as much as another native Wisconsin species, the gray wolf.

If you've been following news over the last several months, you know the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced Oct. 29 its decision to remove federal Endangered Species Act protections for the wolf in Wisconsin and most other states in the Lower 48. 

The delisting was effective Jan. 4.

With state authority on the horizon, in December the DNR announced plans to hold a collaborative, transparent process this year, including updating its wolf management plan, reconvening its wolf committee, setting a kill quota and offering a drawing for tags. The agency's expressed goal was to begin the state's next wolf hunting and trapping season Nov. 6.

The DNR didn't feel it had adequate time to do the necessary work to enact a season this winter, especially the legally required consultations with American Indian tribes. 

But Republican lawmakers objected to that plan, citing state statute that says the DNR "shall establish a single annual open season for both hunting and trapping wolves that begins on the first Saturday in November of each year and ends on the last day of February of the following year" when the species is not listed on the federal or state list of endangered and threatened species.

At the request of the legislators, the Natural Resources Board convened an emergency meeting Jan. 22 to consider the issue. In the end, the board agreed with the DNR to wait until November. 

Meanwhile, on Jan. 14 wildlife advocacy and environmental groups filed a lawsuit in California seeking to restore Endangered Species Act protections for gray wolves in Wisconsin and most other states.

And Tuesday the wolf controversy took another litigious turn when the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty filed a lawsuit against the DNR. The case, filed in Jefferson County Circuit Court, asks a judge to order the DNR to hold a wolf hunt immediately.

The fact the suit was filed on Groundhog Day seems fitting. Debate over wolf management seems to keep cycling back over the same ground, just as the theme of the Bill Murray movie. 

The problem with wolves is humans have such a great disparity in views and values on the native predator. We've never been able to agree on how, or even whether, to manage wolves in the modern era.

American Indian tribes hold wolves sacred. Some Wisconsinites consider wolves varmints and would prefer they were all killed.

Most state residents, of course, support wolves and acknowledge the species has a rightful place in the Badger State and is a great ecological benefit to our woods and forests.

It's possible wolves are now nearing biologically carrying capacity in primary wolf range in Wisconsin, according to most wolf experts. Last winter the DNR estimated 1,195 wolves and 256 packs in the state, both modern-era highs.

The social carrying capacity – what humans will tolerate or support – is a more complex issue.

The most recent indication of Wisconsinite's views on wolves came in a 2014 DNR public attitude survey when the state had a minimum of 660 wolves. 

Among survey respondents in wolf range, 53% wanted wolf numbers maintained at current levels or increased in their county of residence, while 18% wanted wolves decreased and 15% wanted them eliminated.

Outside of wolf range, 56% wanted wolf numbers maintained or increased statewide.

Seven years later, the wolf population has increased. How do state residents feel about them now? And how many wolves should we have in the state?

The job of finding those answers, arguably the most challenging in contemporary wildlife management, falls to the DNR.

Here in the early days of 2021, with lawsuits being filed and lawmakers making demands, the DNR is itself in the crosshairs.

But it also has a unique opportunity. The wolf has shown scientists much more of where it can thrive in Wisconsin than was known in 1999 when the last wolf plan was written. And with the species delisted, the state has lethal control options to assist farmers experiencing wolf depredation on livestock.

I believe the DNR was wise in not rushing a hunt this winter. It would have likely led to the tribes, or perhaps other groups, stopping the effort.

But now we are into February. And much work remains to be accomplished this year.

To fulfill its public trust responsibilities, the DNR should do another survey on attitudes toward wolves now that the population is at record highs. It should also rewrite its wolf management plan and convene a public wolf committee representing diverse views to help guide its efforts.

This work should proceed, regardless of the outcome of the two lawsuits. It has been put on the shelf since 2014 when then-DNR Secretary Cathy Stepp decided to stop wolf work while the species was not under state control.

So the work load has built up. It's a lot to ask of any agency. And not so much because of the wolves.

As Aldo Leopold said: "Wildlife management is comparatively easy; human management is difficult."

Perhaps 2021 will be the year a Wisconsin plan is found that is responsible and respectful to the wolves, the tribes and other affected parties.