News

Wolves, Cranes May Be Next on Game List

Published November 5, 2004. By Bob Gross. The Daily Oakland Press. Front page.
Wolves, cranes may be next on game list

In Michigan, a hunter can be in the field with a gun from July through March pursuing some kind of game.The season is always open on skunks and woodchucks.

The state is examining, however, the possibility of adding two more animals to a game list that already includes about 36 mammals, waterfowl and upland game birds.

The thought of seasons on gray wolves and sandhill cranes outrages some of the same people who fought a mourning dove hunt.

"It would be a travesty to add the sandhill crane and gray wolf," said James Bull, Detroit Audubon Society president. "We had heard Michigan United Conservation Clubs and others were going to push for that next."

But, "If somebody's pushing, it's not us," said Sam Washington, MUCC's executive director. "Which doesn't mean that we wouldn't support it. It would depend on the circumstances. "At this point, we have no plans whatsoever to advocate for either of these seasons."

To Julie Baker, a foe of the recent creation of a mourning dove hunt, sandhill cranes and gray wolves are the tip of a legislative iceberg that would hand authority over all animals in the state to the Department of Natural Resources. "Not only are sandhill cranes and wolves and several other species in danger, House Bill 6272 has far ranging repercussions in addition to that," she said.  That bill, said Baker, was introduced Sept. 30 by Rep. Susan Tabor, R-Delta Township - author of the bill overturning Michigan's nearly 100-year ban on dove hunting

"House Bill 6272, as introduced, would change the mission of the Department of Natural Resources and the Natural Resources Commission from managing wildlife held in trust for the people of the state of Michigan to mandating and directing the agencies to promote the reclassification of every protected non-game animal possible to the game list in order to establish open seasons on them," said Baker.

There is no legislation planned to establish hunting seasons for sandhill cranes - resident in Oakland County at Indian Springs and Kensington metroparks - or wolves, but once-tiny populations of the animals are increasing.

There are about 350 wolves in the Upper Peninsula, up from about 20 in 1992 - and a 70-pound female wolf was recently killed in the Lower Peninsula's Presque Isle County.

"At some point, we'll have to do some population management on the gray wolf," Ray Rustem, supervisor of the DNR's natural heritage unit, told Capital News Service. He said there are several options to control wolf numbers, including the Legislature adding them to the game list.  "There have been more and more human-wolf encounters, some with dogs, and there have been negative feelings about this," he said.

Rob Anderson, legislative counsel for Michigan Farm Bureau, said his group supports removing the wolf from the federal endangered species list, but not a hunting season. "Once you take them off the endangered species list and the state starts implementing a wolf management plan, state wildlife officials will be able to more quickly respond (to predation problems)," he said.

Kathryn Trussell, of Clawson, who spent a week this summer helping to raise wolf pups in Minnesota, said delisting could work in Michigan, but that she would not want a hunting season for wolves. "By specifically killing the nuisance animals, then you can still support the majority of the population while getting rid of the quote, unquote harmful ones," she said.

Hunter chatter that wolves are harming the deer population in the UP is just wrong, said Bull. "It's axiomatic to wildlife management that predators don't control the prey population; it's the prey population that controls the predators," he said. "There's no need to shoot predators to save the prey species. It's absolutely ridiculous."

Although wolf encounters have been mainly isolated in the Upper Peninsula, cranes are creating a statewide problem, said Rustem.

Anderson said the large birds destroy small corn and wheat seedlings. "In certain kinds of fields, they like that new growth that comes out of the ground," he said. "They feed on it like a buffet line."That's what they like to eat. We hear from farmers all over the state that they're seeing more of them and noticing there's more damage that these birds are doing to their fields."

The farm bureau, Anderson said, would support a crane hunt.

A recent two-year survey found 805 breeding pairs statewide. Sandhill cranes are related to endangered whooping cranes.

Baker said mourning dove advocates knew the sandhill crane was in hunters' sights. "'Big, noisy, tasty birds that fly fast and make great targets' - I watch the hunter chat rooms and they've been talking about this for some time," she said.

Washington said he's aware of interest in a crane hunt in Michigan. It is already hunted in 13 other states. "Should the suggestion arise that sandhill cranes should become a hunted species in Michigan, we would certainly take a look at the population figures in Michigan ... before it would become something we could advocate for," he said. Decisions to hunt animals are made carefully, he said. "Each and every thing that is hunted in the state is looked at individually, and not en masse, like people like to think," he said. "We would certainly not do anything that would threaten any species in the state."

But Baker said hunting advocates want to transfer the authority about what gets hunted in Michigan from the Legislature to the DNR and the natural resources commission. "They don't want to face the 25-year battle they faced with the mourning doves," she said.

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