The Saturday Summary is a weekly roundup of some of ICIE’s activities in and around the Idaho Legislature. Staffing limits mean we can’t cover every meeting. If there’s an item of interest to you at an upcoming meeting of one of the environment or agriculture committees, let us know and we’ll try to cover it. Agendas are available at www.state.id.us. Click on “Legislative” and click on “Calendars and agendas.”
The House Resources and Conservation Committee met on Thursday to hear a presentations on tracking Idaho wolves.
The department is collaring and tracking both wolves and elk to demonstrate the impact of wolves on Idaho elk herds.
Using GPS collars allows Fish & Game to get actual data to track individuals in the Lolo Zone and the Sawtooth Zone. The data from the collars are transferred through satellites to the Fish & game office to be analyzed. The committee was shown an example of the path of a particular elk calf and the path of the wolves that it eventually encountered.
Fish & Game reported that Idaho is way over the recovery levels for wolf numbers in the Lolo Zone. 91% of the hunter days in that area have been lost due to wolf depredation. There needs to be an aggressive effort to restore elk populations. The information about actual wolf-elk interaction will help with that effort.
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