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How wolves change rivers....

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3K views 50 replies 25 participants last post by  pigburner 
#1 ·
Some interesting claims made in this clip. I know there are a lot of varying opinions of how wolf management has impacted various regions, and I am curious as to what others think about this.
 
#46 ·
Here in the hills around Dillon wolves have been know to kill the sheep. I came across one sheep owner shooting at the wolves that were killing his sheep. Some of them have lost up to 100 sheep a night.

I'm not against any wild animals. They are just doing what is natural. And as for cattle, I see them up in the woods in the National Forests all summer long. The ranchers all have a lottery to see who gets to put their cows in the hills. They graze the hills bare and then shit to fertilize them. It's a vicious circle.
 
#47 ·
"Wolf kills are also good for the soil. A 2009 study in Michigan's Isle Royale National Park found that wolf-killed elk carcasses dramatically enhanced levels of nitrogen and other nutrients."
There are no Elk on Isle Royal.. or the Clearwater Valley, ID. Okay, maybe 9% of population is left in the valley.
 
#48 ·
Shotgunner: I stand corrected. That would be moose and not Elk in Isle Royal: Wolves modulate soil nutrient heterogeneity and foliar nitrogen by configuring the distribution of ungulate carcasses.
Bump JK1, Peterson RO, Vucetich JA.
Author information

Abstract
Mechanistic links between top terrestrial predators and biogeochemical processes remain poorly understood. Here we demonstrate that large carnivores configure landscape heterogeneity through prey carcass distribution. A 50-year record composed of > 3600 moose carcasses from Isle Royale National Park, Michigan, USA, showed that wolves modulate heterogeneity in soil nutrients, soil microbes, and plant quality by clustering prey carcasses over space. Despite being well utilized by predators, moose carcasses resulted in elevated soil macronutrients and microbial biomass, shifts in soil microbial composition, and elevated leaf nitrogen for at least 2-3 years at kill sites. Wolf-killed moose were deposited in some regions of the study landscape at up to 12x the rate of deposition in other regions. Carcass density also varied temporally, changing as much as 19-fold in some locations during the 50-year study period. This variation arises, in part, directly from variation in wolf hunting behavior. This study identifies a top terrestrial predator as a mechanism generating landscape heterogeneity, demonstrating reciprocal links between large carnivore behavior and ecosystem function.
 
#49 ·
[quote="Dennis Thomas, post: 962144, member: 77201" I have read many reports over the years about the destruction of the balance of the ecosystem by the re-introduction of wolves in Yellowstone but darned if I have been able to find research on the effects on the ecosystem from overgrazing cattle and sheep on federal lands that used to be home of the wolves, elk and bears.[/quote]

Your not looking very hard. The Southwest was totally changed by grazing cattle. Next to land conversion, grazing is the largest impact on ecosystems.

Don't look for reports.....look for scientific papers.
 
#51 ·
Are there any keystone species that are not predators?
The prairie dog is considered by some to be a keystone species, and it is not a predator. It is interesting to note that it is not only the black-footed ferret that preys upon the prairie dog that suffers from the removal of this keystone species, but also the burrowing owl, that doesn't eat or is not eaten by the prairie dog, it simply needs the burrows of the prairie dog to thrive. Scroll down to the bottom of the link below:

http://www.blackfootedferret.org/prairie-ecosystem
 
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