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For Immediate Release
Applications for Alaska Aerial Wolf Killing Released
Elimination of wolves could begin any day
ANCHORAGE, AK -- Today the Alaska Department of Fish and Game released applications for permits to hunters and trappers to allow them to kill wolves using aircraft. Upon approval of these applications, several applicants will be selected to conduct an aerial wolf killing program in interior Alaska near the Village of McGrath.
"These applications should be stamped ‘Rejected: Twice by Alaskan Voters!' and sent to the Governor and the Alaska Board of Game," said Karen Deatherage, Alaska Program Associate for Defenders of Wildlife. "This shameful policy totally ignores the will of the citizens of Alaska."
The objective of the program is to kill all of the wolves in a 2,200 square mile area in order to boost moose populations for hunters, despite evidence showing that moose populations have already met the population objectives of the Department of Fish and Game, and have likely been growing in the past couple years. Current temperatures and the possibility of more snow in the next week or so could provide adequate conditions for spotting wolves and shooting them directly from aircraft. Gunners can kill males, females and pups as part of the program.
The citizens of Alaska have twice voted in statewide measures (1996 and 2000) to ban the aerial killing of wolves. Nonetheless, Governor Murkowski signed a bill last June overturning the most recent ban. At its November, 2003 meeting, the Alaska Board of Game re-affirmed their plan to implement aerial wolf killing in the McGrath area, and instructed the Department of Fish and Game to issue permits as soon as possible for the program.
"The McGrath program is being called a biological ‘experiment',"says Joel Bennett, a former Board of Game member and spokesperson for Defenders of Wildlife. "Given that no moose census has been conducted since the fall of 2001, this looks more like a political experiment to see how much wool the Governor and Game Board can pull over the eyes of Alaskans."
For more information on Alaska's plan to resume aerial killing of wolves, please go to Alaska Wolves.
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