The Wolves of Alaska

Jim Rearden

Description

Jim Rearden is Alaska's most popular outdoors journalist. He holds two degrees in wildlife management and was Professor of Wildlife Management at the University of Alaska Fairbanks 1950-54. As a member of the Alaska Board of Game 75-82 he helped develop the Tanana Flats wolf control program. He details with historical accuracy the controversy that erupted when the 1975 program was announced.
Counterpointing the modern controversy, Rearden includes exciting segments of his best-selling Alaska's Wolf Man, the story of Frank Glaser, Alaska's full-time government wolf hunter who hunted wolves in the Territory of Alaska 1915-1955.
Alaska’s wolves are the main characters in this historically and biologically accurate recounting. Included are vivid anecdotes about wolves with descriptions of their behavior and way of life, examples of their intelligence, and expressions of appreciation for their charm and beauty, as well as an honest look at their savage efficiency as predators and relationship to urban and rural Alaskans.
Contents
Acknowledgements ix
Prologue xi
Introduction xii
1. Hooked on wolves: The market hunter
2. The Ambassador: I enlist: Savage River
3. The Campaign: The Black Pack
4. Hell breaks loose: Savage River Wolves
5. The Crises: Professor Rearden: The wolf dogs
6. Fairbanks in December: Letters
7. Board member: Pat’s say: A daytime hunt
8. Educating Pat: Nature’s way
9. Staff Report: Pat is hired: Glaser’s wolf dogs
10. Kenai: Wolf dog problems
11. Pat’s approach: Snow: Captive wolf: Moose kill
12. About wolves
13. Northway elder: The neighborhood killers
14. The flight: Glaser’s new career
15. The Governor speaks up: Park observation
16. Davy’s arm: Lord Balmar: Saving Reindeer
17. Grant leaves: My caribou article: Amuguq Frank
18. Anaktuvuk: Ren’s wolf notes: Pat’s fur parka
19. Wolf den: Moose kill: Lady: Aerial wolf hunt
20. The Teller Wolf
21. Pat resigns: Love prevails: Moose John and Punyuk
22. Wolverine Village: Uncle Toby: Glaser retires
23. Success in 20A
24. The Nelchina mystery: Wolf summit: Harbo’s plan
25. Bunde’s resolution: Wolf consensus?
Epilogue 319
Fictional characters and names 323
Nonfiction characters 325
References 333
About Jim Rearden 338

Sujets

• Wolves
• Sciences et techniques
• Gray wolf
• Regional
• Nature
• Alaska

Informations

• Publié par: Turner Publishing Company
• Date de parution: 04 avril 2014
• Nombre de lectures: 1
• EAN13: 9780882409337
• Langue: English

Extrait

The Wolves of Alaska
Also by Jim Rearden
Hunting Alaska s Far Places Half a Century with Rifle and Shotgun
Slim Moore: Alaska Master Guide A Sourdough s Hunting Adventures and Wisdom
Sam O. White, Alaskan Tales of a Legendary Wildlife Agent and Bush Pilot
Forgotten Warriors of the Aleutian Campaign
Alaska s Wolf Man The 1915-55 Wilderness Adventures of Frank Glaser
Castner s Cutthroats Saga of the Alaska Scouts
Koga s Zero The Fighter that Changed World War II
Travel Air NC9084 The History of a 75-year-old Working Airplane
Jim Rearden s Alaska Fifty Years of Frontier Adventure
All books in this list of twelve can be found in most Alaska s book stores. The above nine books may also be ordered directly from the publisher [phone]. See copyright page for address, website, e-mail, and fax number.
Arctic Bush Pilot From Navy Combat to Flying Alaska s Northern Wilderness
Tales of Alaska s Big Bears
Shadows on the Koyukuk An Alaskan Native s Life Along the River
The Wolves of Alaska
A Fact-based Saga
by J IM R EARDEN
Copyright 2002 by Jim Rearden
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission of the publisher.
The print edition is available from Pictorial Histories Publishing Company, Inc. pictorialhistoriespublishing.com
Library of Congress Control Number 2002104403
ISBN 978-1-57510-099-9 ISBN (e-book) 978-0-88240-933-7
C OVER G RAPHICS Mike Egeler T YPOGRAPHY B OOK D ESIGN Arrow Graphics
Wolf cover photo by Robert O. Stephenson, Alaska Department of Fish and Game
Published by Alaska Northwest Books An imprint of

P.O. Box 56118 Portland, Oregon 97238-6118 503-254-5591 www.graphicartsbooks.com
To the memory of Bob Hinman (1928-2000), dedicated wildlife manager, lover of life, punster par excellence, a special Alaskan-my friend for half a century.
-J IM R EARDEN
Contents
Acknowledgments
Prologue
Introduction

1. Hooked on wolves: The market hunter

2. The Ambassador: I enlist: Savage River

3. The campaign: The Black Pack

4. Hell breaks loose: Savage River wolves

5. The crises: Professor Rearden: The wolf dogs

6. Fairbanks in December: Letters

7. Board member: Pat s say: A daytime hunt

8. Educating Pat: Nature s way

9. Staff report: Pat is hired: Glaser s wolf dogs

10. Kenai: Wolf dog problems

11. Pat s approach: Snow: Captive wolf: Moose kill

12. About wolves

13. Northway elder: The neighborhood killers

14. The flight: Glaser s new career

15. The governor speaks up: Park observation

16. Davy s arm: Lord Balmar: Saving reindeer

17. Grant leaves: My caribou article: Amaguq Frank

18. Anaktuvuk: Ren s wolf notes: Pat s fur parka

19. Wolf den: Moose kill: Lady: Aerial wolf hunt

20. The Teller Wolf

21. Pat resigns: Love prevails: Moose John and Punyuk

22. Wolverine village: Uncle Toby: Glaser retires

23. Success in 20A

24. The Nelchina mystery: Wolf summit: Harbo s plan

25. Bunde s resolution: Wolf consensus?
Epilogue
Fictional characters and names
Nonfiction characters
References
About Jim Rearden
Acknowledgments
I am indebted to many people for their generous time and input on the manuscript for The Wolves of Alaska . My daughter Nancy Kleine made many helpful comments on early drafts. Former Alaska Department of Fish and Game wildlife biologist Dick Bishop and his wife Mary, made many helpful suggestions. Likewise, former ADF G wildlife biologist Jim Faro spent many hours reviewing the material and made many helpful suggestions-many that weren t tied to biology.
Pat Valkenburg, ADF G wildlife biologist and his wife Audrey-also a fine wildlife biologist-made many helpful comments that I incorporated.
Robert O. Stephenson, ADF G wildlife biologist, was helpful in almost more ways than I can count. He not only spent days carefully reviewing the manuscript and correcting the biology-as well as my awkward syntax-he gave permission for me to use many of his published field observations as those of my fictional biologist Ren Smith. Further, it was Bob Stephenson s Anaktuvuk Pass cabin I stayed in when writing for the National Geographic about the caribou use by the Anaktuvuk villagers, and where Bob introduced me to the wonderful Arctic John. Without Bob s generosity, wolf knowledge, and experience, The Wolves of Alaska would have been much less.
Thanks too, to Grant Spearman, Anthropologist, who helped with Anaktuvuk Pass culture and language.
My long-time friend and Board of Game associate, Sidney Huntington, reviewed the manuscript and made helpful comments.
ADF G wolf researcher Mark McNay reviewed the manuscript and insured that the wolf biology was accurate. Don Young, ADF G Area Biologist, was most helpful by providing accurate figures on wolves, moose, and caribou for Game Management Subunit 20A.
My thanks to Ray Tremblay for encouraging words and constructive comments.
My thanks to Governor Jay Hammond for his constructive comments on the manuscript, permission to use his writings, and for providing the comment that appears on the cover.
Jill Shepherd, Senior Editor for ALASKA magazine, made many helpful comments, and provided the gracious blurb for the front cover.
My thanks to Alaska Representative Con Bunde for permission to use the spring 1993 Alaska House of Representatives Resolution which he wrote.
My thanks to Paul Jenkins, editor at The Anchorage Times , for permission to reprint his editorial of December 8, 1994.
My thanks to Dr. Sam Harbo, for use of his thoughtful Environmental Sanity: Think Globally-Act Locally .
My thanks also to Lee Kuhn, Professor Emeritus, Department of Fisheries and Wildlife, Oregon State University, for his constructive comments on the ms. Kuhn, one of my undergraduate wildlife professors 1945-48, is still overseeing my work.
-J IM R EARDEN
Prologue
The problem with wolves is how to manage them rationally-going to neither extreme-and managing them despite criticism of the public no matter what you do.
-R OBERT A. H INMAN , Wildlife Biologist, Alaska Department of Fish and Game
Of all of the native biological constituents of a northern wilderness scene, I should say that the wolves present the greatest test of human wisdom and good intentions. The problems of rational wolf management are so complex, so beset by prejudicial extremes, so confused by misconceptions and half truths and false moral judgments that, to a large part of the public, the only wolf problem is one of getting rid of and staying rid of wolves. The latter, to my way of thinking, is an appalling oversimplication loaded with potentialities for great mistakes.
-Paul L. Errington, Of Predation and Life , 1967
He s mad that trusts in the tameness of a wolf, a horse s health, a boy s love, or a whore s oath.
-K ING L EAR
There are no compacts between lions and men, and wolves and lambs have no concord.
-H OMER
Under normal conditions predators generally live upon surplus populations of prey species, and their activities have little or no effect on breeding stock. Local readjustments are often desirable to maintain a balance.
Under special conditions, either favorable to the predator or unfavorable to the prey, predators may become a real factor in decreasing populations or in preventing recovery following a decline in population.
-I RA G ABRIELSON , Wildlife Conservation , 1942
Introduction
This faction saga (fiction based on fact) touches on the State of Alaska s attempts to manage wolves, and the work of Alaska s dedicated wildlife biologists with wolves; it characterizes the attitudes of a variety of Alaskans and non-Alaskans toward Alaska s wolves; and it attempts to present a realistic view of Alaska s wolves.
During my half century plus in Alaska my main interest has been to promote scientific management of Alaska s fish and wildlife. Of all of Alaska s varied and wonderful species of wildlife, one stands out as perhaps the most interesting, the most controversial, the most misunderstood, and the one that Alaska s wildlife biologists-and the state-have found to be the most frustrating in attempts at scientific management.
That animal is the wolf.
Extremism by environmentalist special interests now seems to dominate American society. Organizations that promote animal rights seem to me to be the most extreme. Various of these groups want to stop all hunting, fishing, use of laboratory animals for research, animal husbandry, eating of meat, fur farming and use of fur in clothing, ownership of pets, even use of seeing-eye dogs, and the existence of zoos. They are generally opposed to the science of wildlife management, preferring to let nature take its course regardless of the outcome. The wolf and its scientific management in Alaska seems to have attracted the attention of more than its fair share of these extremists.
Many of these organizations have become national and even international. They have learned how to grab newspaper headlines, how to dominate sound bites on television news, and via skillfully written letters how to bilk susceptible people out of dollars to support their causes and organizations.
Few of the dollars sympathetic people send to animal advocacy groups are spent directly for the benefit of animals; a 1990 survey of thirty-three top animal advocacy groups reveal