Wolves Make a Comeback in the Rocky Mountains

With considerable interest I note your editorial “Let Them Come Back” (Nov. 4).

Wolves were a very serious problem to early day livestock operators in Montana. My father came there in 1890, and two of my uncles were there in the 1880s so I have heard a few stories of the long distances covered by wolves and the large numbers of calves and sheep killed by them. Also, I often heard of colts killed by wolves but a frequent trick of the wolves was to get into a bunch of young horses and “hamstring” many of them. This severed the leg tendons which could not be repaired so the hamstrung colts had to be killed.

What is to keep the wolves in Yellowstone Park? The grizzly bears come out of their own free will and I have seen the authorities helicoptering a grizzly out of Yellowstone Park to plant in Montana outside of the park.

Another thought arises from reading the editorial which states:

”. . . The Endangered Species Act requires the federal government to draft programs for the protection of threatened or endangered wildlife and the restoration of the species where they once thrived.”

In pretty plain language, the act requires the federal government to draft programs for the restoration of the species where they once thrived; in other words the federal government must draft programs for the restoration of the grizzly to Southern California, or perhaps to all California where once it thrived.

Somehow I have trouble accepting the justice or even the legality of introducing anything as harmful as a wolf or a grizzly bear into the environment of the livestock grazer; it seems too much like introducing smallpox into Los Angeles.

DAN FULTON

Sun City