Wolf howls

Re “Controversy stalks Montana wolf hunt,” Oct. 25, and “Southern Montana wolf hunt called off on 2nd day,” Oct. 27

We pander to powerful hunting and ranching interests at the expense of wilderness, wildlife, good science and good stewarding.

I got the chance to visit Yellowstone last summer for the first time. It makes me howling mad that the wolves and bison I enjoyed observing are subjected to bullets as soon as they cross the national park border. We need more bison and wolves, not fewer.

Debbie Edwards

Glendale

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Writer Kim Murphy states that wolves “kill for the pure pleasure of it.” Wolves are predators. They kill to survive.

Conversely, hunters wait outside Yellowstone National Park to shoot wolves that stray beyond its boundaries. They’re shot for no purpose other than maybe to be “mounted for display.”

This raises a question: Who’s killing for the pure pleasure of it?

Matthew Duncan

Orange

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I love wolves, so I am writing this on behalf of the beautiful wolf on the front page.

Why work so hard to bring wolves back from the brink of extinction so they can be stalked and killed for whatever excuse people make to shoot them? So they are killing elk. Guess what? That’s what wolves do.

The government is doing the wolves no favor by spending taxpayer money bringing them back so they can be subjected again to hunters who virtually wiped out their population over the last couple hundred years.

Where is the outrage? Wolves have always gotten a bum rap.

Jocelyn DeVault

Newbury Park

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Thank you for Murphy’s excellent article on wolf hunting outside of Yellowstone National Park. I found it very balanced, informative and thought-provoking.

The article highlights the dilemma we humans face: Will we continue to treat the land and its inhabitants as our personal, private preserve in which we have the right to kill anything that does not behave according to our belief that we are the dominant species? Or will we find a way to coexist with the other species through learning about them and their needs and habits?

One striking aspect was the comment by a hunter that the wolves they hunted showed no fear. Perhaps these wolves, who were watched and held by humans, had no previous experience of humans that taught them to be afraid.

Now that they have encountered humans who wish to kill them, what will their response be to other humans?

Tom McGee

Oxnard