Alaskans shoot wolves from helicopters and airplanes

Alaskans shoot wolves from helicopters and bush planes after chasing them to the point of exhaustion.  Barbaric, isn’t it?  Sarah Palin even put a $150 bounty on freshly killed wolves.  Putting a bounty on animals is the same practice that brought bald eagles to the brink of extinction some fifty years ago.  Wolf pelts are sold in nearly every Alaskan tourist shop.

I wanted to post a link to writing by Alaskan biologist Steven Stringham.  He has spent his career studying wolves and bears in Alaska.  Click here to read about aerial hunting of wolves and bears from the perspective of an Alaskan biologist.  Some people have asked me if there are too many wolves in Alaska, and Stringham’s articles explain why this is not true. 

Big game hunters make lots of money bringing out of state trophy hunters up in helicopters to shoot wolves.  These big game hunting organizations have donated a lot of money to Palin over the past several years (see link above).  The Alaskan people voted TWICE to ban aerial hunting of wolves, yet Governor Palin has made sure this practice continues.  Over 124 wildlife biologists in the US and Canada have protested aerial hunting of wolves.  Additionally, there has never been a documented case of a wolf attacking a human- they pose no risk to Alaskan residents.  Palin’s commitment to shooting wolves from helicopters demonstrates that she is a politician who ignores science and caters to special interest groups.  Additionally, it costs over $500 an hour to charter a bush plane, and twice that to charter a helicopter in Alaska.  Alaska game and fish dept. is using our tax dollars to pay this outrageous cost per hour to shoot wolves from the air -even though there is no scientific evidence to support the claim that killing wolves will boost moose numbers.

Tags: aerial hunting, aerial hunting of wolves, aerial shooting, Alaska, Hunting in Alaska, Mudflats, Sarha Palin, VP Sarah Palin, wolf hunting