An amendment that could reduce the killing of wolves who spend most of their time in Yellowstone National Park was passed by the Montana Fish and Wildlife Commission on Friday. As revised, the regulation will divide what was Wolf Management Unit 313 north of the park into two separate hunting and trapping areas. With the change, the two smaller units — WMUs 313 and 316 — will each have a quota of three wolves each season.
Commissioners on the Montana Fish and Wildife Commission listen to testimony during an August 16 meeting in the Montana State Capitol. WMU 316 is more remote, composed largely of the mountainous Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness Area near the park’s Northeast Entrance and Cooke City, and therefore often covered with snow to deter wintertime pursuit of wildlife by hunters and trappers. WMU 313, to the west of 316, includes the more accessible Gardiner Basin near the North Entrance to Yellowstone.
Commissioner Susan Kirby Brooke, who represents Region 3 in southwestern Montana, carried the proposal after meeting with wildlife advocates as well as trappers in the area over the past year. “So as we all know, that quota is not set on any biological data,” Brooke said. “It’s a social number that was (determined) by various people that have been in commissions before me.
” Supporters of the change included business owners in the Gardiner area, such as wildlife watching tour guides, who benefit economically from having wolves on the landscape. One estimat.