Hunters plan weekend wolf protest

The Daily Inter Lake

A loose-knit group of hunters has organized a protest in Kalispell Friday and Saturday against the delayed delisting of wolves in Montana.

"We just decided that we've got to do something," said Tom Welch, a lead organizer for the protest that's planned in front of the Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks headquarters on Meridian Road starting at 9 a.m. Friday and Saturday.

The protest is timed to coincide with the Great Rockies Sportshow that will be held on the other side of Meridian Road at the Flathead County Fairgrounds.

Welch said hundreds of people are expected to participate in the protest.

"We even have a group coming from Idaho to support us," he said. "I would assume most of them are hunters but I know a few people who are not hunters who said they are going to show up."

Welch said three organizational meetings have been held over the last couple of weeks.

Participants are being urged to wear hunters orange, to be polite and to bring signs expressing frustration over the impacts of a growing wolf population on elk and deer.

He said the protest isn't necessarily against Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, because removing wolves from protection under the Endangered Species Act is an action that rests with the federal government and the courts.

"We are generally in support of delisting" and turning wolf management authority over to the state of Montana, Welch said. "But we feel more can be done. They are going to have to be managed heavily if we are going to have any game left."

Welch said he expects the group eventually will evolve into a formal organization, perhaps as a chapter of the Utah-based group called Sportsmen for Wildlife.