Summit Daily News for Breckenridge, Keystone, Copper and Frisco Colorado – News By JESSE HARLAN ALDERMAN, The Associated Press

BOISE, Idaho — Gov. C.L. “Butch” Otter says he’ll support public hunts to kill all but 100 gray wolves in the state once the federal government removes the animal from Endangered Species Act protections.

The governor said he hopes to shoot a wolf himself.

The Idaho Office of Species Conservation estimates the state’s current wolf population at about 650, in roughly 60 packs. Otter told The Associated Press after a rally of hunters on the Capitol steps that he wants hunters to gradually kill about 550 of the animals, leaving about 100 wolves or 10 packs, the minimum the federal government would allow before wolves again would be considered endangered.

“That management includes you,” Otter told the approximately 300 hunters, many wearing camouflage clothing and blaze-orange caps. “I’m prepared to bid for that first ticket to shoot a wolf myself.”

Idaho Sportsmen for Fish and Wildlife bused in wolf opponents from as far as Twin Falls, 130 miles away, for Thursday’s rally with Otter and several state lawmakers. They urged the government to immediately remove wolves from endangered species protection.

Otter also signed a proclamation making Thursday “Idaho Sportsmen Day.”

The crowd — including one hunter with a stuffed baby fox around his neck and a sign declaring “Wolves are illegal immigrants too” — stood for more than an hour in the midmorning snow. They applauded wildly as Otter amplified their position that wolves are rapidly killing elk and other animals essential to Idaho’s multimillion-dollar hunting industry.

Idaho Mountain Express: Scientists: Wolves not decimating elk herds – January 12, 2007 By STEVE BENSON, Express Staff Writer

There is no evidence that wolves have decimated elk populations throughout Idaho, according to two scientists who have been studying the predator for several years.

“At this point there is very little evidence that the presence of wolves has caused a decline in elk numbers anywhere, especially in Central Idaho,” said Jim Peek, a retired professor of wildlife biology and a member of the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation board of directors.

Idaho Doesn’t Deserve Delisting | Travel & Outdoors | New West Network By Bill Schneider

Given Idaho’s irrational attitude about Canis lupis, it’s hard to imagine the FWS, even though under the thumb of former Idaho Governor Dirk Kempthorne, could trust the state to properly manage wolves.