The Big Minnesota Mammal Guys

The class went to the Minnesota DNR (Department of Natural Resources) headquarters in Grand Rapids today. We heard from Dan Stark the state's wolf management biologist. Yes his name is Stark and he works with wolves, that is all. His main talking points were how he does his job and what his results from population poles are. He also touched on the history of wolves in regard to the endangered species list. Wolves are biologically recovered, their recovery is one of the most successful around the globe, and they do not need to be protected. They have a strong enough population to survive a hunting season. It is likely that wolves will be removed from the endangered species list and states will have the freedom to chose management plans. AKA wolf seasons.

This is a highly controversial point because there are such contrasting views on wolves. Some people hate them and some people love them, there is no middle ground.

The IUCN bear co-specialist and bear researcher for the state of Minnesota also spoke. It is always a blast to be in his lecture. He makes it a quiz and I learned as much from his style of presenting as I did his content.

We also saw a collared wolf who died in the wild from unknown causes get an autopsy. There were no conclusions, but it was impressive and interesting to see a wolf that close. I was a little unnerved at how greedily some people looked at the carcass. Yes it is a carcass, but it was once a living creature and it is our job to determine what happened to him not use his death as a trophy experience.

The walk to breakfast. On this day we actually left before the sun came up.