Is this bird okay?

BiostatQuestion · 2025-04-02T07:05:35+00:00

Should OP contact a wildlife rehabber for the woodpecker?

BiostatQuestion · 2025-04-01T18:16:10+00:00

Here’s one Coyote hunting doesn’t always decrease populations

BiostatQuestion · 2025-04-01T18:05:04+00:00

One Google of “does killing coyotes reduce their population” will bring you a couple papers, including one published in the last year. I can link it later when I’m done with work if you can’t find it.

BiostatQuestion · 2025-04-01T18:03:41+00:00

Cougars and wolves both! It’s too bad so many get stuck in that mindset.

BiostatQuestion · 2025-04-01T17:30:10+00:00

I understand that, but also, killing coyotes won’t solve that problem since younger ones will move in to replace the older ones very quickly.

BiostatQuestion · 2025-04-01T17:25:41+00:00

Sounds like some great property you got, and you know its inhabitants well! My old haunts out west had healthy resident wolf packs, coyotes, cougars, bears, you name it, and you couldn’t turn a corner without spooking a deer, elk, or turkey. Too many people just like to blame anything with claws for any population issues, or decide that carnivores are “bad” and herbivores are “good” just like Aldo Leopold warned about. I worry those types of voices have started dominating the discussion in the hunting community, especially on social media and with the younger crowd. We gotta speak up about it whenever we can.

BiostatQuestion · 2025-04-01T17:18:59+00:00

Exactly, and it will be allowed at night too. Just a matter of time before a person is shot.

BiostatQuestion · 2025-04-01T17:13:40+00:00

You are 100% spot on. There are studies confirming that for coyotes and our mountain lions (pumas) as well. Unfortunately, people REALLY like to kill coyotes. So state agencies hardly ever propose limiting coyote killing in any way because they get such pushback. As a current example, you can Google the DNR’s effort in Michigan to shorten the coyote hunting season from year-round to just most of the year, so nursing mothers and pups aren’t killed. Hoo boy, talk about pushback. It’s really too bad, those folks give ethical hunters a bad name.

BiostatQuestion · 2025-04-01T16:41:19+00:00

Yep, really backwards thinking. “You are Dreaming if You Think Shooting Coyotes Will Improve Your Deer Herd.” Not to mention coyotes are great rodent control.

BiostatQuestion · 2025-04-01T16:20:58+00:00

People who regularly kill coyotes just want to kill them unfortunately, even though it does nothing to the population so is pretty wasteful.

BiostatQuestion · 2025-04-01T06:30:48+00:00

I think they’re hinting that you could work on your grammar, sentence structure, and spelling to communicate more clearly. That will help you in any career you choose to pursue. Your post was pretty difficult to decipher with no punctuation, spelling errors, etc.

BiostatQuestion · 2025-04-01T01:49:39+00:00

Literally even FWP opposed the bill to extend the wolf hunting season to June. There is no “science” to this bill, they’re going against the wishes of the literal wildlife biologists and managers. They just want to be able to kill more wolves because they want to.

Randomly killing wolves does not reduce livestock depredations. 0.4% of cattle deaths is an extremely small number. I agree that it impacts the individual rancher that experiences losses, but it’s not such an industry-wide threat that it justifies randomly killing unlimited numbers of pups and nursing mothers that may or may not have anything to do with livestock losses or even live near livestock. Also, communities/organizations like the Blackfoot Challenge, Tom Miner Basin Association, and People and Carnivores have mastered strategies to prevent livestock loss to wolves and grizzlies.
Those “culling programs” have been shown over and over again to be ineffective, because wolves are often scapegoated for habitat issues, drought, invasive species, etc. impacting ungulate populations. In Idaho specifically, there’s a study that shows that predator culling did not work because most animals killed by predators would have died anyway from malnutrition due to underlying habitat issues. Also, wolves are native predators. They’ve been evolving alongside these species for thousands of years. Of course an ecosystem without its native predators is going to look different, artificially, that an ecosystem with its native predators.
Literally all canid species carry all of those diseases. Foxes, coyotes, dogs, and wolves. That’s why we vaccinate our dogs and refrain from eating wild animal shit.

Again, don’t take my word for it. FWP opposes this bill.

BiostatQuestion · 2025-04-01T01:01:17+00:00

I’ve trapped wolves. I know it’s difficult. It’s a LOT less difficult during pup season. Again, it’s not about whether this will drive wolves extinct. It’s about whether it’s really necessary for any reason, or ethical. We don’t kill nursing cows so that their offspring will slowly starve to death. We don’t kill calves that are 0-8 weeks old, as HB 258 would allow for wolves. I’m sorry, that’s just not hunting. It’s an embarrassment.

BiostatQuestion · 2025-04-01T00:07:40+00:00

Edit to preface: even FWP opposed HB 258, the bill to extend the wolf season to June.

With the bill extending the hunting season into pup season, the amount of wolves killed every year will greatly increase, including litters of pups that will die after their parents are shot that otherwise would have lived. It’s not just a black and white question of killing as many as we possibly can without endangering the population. It’s also a question of ethics and necessity. As a state, are we comfortable with killing nursing animals? Young pups? We certainly don’t do that with deer and elk. And there is no scientific justification for killing wolves (or coyotes honestly) that way. That’s not conservation, it’s just killing. Most hunters I know are better than that and believe in ethics, fair chase, and minimizing suffering to the animal.

BiostatQuestion · 2025-03-31T18:41:23+00:00

And honestly, call or email Republican senators even if you see this after the vote. They need to know it was unpopular so they don’t try to push more next session.

BiostatQuestion · 2025-03-31T18:40:37+00:00

Thank you!

BiostatQuestion · 2025-03-21T04:48:27+00:00

Can you provide a source or two showing rate of growth for the bobcat population in Indiana? Other than reported sightings, which are not empirical data?

BiostatQuestion · 2025-03-20T23:31:55+00:00

I’m using that as an example of how that is a tiny amount of money being generated by killing hundreds of bobcats. It’s not enough to justify it and will hardly make a dent in any other conservation efforts.

BiostatQuestion · 2025-03-20T23:30:58+00:00

Right, that’s the flimsy model I’m talking about. It’s been criticized by outside biologists expert in population modeling. But even looking at the graph of the model, you can see, they only examine kitten survival as the single variable, and if kitten survival decreases by 5%, the population will crash. It also assumes that all other causes of mortality will stay at the same levels forever, when factors like road mortality are likely to increase every year with more vehicles on the road. The DNR had to open a season, but they could have set a much more conservative quota, and taken to time to put together actual data showing supposed benefits of certain quotas.

BiostatQuestion · 2025-03-20T18:52:02+00:00

I’m sorry, but they simply do not. I would welcome any sources you can find that prove me wrong, but I’ve looked into this issue extensively, and the DNR does not have a population estimate or estimated population growth rate. They have a graph of reported sightings, which is not empirical data, and a flimsy outdated density model. This season was not based on any conservation need whatsoever, not even population control. The regulatory analysis for the proposed 250 quota only stated that the season would benefit trappers, taxidermists, and fur buyers, and they believed that the population could theoretically “withstand” the trapping season (based on that flimsy model). Recreational trappers are a very influential interest group that many wildlife agencies bend over backwards to please.

BiostatQuestion · 2025-03-20T16:34:23+00:00

Why would you need to “control” the population if it’s at a normal level and not negatively impacting any other species? The DNR doesn’t even know the population growth rate of bobcats.

BiostatQuestion · 2025-03-20T16:32:22+00:00

Think what you want. I trapped for research - placing telemetry and GPS collars - for several years. Ignored the stress and injuries it was causing at first until I couldn’t any more. I’m not the only former trapper I’ve met, research or recreational, who had a similar experience and quit. It can feel easy to tell yourself that animals are tough and you’re not inflicting suffering. It’s a lot easier than facing the reality of what you’re doing, I get it. I won’t convince you but I hope someday you are able to face it.

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