WALLOWA COUNTY — Wolf kills of livestock are becoming more frustrating to Wallowa County ranchers and livestock officials when they see how those depredations are handled by the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Crow Creek rancher Tom Birkmaier, who is the president of the Wallowa County Stockgrowers Association, runs about 500 cows, most of which have calves. He lost a half-dozen animals to wolves of the Chesnimnus Pack in late April and early May.

Birkmaier said he asked ODFW to “remove” the pack — meaning to kill them.

In response, ODFW issued a kill permit April 29. The permit, good through May 24, allows Birkmaier or an agent on his behalf to kill two wolves in Dorrance Pasture or Trap Canyon Pasture, where the depredations on cattle occurred, he said.

One of Birkmaier’s agents killed a yearling male on Tuesday, May 3, said John Williams of Enterprise, co-chairman of the wolf committee for the Oregon Cattlemen’s Association. Birkmaier declined to identify who took the wolf in an interview on May 9.

“I don’t want him to get threatened” by wolf proponents, Birkmaier said.

He said that at the time of the killing, the wolf was not actively attacking cattle, but was in Dorrance Pasture along Crow Creek. A targeted wolf does not legally have to be in the act of attacking livestock, it just has to be in an area where depredations have occurred, he said.

Effective management?Todd Nash, president of the OCA, a Wallowa County Commissioner and a local rancher, said that the state conservation and wolf-management plan has two main parts.

“They’ve done one but not the other,” he said. “They’ve been highly critical of poaching, and I’m not defending that, but they need to step up to the plate when it’s appropriate for them to take lethal action, and they have not done so.”

He emphasized that he doesn’t mean elimination of wolves as a species.

“We’re not talking about total eradication of wolves,” he said. “When wolves get to be chronic depredators of livestock, then you have to be effective managers.”

But the kill permit issued to Birkmaier allows what is already legal in Oregon’s eastside cattle country, where wolves were removed from the state’s endangered species list in 2015. State law allows a rancher to eliminate wolves after two confirmed kills of cattle.

“We already have permitless take in that anybody on this side of the state where wolves are chasing, biting, killing their livestock, they have the authority to go ahead and kill the wolves,” he said. “So the permit they gave was not much different than what we already have available to us.”

Nash said the ODFW issuance of a kill permit wasn’t effective wolf management.

“Their response was to give two kill permits for a given area. In that area, it’s restrictive,” Nash said. “I’m going to use the example of if (serial killer) Ted Bundy moved out of one apartment and into another, you’d just say, ‘Oh, he’s moved now. You can’t arrest him.’ … Instead of the whole pack, they’ve restricted the area down.”

Nash showed photographs of sheep that were killed April 29 in the Elk Mountain area of Wallowa County. Three lambs and two ewes were killed and the report blamed the depredation on coyotes, officially calling the responsibility “other.”

He showed photos of fresh wolf tracks nearby and a dog track to compare for size. He also decried what the ODFW said was a coyote attack.

“Those (wolf) tracks were right next to where the sheep were killed,” he said. “And they’re calling it a coyote? But there wasn’t a fresh coyote track out there. There were some old ones.”

Williams also was on the scene of the attack on the sheep. He agreed it was a wolf attack and not coyotes.

Nash said he went right to the top of the agency.

“They’re absolutely wrong on this one,” he said. “I talked to the director and asked for a review, that they take a keen look at this because they’re just wrong.”

Like Birkmaier about his agent who shot a wolf, the owner of the sheep wanted to remain anonymous. Both hope to keep a good relationship with the ODFW.

Birkmaier said the local ODFW agents have offered to help tend his cattle.

Agency reportThe most recent livestock kills in Wallowa County reported on ODFW’s wolf depredation report were on April 30. Three more attacks were listed in Baker County on May 5.

Birkmaier said he’s lost a couple more calves this month and he’s spending time treating a calf that he’s not sure will survive.

“I’m spending an hour a day doctoring the other one,” he said. “I can’t get ahead of the infection.”

He said he understands it takes a while for the agency to complete investigations and list the depredations, but wolves don’t wait around for agency paperwork.

“Generally, they take great deal of time when time is of the essence,” Williams said.

Dennehy said determinations of reported wolf kills are generally reported within 48 hours of a producer’s report. When the agency’s determination is considered unsatisfactory to the producer, a review process is available.

“If requested by the owner of the livestock, we have a process to review disputed determinations and that is happening now,” Dennehy said about the April 29 sheep kill.

As of May 9, the report still said “bite wounds were consistent with coyote attacks on sheep” and listed the determination as “other.”