Court orders wolf hunt this week

Posted at 3:30 p.m. on February 22, 2021

The Brillion News

MADISON – The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources announced that the February wolf harvest season is underway through Feb. 28, 2021 in accordance with a circuit court order.

The DNR received 27,151 wolf harvest applications. There are 2,380 harvest authorizations available for purchase for applicants who are eligible to obtain a license and carcass/pelt tag.

During a special meeting of the state Natural Resources Board on February 15, the board unanimously voted for a harvest quota of 200 wolves outside reservation lands.

Of the approved quota, 119 wolves are allocated to the state, and 81 wolves are allocated to the Ojibwe Tribes in response to the Tribes’ declaration and in accordance with their treaty rights within the Ceded Territory.

Harvest updates and zone closures will be posted as information becomes available. For the latest information, visit https://dnr.wisconsin.gov/topic/hunt/wolf/index.html

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service removed gray wolves from the federal endangered species list on Jan. 4, 2021, returning management authority to the lower 48 states and tribes. The Wisconsin DNR has successfully managed gray wolves for decades and will continue to do so.

The DNR will continue to plan for a wolf harvest season to open on Nov. 6, 2021, while simultaneously working towards completing a wolf management plan to guide management decisions beginning in 2022.

The DNR planned to wait until November to have the first wolf hunting season, but Hunter Nation, through the legal arm of the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty, sued to force the DNR to hold a hunt before the end of February, 2021, as required by state law.

Most of the wolves to be hunted are in far northern Wisconsin and in central Wisconsin.