From the Flathead Beacon . . .
Wildlife officials captured a young male grizzly bear Friday in a residential area north of Columbia Falls, according to Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks.
The 4-year-old bear was caught in a trap set for a much larger grizzly that was getting into garbage in the area.
The young male was relocated Saturday in the Whale Creek area of the North Fork of the Flathead River drainage . . .
This is a pretty good story. Montana FWP thought they were going out to retrieve a dead caribou that wandered away from a Canadian herd. Instead, they ended up with a live Caribou on their hands . . .
What started out as an unusual hunt for a dead caribou that wandered south of Eureka from Canada turned out to be an animal rescue mission Thursday for Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks biologists.
British Columbia wildlife officials notified the biologists Thursday morning that a recently transplanted cow caribou had wandered into the Pinkham Creek drainage, and its satellite collar was broadcasting a mortality signal that is triggered when the collar doesn’t move for six hours.
Jim Williams, the regional wildlife manager, teamed up with biologists Tim Thier and Tim Manley to retrieve the animal using snowmobiles.
A so-far successful westslope cutthroat trout restoration effort in the South Fork has implications for future projects in other areas . . .
A decade-long program to restore Montana’s state fish to a chain of 21 alpine lakes above the South Fork Flathead River drainage is showing good results, a Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks official said.
Some of the lakes in the Westslope Cutthroat Trout Conservation project have been poisoned to kill non-native fish and then stocked with cutthroats. Others have been densely stocked each year with genetically pure trout to try to get rid of hybrid populations. Five remote lakes have received no treatment so far.
The pine beetle infestation may finally be tapering off . . .
Mountain pine beetle activity is declining in Montana, a U.S. Forest Service official says.
The finding is the result of aerial surveys last year and analyzed in the 2011 Montana Forest Insect and Disease Conditions report prepared by the Forest Service and state Department of Natural Resources and Conservation.
But the report also found emerging problems with western spruce budworm and pine butterfly.
The report covers about 20.5 million forested acres in Montana, including federal, state and private lands.
The bears are off to an early start this year . . .
Bears are stirring earlier than usual and have already resumed behavior that led to a record number of captures last year.
Officials with Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks recently relocated a 535-pound male grizzly bear that killed seven calves in four nights near Lincoln. The local FWP office has also been receiving reports of bear sightings near Whitefish and Columbia Falls.
The reemergence of bears has led to a campaign by wildlife officials reminding residents to clean up attractants that increase the likelihood of conflicts.
It looks like Montana’s wolf hunt will finish up on February 15 at just over 70% of the original quota . . .
Unless the wolf hunt picks up substantially over the next few days, it appears Montana will fall well short of its statewide quota when the extended season closes Wednesday, Feb. 15.
So far, 156 wolves have been harvested, just over 70 percent of the 220-animal quota. In Northwest Montana’s Region One, 61 wolves have been harvested in six wolf hunting districts with a total quota of 73.
The wolf hunt is officially over for the North Fork and environs. Here is the press release . . .
The hunting of all wolves in Montana Wolf Management Unit 110 which includes portions of Lincoln and Flathead Counties, in northwestern Montana, will close Wednesday, February 1, 2012 at one half-hour after sunset.
The order halting the hunt came after Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks officials received word that the pre-established harvest quota for wolves in the WMU had been met.
For more information, visit FWP’s website at fwp.mt.gov click “Montana Wolf Hunt,”or call the toll-free number at 1-800-385-7826.
And here is a related Associated Press article . . .
Montana officials are closing down wolf hunting in parts of northwestern Montana bordering Glacier National Park after hunters filled the area’s two-animal quota.
Hunting closes after sunset Wednesday in portions of Lincoln and Flathead counties west of the park.
From the Daily Inter Lake . . .
Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks has closed wolf hunting in a district covering areas east of Kalispell and in the Swan Valley because the allotted quota was recently met.
The quota for District 130 was 12 wolves, and over the weekend the state announced that the quota had been met and the district would be closed as of sunset Monday…
The Montana wolf hunt is scheduled to continue through Dec. 31. A proposal to extend it one more month is under consideration.
October, as usual, is a big month for bear-human conflict . . .
The busy season for bear management is well under way in Northwest Montana.
Over the past two weeks, Fish, Wildlife and Parks bear conflict biologists have captured and relocated eight grizzly bears from the northeast portion of the Flathead Valley, according to a news release Friday from the state wildlife agency. A ninth was captured in the Yaak.
Three of the grizzly bears were captured north of Columbia Falls; five others were captured east of Montana 206.
There’s no explicit North Fork connection, here, but North Forkers tend to be grizzly aficionados and this is a good griz story . . .
Could it be webbed claws? Or maybe an ancient connection to a Labrador bloodline?
In any case, a young grizzly bear has demonstrated Olympian swimming skills on Flathead Lake, proved with GPS data from a satellite collar that was recovered Monday near the town of Swan Lake…
Mace calculated that the bear traveled 1,200 miles on land and water while she was wearing the collar from June 2010 to September 2011…