It turns out that mountain lions could be wandering the Boise River greenbelt at any time, preying on stay cats and squirrels, staying undercover, and keeping away from humans - and that's fine. The problem with the half-grown cat that was shot by police last night around midnight was that it had stopped behaving like a resident of the wild, and more like a townie - after its picnic on a deer carcass in a Warm Springs Mesa resident's front-yard flower garden, the lion had moved into town and stayed, gone for several jogs on the greenbelt, and then hung out on the BSU campus, where it was inside a Dumpster at the student union, feasting on garbage, when it was spotted.

“We did make a couple of attempts to try to get it out of town, and unfortunately, it stayed in town,” said Matt O'Connell, senior conservation officer at Idaho Fish & Game, shown here. The first plan was to use “aversive conditioning,” firing rubber bullets at the big cat to scare it back into the foothills it came from, when it was still in the Warm Springs Mesa neighborhood where it killed the deer, right across the street from a deep ravine leading back into the hills. But once it moved into town, that wouldn't have worked, and tranquilizing the animal could compromise it, O'Connell said, possibly sending it running into traffic or other trouble before the tranquilizer could take effect. “Employees saw the cat in a Dumpster on campus right near the student union,” he said. “The cat had kind of crossed the line between normal behavior,” and was going after human-provided - not natural - food sources.

Boise typically sees “one or two cats a year that wander into town,” O'Connell said. Typically, when humans encounter mountain lions, “Normally, the lion is going to run,” he said. “Lions are very wary of people. They're very clever at hiding. Most of the time it's not a worrisome thing.” He added, “If they stay on the greenbelt mostly out of sight, nobody knows about it.”

O'Connell said he was “disappointed” at the result this time, but added, “At least now people can use the greenbelt” without worrying about the big cat. “I feel bad for the animal,” he said. “I never like to see an animal, especially a young one like this, dying, but sometimes it's just the reality of what we have to do.”

The mountain lion that had been prowling downtown Boise and the Greenbelt since the weekend was shot last night around midnight by Boise Police, after it was spotted near a Dumpster in the area around the student union building at Boise State University. “They did take it out,” said Idaho Fish & Game spokesman Mike Keckler. “We did take possession of the cat.” The mountain lion turned out to be a young, subadult female, about 50 to 60 pounds.

“She'd probably been chased away by her mother; by this point the mother's raising new kittens, and then tend to run off the older ones because they're busy with the new ones,” Keckler said. “A lot of times these young cats are trying to find their way, and in this case, this cat ended up in town and was staying in town, and as such did not make a good candidate for relocation.”

The Boise Police Department said in a news release, ” Ada County Dispatchers began receiving calls from citizens at approximately 11:30 p.m. last night indicating the mountain lion was in the area of BSU and the greenbelt, just north of the stadium. Idaho Fish and Game officers, along with Boise Police responded to the location. On the advice of Fish and Game officials, the cat was shot as it walked across the greenbelt pathway. Fish and Game have taken the animal into their custody. It is unfortunate that the incident ended this way, however, safety for the citizens of Boise has to be the primary concern when conflicts of this nature take place in an urban environment like downtown Boise.”

Boise Police and Fish & Game officials are on the lookout for a mountain lion that's been sighted repeatedly in town; people are being asked to call city police immediately if they spot the big cat, a 70-pound juvenile male. The mountain lion is apparently making its way in leisurely fashion from the Warm Springs Mesa area, where it feasted on a deer carcass in a resident's front yard on Friday night, down toward the Boise River Greenbelt - it was seen crossing Warm Springs Avenue and hitting the Greenbelt on Saturday night about 11:30. Then, early this morning, two reports came in of a mountain lion on the Whole Foods construction site near Broadway and Myrtle, followed by a report of the cat running east on the Greenbelt near Bronco Stadium.

“Chances are that cat probably either left the area or is bedded down 'til nighttime - they're nocturnal,” said Idaho Fish & Game spokesman Mike Keckler. “It might have just wandered down and wandered back where it came from.”

Keckler said the initial sighting came when the neighbor spotted a deer carcass, and then noticed a bit later that it had moved about 20 feet. “It was a mountain lion kill,” Keckler said. “Apparently the lion had dragged this carcass back and was feeding on it in a flower garden. When we got up there, the lion was gone. They waited and waited and waited and it didn't come back, so they removed the carcass.”

Mountain lion sightings aren't uncommon in Boise, Keckler said. “We live in prime mountain lion habitat here. The Boise Front is right here next to us, so it's not uncommon at all.” Wildlife including big cats tend to follow the river through the area, he said, which provides lots of cover along with attractive food, from deer to mice. “They'll eat house cats, they'll eat raccoons, they'll eat anything they can get their teeth into,” he said. Best case, he said, the big cat's already left town on its own, “because once they get a taste for hanging around town and they're finding food sources here, chances are it cannot be relocated.”

A wolf killed by a Hailey homeowner on Jan. 22 has tested postive for parvo, a common and highly contagious canine virus that can be fatal. Idaho Fish & Game reported that the homeowner reported the wolf had been observed near his house for at least two days and was acting sick or injured; click below for the full news release from Idaho Fish & Game.

Idaho Fish & Game is reporting a rare Canada lynx sighting in the Salmon-Challis National Forest, the first direct evidence of lynx presence there since 1991. “This would be an extremely rare event, and we’re waiting to get genetic test results before we confirm it’s a native, wild lynx,” said Fish & Game wildlife manager Tom Keegan. Canada lynx are listed as threatened under the federal Endangered Species Act, and they are designated an Idaho “species of greatest conservation need.” Fewer than 40 have been reported in the Salmon-Challis region since 1896. Click below for the full Fish & Game news release.

The Fish & Game budget request for next year shows a 20 percent increase, but that's due to a one-time project: $13 million to build the new Springfield fish hatchery with Bonneville Power Administration funding, for sockeye recovery. “Excluding the hatchery, our budget request is $79.3 million, or an increase of less than 3 percent from this current year,” Fish & Game Director Virgil Moore told JFAC this morning.

Asked by lawmakers whether the department needs to look at a license fee increase, Moore said, “We probably should come back next session for a request, but we can likely survive one more year. At that point we're going to be right up against the wall … unless the economy improves and non-residents start coming back in previous numbers.”

Idaho's Fish & Game Department receives no state general funds, instead operating solely on hunting and fishing license dollars, federal funds, power company mitigation funds and revenues from special license plate sales. Hunting and fishing license funds are 46 percent of the department's total funding, and more than half comes from non-residents.

However, non-resident license buyers have been declining since 2008. Non-resident deer tags have dropped from 15,800 then to 9,200 now. “That's a 40 percent loss in tag sales in the last three years,” F&G Director Virgil Moore told JFAC today. Non-resident elk tags have seen a similar trend, dropping from a long-stable 13,000 a year, which hit the quota, to about 8,00 now. “These two tags make up the bulk of our non-resident revenue,” Moore said. “So this is a very important customer to the department and to the state of Idaho. Not only do these folks pay for the most expensive product that we sell, they usually spend four to five times what they spend on licenses … when they come to hunt,” and some as much as 10 times. “So it's a loss to our rural economy.”

Resident tag sales also are down from the high of 62,000 to about 58,000, a 7 percent decline, Moore said. “Some of this is just the general economy. Some of it has to do with issues associated with elk herd status, and some of it has to do with people's view of whether or not they can get an elk or opportunity out there.” Strong fishing license sales and wolf tag sales have boosted revenue in the last six months, Moore said, but haven't made up the last three years' losses.

Moore said the shift from running out of tags - they routinely used to sell out - to having leftovers has put the department “in the position of we've got product available … and they have a very short shelf life. After the season is over, they have no value whatsoever; we can't stockpile those and sell 'em next year. So we undertook some marketing last year.” The department created “I-Hunt” and “I-Fish” websites, aimed at both residents and nonresidents, and launched Internet banner ads on news sites, targeting “hunter-rich states like Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and California.” “The first six months of the fiscal year, our license revenue is up 5 percent, and it coincides with this campaign,” Moore said. “We only spent $35,000 on this campaign, and its impact is huge.”

“The reason folks said they were staying away from Idaho was wolves, the elk herd status, the economy and the price of the tag,” Moore said. “But the good news is wolves have not killed all our elk.” Bull elk numbers now exceed objectives in 20 of Idaho's 29 zones, he said. “There's still very good hunting in many areas,” though the zones that have been impacted are among the state's most popular.
  

Need a whopper of a gift idea for the avid outdoorsman- or -woman on your list? Idaho Fish & Game has one: A lifetime of Idaho hunting or fishing - or both. Fish & Game has been offering lifetime license certificates since the late 1980s, and since 1995, they've sold 7,895 of them. The lifetime certificates can be purchased only at Fish & Game regional offices or their state headquarters; they vary in price depending on age. “Occasionally people will come in and buy a lifetime license certificate for a child,” said F&G spokesman Niels Nokkentved. “It's a pretty good deal if you're a young person, not so good perhaps if you're a senior citizen.”

The prices: For kids 0 to 1 year old, $276.75 for hunting only, $601.75 for fishing only, $795.50 for combination. That jumps up to $386.75 for hunting-only for ages 2 to 50 years, $841.75 for fishing-only or $1,113 combo; or, for ages 51 and older, $221.75 for hunting-only, $481.75 for fishing-only, or $636.75 for combo. Lifetime license holders who move out of state can keep their licenses, but must pay the nonresident tag and permit fees; tag and permit fees aren't included with the license certificates.

Idaho Fish & Game has sold 296 lifetime certificates so far this year, up from a total of 294 last year but down from 2009's 343. Asked if there's a bump in sales around the holidays, officials said not really – they're an item that's most popular for birthdays, or just after the announcement – but before the effective date – of a fee increase. Gift certificates also are available for annual hunting and fishing licenses, if you're not that big a spender.
  

Though problems with bears have been all over the news this year - including the New York Times' recent suggestion that some of Idaho's slow-Internet problems are due to bears - this year is actually seeing far fewer bear complaints in North Idaho than last year. Spokesman-Review reporter Becky Kramer reports that last year, Idaho Fish & Game received 770 calls regarding problem bear activity in Bonner, Boundary and northern Kootenai counties; this year, the tally is just 158 complaints. More-abundant natural food supplies this year are the likely reason for the drop; last year, hungry black bears suffering through a poor huckleberry season were raiding bird feeders, upsetting garbage cans or prowling for dog food; you can read Kramer's full report here.

The mountain lion that was killed by authorities in rural Boise County last night attacked a 10-year-old boy, who escaped with minor scratches, the Associated Press reports. The youngster and his dad were looking for their missing dog near their home about 15 to 20 miles northeast of Boise when he came upon the cougar - which had killed the dog. The boy ran, but stumbled and fell. That's then the mountain lion took a swipe, scratching the boy's arm and hand, before the dad fired into the air and scared the big cat away. Officers tracked down and shot the mountain lion late Thursday; you can read a full report here, and click below to read the Idaho Fish & Game news release, which notes that this is only the second-ever incident of a mountain lion attack causing injuries to a human in Idaho.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA, is bringing its anti-fishing campaign to Boise today, with a noon protest scheduled outside a bait and tackle shop on Vista Avenue, Idaho Angler, to press the group's current campaign that fishing is cruel. “Parents should get their kids hooked on compassion, not on maiming and killing fish,” said PETA's Virginia Fort in an announcement of the Boise protest. The group contends that “fish are intelligent, sensitive animals who experience stress and pain when they are cruelly hooked or hauled up from the deep in commercial nets.”

Idaho is known for its fishing, which has a long history and culture in the state; hundreds of thousands of Idahoans hold fishing licenses, according to Idaho Department of Fish & Game records, and more than 100,000 out-of-staters purchased short- or long-term Idaho fishing licenses in 2010.
  

Idaho Fish & Game officials will be releasing more information shortly about an incident last night in which a mountain lion was killed after causing minor injuries to a child near a Mores Creek subdivision; it was the latest in a series of wildlife incidents, including one in which a mountain lion was shot by authorities in Boise near St. Alphonsus Hospital earlier this month, after being spotted around town for several weeks.

The Associated Press reports that three wolves have been taken since Idaho's second-ever wolf hunting season opened on Tuesday. Hunters have 72 hours to report a wolf kill to the agency's regional offices. So far, Fish & Game reports that one hunter bagged a black male wolf near Island Park in eastern Idaho on Tuesday; and a hunter roaming the backcountry near Warm Lake in central Idaho shot and killed two — one female pup and an adult female. Fish & Game spokesman Niels Nokkentved said all three were taken legally.

Even as Idaho's Fish & Game Commission prepares to set this year's wolf-hunting season at its meeting this Thursday in Salmon, the wolf issue is back in court in Montana. U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy held a two-hour hearing in Missoula today, the AP reports, on a bid by wildlife advocates to challenge Congress' move to strip endangered status from the gray wolf across five states in the Northern Rockies; Molloy now must decide whether Congress violated the separation of powers under the U.S. Constitution. Click below for a full report from AP reporter Matthew Brown in Montana.

Idaho is planning a fall wolf hunt with no overall limit - and no limits in four zones, the Panhandle, Lolo, Selway and Middle Fork zones - because of “documented impacts to elk and other prey species in those zones,” Idaho Fish and Game officials announced today. It's also planning a trapping season for wolves in the fall, in an effort to reduce the wolf population by more than the 188 animals taken in the state's first wolf hunt in 2009; you can read our full story here at spokesman.com, and read the full proposal here.

Virgil Moore, state Fish & Game director, said the plan is consistent with hunting regulations for other animals. “We don't have harvest limits on most of our other species,” he said, instead using a “general-season approach” for management. Said Jon Rachael, big game manager for F&G, “This is very consistent with the approach we take for black bears and mountain lions. We've done that for a long, long time.”

The proposal also would allow hunters to get two wolf tags per calendar year, rather than one.

Fish & Game is launching a survey of hunters and the public about the proposal, and it will be up for a vote by the Fish & Game Commission at its July 27-28 meeting in Salmon. Moore said under the plan, wolf harvests would have to be reported within 72 hours, and if the number killed becomes excessive, hunting can be cut off in a particular zone. However, he said he doesn't expect that to happen. “We learned in '09 that wolf hunting is extraordinarily challenging,” he said. Fewer than 1 percent of hunters with tags actually shot a wolf in that year's hunt, he said.

Idaho currently has 1,000 or more wolves, the two said, and the department's goal is to reduce that number, well staying well above the minimum federal recovery level of at least 150 wolves and 15 breeding pairs statewide, though the department's not setting a specific number for the reduction.

Gov. Butch Otter has appointed Kenny Anderson of Rigby to the Idaho Fish & Game Commission, to replace Cameron Wheeler, whose term expired June 30. Anderson, 60, is the founder and owner of Anderson Cabinet and Millwork, and avid sportsman and a lifelong eastern Idaho resident. Otter said, “We had a number of great candidates for this position; we really couldn’t have gone wrong with any of them. But Ken Anderson stood out as someone whose grasp of the issues and even temperament will help the Fish and Game Commission continue its excellent work.” Click below for his full announcement.

Idaho is considering a wolf hunt without quotas in much of the state, the AP reports, but hunters so far have purchased only a fraction of the tags they did in Idaho's first hunt in 2009. “We're not getting near the response this year in term of tag purchases that we did that first year,” Idaho Fish and Game Deputy Director Jim Unsworth told The Associated Press. As of yesterday, only about 3,100 tags had been sold; some 30,000 were sold two years ago. Click below for a full report from the AP.

Idaho Fish & Game has, for the first time, delegated authority to local law enforcement agents to kill wolves, to address a pack of about seven wolves that are suspected in attacks on dogs and livestock in Elk City, the Lewiston Tribune reports. Wolves are now under state management after having been removed from endangered species protections pursuant to a law passed by Congress; already, five wolves in the Lolo zone were shot from a helicopter as part of the state's new efforts to control wolf numbers. Click below for a full report from the Tribune and the Associated Press.

The Idaho Department of Fish & Game has started selling wolf tags for a fall hunt, at a cost of $11.50 for Idaho resident hunters and $186 for non-residents, including vendor fees. A valid 2011 Idaho hunting license is required to buy a tag; they're available at Fish & Game offices and hunting license vendors.

Seasons, rules and limits haven't yet been set for Idaho's planned wolf hunt; the Fish & Game Commission will set those this summer. In Idaho's first state-sanctioned wolf hunt in 2009-2010, more than 31,000 tags were sold and 188 animals taken by hunters; the harvest limit was 220. A federal rule published today officially removed wolves in Idaho from endangered species protections, allowing the hunt plan to move forward.

In a joint statement, Idaho's congressional delegation praised the Interior Department's move today to delist wolves, as directed by legislation crafted in party by Idaho Rep. Mike Simpson. “No one can rationally argue that the Rocky Mountain gray wolf is still endangered,” Simpson said. “Wolf populations in the west are robust and far exceed recovery goals. If the Endangered Species Act is going to be effective at all, we need to remove recovered species from the list and consider it a victory.”

U.S. Sen. Mike Crapo said, “The wolf is recovered in the northern Rockies and the State of Idaho has proven that it can and will effectively and responsibly manage wolves.  Now that the federal government has taken this step, the State of Idaho can finally get to work.” Added Sen. Jim Risch, “Common sense has finally prevailed.” And Rep. Raul Labrador said, “The original purpose of the ESA has been perverted to do the bidding of activist environmentalists. This is the first step to ensuring these groups no longer misuse the ESA to permanently protect a species regardless of its recovery.” Click below for the delegation's full joint statement.