Verlyn Klinkenborg, an exceptional writer and a member of the New York Times editorial board, published an editorial on wolves in the Northern Rockies in yesterday's New York Times.

In his editorial, Klinkenborg eloquently described something usually missing from the discussion surrounding wolves:  their mythical status in the West and elsewhere.  He wrote: 

When it comes to wolves, federal law has been protecting what is, fundamentally, a mythic species.  And when it ceases protecting them, they will be exposed to the worst aspects of that myth - a deep, ancestral hostility to wolves based on ... nothing.

Wolves do not kill humans.  They are responsible for a minuscule number of livestock deaths in the West - less than domestic dogs - and there are federal and state programs specifically designed to compensate ranchers who lose stock to wolves.

To hunters, killing wolves is both an end in itself and a way of reducing their predation on elk and deer.  And it is more than that.  Killing a wolf is also a way of participating in the myth of the West.  That myth nearly drove the species to extinction.

The myth of the nefarious wolf (see Little Red Riding Hood) fuels much of the anti-wolf rhetoric in the West.  But the myth is just that, a myth.  In reality, wolves are an ecological keystone species and have been an economic boon to the Montana, Idaho and Wyoming communities near Yellowstone National Park.  And because the myth threatens real wolves in the Northern Rockies, Klinkenborg, like NRDC, is concerned about removing wolves from the endangered species list in Idaho and Montana. 

Sir Verlyn, thank you for sharing your thoughts on wolves.

(In the interest of full disclosure, I am a huge Verlyn Klinkenborg fan.  In fact, the first reading at my wedding last fall was from his book The Rural Life.  If you want to read brilliant writing, check out his editorials in the New York Times and any of his four books.)

(And, finally, while on the subject of wolves, please join NRDC's "The Big Howl" campaign.  Thank you.)