FB and legislators

Idaho Farm Bureau spokesperson Shawn Ellis told me about discussions being held between legislators and Idaho's farmers and ranchers. Anywhere from water to wolves to education funding, etc.. So they're talking about everything. And if you look at Idaho Farm Bill's policy book, we have like 150 different policies that you can assume they're talking about a good chunk of those. They're talking about issues that are important to agriculture and that could affect their commodity and their farms and agriculture as a whole. They're trying to make sure that legislators support bills that benefit agriculture and the state, not just agriculture, but in the state, and oppose bills that do the opposite. Speaker1: 13% decline in wolves from last year. Speaker2: Let's be clear. That's a good thing. By the way, Farm Bill members, a lot of ranchers, but a lot of Farm Bureau members also ten or 15 years ago said there was 12 to 1500 wolves in Idaho. At least some people thought they were crazy, but it turns out they were right. And so reducing the number from 1500 to 1300, 13% reduction is actually a good thing. The state plan calls for getting wolves to 500, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service supports that goal. So we're nowhere near that. And by the way, anyone who says Idaho plans the wholesale slaughter wolves is blowing smoke and they're, pardon the pun, crying wolf. The original recovery goal for wolves to be delisted, according to the federal government, was 150 in Idaho. We surpassed that long time ago. 1500 is, you know, they're having major impacts on livestock and not just livestock, but a lot of the population, especially elk and deer. So getting them more into balance with those, the rest of the wildlife population is a good thing. And having 500 wolves in Idaho is actually a pretty good goal. Speaker1: Like Shawn said, it's a good thing.