
photo: Center for Biological Diversity
Farmers in Oregon reported the death of four of their calves and a sheep to the authorities. That meant the death penalty for a family of wolves, the alleged killers. The “eye for an eye” killings of the wolves were executed; father, mother and two children were shot and killed by officials from the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife.
The farmers did not mourn their dead animals because of their bond to four living beings, but because their property had been destroyed. The wolves had no chance of surviving their deeds, even though it could be argued that they had simply followed their survival instincts.
“The bullet he’d been dodging for many years finally caught up with the great Oregon wolf, OR4, on March 31. In the early afternoon, officials from the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife shot to death the patriarch of the Imnaha Pack from a helicopter over Wallowa County, an area where gray wolves dispersing from Idaho first began returning to Oregon, where they’d been killed off in the mid-20th century. Shot along with OR4 was his likely pregnant partner, OR 39, known as Limpy for an injured and badly healed leg, and their two young offspring.