Video URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJUN7BhGg04
The Joe Rogan Experience wolves are dominant intelligent calculating Predators yeah that they eradicated from the West for a reason yeah Yeah man so I think he hit on a bunch of things that would like bring me back to my opinion on it and that's that a lot of this stuff when you when so I know they they've basically described two different areas in Colorado where they're going to put the two or the uh the two first sets of transplants and one of them is like right in where you're not I mean I rode that country with a horse like all over the place in the circle of where they're going to put those wolves is right there so I know where they're gonna put those you know one of the spots I know the spot intimately I know the wildlife there intimately how many wolves are they gonna put in so my understanding is off the bat the first year and I and I I believe their goal is by December of this year um it's going to be like between 15 and 30 I believe is the first bunch and they're going to have them in two different two different spots but in that you're in that Veil Veil quarter Corridor you know up to the flat tops in there uh you know so they're probably gonna put 15 to 20 wolves in there the thing the thing that you hit on Joe that I think kind of forms my opinion is I mean these areas when you go in a man they seem so wild right like you know I could the flat tops I could get on a horse and I could ride for 15 15 hours and not see a road you know or 10 hours and not see a road and they seem so wild even to me being there but I don't think that people realize how much how much humans have already affected that landscape and how it doesn't matter like the this myth that putting wolves back in the land that landscape is going to turn it back to some ecosystem that was here you know 300 years ago I I I think it's I think it's a figment of their imagination man and and the reason I say that is because I've also spent a fair amount of time in British Columbia that seemed so much more wild to me and let me kind of like give you context of why that is you know you've have you ever been to Vail Colorado no yeah okay oh I I have but not not outside okay so like if you look at if you look at the dynamic of that
area there's a huge Highway that goes from Highway 70 that goes from Denver on the Front Range up you know past all the ski resorts into Vail into eagle and then it kind of goes down through a big the canyon Glenwood Canyon and kicks back into to Aspen that all the winter range there is split by this massive Highway and then that Highway has a an eight-foot game fence along the whole whole thing and then you know along that Veil Valley where they're wanting to put put these or where they are going to put these wolves you know there's you know 50 000 full-time residents and you know there's probably double that in the High season ski season stuff unless you got these huge ski resorts I guess what I'm getting at is when somebody tells me that the low-hanging fruit to kind of rewild that areas is wolves it's just [ __ ] you know what I mean how is it getting past though well it got passed by a ballot initiative you know that the ballot initiative is how wolves got you know got to the situation they are now and basically what the ballot initiative did is it forced the CPW to take on this goal of transplanting the the Wolves so it wasn't the cpw's choice and they and they you know there's a I don't know the exact laws uh Joe but this the CPW and that's the Colorado's Park the Colorado Parks and Wildlife they're in charge of managing the wildlife in Colorado how can they put something like the transplanting of wolves a very complex biological problem I mean it's you're dealing with Biology and Wildlife how can they put that as a ballot initiative like how can they put that in the hands of people other than Wildlife Conservation experts Wildlife biologists well I mean the realities are laws our laws allow that you know yeah but it doesn't make rational sense no you know but it's a it's a decision that for people that are just like yeah that'd be amazing let's put the Wolves out there like people are gonna lose their dogs like sure you're gonna your dogs are gonna get eaten like it's going to affect anyone who has livestock you're gonna have a problem whether that problems in three years or in five years those problems are coming yeah dogs are 100 gonna get eaten right if you have
acute golden retriever like mine you leave them outside like guess what that dog's dead sure they're gonna team up on that dog and tear it apart yeah and if you're cool with going outside and seeing wolves eat your dog like well then you've made the right choice but if you if you're not like if you don't think they're going to go after low-hanging fruit if you don't you don't think they're going to go after easy prey sure you don't understand wolves talk to people that live in Alaska yeah like you know anybody who lives in like British Columbia like they have real [ __ ] wolf problems up there right and these are of problems that we used to have in the west but they eradicated them right I mean I don't think it's good to eradicate them I'm not saying that what they did was right when they poisoned horses and left dead horses filled with strychnine and you know and the Wolves all died off but they did it for a [ __ ] reason yeah yeah what and that's the thing that's that's so crazy about you know back to the the process of how it happened everybody who who wants wolves in Colorado and we can get into you know the depth they want them because that's not really clear you know they they just went through this whole uh you know setting up the plan for the CPW and it it became very clear in my mind watching that process that they they don't really want there to be any you know uh management of wolves in Colorado either it's gonna ever but no yeah so basically well that's crazy yeah and so that that week I think you know anybody rational is going to be like look like we gotta have like a top to the population there's no management at all well so here's the deal is they're not they have a draft plan you know for to manage the Wolves what happened is when the CPW did that draft plan it included some discussion of wolves being lethally managed at all different stages you know what I mean Joe like even now if they you know a real problem with livestock you know could they be lethally managed but down the road once they had once they had hit certain population objectives could they be hunted right like that was discussed well it turns out the ballot initiative basically says that wolves are a non-game species and that was in the language of the ballot
initiative so they can't really they can't really now say the CPW can't really say that they're going to someday be a hundred a hundred species in Colorado I personally think and I you know everything's like 2020 hindsight but even when the ballot initiative originally you know was out there and I always thought it was going to pass by a landslide that's what's so crazy because it just barely passed but um I always thought like the problem with Colorado is it's different than these other Western States you know Idaho Montana Wyoming because they're gonna They're Gonna Keep the population in line through hunting or other you know other methods but in Colorado I don't think the politics are you know Batman I think it's just going to be like who knows what the top is on you know how many there is how much they affect the ungulate population you know who who knows you know but what I was going to say is what's crazy about this ballot initiative and the Bummer part about it is everybody that's going to deal with the negative consequences they're they're people that voted no in but they're in the areas where the wolves are going to be transplanted everybody that voted for it they don't have to deal with the downside they're living in Boulder yeah dude and unlike you man they're cool like I've been around them in Canada they're way cool but the the problem is is every person that that I've interacted with in British Columbia you know or even in the western states that have a fair amount of wolves every person is just trying to make a living on a landscape you know he's a guide an Outfitter a logger a cattle ranch or whatever like he's out there living He or she's out there living with them and dealing with them they're all just like when you ask about wolves they're like it's just like you know what I mean because they got to deal with the negative consequences all the time they're a totally different kind of animal than any other animal because they act as a pack and right they have some sort of Intelligent Communication they're they're badass they're amazing yeah they're cunning and crafty and they're efficient ruthless Killers yeah and they also Surplus kill you know I'm sure they find them like I think it was Wyoming recently but they
found just like [ __ ] giant pile of elk that they yeah had trapped in high snow and just tore to Pieces yeah yeah and I don't know like the stats on how common that is but you know other other predators do that too yeah cats do that yeah yeah but it's a bit you know the difference between them is that they act as a group yeah they're the only one of those predators that acts as a large group yeah no in in the in their their effect I mean they're they're effective I mean even when you talk to I know I know uh a guy in British Columbia that's I mean his whole world's his whole world is focused on trapping them and I've sat and talked to him just about like the details you know like boiling and snares you know how he goes in and puts his snares in you know how he goes in and checks them like all that bad little snare sleep no sense yeah yeah yeah yeah because they just pick up on that that stuff you know they're just so smart it's and they know that they're being [ __ ] with too oh yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah which it's funny because the first thing you said is they're a dog and that I mean you you have dogs you know how it is like they get it figured out yeah they know things yeah yeah for sure I mean I talked to my dog like he understands certain things right I'm like come on dude let's go outside it just starts going towards the door yeah oh yeah for sure I can I don't have to say it like want to go outside yeah do you want to go outside I can just say hey come on man let's go outside yeah he's like oh yeah let's go outside yeah are you hungry and he's like [ __ ] you I'm hungry I'm like okay let's eat like he knows what that means yeah he is he knows some aspects of language sure and you know what he is is like a really tame docile version of a wolf yeah a wolf is like a like have you ever been around a Belgian Malinois yeah I I don't think I'm those are the dogs they use in war and police dogs okay they're [ __ ] scary little meat missiles I got you and they look at you like this yeah they're always thinking and you can't just keep one of those [ __ ] in your yard they're too smart they're working dogs first of all they climb fences yeah like a chimpanzee they just go right up the fence and over it I mean have you ever seen like videos of Belgian Malinois
working I don't think I have Joe dude I'm trying to put it's wild they can do [ __ ] where they leap through the air like you can't [ __ ] believe they really can jump that high right like soaring through the air I'm talking like 12 feet in the air they run jump off a guy's back and then leap through the air like climb over walls that are like 10 feet tall just by running up the wall yeah it's it's insane that's that's a wolf yeah this is a this is a Belgium oh yeah I've seen it man look at this I mean that's insane it is nuts how's that dog doing that look at him running up the [ __ ] wall he's he's basically a monkey got it figured out look he's running up a [ __ ] tree to get to him it and then he's hanging on it crazy man you know the diversity amongst dogs is wild it is wild but these dogs in particular are bred and look how smart they are look you can walk across a type robe look at that and then saying I mean that's [ __ ] insane dude they're so intelligent but that's closer to a wolf yeah way closer to look look at his ears I mean they're they're basically an athlete wolf yeah you know have you ever seen these uh these Great Pyrenees dogs that they run with the Sheep yes yeah they're they're well they're cool in a much different way yeah they basically think they're sheep yeah you know pull up a Great Pyrenees dogs yeah they're interesting it's it's so wild that they all came from wolves and you have so many different styles of like the way they look dude these dogs so so there's big big domestic sheep permits where I used to outfit so guys running you know big bands of sheep periodically in the wilderness areas and and they keep these dogs with them and uh these dogs are something else to run into you know in the night up in the mountains or whatever and they're they're just you know they just protect those sheep just you know you see these big bands of sheep like this and so do they keep wolves off of them yeah so so I've heard mixed things in this would be interesting because right where they're going to put some of these wolves in Colorado there's some pretty big domestic sheep guys that run these Pyrenees dogs oh Jesus and they actually so so sheep in the wilderness are one of the few animals that are still guarded
by humans you know they usually have a herder with them yeah and a lot of them are guys from nowadays it seems to be that most of them are from Peru I believe and I used to run into the guys because they've been out there living with these Sheep Man for like weeks at a time so yeah even though there's a language barrier like when they see you up there like they wanna they wanna hang out you know say hi whatever just happy to see people yeah they'll have like they'll have a horse with them you know maybe I don't know probably five six hundred cheap and they'll have a couple of those dogs wow you know but back to your original question is I've heard mixed things about these dogs ability to to deal with Wolves you know and and it has to do with the fact that well there's more than you know there's a group of wolves so if they can draw one of these dogs off you know that wolves can wolves can kill them