Dear Friend,
Last week, the Wisconsin Natural Resources Board held a meeting. Wildlife advocates testified. Scientists were cited — selectively. And NRB member Al Lobner said something that actually caught our attention. Something true.
He said wolves don’t get along with coyotes. And coyotes don’t get along with foxes. The three canid species compete for position in the ecosystem. He’s right — that’s textbook ecology. It’s called mesopredator release. Remove the apex predator, the mid-level predators explode.
Which is exactly how Wisconsin went from wolf country to coyote country. We killed the wolves. The coyotes moved in. And now the same lobby that killed the wolves is hosting contests to kill the coyotes they helped create.
Here’s what they don’t tell you: coyotes aren’t the fawn-shredding, cat-eating monsters the hunting lobby needs them to be. Their diet is dominated by rodents — saving Wisconsin farmers an average of $29,000 per farm per year. Read the science →
And the cat narrative? A peer-reviewed forensic necropsy study found that 15% of “coyote cat kills” were actually scavenging — the cats had already died from car strikes or other trauma. USDA Wildlife Services doesn’t do routine necropsies to tell the difference. The narrative is built on unverified claims.
The coyote “problem” is a problem the killing contest crowd manufactured. Al Phelan handed us the science to prove it.
In November 2023 he posted on Facebook joking about baiting wolves with doughnuts and Rice Krispies. Six days after testifying before the state Senate that wolves were “getting bolder,” he shot and killed a collared wolf at 1 a.m. on Christmas Day.
The wolf was a 13-year-old female — the Red Cliff Band of Lake Superior Chippewa’s longest-lived, most-studied wolf. Part of the Echo Valley pack. Mother of 35 documented pups over nine years of research. The tribe called her family.
Quaintance was fined more than $4,000 under the Endangered Species Act. Chris Vaughan of Hunter Nation immediately organized a GoFundMe for his legal fees and pledged to match the first $5,000.
These people are on personal cell phone terms. That is not a coincidence. That is a network. Ted Nugent. Brett Favre. And now this.
While the NRB debates whether it’s legal to hunt federally protected animals, here’s what’s actually happening in Milladore’s backyard.
33,000 acres. Sandhill cranes, bald eagles, trumpeter swans, greater prairie chickens. Conservation did this. Not a body count.
No entry fee. No prizes for most kills. Just Wisconsin in all its glory.
Free ecosystem engineering. Ducks, frogs, eagles, and herons all benefit. No killing required.
Documented at Mead. Reducing deer-vehicle collisions by 24% in Wisconsin counties where they’re present. Saving $375,000 per county per year. Economic value: enormous.
Saving a farmer $29,000 right now. Get the fact sheet →
Flat. Beautiful. Zero carcasses. The wolves aren’t bothering anybody.
The light on the Little Eau Pleine River valley in early morning is something the kill contest crowd will never see — they’re inside tallying bodies.
Learn how ecosystems actually work. The $29,000 a coyote saves a Wisconsin farmer doesn’t appear on any kill-contest scoreboard.
Support the businesses that depend on a healthy, thriving community — not one known for hosting killing contests.
Just down the road. A stunning Wisconsin landmark built by hand over decades. Beauty without a body count.
At the NRB meeting, Al Lobner told the board that killing contests put kids through college. That they buy children ammunition. That once, they helped a woman whose husband had been electrocuted.
He meant it as a defense.
We heard something different. We heard that these organizations are capable of generosity. That they have money to give. That they choose — every single time — to attach that giving to a body count.
They could just give the money. They don’t.
We hope you’ll do the opposite.
A three-day coyote killing contest hands out $15,000 in prizes funded by $100–$150 entry fees. We should be able to match that energy. If you’ve got $50, find two friends. We’ll find the fourth — and we’ll match you dollar for dollar.
Wisconsin’s wildlife doesn’t have a lobbyist.
It has us.
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