6 Wisconsin Tribes Sue DNR Board Over Wolf Hunt

WISCONSIN — Six Ojibwe tribes filed a lawsuit Tuesday against the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources leadership Tuesday to stop the November wolf hunt.

The Red Cliff Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, Bad River Band of the Lake Superior Tribe of Chippewa, Lac Courte Oreilles Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, St. Croix Chippewa Indians and the Sakaogon Chippewa Community filed the lawsuit against department secretary Preston Cole and the members of the Natural Resources Board.

The case will be heard by the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin.

The tribes are suing to stop a wolf hunt scheduled to begin Nov. 6, according to the complaint. The suit argued that the upcoming hunt violates treaties made in 1837 and 1842 between the tribes and the United States.

"Defendants purposefully and knowingly discriminated against the Ojibwe Tribes by acting to nullify their share," the complaint said. "Second, the defendants failed to use sound biological principles in establishing the quota for the upcoming hunt."

Because the department didn't put in adequate safeguards for the tribes' share of the wolf hunt, the tribes argued that the department is managing the hunt in a way that violates their treaty-protected rights.

In February, hunters overshot their wolf hunt quota by 82 percent, gobbling up the number of wolves reserved for Native American tribes, HuffPost reported.

A University of Wisconsin-Madison study concluded that the number of wolves in Wisconsin has dropped by a third since 2020, but the Natural Resources Board designated that 300 wolves would be killed in November's hunt.

Patch reached out to the Department of Natural Resources for comment.

See More: Wisconsin's Wolf Hunt: 5 Things To Know