WDNR errors in wolf science
Wisconsin wolf science debate
The following page explains why the public should not trust the state of Wisconsin's claims about the wolf population size in the state, or wolf mortality rates and birth rate.. The public should not trust those claims because the state and its allied authors ignore the principles of Open Science by not sharing data or methods, selective citation of the research they prefer no matter how poor it is, and by viewpoint discrimination against other research that challenges their views. Since 2013, we have been publishing our findings in stronger journals, using more rigorous independent review and stronger inference, sharing the data, and speaking truth to power. The Wisconsin DNR remains intransigent, unrepentant, and mired in poor science. Below we present our rebuttals to the two most recent efforts from Glenn Stauffer and Nathan Roberts.
Treves, A., Agan, SW, Langenberg, JA, Lopez-Bao, J.V., Louchouarn, NX. Parsons, DR, Rabenhorst, MF, Santiago-Ávila, FJ, 2024. Response to Roberts, Stenglein, Wydeven, and others. Journal of Mammalogy 2024 in press.
Treves, A., Louchouarn, NX. 2024.
2025. Reply to Stauffer et al.: Uncertainty and precaution in hunting wolves twice in a year: in review at PLoS One available here.
To summarize our rebuttals to Roberts and Stauffer, we showed how
a. Stauffer et al.’s 2021 model of wolf occupancy in WI relies on data from previous years of winter tracking even if lethal management like a wolf-hunt happened. Therefore, they are likely to be counting dead wolves as alive. That is why no one should trust the state estimate of the wolf population. If Stauffer and Roberts shared data as required by publication ethics, they could support their estimates and their claims. But they have refused to share data again and again since 2012.
b. State estimates of birth rates and death rates are based on flawed science and have never withstood peer review.
c. Roberts and Stauffer both perpetuate a myth that radio-collared wolves who disappear just went off the air because of transmitter or battery failures despite the rate of disappearance being two- to three-fold higher than rates of disappearance for other (non-wolf) animal telemetry data.
d. Neither Stauffer nor Roberts share data so their claims are not credible. Neither they nor their co-authors transparently disclose potentially competing interests both financial and non-financial. These are breaches of publication ethics and research integrity according to the National Academies of science. We’re working with editors of journals to flag their articles for concern or correction. The evidence for our claims is here. Please note there is an unresolved issue with nondisclosure of multiple potentially competing interests by Roberts et al. and Stauffer et al. I have raised these issues with the appropriate scientific integrity editors during the course of peer review. I await successful resolution following National Academies guidelines on research integrity. I will remove the disclosures they should have made once resolved.
In 2024, we shed light on nondisclosure of potentially competing interests among DNR staff and allied authors. In two peer-reviewed, published papers, one in Journal of Mammalogy rebutting Roberts et al. and one in review at PLoS One rebutting Stauffer et al., we presented ironclad evidence of undisclosed affiliations, and interests, both financial and non-financial. These are breaches of scientific integrity long described by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.
Details can be found here.
I also explain why scientific integrity is so important to public confidence in our research community and good government at this page.
Note Stauffer et al. and Roberts et al., claim we are trying to silence them when we are obviously trying the opposite, to compel transparency about their potentially competing interests, see this article on competing interests.
See this editorial Treves, A. 2024. Authors declare no competing interests—really? Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment (guest editorial) to understand why disclosures of potentially competing interests are important and why current practices in scientific peer review need an overhaul.
The DNR and NRB documents we cited from 2021.
The Supplementary Information from Treves & Louchouarn 2022.
Simulating study designs paper as a compressed file of scripts and data.
Supplementary Data published for J Mammalogy paper on WI wolf mortality: Supporting Information SD1-SD5. Please note that on 11 June 2017, one file was updated to correct a typo discovered by FSA.
For Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, Endangered Resources Bureau Population Reports before 2016 accompanying the article on gray wolf mortality in Wisconsin. Note: not all years were available for download before the WDNR archived or removed the reports. Please email Adrian Treves if you have unedited reports from the missing years, which I can add to this public repository.
Population Reports 2016-2021. Accessed 1 April 2021.